“Angst” is the second album release from the Spanish band Hybrid. Having been captivated by the mixture of the extreme, experimental and progressive and technical metal styles which all feature in this work, Andrew Doherty interviewed Iván Durán, the band’s guitarist to find out what makes them tick.
AN: Hello there and thank you first of all for agreeing to this interview. Congratulations too on your stunning album “Angst”. It certainly seems to conform to the statement on your Facebook site that “Hybrid was born in 2004 with the intention of setting up an unorthodox extreme music project without self-imposed limits”. How did this concept come about in the first place?
ID: Hi, Andrew! Thanks for your words and for your in depth review of the album. When you start a band you mainly have two options: to emulate another band/s by ripping off their ideas, or to be honest and play the music that flows from your heart, not caring about styles or people’s opinion.
We are aware that almost everything seems to have been invented, but we try to sound fresh by mixing diverse influences and breaking a few rules of popular music standards.
AN: Although there’s a suggestion in the “music project without self-imposed limits” of an anarchic structure, I sense it’s very disciplined and there’s a solid platform with brutal death metal roots and structures at the centre. Is that how you see it?
ID: To carry out a project like this you have to be very disciplined. Making so many different parts in the same song is a challenge and when you start to add so many multiple layers, it’s easy to lose direction and transform a good song into a total mess. The main idea behind Hybrid’s music is to mix all kinds of extreme metal with other styles we like in such a way that the mix between genres sounds solid and compact.
AN: A distinctive feature of your work is the constant changing of tempo and styles including progressive jazz and even Latin-sounding rhythms. I’m sure there’s no rule about this but how do you decide what works best within a song and what to put where for maximum effectiveness?
ID: There’s no rule, the only rule we follow is to keep the song flowing correctly and to be satisfied with the overall result.
AN: In the construction of your work, is the process to start with a simple riff and add layers until you’ve all run out of ideas?
ID: We jammed between the three of us to try different ideas and structures. Sometimes we just do rough guitar riffs or a bunch of rhythms and then we try to mix the different parts adding bridges and variations/arrangements over these parts.
Of course we had our collection of riffs classified as death metal, crustacean, machocore, nsblackmetal, ganstarap, trvedjent, falsegrind, hipsterblackmetal, etc … and then we choose those which works best in the context of the song, or we simply roll a dice and see what happens.
AN: There was a 4 year gap between “Angst” and its predecessor “The 8th Plague”. What caused the gap between album releases?
ID: We like to create hype, just kidding, we had lots of problems finding new members and we took some time to learn the old songs together and create new ones. The strictly musical part was the easiest, especially for me as I live in another city 600 kilometres away from the other guys.
Needless to say, this further complicates the situation. It’s hard and expensive to do rehearsals, but in the end we’ll all be rich so it’s worth the effort.
AN: “Angst” is fun to listen to. Was it fun to record?
ID: Definitely not, it was hell on earth, all kind of problems from the start until the end, but it was worth it.
AN: How has “Angst” developed in style compared to “The 8th Plague”?
ID: The approach is the same but with new members so the vibe it’s different than “The 8th Plague”. Maybe it’s more risky, experimental and obscure.
AN: “Angst” is a psychological condition and there are references to “tasting insanity” and being “crushed by the weight of existence” in the album. Was “Angst” chosen to reflect the world we all live in, Spain where you are from or is just a creative theme?
ID: The album title and its concept is a psychological response to an existential call out in this nonsense modern idiosyncrasy we are all involved in.
The problems here in Spain are the same as in any other parts of the world but with more “fiesta, flamenco and tapas”, corrupt governments and retarded people with their tablets full of books they will never read.
AN: Whereas in the earlier parts of “Angst” the constant changing of style is a key feature, there was a moment about a minute into “Cuando El Destino Nos Alcance” where I felt that you developed a completely different atmosphere. It as if all the styles had come together for once instead of clashing with each other. On top of that it’s instrumental. It was as if the extreme metal had given way to something else smoother with a progressive post-metal feel. What was your thinking here?
ID: “Cuando El Destino Nos Alcance” is our radio friendly song. We did it to play it to our mothers and girlfriends and got good reviews.
AN: The Eastern rhythm and use of the sitar on “Doomed to Failure” was an interesting development. Even mixed with metal, it provokes images of calmness and meditation, which contrasts with the rest of the track and with the breathless spirit of “Angst” as a whole. What inspired you to include this section?
ID: Thanks, it’s a tradition in every Hybrid recording to close with a slower and hypnotic song. Antonio knows how to play the sitar with his ultralarge gypsy-nail, so we thought it would be a good idea to put it on that last song. Antonio played some kind of raga and I added some distorted chords on the guitar to get a darker sound, finally Óscar wrote the piano part and I added a clean arpeggio in the end to finish the song and the album. We are really satisfied with this track as it’s just the idea we had in our minds.
AN: Two bands that Hybrid remind me of, at least in the brutal metal parts, are Suicide Silence and Cephalic Carnage. But then I also detected a similarity in concept with Ephel Duath through the way that you challenge us with a crossover between extreme metal and other styles. Who do you see as the main influences on your music?
ID: We are not into Suicide Silence but we respect Cephalic Carnage and Ephel Duath’s work. We don’t have “main influences” so we take inspiration from every form of music we enjoy, from Allan Holdsworth to ZU passing through Sandy Marton (http://youtu.be/SrdShjy53Y8)
AN: I read that you have played live as support to the likes of Tool, Deftones, Misery Index and Textures. That must have been interesting for you. What have you learnt from being close to these bands?
ID: It’s always a great opportunity to share the stage with big names like these. The lesson for smaller bands like us it’s an easy one: even if you play great it’s likely that not even 20 people will attend to your concert, so face it and enjoy the show.
AN: “Angst” has just been released at the end of April this year. Are you happy with the promotion of it?
ID: No, we need banners in the SuperBowl, in the opening of Game Of Thrones, in the Bangbros site, maybe some energy drink with our names and signature guitars with jagged shapes. But anyway, we’re still happy.
AN: Do you have any live concerts lined up?
ID: Not yet, but hopefully we will do some shows to promote the record if anyone is interested in seeing us and we find a promoter who pays more than a sandwich.
We know it’s hard, sandwiches are expensive these days, and people are really busy watching porn on the internet to find time to go to extreme and weird metal shows.
AN: What are the next stages beyond “Angst”? Have you thought about any other projects yet?
ID: Besides conquering the world and consuming as much porn as we can, Chus is busy with his role as drum teacher and session drummer, Antonio is doing his thing collecting shemale pics and I will start to mix my beard and roll band Cachalotauro in a few days.
AN: To finish, is there anything you would like to say to readers of Ave Noctum?
ID: Hey folks, thanks for reading this interview and be careful not to wear the t-shirt of the band you’re going to see playing live, it’s obvious and redundant.
You can order our new album “Angst” through our email account [email protected] or via direct message to our Facebook:
If you are brave enough to listen to “Angst” in full-streaming, click here and enjoy the ride:
If you like our music click on the “Like It” button on our Facebook page or you will go bald pretty soon.
(Interviewed by Andrew Doherty)
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