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Fluids shall furthermore sharpen the blade
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I’m going to cut straight to it here: we have something special for you today. Something far and away from the usual fare; something insidious and untamed. What is that something, I hear you ask? That something is the debut full-length from the mysterious and shadowed Austrian entity of Hagzissa.
Those in tune with such things will recall this enigmatic collection of souls quietly releasing a ripper demo in 2017 under the banner of Iron Bonehead Productions. That demo was raw yet shimmering with an arcane magic; bewitching the few that heard it and leaving them salivating at the thought of further delights. Now, two long years on from that auspicious first conjuration the feverish anticipation is now allayed – the four horsemen return once more through Iron Bonehead with the fully realised and blazing new form of that early work; entitled They Ride Along.
In their unique robes and with manic fervour they reap madness with their newly polished spells; eight shrieking and howling odes to the primal and otherworldly. It’s music that sounds like it’s been whipped to your ears on laughing winds as you stand in ragged cloth at the crossroads at midnight. As the press release states Hagzissa really do walk a wild path of ancient wickedness; unfettered from the norms of regular existence, dancing on that gossamer-thin line between this earthly realm… and the other.
But I don’t want to ramble on about it too much, because here to beckon you along the shadowpath is founder/vocalist/bassist B. Moser himself and he gives us a wonderfully detailed glimpse into the shrouded mysteries of Hagzissa plus the creation of They Ride Along. So free your mind, call forth the spirits, listen to the full intoxicating concoction ahead of its August 23rd release date, and read on below if you dare. Hails.
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Greetings B. Moser! I hope you are well. Your debut album They Ride Along is being premiered in full today, and it’s a wild beast of untamed black metal and diabolical grooves. So, tell us a little about it – what message does it bring, and what does it mean to you?
– First of all, I would like to thank you for the presentation of the whole album and also for the opportunity to share some of my thoughts with you here.
The title They Ride Along is short for ‘They Ride Along on the Howling Winds!’ which is, I think, the third complete song I ever wrote for what turned out to be Hagzissa. It must have been sometime between 2012 and 2013 and I always used to wander about in the calm, empty fields of my small home town in absolute darkness. You know, your mind then tends to play some tricks on your senses and while walking for hours, one ultimately starts to hear and see things. Most of the time it has been very cold and moist so the winds really told me stories. But, I am aware that those kind of stories only will be told at night, at pitchest, darkest night. My home town is one of the oldest in Austria and the area is very rich of tales and lore. The devil is no stranger in those tales, but there are many twisted and bizarre figures one might stumble upon when walking all alone. It’s been alluring, a fascinating time for me. I moved away some years ago; but occasionally I go on one of those walks again and instantly recall that savage energy, which still knows how to shake me to my innermost. They truly ride along those winds!
Your 2017 demo introduced a few of these songs to us, but They Ride Along presents those tracks in a new light – the sound is greatly updated, the murk is gone and everything packs a powerful gut-punch. Is this how you always envisioned Hagzissa to sound when you were writing these songs? What was it like seeing them take their final form during the recording process?
– Honestly speaking, when I am writing songs I always rely on a certain feeling. I simply have to, as there are way too many distracting possibilities of letting music sound in a specific way. Think the instrument, playing style, one’s current condition, pedals and amps at hand, little accidents; let alone recording equipment, the room, the person behind the desk – I think you get the point. It just turned out the way it is now, because everybody had that mentioned certain feeling about it. And all that starts with the riff! If you truly feel the riff, you understand everything about it. No more alchemic formulas or mumbling “holy” words of evocation needed for actually summoning the true primal evil that is inhabiting everything around us.
Nevertheless, together we absolutely managed to put it on point. I am very glad how those songs turned out and the result is something I – and all of us – can be proud of.
Let’s head back to the beginnings of the project. Although you gave official life to Hagzissa in 2016 I read that the idea of the project predates even your (and drummer L. Pachinger‘s) other project Kringa, which was formed in 2009. This sounds fascinating, so I’d like to delve a little deeper into the story here: when was the idea for the project actually formulated, and why? Then, after all that time passing, what urges or circumstances finally led to the inception of Hagzissa?
– Well, for that question, please let me travel back in time for a bit: In my teenage years, when I slowly but steadily got obsessed with more and more dark and extreme (black) metal, I also started reading lots of obscure stuff. I have always been into mythology and folklore as to me it always seemed to deliver explanations for the irrational. People used to call it “the unspeakable”, a term that is describing respect, confusion, fear and even curiosity. If I now and then compared it with black metal, it simply meant the same to me – a resonance of the beyond. Wherever, whenever, however that may be! Don’t get me wrong here: I am all but a denier of science and research, but speaking of music, the “unspeakable” is forever to be intertwined with it and that was something I forever found a home in.
My skills though were much too weak to properly express my ideas and feelings in that kind of approach. So, luckily enough, I got to know Vritra and then-drummer Moloch in 2010, who have been jamming for some months and were happy to find a bass player/vocalist. I soon understood that Kringa, although having a similar background of dark mysticism, was bearing a quite different longing, another one and a very powerful one. I was hungry, so together we went on exploring that different kind of the “unspeakable” very thoroughly. When in 2014, L. joined through an unexpected twist of actions by our then second drummer, we sharpened our visions more and more. I never stopped to write songs in that old obsessive way I had before Kringa and eventually took action, when I crossed paths with some other individuals who shared the same madness with me and backbone L. In 2016, I felt ready for really stepping out of the shadows; L. and C. gladfully joined me and here we are.
Hagzissa is clearly steeped in themes of folklore and witchcraft – without reading the lyrics the album still appears to reference everything from The Wild Hunt to casting a circle. Given that They Ride Along is quite a personal album, how do these themes manifest in your daily lives?
– I might have covered that specific question accidentally through most of my other given answers – sorry for waffling.
The only thing I might want to add here is that one’s personal surroundings surely have a distinctive impact on the music you make. We are coming from a very old countryside – also C., who is originally from Northern Italy, the “Land of Mystery” – and if you walk around with open eyes, it is impossible to miss the history around you and take it with you. Between Hallstatt, Bohemia and the Salzburg or Bavarian bishops’ lands a lot of things did happen. Not always necessarily, but mostly of a heinous sort.
The first three tracks each have a sub-title: ‘Die Pforte (A Speech Above the Moor)’, ‘Irrsinnsdimensionen (A Bath Amidst the Wells)’ and ‘Moonshine Glance (An Iron Seed in Sour Soil)’. I know the album as a whole flows quite well, but are these tracks in particular intended to be heard as a kind of three-part interconnected suite? If so, what is it that connects them all?
– Not at all. Each of those 8 songs is intended to speak for itself. Yet, when we started working on them with the intent of creating a full-length, the track listing simply fell into place perfectly. There was no much thinking needed. The story told itself. Back in the working title period, we had a totally different listing.
At the end of ‘Moonshine Glance (An Iron Seed in Sour Soil)’, there’s an intriguing piece of what I assume to be film dialogue. A disembodied voice intones: “In the far dark corners of every human’s soul there lurks a black crouching spectre. The ghost like shadow that waits. A shrouded thing that pulsates with malignant evil. The name of that ghost, is…” …and I can’t catch the last word! So, first – what is the name of the ghost, and what is the significance of this dialogue to the album?
– In all honesty, I also never caught that name correctly. And I never really wanted to know! But it fascinated me. I decided to put that speech between those two songs which are actual curses for the very sake of that itself. To give just a brief insight here: the first one is about wishing somebody spoilage, sicknesses and slowly piercing him to death in a drunken frenzy. The other one is no better intentions, but more focussed and actually based on something that could be described as Middle European Voodoo.
But, back to your question: What we have here is a part of the introduction to a recorded reading by erudite Christopher Lee. The way those words are depicting the ever-lingering subconscious horrors that might drive anyone into sickening madness just resonated with me, if you are bearing those two curses in mind.
Following on from that, are film and/or books something that you would consider to have had a notable influence on the art of Hagzissa at any point? Are there any in particular that you can suggest for people who want to dive further into the vibe and inspirations of They Ride Along?
– Yes, it had. I’d consider literature more important at the first place as it somehow spoke to me on a different level. Biggest early influence is the first part of Faust, the monument by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. There is also a great filming of a theatre play from 1960, produced by Gustaf Gründgens. Other examples: The Sandmann (1816) by E.T.A. Hoffmann, “Zauberstücke” like Der Alpenkönig und der Menschenfeind (The Alpine King and the Misanthrope, 1828) or ugly naturalist stuff like Before Dawn (1889) by Gerhart Hauptmann always kinda fascinated me and speak of another world. Moreover, I would name lesser known author Gustav Meyrink and his Walpurgisnacht (1917) and The Golem (1915).
I then developed a cineastic fascination pretty much later on. Movies like Nosferatu (1922), The Seventh Seal (1958), The Wicker Man (1973), Suspiria (1977) or even November (2017), an Estonian production might also give you an obscure insight. But the main inspiration always remains the true folklore. The subconscious, the fright of peasants and the works of the devil.
Now, the cover art is quite unique. Eschewing traditional black metal tropes, it is instead a hand-drawn image of a bowed warlock or druid, blended with a giant demonic visage. What’s the story behind this? Who is the artist, and what does it signify?
– I agree. We could not be happier about how the cover turned out to be and can not thank Giuseppe enough. He is an acquaintance of C., based in Milan and he knows a thing or two as well in the fields of ancient sorcery. I didn’t send any sketches to him or something like that, I really wanted to let him work totally free, based on my (pretty detailed) explanations on the album and each song. As you can see, he also caught himself a spirit of the night and took some rides with him, returning exhausted yet liberated! So, not only the cover art, but the inner sleeve is laden with free hand nocturnal mysteries that turned out really, really well.
The album will be available on LP and CD on the 23rd August from Iron Bonehead Productions, who also released your demo. How did you first come into contact with this esteemed label, and how has it been working with them so far?
– Well, we never really intended to sell our first promo tape on a broader level as it simply is not perfectly executed at all. Still, it already reflects exactly what we were trying to create and as we wanted to play some violet theatre live, I just uploaded a track for promotion on youtube. Not shortly after, P.K. was stumbling upon it and was asking if we had some more. I said “not enough”, but he was really into it and offered to repress them as an official Demo, heralding an album that was later to come. And here we are! When he heard the first studio recording for the album, he was confused and expecting something different. Nevertheless, he has always given full trust and support. And I gotta say, we are very happy and honoured to work with Iron Bonehead. Onwards!
I‘ve seen some footage of your robed live performances, Hagzissa in the flesh seems to be a powerful proposition and you have been playing quite a few shows. However there is one in particular I’d like to ask about: I believe you’re part of the astonishing lineup of Invicta Reqviem Mass V this year, which is one of the events I simply must attend somehow before I die. What will be in store for attendees from your set, and are there any acts on the lineup that you’re particularly keen to share the stage with? Or – are there any other shows coming up that you’re excited about?
– We haven’t been directly contacted to play, but as it seems to be in a tradition with this festival, a whole group of connected bands has been addressed, so L. and me will also be playing with Kringa and – as a live premiere – Alruna. I think the concept is quite interesting as it brings the possibility of adding an own touch anew each year while still keeping a constant. We are very curious about this event and also a bit surprised about this invitation for Hagzissa. I mean, Invicta Reqviem Mass seems to have been a gathering at deeper level of underground bands, regardless of their intensity or sheer darkness. But of course, we are very much looking forward to it and are thankful for the opportunity to play in Portugal. Also, we are keen to see Hail Conjurer – one of the more interesting among new black metal bands!
And finally – what lies in the misted future for Hagzissa? Have you begun conjuring any new material?
– There is actually some new material and also a split with a close band on the horizon, but I don’t want to go too much into detail here now.
For the moment, we are gladful about the first reviews and feedbacks for They Ride Along but also remain very curious about the further reception of this twisted piece. We shall see.
Furthermore, we have some stages to share with great bands in the nearer future: “Celebrare Noctem Fest” with Blasphemy, Mortuary Drape and Ritual Death among others shall be glorious! And being part of “A Sinister Purpose Fest” in Leipzig is no less of an honour. Some other gigs will be announced in the future.
Sincerest thanks for your time, it’s been a pleasure. Are there any final words or wisdoms you would like to leave us with?
– The pleasure is ours. Final words? Don’t let yourself get tricked by summer’s heat. Any season has its demons. And the acedia that is brought to you by the noonday devil is of a specially awful kind. Thank you.
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They Ride Along releases August 23rd on LP and CD formats via Iron Bonehead Productions.
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