“CANCERBLOOM” pushes HVRT into darker, more fearless territory, blending political urgency, raw emotion, and genre-bending intensity. In this interview, the band reflects on its themes, creative process, and evolving identity.
1. “CANCERBLOOM”
feels like a raw confrontation with modern decay and disillusionment. What
first inspired the concept behind this album, and how did its themes evolve
during the writing process?
“CANCERBLOOM” has a loose overarching theme, similar to our previous record The
Grief That Feeds The Night. The title suggests a collection of facets and
perspectives on all the ways our world, our society, and even our own
identities feel fractured, threatened, or at least deeply concerning in their
current state. The album isn’t built on fictional worlds or abstract concepts —
it’s shaped by the things we deal with every day as individuals and as a band.
These are the issues that dominate our conversations, the things that genuinely
occupy our minds. For us it was important that every song has a clearly
recognisable theme, something that affects all of us in one way or another.
People might not share our exact perspective on each subject, but the topics themselves
are so present in everyone’s lives that they rarely need explanation.
2. You recorded CANCERBLOOM almost entirely live, avoiding digital
perfection. What made you choose this approach, and how does it shape the
album’s emotional impact compared to your earlier work?
We’re actually very used to recording live. Our previous album was done the
same way, and the band we evolved from — Shitshifter — recorded everything live
as well. So this approach is deeply rooted in how we operate as musicians. It
also comes from a conviction we share: in modern metal there’s an almost
obsessive need for digital perfection — everything has to be edited, quantized,
locked to a grid. And in that process, a crucial element gets lost: the
performance itself. For us, performance is tied to realness, credibility, and
ultimately emotional impact. When everything is flattened into grid-perfect
production, it becomes interchangeable — and honestly, a bit boring. We
understand how the genre ended up there, but it’s simply not what inspires us.
We want the individual players’ performances to shine, to feel alive and human.
That mindset even shapes our songwriting. We try to never lose sight of
musicality; we believe that a good song should still work at its core — even if
you play it as a minimalist version on an acoustic guitar. If you stripped many
modern metal productions of their layers, effects, and perfectly edited
surfaces, the compositions underneath would sometimes feel surprisingly thin.
That’s something we think about very consciously, both when we write and when
we record. Recording live keeps that essence intact — the energy and the
imperfections.
3. The record moves far beyond traditional death metal boundaries. How do
you balance your extreme metal roots with the experimental and genre-defying
elements that define CANCERBLOOM?
We try not to rely on formulas when writing songs, and perhaps that’s why
our music moves across genres rather naturally. None of us grew up as “metal
heads” in the cultural sense. We came to our instruments through completely
different musical worlds — classic ’70s hard rock, Blues, ’80s rock, glam,
prog, even country and other unexpected genres. Extreme metal wasn’t our
foundation; It's something we discovered as teenagers and young adults,
something we eventually embraced and now identify with. But it’s not the core
of our individual musical DNA. It’s simply the shared space where our tastes
overlap today. Because of that, HVRT could theoretically have become a
completely different kind of band if a different set of influences had formed
our common ground. Extreme metal just happens to be the point where our paths
meet — but to the left and right of that point, each of us has a huge range of
influences that have nothing to do with metal. And especially in recent years,
those influences beyond the genre have become just as important, if not more
inspiring, than extreme metal itself - at least to me. Speaking for myself,
I’ve been fairly bored by most modern metal releases for a while now, which can
be frustrating. The music that gives me real “wow” moments — that sparks ideas
or shifts my perspective — tends to come from outside metal altogether. And
that broader listening culture naturally flows into our songwriting.
4. The lyrics are deeply political and personal—touching on topics like gun
violence, far-right ideologies, and digital alienation. How important is it for
HVRT to merge social commentary with extreme music?
For us, it’s almost impossible to separate the music from the world we live
in. We all have strong personal convictions and are interested in politics —
some of us are even active within political parties. So the way we write lyrics
naturally reflects that. The kind of language we gravitate toward is direct,
sometimes abrasive or punk-ish, and definitely grounded in reality. Traditional
’90s death metal clichés — splatter fantasies, gore stuff, all that — don’t
speak to us at all. There’s almost a whole dictionary of genre stereotypes that
many revival bands still lean on, and it just isn’t our world. Extreme music,
for us, is a vehicle for confronting the things we deal with every day: the
political climate, the rise of extremism, the way digital life shapes us…
If we didn’t address those things, the music would feel disconnected from
who we are.
5. Songs like “Wohin mit der Scheiße von gestern?” and “Sie sind hier” sound
both furious and reflective. Can you talk about the messages behind these
tracks and what you want listeners to take from them?
The two songs deal with different issues. “Wohin mit der Scheiße von
Gestern?” is essentially about a generational conflict — the feeling among
Millennials, Gen Z, and younger generations that we’re inheriting a world that
often feels almost impossible to manage. A lot of that has to do with
environmental destruction and the climate crisis, and with the fear that the
decisions made right now will create irreversible consequences that will define
the next decades of our lives, no matter how politics might shift in the
future. There’s also a frustration with the arrogance and dismissiveness coming
from parts of the older generation, who brush off younger people’s concerns or
activism and refuse to acknowledge that the world of today has nothing to do
with the world of 20 or 30 years ago. And yet many political parties rely
exactly on that nostalgia-driven voter base that wants to rewind everything
back to 1990 — which is absurd and dangerous. “Sie sind hier” touches on
something related but has its own focus: the rise of the political right in
Europe, especially in Germany with parties like the AfD. The song deals not
only with the people who vote for them, but also with the wide societal middle
that tolerates it — whether by looking away, normalizing it, or not voting at
all. That silent middle might not actively support far-right ideologies, but by
staying passive, it still strengthens them. So the threats emerging from this
rightward shift are, in part, a result of political failure — but also of
collective inaction and a lack of responsibility from society as a whole.
6. The return of drummer Stephan Spilker after more than a decade clearly
influenced the sound. How did his comeback change the dynamic within the band
and the creative process?
To clarify: Stephan never played in HVRT before. He was the drummer in
NVRVD, a band Christian and I played in many years ago. When that band
dissolved, we didn’t play together for about twelve years, and during that time
Stephan moved into completely different musical territories: singer-songwriter
projects, swing, jazz, even ’50s rock’n’roll. So when our former drummer Tobi
left, Stephan was immediately our dream choice to step in, even though his
playing style is very different. The music in HVRT — and in our previous band
Shitshifter — was always written around the drummer’s style. Tobi was a raw
force of nature: very punk-infused, incredibly powerful, and he gave the band a
certain live ferocity. He wasn’t as technically oriented as Stephan, and that shaped
the songwriting: more minimalistic, riff-driven, direct, and less atmospheric.
Stephan, on the other hand, is an extremely versatile, highly skilled, and
still very powerful professional drummer. His return opened up a completely
different creative spectrum for us. With him, we can push the extremes further
— in dynamics, complexity, detail, and atmosphere.
7. You’ve collaborated with artists like Thorn (Necrotic Woods/Raptvre),
Kirill Gromada, and Rebecca Möller. What did these guest appearances bring to
the overall vision of the record?
We’ve always loved working with guest musicians — we’re lucky to have
incredibly talented friends. Bringing them into HVRT feels natural; it's an
extension of our musical vision. Thorn, for example, is someone I play with in
Raptvre, where we explore progressive black and death metal. He has this
wonderfully eerie, filthy, and genuinely unsettling vocal quality that was
perfect for “Neutronensterne”. His voice adds a kind of haunted authenticity
that we could never have created ourselves. Kirill, who also plays in Raptvre
and also fronts Pripjat and Ayahuasca, is a complete musical multitalent —
songwriting, instrumentation, vocals, everything. For “A Newfound Comfort,” we
wanted a slightly thrash-infused edge, and we knew from his work that he could
deliver exactly that. His tone brought a character to the song that neither of
our voices could have matched. And then there’s Rebecca from Blood Specter — a
great and incredibly versatile vocalist. On “Zwitterlicht”, we imagined a
push-and-pull dynamic between my voice and hers. The track is introverted and
introspective, essentially a dialogue between two perspectives within one
person. Her presence made that emotional duality feel much more real.
8. The title track, “Cancerbloom,” paints a haunting picture of digital
disconnection. How do you personally see the relationship between technology,
isolation, and creativity today?
For me, the more interesting part of the question is the relationship
between technology and isolation. It’s not exactly a secret that the way most
of us use social media isn’t healthy. Everyone knows these platforms can be
incredibly dark spaces where the worst parts of human behavior surface. One of
the biggest problems is the illusion of connection — the sense of having
countless “friends” online while, in reality, people become more and more
isolated in their actual lives. That tension, and the emotional fallout that
comes with it, is at the core of the title track “Cancerbloom”. Technology
plays a complicated role in creativity as well. On one hand, we can write
critical lyrics and explore these themes precisely because we’re aware of how
technology shapes us. And of course, it’s undeniable that modern tools make it
possible for bands like us to create extremely detailed pre-productions and
recordings that simply wouldn’t have been feasible twenty years ago. But that’s
the obvious part — the part everyone already knows. What interests me more is
how the digital world affects our sense of self and our relationships.
9. CANCERBLOOM feels like both a statement and a journey. Was there a
particular moment in the studio when you realized you were creating something
special or different from everything you’d done before?
Whether something we create is “special” is only partly in our hands. Our
own perspective on the music isn’t any more important than that of the people
who eventually listen to it. We’re far too close to it to have an undistorted
view, and in the end it’s the audience who decides what the album becomes for
them. As an underground band that isn’t chasing trends, we’re not under the
illusion that a record like this will change the world or spark some huge
breakthrough. That’s not why we make music. What we can do is act out of
conviction. We try to be the band we ourselves would want to see — and many
great bands before us have followed exactly that philosophy. If there’s a
“recipe” at all, it’s simply that: make the music that feels honest and
exciting to you. So instead of waiting for a moment in the studio where
everything suddenly feels monumental, we focus on doing the work in front of
us. If listeners later decide that CANCERBLOOM is something special, then
that’s their experience.
10. Looking ahead, how do you see HVRT’s evolution continuing after
CANCERBLOOM? Are there new directions or ideas already forming for the next
chapter?
As long as we keep discovering music that excites us — regardless of genre
— there will always be new material for HVRT. And yes, there are already quite
a few ideas in motion. CANCERBLOOM was really just one part of a much larger
pool of songs that existed at the time we recorded it. We easily had another
full album’s worth of material that never made it into the studio, and since
then we’ve written another eight to ten tracks. So the raw material is
definitely there. But having lots of songs doesn’t automatically mean we have
an album. For us, it’s crucial that the tracks form a coherent whole — that
they’re equally strong, that they belong together, and that they represent who
we are as a band at this moment. Some older songs have been with us since before
our previous record, but they no longer feel connected to who we are now, so
it’s increasingly unlikely they’ll ever be released. Creatively and
politically, there’s unfortunately no shortage of things to write about these
days — often more than we’d like...
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