Interviews: Phrenia

In this new occassion we have had the opportunity to interview the Electronic Modern Metal/Metal band Phrenia from Serbia. Check out the interview and follow the band on their FACEBOOK PAGE. 

1. Where did you get the idea for the band name, you planned it or came out just like that? 

After we first came together, for a while we avoided naming the formation, as we were short on good and catchy band names. Julian came up with the idea of ‘Phrenia’. We mix heavy and electronic music quite heavily in our songs, it’s almost like if it was written by a schizophrenic person. So our name came from chopping off the first part of the word ‘schizophrenia’. 

2. Why did you want to play this genre? 

At the time we formed the band local music scene was really separated into two groups: metal/rock listeners and electronic music lovers. The initial idea was to create something that both side would enjoy. Besides that I had this idea for a while to mix these two genres together, to create something that feels trancy and ambient but still counts as heavy music. 

3. Did you know each other before the band was formed? 

Since we were living in the same area, everybody knew everyone, at least for some extent. Zoltan and myself were into playing acoustic music at that time. We knew Julian from his other band. One interesting fact, that our drummer Peter was a guitar player around that time, but he was into drumming too. We knew him before so when we had this idea, to create that electronic-metal-heavy thing we asked if he would like to join our new project. Attila, who is no longer part of the band was invited by Julian, so as our first bass player, Zsolt. Our former bass player Ivan had a great reputation as being a terrific musician, so he was an obvious choice. Sadly, he moved to London last year. A friend of ours Sandor took the baton recently. 

4. Each band member favourite band? 

Zoltan loves modern metalcore like Eskimo Callboy and Asking Alexandria. Sandor is a huge Bullet For My Valentine and Trivium fan. Julian is more into metal or rock with melodic vocals, like Bring Me The Horizon, AWS (Hungarian band, they were featured in Eurovision as a metal act), USEME (also a Hungarian band), Annisokay. Peter loves modern metal too, Killswitch Engage for example or the mentioned band USEME. Speaking of myself my favourites are Annisokay, PVRIS, Bring Me The Horizon and Thrice to name a few. I’m also really into electronic music, mainly uplifting trance, or anything like that. 

5. Who or what inspires you to write songs? 

We really enjoy creating something out of nothing. We just enjoy putting melodies and grooves together that might someone else enjoy as well. 

6. Where was your last gig?

Our last show was at A38, Budapest together with USEME, and Mirror. They are both from Hungary. It was a mental night, we really enjoyed our time there. The crowd was amazing, as well as the other bands. 

7. Where would you like to act? 

If you expect a wild answer, we would say NovarRock, haha! Playing on one of those huge festivals are our ultimate dream. 

8. Whom would you like to feature with? 

Sikósi Örs from AWS if we’re talking about the Hungarian scene. On international level we would welcome anyone!

9. Whom not?

With weird Hungarian or Serbian celebrities.

10. Any of you has ever suffered from stage fright? Any tip for beginners on how to beat that? 

We had general stage fright every time we had to play for a bigger crowd, but thankfully it’s totally gone now. The best tip that we can give is to not to focus only on what you play and how you play, just enjoy being there and give the crowd as much energy as you can give. What you get back will make your stage fright go away. 

11. What bands have inspired you the most?

We can agree that Bring Me The Horizon was our biggest inspiration. Sempiternal was awesome, but with That’s The Spirit they just blew our mind. It just had everything what a good music needs to have. At least for us.

12. What's the weirdest thing a fan has ever asked you for? 

After a show at Hungary someone came to me and asked for a favour. His girlfriend wanted to dance with me to a song from the band that came after us. 

13. What do you think of your fans? 

We are grateful for every single person, who follows us, listens to our music and buys our merch. They are our inspiration and their love gives us the strength to continue, no matter what. 

14. What do you think of our site? 

We really like the Track By Track and Behind The Artwork articles! 

15. Something add? 

Not much!