Summon: How did the band get started?
Balahr: The band took form in 2008 when, with Kerennos and Sreng, we decided to take advantage of some old riffs that I had written so we could form an actual band, honoring our common passion: extreme metal and most particularly early 90’s black metal, keeping in mind the hope to bring our own vision on this music. After having tried several drummers without really any success and having produced a demo and a split we had the chance to meet Bress in winter 2009, and that’s, in my opinion, the moment our music started having a real substance, a real texture.
Summon: What kind of music do you play?
Balahr: We play black metal, generally speaking. You won’t find in my opinion a specific tag to attach to the band. If we could name what we do, let’s say it is artisanal, « sylvan » and warlike with quite a few melodies and a sustained pace. But you will probably find other qualifiers listening to our music.
Summon: How has the fan response been?
Balahr: Like any band who decides to get out from the dark and release music, we sincerely hope to have an audience. But I think speaking of « fan » at our level is premature. There are a lot of people supporting us and some larger bands and influent people; we’ve had quite a few of good feedback, review-wise. That allows us to meet people, to play gigs and even sometimes make good friends. That’s already much more than we’ve ever hoped, back when we started. Let’s hope things keep going that way for a long time.
Summon: Where did the band name come from?
Balahr: The name of the band comes from my early readings. I discovered the « Fhoi Myore » in Michael Moorcock’s books « Corum » trilogies. They are creatures coming from nothingness, looking to recreate on Earth the nothingness they came from. By mistake, they ended up on the terrestrial plane because of an opening in the multiverse. They felt like strangers to the world they fell into, up to the point they became physically sick from it. They do not destroy neither from hatred or ideology, but only to recreate the conditions of their own, original place. That is a rather close notion of what we feel when we look at the world around us; we are strangers there and it sickens us. The other reason we chose that name is because of what the name itself carries, the ancientness surrounding it: « Fhoi Myore » is a transformation of « Formors » or « Former », a wink to our music coming directly from the origins of black metal. Finally, in the Celtic legends, the « Formors » are idiotic and deformed creatures which are so greedy that they end up devouring the earth and dying because no resources are left anymore. It strangely reminds us humanity.
Summon: Introduce the band members and what they do in the band.
Balahr: We are four permanent members: Bress at the drums, Kerennos takes care of the bass duties, Sreng sings. I am in charge of the guitars (and generally speaking, of the music writing). When we play on stage we also have a session guitarist. For the French tour we did back in May, Tedd took the second guitar. By the way, he is the writer/guitarist from the excellent band « Wyrms ». He also is our to-go artist for the artworks and layout of all our productions and live banners since the 2010 EP (« The Northern Cold »).
Summon: Who writes the music? Lyrics?
Balahr: Sreng writes all the lyrics. They do not fit in a single frame but they rather talk about a broad spectrum of subjects. For example, the album talks about the nature’s transformation during autumn, which dies so it can become the seed of a future creation in spring. But most of our tracks like « I’m The Master Of Hounds » (talking about Kerennos the master of dog-like creatures of the Fhoi Myore, that are sent to attack mabdens) simply are tributes to Michael Moorcock works. On the split album with Pestiferum, we decided to paint the chaos under various forms, from creation to destruction until the white inferno which represents the absolute non-creation, the void of emptiness, so to speak. We try to discuss about the maximum of thematics that are close to us and to ourselves, without creating any restraint.
Summon: And where do the lyric ideas come from?
Balahr: In Fhoi Myore, the music always is written long before the texts : that way the lyric ideas often come from the music we created and wrote. Sometimes when I complete a track I give it a name, more or less helping Sreng about the direction of the described ambiances. Sometimes Sreng uses the feelings he experiences while listening to the track and drafts some texts about it. It really depends on the moment and on the track. One thing we known for sure is that we should never force anything. We always let our ideas sprout in our minds before laying those down on a track, even if we have to re-write some parts several times.
Summon: What is your view in Satanism and Occultism?
Balahr: I suppose that everything depends on the meaning you give to satanism and occultism. If you consider it like a religion as opposed to Judeo-Christianity, it’s just completely ridiculous. If you consider it like a libertarian and/or pagan school of thought it starts making a bit more sense, even if those terms make me puke. I will speak in the name of the band and I think the other members share more or less the same vision. In Fhoi Myore we are neither satanists nor Paganists in the common meaning. No elder gods or ancient devils, we consider black metal like a religion, which we use to create our own dogma, a mixture of animism and creative chaos, reflecting on all creations in the universe. It can be rather close to what some people call satanism but the sole evocation of this term does not have any sense since it was created my humans. We are against good morale and established orders, our ties with our « own » beliefs are strong and inalienable.
Summon: How many albums/CD’s have you released?
Balahr: We have made a split and a demo in 2009, an EP in 2011, re-released by Broken Limbs Recording on tape, an album on CD in 2012 released by Ancestrale Production, and our latest effort is a split CD with Pestiferum released this year on Ossuaire Records.
Summon: Tell me about some the songs on the latest CD?
Balahr: I already talked about it on one of my previous answers, the split album talks about the various forms chaos can take, whether philosophical on our side, or spiritual on Pestiferum’s side. We really tried on the split to show our feelings by talking about the different aspects of a single thematic, while keeping in mind that each band should keep its own signature. Our part is divided in several « acts », recounting the evolution and direction of Chaos in the different planes of the multiverse, which it dominates.
Summon: Do you have any side projects?
Balahr: Sreng, Kerennos and myself have little time to dedicate to other musical projects, because Fhoi Myore little by little took a lot of space in our lives. Since we do not set ourselves limits in terms of creation we do not feel the desire to create other entities; another reason is that it is also as much as a musical project than a therapy. It allows ourselves to liberate ourselves from our bland « everyday life », allowing us to come closer to each other as much spiritually than philosophically. Bress is often solicited by other bands for recordings or lives (because he also needs some kind of liberty), but never uses his Fhoi Myore name in those cases, for it is not something that can be shared with anything else.
Summon: Who are some of your musical influences?
Balahr: There are a lot, more to it than being passionate about that music since our adolescence, we also are collectors. If you have listened to our music, you probably suspect that the first albums of bands like Gorgoroth, Abigor, Mahyem, Drudkh or Behexen recently are being spun on our players. For my part, I listen to more and older Crust or Heavy/Black stuff like Doom, Bulldozer, Carnivor, Holocausto or the first albums by Extreme Noise Terror.
Summon: Which current bands?
Balahr: Concerning recent bands, I listen to a lot of French bands like Wyrms and Angmar. I also recently discovered Sad and Winter Deluge which took me by a great surprise.
Summon: What is the band like when you play live?
Balahr: You can find on the internet some videos of our live performances. Sound sucks ass but it gives a good idea of the general ambiance surrounding them. To sum up, it’s ballsy and fast black metal, close to our recordings (sometimes faster and thrashier, depending on how we « feel » our upcoming set), but live you will also find a good dose of thrash and a punkish vibe that you won’t necessarily hear on our studio productions.
Summon: Have you guys ever played in another country?
Balahr: Sadly for us we never had the chance to play outside our borders yet. But it may change during 2014, I won’t say more because I really want it to happen, and the more we talk the less we do!
Summon: How big of crowd shows up at shows usually?
Balahr: I’d say it depends on the size of both the venue and the town that holds the show, but what matters more isn’t the number of people attending the show, but their reaction to our music. It’s really great to play in front a hundred persons liking what we’re offering and outspoken about it, rather than in front of 500 static drones.
Summon: How is the crowd response when you play?
Balahr: We never had a negative feedback, so I suppose the people coming to see us are satisfied with what they saw. During our live experiences, there often are two types of audiences : the one who came to get wasted on our fast blasted or thrashed parts, and who headbangs and gets fucked in the pit ; and the others, calmer and laid back who just listen to our ambiances and melodies.
Summon: What do you think of the US Black Metal/Death Metal scene?
Balahr: The American extreme metal scene holds some fantastic bands like Absu, Judas Iscariot or Leviathan, but also some really underground pieces that fuck you up good, like Preteen Deathfuk that I discovered trading with a Japanese buddy. It’s a scene that I like and respect, but I sadly admit that so few underground US bands manage to come into our ears.
Summon: What do you think of the Overseas scenes?
Balahr: Objectively I think there’s good stuff everywhere. Proof is that there regularly are absolutely killer releases being exposed to the world from both South and North America. Even in Asia and sometimes in New Zealand (with the exceptional band Winter Deluge that I already cited but really deserves to be mentioned again). Europe never had the monopoly of good music even if there are so much big and legendary bands, especially in black metal. It’s just a matter of looking and having enough courage to go through so much shit miasmas from all the inconsistent bands. But it’s even better when after having listened to tons of crap you finally lay your hands on the fucking excellent band. I will never get tired of it.
Summon: What are some of new favorite black metal/death metal bands?
Balahr: If there is one band that particularly struck me lately, it’s Blood Of Kingu, and most notably their debut album « De Occulta Philosophia ».
Summon: When do you guys plan on writing any new material?
Balahr: We are about to record a new split with the excellent friends and musicians Wyrms. A limited vinyl release will happen summer 2014 if everything goes smoothly. It will most presumably be under the Ossuaire Records label, ran by a good friend who also is the drummer of Angmar.
Summon: What does the future hold for the band??
Balahr: We are going to write and record new material, and play a few shows in 2014. Sadly not in US but who knows what the future is made of?
Thank you for the interview. You can contact us at contact@fhoimyore.fr, do not hesitate to send us good music, we will listen thoroughly!
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