Interviews About Albums: MAW - The Humble Collapse (2025)

In this new interview, we sat down with the Polish Stoner Rock/Desert Rock band MAW to ask questions about their album, "The Humble Collapse".

1. What can you say about The Humble Collapse?

It is an album that definitely extends our sound. It was created after lineup changes with Jacek Niewiadomski who replaced Piotr Stachowiak on vocals and Szymon Piotrowski who replaced Michał Gawroński on drums. We incorporated quite a bit of sound from outside of the traditional stoner rock realm.

It was recorded live in two days and this band shows exactly what bands went through during the period when it was created. The album was ready if it came to recording in 2021 but the mixing process search for the right record label and all the decisions on what to do with this music took so long that here we are in 2025 releasing the thing.

2. What is the meaning of The Humble Collapse name?

The Humble Collapse (THC) shows us and the world collapsing in a slow way. Being fine with what's going on, resigned to its own fate. It refers to the reality of the pandemic in Poland in 2020/2021 with very restricting lockdowns, isolation, etc. But mostly it is about our band when everyone was going through life-changing events and we knew that they could lead to the band's collapse. We are not a huge nor big well-known band so our collapse was very humble.

3. Which one is the composer of The Humble Collapse?

We are all the composers. Everyone wrote one interlude and performed it. So that's one thing where everyone contributes. Lyrics have been written by our vocalist.

Most of the music was created organically with the whole band jamming and working on ideas. Of course, there were certain songs, maybe two one of which was mostly Martyna's idea and the other one was mostly Kuba's idea. But in the end, even those two went through a process of the whole band shaping the final product. So yeah it was a very collaborative process.

4. If you had to pick one song, which one would you pick?

For me [Martyna] it is Still because it was the last one recorded. It was also the last time I played with all the guys as I left Poland 3 days after recording. I miss them, hanging out with them and playing, having band practices, playing live, etc. So it is a very sentimental song for me.

5. Is there a special message in The Humble Collapse? If there is what it is? 

The album just reflects the emotions we felt at the time we were writing it. It's got a certain vibe to it and this vibe is the message. Also, our lyrics are about humanity, inner struggles, and society so I hope people will find this one resonating with them.

6. Are there some lyrics that you'd love to share?

I think Black Box is interesting. It addresses human nature or it actually questions our humanity in a way too.

You'll never know how others perceive this world, events, etc.

The title is a term from software engineering. It refers to testing that examines only the functionality (an output for a given input) without looking into internal processes. So we don't know the real mechanics of how the output got created.

Our behavior, and perception depend on our individual thought patterns mixed with our life experiences.

We don't even know if we really control thoughts or if it's just a pre-programmed set of conditions and rules and then our will is just an illusion of having the power to make any decision. Even if we communicate about feelings and emotions it's gonna be received by others' mix of individual thinking patterns and experiences. So they cannot understand us fully and we cannot understand them fully. So in theory we're all black boxes for each other.

We can only see inputs and outputs and we cannot be certain about anything if it comes to communication, the real emotions of others, or the real "path of logic" that led them to make certain decisions. It's because we are not able to see the internal processes of others.

And the theory that maybe our brains aren't controlled by us (soul or some sort of singular being) but they are just like hardware running some sort of preconditioned algorithm makes the whole idea even more robotic/software-related. Here's a part where you can see references to coding, the lyrics are kinda like commands:

"Before our very eyes adoption, please be conquered step exit all mind step inside your kind

Before our very eyes all the distance, be conquered step inside your kind step exit all mind"

7. Which inspirations have been important for this album? Like musically or friends, family, someone you'd love to thank especially?

So as I mentioned the whole inspiration comes from the rough time that we had in 2020 and 2021. It all comes from life. Musically I think we went a little bit more into some sort of prog rock, in my case it was mostly Pink Floyd but also King Crimson at that time. And outside of inspiration we of course want to thank everyone who supported us and who believed in us. All the people that even accidentaly helped to record that album by for example helping me with moving my stuff just before I left Poland.

Without those people, I don't know if I'd be able to find enough time to record it. It was mostly my family and close friends. Thank you!

And of course, our record label Argonauta Records, thank you!

We've already gone through self-releasing physical copies and I don't know if we'd've had enough time and determination to go through that mess one more time.

So thanks to them we'll have CDs which is a huge deal for me as I love and collect CDs and vinyls and I'm always disappointed when I see that a band that I like doesn't have anything to buy other than a digital version.

8. Something to add?

Thank you for the interview and the interest in our band and our new release. And to all our listeners thanks for your time, support and see y'all somewhere in the world. Ride on!