1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical project?
We’re Snaum, a two-piece band from Warsaw, Poland. I (Xypus) write all the music and handle production stuff, and Hewan is doing all the vocals and visual performance side that you will see in the video we’ll be releasing soon.
2.Recently you have released an ep, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical style that you went for on the recoridng?
We play a quite experimental mix of black metal, sludge and industrial music. We didn’t aim for any specific genre, we just write music we love and want to listen to ourselves, drawing from many sources of inspiration. When people listen to what we play, they usually are like ‘WTF is this’ and then we know we’re doing things right :) While I don’t think it’s possible to be 100% unique and original, I like to think that we stand out of the crowd at least a little bit. We have blast beats, super low guitar tunings, dirty synths, black metal shrieks, long, mournful drones and dreamy, trip-hop passages so definitely you need to have an open mind to like what we have to offer.
3.The band also avoids the use of traditional lyrics or songwriting, can you tell us a little bit more about this concept?
The traditional song structure with verse and chorus is sometimes limiting and predictable, and we wanted to just do whatever we want. We wanted our songs to be little stories told with sound only, they have distinct intros, main parts and outros that operate with different intensity and emotion. As to the lyrics, when we were writing the songs Hewan recorded some vocals with no words, you know, just to establish the lines and so on, then we tried to fit some lyrics in them but we didn’t know if they should be in Polish or in English or perhaps in some other language and suddenly we realized that we don’t actually need them. With extreme music it’s usually really hard to understand what the singer is screaming or growling about, and when you check out the lyrics, they’re often just disappointing because let’s be honest, it takes a special kind of talent to know how to work with words and not many people have it. Besides that, without lyrics you can attach any meaning to the song that you want, it can be about whatever you want it to be. It fits the idea of telling a story with sound instead of words, evoking emotions and images that are very personal to the listener. And Hewan says that having no words to stick to allows him to express better whatever he wants to express with his voice so it works for everyone.
4.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Snaum'?
It’s just a made up word. We’ve had a very long list of names we came up with because we’ve had a very strict set of criteria it had to fit - it had to be easy to pronounce and to remember, it had to be original (or at least not used by everyone and their mother already) and it had to not be cliche. Then we were twisting and bending all we had on the list until we settled for Snaum. I bet it does mean something somewhere but it is enigmatic and has this slightly malevolent sound to it which is exactly what we were going for.
5.Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented on the ep cover?
The artwork was done by Maëlle Cadoret, a very talented French artist. I found her by accident on the internet, contacted her, she loved our music and prepared some artworks for us to choose from. They were all great so it was a very difficult decision. The one you can see on the EP cover conveys similar emotions to our music I think and it depicts something that is being constructed, much like our band that really took a long time to find its identity.
6.Currently there are only 2 members in the band, are you open to expanding the line up or do you prefer to remain a duo?
This is a difficult one. I am not very good at collaborating with others because I really don’t like to compromise when it comes to my ideas and actually I haven’t met a lot of people whose ideas I’d really like. Hewan is an exception here because he doesn’t really mind me being the tyrant, or at least that’s what he says haha :) Sometimes I feel like I could really use someone else to contribute to the music because you’re not always inspired of course, but it would have to be someone really special and I have yet to find such a person. I have tried several times to collaborate but I was always disappointed. So for now I think we’ll remain a duo, perhaps we’ll hire some studio musicians to record some parts in the future but that’s it. Especially that we don’t plan to do live shows so there’s no real need for a full setup.
7.Currently you are unsigned, are you looking for a label or have received any interest?
Well we’ve had some proposals and we have reached out to some labels but after consideration we decided that we don’t really need a label. If we were a touring band things would’ve probably been different but for an underground studio project a label is just an unnecessary complication. We’ve reached out to some more experienced people for advice (shout out to Ryan Schutte from Pound, check them out!) and we decided to just handle everything ourselves.
8.On a worldwide level how has the reaction been to your music by fans of extreme metal, experimental and noise?
It’s difficult to say at this point, ask us in six months. The people we have shown our music to usually liked it so that’s a good omen :)
9.Do the band members also have experience working with other bands or musical projects?
Yes, we have both been in bands before, but those were the typical metal acts and it was a long time ago and actually nothing to write home about :) We’re both over 40 and we know exactly what we want now so Snaum is probably the most important and serious musical endeavour of our lives, at least so far.
10.Where can we expect a full length and also where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?
As to the full length - I’m not sure if there will ever be one, I’d much rather release smaller albums but with more meaningful content, especially that we’re sticking to the digital format. But of course nothing is set in stone. Right now we’re fully focused on getting ‘selfmadeself’ out and we’re not really thinking about new music, there’s just some loose ideas floating in the air. If anything, our next release is probably going to be more extreme in every meaning - more blast beats, more harsh synth noise and more mellow, droney parts. Who knows, maybe we’ll do some hip hop as well haha :)
11.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
Over the years we have listened to all kinds of music - from classic stuff like Metallica to some weird drone shit like Sunn O))), with things like folk or trip-hop in between. As to where I get my musical ideas from - I just pick stuff from very random places, from Neurosis and Godflesh to Massive Attack and Ani DiFranco, to some suggestions Spotify gives me haha :)
12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?
Check out our music, have an open mind and be kind to each other, the world has enough of evil shit going on :)
https://snaum.bandcamp.com/releases
https://www.facebook.com/snaum.official
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