Interviews About Albums: Harakiri For The Sky - Scorched Earth (2025)
In this new interview, we sat down with the Austrian Post-Black Metal band Harakiri For The Sky to ask questions about their album, "Scorched Earth".
1. Scorched Earth comes after a longer break compared to your previous
releases. How did taking four years influence the album’s sound and
themes?
J.J.: Since we recorded “Maere”, which we finished in February 2020, right
before the Pandemic, which was also the reason it was released more than
a year later, my life changed completely. My Ex ended our relationship and
kicked me out of our flat. That was in late autumn, in the midst of I don’t
know Lockdown. The band was also on hold because you couldn’t
play gigs during this terrible time and I had nowhere to go. So the only
option I had, was to move into a cabin in the woods, not far from where I
grew up, that’s the property of my family for generations. I lived there for a
few months, made music, wrote lyrics and a book, and tried to drink myself
to death. There were times I didn’t speak to a single person for nearly a
week. When spring arose and the snow began to melt again, I finally had
enough and tried to turn my life around. Retrospectively, this and the time
after was one of the most creative times of my life. Most of the lyrics for
“Scorched Earth” have their roots in these months and years. I unknowingly
already wrote a “Break-Up Album” with the lyrics from “Maere”, so the new
album is mostly about the afterlife and the katharsis I went through.
2. The title Scorched Earth is described as a snapshot of our broken world.
Could you share specific events or moments that heavily influenced this
theme?
J.J.: “Scorched Earth” stands as well for a personal feeling, as mentioned in
the first question, but also for the things that happened in my life and in the
world since early 2020. I’m pretty pessimistic when I take a look at how the
world is turning. Ukraine is still at war with Russia, the Middle East is on
fire, and Antisemitism is rising all over the world. The world is terribly broken, and
I don’t know what to say, but the last two years changed me as a person and
shaken me to the core. Every day you wake up, look at your phone and
there’s the next disturbing news. And that’s how the day starts, and also how
it ends. And yeah, if you want me to say so, “Scorched Earth” as a title is a
metaphor for all that and for the feeling and the burden I carry around in my
head. The album itself is not political, but what happens in the world forms
our mood and so our art.
3. You mention experimenting with untypical sounds while staying true to your
style. Can you give us an example of these new sonic elements?
J.J.: The fundamental element of our music has always been the melancholic
atmosphere together with bittersweet melodies. In “Scorched Earth” one thing
that evolved is the aspect of structure, as our songs are much more complex,
but also quite extensive, and more experimental than ever before. But generally, these things mostly happen naturally in this band. We are starting with a song
and things take their turn. We never think too much, about how a song or an album
should sound or what other people will think about it. Art or the expression
of our selves must evolve naturally, and grow directly from one's heart. Otherwise, it’s
not authentic and worth nothing.
4. Your lyrics continue to explore love, life, and death. How has your perspective
on these themes evolved since Maere?
J.J: I already said a lot about these issues in the first two answers, but to get it
straight, I think these three components are the ones forming us as humans and
individuals the most. It’s a journey that starts with our birth and ends with our
death. A journey and a way cluttered with heights and depts, shards, despair, and
estrangement. And we keep on exploring it till we die, a journey, that’s ironically
the prime part of life.
5. What challenges did you face while maintaining the balance between growth
and remaining faithful to your post-black metal roots?
J.J.: I wouldn’t call it challenges, cause all we do comes naturally. We don’t
meet up and say: Hey let’s do some strange experiments. No, we just write the
music and the lyrics that we feel deep in our hearts. Matthias and, I are
not thinking too much in genres, but as you say, we are deeply rooted in Post
Black Metal, and I think you can also hear that on our new album. New
elements are great and keep our music fresh, but Post Black Metal will always
have the biggest part in HFTS.
6. With "Scorched Earth" representing a culmination of all your past albums, do
you see it as a transitional piece or a definitive statement for Harakiri For The
Sky?
J.J.: Yeah, that’s how I’d say it. We took the strongest parts of our musical
history and mashed them up. What came to life was this album. This is also why
you can see all the animals of our previous albums now on one cover because
it’s all of them collected in one release.
7. Could you elaborate on the creative dynamic between M.S. and J.J. during
the writing process for this album?
J.J.: Sure. We have been doing this for a pretty long time now. Working together as
a two-piece or a whole band is not always too easy. But with the years you get
to know where the other's priorities are, what’s important to them, and how they’d
like their songs to sound at the end. I don’t have to ask Matthias these days,
where in the song, which parts I should lay my vocals, I just know it. That
works out 95% these days, we don’t have to discuss these things anymore or at
least not very often.
8. The album cover is striking and symbolic, featuring animals fleeing a burning
city. How did this idea come together, and what deeper message does it
convey?
J.J.: The cover should for sure fit its title “Scorched Earth”. The animals fleeing
the fire and the burning forest, in this case, is a metaphor on the one hand, and
on the other hand, we wanted to have all the animals of the previous album on the
cover, cause we see “Scorched Earth” as something like a collection of all eras
of this band.
9. The use of purple is new for your artwork. Was there a particular reason
behind choosing this color, and how does it reflect the album’s tone?
J.J.: There is not really a deeper meaning. We just really like this color and we
never used it before, so this was an easy decision. But for sure it also matched
with the elements of night and fire.
10. You’re about to embark on an extensive tour following the album's release.
How do you plan to bring the emotionally intense themes of Scorched Earth to
life on stage?
J.J.: We’ll see. We are still doing some rehearsals before we leave for the US to
find out, which songs from the new album will also work out on stage. For sure
we’ll play the single outputs, but we want to be prepared for more so we can
also switch them from concert to concert if we like. It’s getting more and more
difficult to play a proper setlist from album to album, cause we have so many,
mostly lengthy songs after six records. There are so many old songs we’d like
to play, and so many new. ones But a concert also shouldn’t last longer than 80
minutes or something, in my opinion. So we have the difficult decision of sorting
them out really carefully.
11. Are there any tracks on this album that you’re especially excited to perform
live for the first time?
J.J.: Yeah, “Keep Me Longing” is my favorite right now.
12. With five Amadeus Music Award nominations and global tours, what drives
you to keep pushing creative boundaries after more than a decade in the
scene?
J.J.: I still want to explore new places and grow personally. I live in a steady
fear, that if I change something in life as I live it I’ll quickly get old and boring.
Traveling and making music was always the biggest part of my life, and I don’t
think I’ll change that all too soon. And for sure there are still a lot of places I
want to go. So the journey continues.
13. The album is described as a conclusion of your story so far. How do you
envision the next chapter for Harakiri For The Sky?
J.J.: Ha, good question. I can’t say anything about that, this will be a surprise for
me as well. What I can say, is that I’m already collecting notes and sentences
that will eventually be part of the next album's lyrics. So this is definitely not
the end.
Thanks for the interview mate. Have a good one. Yours J.J.
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