CVLT Nation
Artist to Artist Interviews
Amenra Vs. Hessian

Community is what keeps this world going around if you ask me.On the real when i see friends coming together for the greater good of creating i get hyped.This is something that happens on the regular in Ghent Belguim their is a group of creative humans that know the power of unity! Today CVLT Nation is super stoked to share with you the artist to artist interview between AMENRA vs HESSIAN.

You can preorder the AMENRA/HESSIAN split 7″ HERE!

Interview after the jump…

= When did you guys form? And why? Do you have goals set?

We formed in the summer of 2010 and played our first show in October in Belgium. The reason for starting Hessian is pretty much because we wanted to do our own thing with the genre. We really try to not be too obvious when it comes to writing songs and not repeat ourselves too much in what we do. We had some minor goals when we first got started but with all the stuff we got the chance of doing already Hessian took a more serious turn. At the moment we’re focusing on writing a full length and then we will definitely be touring a lot. You know, spread the hate.


= You guys are from Ghent, tell us something about your city.

Ghent is the best. It’s cool to have a big city that still feels warm and cosy if you know what I mean. I mean there’s always lots of stuff to do and though it’s a bigger city, everybody kind of knows one another and you’re very likely to run into people you know. It has a very interesting mix between old and new architecture so it almost works inspirational to just walk around in the city with a pair of headphones.

= There seems to be a lot of fuss around you guys already,
 and you guys have only released an ep on Smoke and Dust, how do 
you explain that?

I think that connection between people in Ghent I talked about earlier has a lot to do with that. We all help each other out in any way we can and try to push each other forward. I think it’s because the people we’re surrounded with have that train of thought that stuff is moving pretty fast for us. To be honest we never thought we would have accomplished this much in merely a year. I was even asked to join Amenra on bass a few months ago. Naturally I said yes and it’s been a great experience so far. I think the influence of me playing with Amenra will definitely be felt in Hessian. Maybe not so much in the music itself but more in the motives for writing the songs. There’s always a reason to undertake something with Amenra.


= Hessian played a special show where you played simultaneously 
with Oathbreaker, how did that come about? Can you tell us a lil’ 
something about that show?

We got to play that show as part of a big Church Of Ra showcase in an actual church in Ghent. All bands who played have a connection to Amenra in one way or another. Since every band playing was planning something special, the idea formed to play a set where we play both Hessian and Oathbreaker songs as a joint force. It’s safe to say this probably was the coolest thing we’ve had the chance of doing this far. I mean, how often do you get the chance to play in a sold-out church? We’re playing a similar showcase on the New Noise Festival in Germany next summer with Oathbreaker and Syndrome. Really looking forward to it.

= I recently saw Hessian in Ghent with Lennart from Oathbreaker on guitars. What’s the story behind that?

The thing is that at that moment Oathbreaker was actually on tour with Hierophant trough Europe. But because of some circumstances Lennart couldn’t make it to the last three shows of that tour. He was however able to make it to the Hessian show in Ghent. So we ended up switching bands for a weekend. I played the three shows with Oathbreaker while he replaced me with Hessian in Ghent. Problem solved. I once even played an Oathbreaker set in Hamburg with Cedric from Rise And Fall on second guitars. Always happy to pull of stuff like that.


= What are Hessian’s plans for the near future? Labels interested already?

We’re almost finished writing our first full length which we will be recording in may. In the meantime we will have a US release of our EP in the form of a split record with Pale Creation which will be released on Magic Bullet records. We will also be releasing a split 7” with Amenra containing a new song from our upcoming full length. This will be released on Smoke And Dust records.