Hexvessel: Going For Cold
Polar Veil, the new album from HEXVESSEL, the self-styled occult sound of the Finnish forest, comes forth with a harsh frostbitten nature as the album title suggests and sees the band embrace a black metal coldness. We caught up wit vocalist Mat McNerney to talk all about HEXVESSEL, Polar Veil, live shows and the power of black metal.
With the brand new HEXVESSEL album Polar Veil, we begin by discussing the next era of the band, with Mat telling us about the album and how the sound of Polar Veil is definitely a change in style for the band. “The album is a very different beast. It came about with a change with HEXVESSEL, where I think I had to really go back to the source of what it was I was doing. It’s a hard thing because I don’t want to call it a project or a band, it’s always been my solo work, and it’s a spiritual journey, which is recorded in music milestones.”
Mat then expanded about Polars Veil‘s sound and gave an insight into the creative process of the record and how isolation was crucial to its development. “The album is like a landmark on a journey. It’s a very different kind of space and time that I entered with the album. So it was very reflective and the recording process and the writing process were also very isolated, and I think that really reflects in the music, but it had also come from from another place so the sounds of it being relatable to the one man black metal movement, it made sense.”
The coldness of the album title is evident and while it obviously salutes the frostbitten nature of the black metal influence, it also refers to the harshness of nature as Mat explains in detail. “I think there are many aspects to living in the sub Arctic regions in the Northern part of the world, and that the idea when you make this place your home, you have to come to terms with the environment. Not just the romantic sides of nature, but also the very harsh and very inhospitable sides. The fact that you’re faced with the ideas of survivalism on a daily basis, when when living through the winter. I think if you’re talking about writing and creating in isolation, that definitely comes into it. It definitely leaks into your experience. It’s definitely something that I allowed more of on this record and it’s a contemplation on what it means to feel at home with something and that I’ve always been attracted to this climate.”
The subject of whether this album is seen as a rebirth of sorts for HEXVESSEL is broached and Mat describes his feelings in this. “I guess it could be could be seen that way. For me, it’s more of another chapter and another milestone on that spiritual journey, which I always wanted HEXVESSEL to be a free vehicle.”
Since HEXVESSEL have started, the band’s music has grown in different directions with each release and Mat explains why this is a truly important thing. “I think that’s what happens if you’re creating alone, and I’ve been doing most of the writing alone. I admire bands like ULVER who have adapted and changed their sound, but in a fearless way. I think that if you’re a true creative, you should be fearless about these things.”
We then delve into Mat‘s beginnings with black metal and how he first immersed himself in the music and culture and how it has influenced him as a person. “I was tape trading in the 90s with friends and it was death metal, and then it became black metal. All the bands that were really exciting were to do with that movement, so it was early ROTTING CHRIST, NECROMANTIA, UNHOLY from Finland and BEHERIT and bands like that, and then, of course, the Norwegian movement came in and sort of cemented everything. It was a logical progression in terms of your way of life, as a metal fan, you know, black metal was was deep submersion. We were deep into it, not just the music, it was everything. It’s strange to say but it was a very productive and positive force in life. It’s always been there. That’s what I am. I’m a black metal guy. That’s how I see the universe.”
As nature takes a big place on the album, and HEXVESSEL have described themselves as the occult sound of the Finnish forest in the past, Mat tells us about the most breathtaking forest landscape he has ever seen. “I guess it’s the old growth forests, and they’re quite hard to come by in Finland. There is a national park here that has some 600 year old trees, they’re some of my favourites.”
We end our epic chat with Mat describing his highlights with HEXVESSEL and he tells of some truly special live shows. “We’ve played some pretty amazing shows, we played out in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, at a festival out there. That was quite special for us playing in the forest. We’ve played in the Austrian mountains as well at the House Of The Holy festival, and that that one was also very special. We played a couple of times at Roadburn. Headlining on the main stage, those have been really special times. I think the band lends itself to those special environment shows where you’re playing in the forest or the mountains or something so you can have the right soundtrack for the scenery.”
Polar Veil is out now via Svart Records.
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