Track By Tracks: Patria - Hexeri (2022)

1. HEXEREI:

Hexerei was composed by Dave Deville, owner of Dead Marshall Studio and a great friend of us. He was quite free to compose whatever he wanted, based on the theme and lyrics we already had. The main inspiration was “The Omen” a movie theme created by the legendary Jerry Goldsmith. The result fits like a glove, with a kind of "dark ages" tempo and a "sudden possession sensation" at the end.

2. WORMS OF LIGHT:

My father had a huge interest in occult subjects. Okay, he wasn't a great father (that's a topic for a therapy session), but I ended up inheriting a taste for the "forbidden." As a child, I had access to a lot of "unconventional" literature and one of my father's first books that I could read was "The Prophecies of Nostradamus". The centuries, written in a kind of metalanguage, were so fascinating that they marked me for the rest of my life. Even as a child, I've tried to interpret that somehow (I think it was a great exercise in creativity for a child). Worms of Light was inspired by Nostradamus's "Prophecy of the Two Suns." We kept the same metalanguage of centuries simply because the instrumental of this song is so sick that the possibility of multiple interpretations of the lyrics would be very cool.

3. ARCHETYPES:

The first drafts of Archetypes have been with me for years, once again due to the old books I've inherited from my father. In this case it was an english version of the epic of Creation according to the Babylonians, called "Enuma Elish". I loved the drawings of Mesopotamian artwork and the pictures of cuneiform tablets when I was a child.

Later, in my early teens, I was able to read the scriptures in English. The lyrics of Archetypes are an early passage about the creation of the universe and its primordial entities.

4. A LAST BREATH OF SULPHUR:

A Last Breath of Sulfur was the first idea we had for this record, at the end of the Magna Adversia sessions. These lyrics are a metaphor and an outburst about how persistent we still manage things, carrying on a black metal band for over ten years, even rowing against the tides all the time, just for devotion to the music we love. The lyrics were initially all written in English, but the idea of inviting Lembetu, lead singer of Loits, from Estonia, made us think about asking him to record his part in Estonian and not in English. The result, in addition to the different voice timbre of Lembetu, also brought a very curious intonation, that the Estonian language has for us westerners.

5. UNDER THE DEVIL'S VOID:

Under the Devil's Void has the typical traditional black metal lyrics. An expression of our disgust for Christianity. Simple as that! (Ok, I have to confess that for this lyric I ended up being inspired by a very unlikely mix of HP Lovecraft and Watain)

6. CONSECRATION:

Well, like everyone else, we were stuck during the global pandemic period. When we got fed up with doing nothing, we decided to start writing a new record. The only definition we had was that it would be a more raw record than the last ones. Consecration was the first song made for Hexerei and the lyrics were based on medieval concepts of alchemy. For the alchemists of the Middle Ages, all organic and inorganic materials were compounds of sulfur and mercury. Therefore, by changing the proportion of these elements in a body, it would be possible to transform anything.

They also considered the participation of divine (or malefic) forces in the phenomena they observed or tried to provoke. When the lyrics were ready, its first sentence reminded me of the poem called "Psicologia de um Vencido" (Psychology of a loser) by the Brazilian poet Augusto do Anjos. As a kind of tribute, we used a part of the poem in the lyrics, sung in Portuguese (which we haven't done for a few years).

7. UNBORN SPELLCRAFT:

Unborn Spellcraft is based on ancestral witchcraft that worships gods prior to the historical period, having among its main beliefs that the human being is not superior to other animals and that everything in the universe follows the same flow. There are no dogmas, groups, or organizations. Just individual devotion to the flow of life towards death.

8. STORM OF WILDERNESS:

Well, at this point you can already see that mythology and old stories fascinate me, right? Storm of Wilderness was inspired by the Greek story of Orion. In Greek mythology, Orion was a giant hunter which was placed in the stars by Zeus after his death. According to the myth, Orion was the son of Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea, from whom he inherited the ability to walk on water. After crossing the sea to the island of Chios, where he attacked the daughter of the island's ruler, Orion was blinded as punishment. However, he was later healed by Helios, the Greek personification of the sun. Orion became arrogant about his great hunting skills and vowed to kill all creatures on the planet. The Earth Goddess, Gaia, responded by sending a giant scorpion to destroy him. In the ensuing battle, Orion was killed and both he and the scorpion were placed among the stars.

9. TRANSMUTATION:

Still based on the concept of Medieval Alchemy, Transmutation (The act of transforming one chemical element into another) was written from the perspective of personal transformation. Something like using the "human element", applying to his wisdom, strength, and rebellion, and being able to transform this element into something new. The result is a new pure element, free from the dogmatic filth of religion, but at the cost of an explosive and painful reaction. Would you pay the price for this transformation? I've already paid and I don't regret a thing.

10. ALL VICES:

All Vices is based on "The Pentagram Poem" by Aleister Crowley.

Demon Fog, from the Brazilian black metal legend Songe d’Enfer, brought these lyric and interpreted it in a way that is so in line with the meaning of Crowley's poem that it chill your spine. The strength of the human being does not depends on dogmas, flags, or races. It is a poetic manifesto and a reminder that man is mortal, yet great. Though mortal, man is man's own god.

11. VIIMNE VÄÄVLISÕM:

Well, the jam of Lembetu, from Loits, in "A Last Breath of Sulphur", singing alongside Tsword, was so interesting that we asked him to record a version just with him singing in his native language.

Thus came VIIMNE VÄÄVLISÕM, with Lembetu's unique vocals giving a totally different face to the usual PATRIA. A great bonus track and quite different from the usual (After all, how many bands from outside Estonia have a song sung in Estonian?)