INTERVIEW: Sean Swafford – Aenimus

The progressive metal scene is becoming increasingly populated with ridiculously talented musicians who are willing to think outside of the box to create something innovative and exciting. One band in particular who is quickly grabbing attention is Bay Area’s AENIMUS. Their second full length effort entitled Dreamcatcher is available now via Nuclear Blast Records and prior to the album’s release, we caught up with guitarist Sean Swafford to get the low down on their intriguing horror based concept album.

For the benefit of our readers how would you best describe AENIMUS?

Sean: If you’re talking about genres then progressive death metal. We like to be experimental. That’s the whole point of art. We want to do as much as we can with what we have.

Your sophomore album Dreamcatcher is due for release this month, what can we expect from this effort?

Sean: To piggyback on the last question a lot of experimenting. We experimented a lot on the first album but not nearly as much as on this one. What I really enjoy about making music is making sure that every song has its own identities and that you can clearly differentiate between them. Some people can misinterpret that by thinking we haven’t found our sound or we have no direction but I think the whole point of art is to take risks and the whole point of experimenting is to take risks. The first thing we delved into with this album is VST’s. We touched on them a little bit on the last album on the track The Final Delirium we added some strings but on this album we dove right into it. Not only did it spark inspiration when we were hitting some road blocks but it added a new dimension that we’d never explored before. We’ve experimenting with loads of different synthesisers ranging from 80’s horror synthesisers, grand pianos to more theatrical VST’s like having a whole orchestra. It was a tonne of fun and the album is riddled with that as an additional layer.

The press release states that the album’s concept is based around the re-imagining of famous horror stories. It must have been quite the undertaking to ensure the instrumentation, orchestral elements and the narrative all meshed together?

Sean: It was a huge undertaking. It was an idea I came up with on tour as we always have long drives and that environment breeds random thoughts and that came to my mind as I’m a huge horror fan and thankfully most of the other band members are. It was fun exploring that and it was a huge undertaking, not only writing music in the vain of those stories and trying to convey them musically and lyrically. It took a lot of studying and listening to audio books which are super long! Especially IT, it was like 15-20 hours which is insane. Then to condense that into songs as well as confining yourself to a box with the concept builds new writing techniques to be able to break the mould without destroying the mould.

One thing I loved was that usually with progressive/tech death albums they ease you in with a lengthy intro and you guys just thought “to hell with that” and dived right into the riffs. The volume was cranked right up on my headphones and I nearly jumped out of my skin!

Sean: [Laughs] Yeah! That was intentional. We wanted to do something completely different from the first album. We did that with the first album and a lot of bands do use the long intros which I enjoy but I wanted to not only do something different to what we what have done previous but different to what other bands have done too.

How did you find working with the likes of Mike Semesky and Brian James?

Sean: One of the things we wanted to dive into in this album was clean vocals and we talked about implementing them for the first album but it never really came to fruition. I was curious about adding my own vocals and Seth, our bassist is already really good at singing so I wanted to learn how to sing properly and all about the techniques and just learn about that instrument as there is so many subtleties and details with any instrument that you learn as you dive into it that a novice eye or ear may not notice so I wanted to make sure I was as good as possible for the album and cram as much as I can for it and that’s how Mike came into the picture. He is my vocal coach so he taught me loads of different techniques to make it sound better. The more I learn the more similarities I’m noticing with guitar which is cool so I can have a parallel. Naturally we asked him to be part of the album as a guest spot so that came together well. Brian was previously in our band and he was the main writer of the first album before joining FALLUJAH shortly after. I wanted him to be on the album for a few different reasons. One was we all wanted him on this album and he is one of my favourite writers in this scene, he is completely underrated. I wanted him to not only be on the album because we liked his writing but because he was the main writer I wanted it to be a send off, like he was giving us his good grace y’know?

Ah like a sort of passing of the torch effectively? 

Sean: Exactly! Thats what I was aiming towards. I came into the band late into the first album so I only wrote a couple of songs, I was barely in but this one I was a much larger contributor. It was fun working with him again and he came up with that solo so fast which pissed us all off [laughs].

It must have been a boost to join the ranks of Nuclear Blast for this release?

Sean: We were actually in talks with Nuclear Blast for the first album but it never came to fruition for a number of different reasons. This time round we’ve been talking to them since the touring for the first album. We went about it in an unconventional way as normally you’d sign a contract they’d give you money to record the album but we went the other way round and we did pretty much everything to present to them and to make it as easy as possible for them to sign us. I kind of saw it as backing them into a corner and saying “we have everything you need”. We recorded the album, got it mixed and mastered and done all the promotional material like a bunch of playthrough videos and interview videos. Pretty much anything an album release would need and what a label would normally provide us with but we took it upon our selves to show how serious we were so we made it pretty straight forward for them to just say “Yeah of course!”. We did the majority of the work so it showed our work ethic and they are one of the easiest bunch of people we’ve encountered. We’ve spoke to a few labels but nothing really clicked as much as them. They’re so down to earth and in my mind a part of the band. We take their advice seriously because we respect them. It’s more collaborative rather than them just being a business and us being the artist. It’s really relieving!

You’re due to embark on a lengthy North American tour with HYPOCRISY and FLESHGOD APOCALYPSE. That’s one intense lineup! Are there any dates you’re particularly looking forward to?

Sean: We’ve toured quite a lot on the last album but we haven’t really touched the East Coast. In the US markets and Canadian markets I’m really excited to be able to explore those untapped markets which we’ve only really dipped our toes into. I’m looking forward to seeing what the crowd reactions are like in those areas.

If you had the opportunity to tour wherever you liked where would you go?

Sean: Oh man, I would probably want to go somewhere unconventional. I’d still wanna go to places like Europe and Australia but I’d love to do something unconventional like how METALLICA did Antarctica [laughs]. Ireland would be sweet. I’m super Irish so that would be cool to see my roots. In terms of being a world traveller Japan would be amazing and a huge culture shock which would be really interesting as a human in general.

Is there any chance we’ll see AENIMUS return to the UK with this album cycle?

Sean: We were in the UK for UK Tech-Fest which was really fun and we’re super excited to get back. I don’t know when, it all depends on opportunities. We’re still an up and coming band so we still have a lot of build up to, to get to that point. Hopefully sooner rather than later! Our opportunities currently have been pretty insane. The HYPOCRISY and FLESHGOD tour is going to be a huge opportunity right out of the gates. I’m anticipating something but nothings came through the flood gates yet in terms of anything solid. Who knows, hopefully this year that’d be great.

I’ll keep my fingers crossed. Are there any songs you’re nervous about playing live? There’s some pretty elaborate material to work with!

Sean: There are some songs which are insanely difficult and take a lot of coercion to get the entire band on the same page in terms of playing it live. Like “why did we do this to ourselves?” [laughs]. Songs like Caretaker which was mainly written by our bassist Seth and I recorded and rewrote a lot of it as it was unplayable! This was great though as it kind of broke me out of my routines in the way I navigate the guitar. This helped me break the mould in the way I write stuff but even me rewriting it it’s still insanely difficult and it’s like sprinting the entire time. That songs probably going to be the hardest for the entire band to agree to play it live which is unfortunate as it has some of my favourite moments in that song. In terms of the other songs some are a lot more playable but it takes a lot of practising and tendonitis! Are minds are excited but our fingers are not [laughs].

[laughs] Especially on such a lengthy tour as well!

Sean: Yeah, I’m sure like any human we’ll acclimate but agreeing to put us through that gruelling process. Boxers and athletes are going to hate me for saying this but it’s similar to getting ready for a fight, you go through pains in your hands and recuperation if you injure yourself. I went on a tour a long time ago and I injured my pinky as I was practising so much so I had to tour with that which was like running on a sprained ankle. I learned from that mistake by trying to build up my chops way before the tour. It’s always nice challenging yourself but you’ve got to stay modest so you don’t kill yourself! [laughs].

What does the remainder of 2019 have in store for AENIMUS?

Sean: Nothing solidified really apart from the upcoming tour. We’ve been talking to a few agencies in Europe which makes me think something may be in store but right now it’s all just in discussion. As such a new band I think everyone is just seeing how well this album does as it’s still an industry standard to see how our first week sales are and our attendances to see whether we will be a viable option for them. It’s all up in the air which is making us all really nervous. You never know with art, especially music and you don’t know whether it’ll be polarising or it’s something they would embrace. It’s always hard for us to write music and not think about those factors as they could affect your career. It’s always important to keep your integrity in tact though. My mantra for this album was “If it sounds sick, that’s it’. I don’t care what people say and hopefully it’s positive if it’s not, whatever. I like any kind of criticism as long as it’s descriptive and not just one syllable words so I can take it into account. As long as it’s from a respectable source as opposed to someone who has never made music before. I don’t take those into account necessarily. To me I try to take everything into account but at times you have to just push it away and think “Who are we writing the music for? For them or for us?”. Sometimes I over-complicate things, like this question [laughs]. But I try to simplify it so “If it sounds sick, that’s it!”.

I completely agree and in the days of social media everyone wants their voices heard and you have to take it with a pinch of salt. I’ve had critique on my own work suggesting favouritism or that I’ve accepted payment to skew my opinions and you’ve just got to brush it off and not let it affect you.

Sean: It’s definitely hard to navigate that as it’s a balance. Are you going to listen to those people and possibly jeopardise your integrity as an artist or just not listen to them at all and go in blindly with what you think sounds good? It’s a really hard balance and it’s a relationship. There’s a business behind this or there wouldn’t be a career behind it so we have to take that in effect, but how much? If you hear some really strong criticism you have to have a really strong foundation to take that with a grain of salt rather than take that and wallow and never write music ever again! Everyone does it differently!

Thanks very much for your time man I really appreciate it. I’ve not had a lot of time with the album but I’m really excited to delve into the concept and the lyrics and discover what it entails. 

Sean: Thank you so much. We put in a tonne of Easter eggs, some more subtle than others and there is a lot of things we tried to cram into it so if you really like the album you can keep peeling back the layers. Hopefully everyone likes it, we’ll see!

Dreamcatcher is out now via Nuclear Blast Records. AENIMUS are featured in our brand new digital issue. Subscribe to our Patreon Page to gain access. 

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