Enemy I Interview

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?
Founded by singer/songwriter Rob DeVille and drummer Alex Swienty in 2013, Enemy I is a versatile/depressive industrial metal band based in Berlin, Germany.
In February 2014, we released our first debut EP, containing 5 tracks which show our flexibility between different metal genres.
Presently, we’re expanded to five musicians and have finally released our first full length album called "Dysphoria".

2.How would you describe the musical sound that is presented on the recordings?
We try to combine different metal and rock genres with industrial hues, sometimes with a melancholic feel, other times with more angry/aggressive tones. Almost everything between Gothic and Death Metal is allowed, for we don’t want to limit ourselves.

3.You describe your music as 'depressive industrial metal', can you tell us a little bit more about this term?
Since we never felt home in just one specific genre, we started a little brainstorm some years ago. Reflecting our individuality, we came to the point of entitling our music style as such, because happiness is rare in our songs. As versatile as we are, industrial soundscapes and minor keys are part of most of our music.

4.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?
As the title 'Dysphoria' already promises, our lyrics are mainly about less happier things than love, freedom or dancing in the sunshine. Even though the topic “love” is a trigger for many lyrics, it’s usually meaningless and without a happy ending. But no matter if it’s about a broken relationship, the inner fight with oneself or the absence of any godlike existence, it’s usually the dark moments in life which make our frontman Rob become creative.

5.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Enemy I'?
It’s about the principle Michael Jackson has already been singing about in “man in the mirror”. Everyone has their problems and mistakes and of course it’s a lot easier to blame someone else for it. But if you really wanna change something about it, you have to start with reflecting yourself, cause somehow we're all our own worst enemy. So it’s kind of self-therapy for us.

6.What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?
One of our personal highlights was for sure our support gig for Die Krupps last year. But also the smaller stages and venues are always fun to perform at. Whether it be unplugged or with the full set-up, we always love to play live and are looking forward for further gigs to present 'Dysphoria' live and not only on CD.

7.Do you have any touring or show plans for the future?
We’ve been so engaged with the album (we’ve done the majority of the production ourselves), that we’ve barely had the time to care about concert bookings. Shame on us! ;-) However, after the record release concert on May 27th in Berlin, we will start planning further concerts and hopefully get a little tour together for fall, winter and 2018, before we start working on the next album.

8.Currently you are unsigned, are you looking for a label or have received any interest?
We received some offers from independent labels during the last year, yet we finally decided to release it on our own, with the help from distribution partners such as recordJet and Soulfood. But of course we’re always open for serious offers, maybe for our next album. Let’s see what the future will bring…

9.On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of metal and industrial?
Even though we barely made much promotion for the debut EP, still we received positive feedback from numerous radio stations in Canada, North America, Nicaragua and other countries. We were more concentrated on releasing our first songs, playing concerts and building up our fan base slowly and focus on the album release, because it's always a matter of money to run a big promotion and get people to know you. Now that we finally are releasing our debut album we're looking forward to getting some more feedback and infect the world with our music.

10.Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?
We'll hopefully stay as flexible and open-minded as we are today and in the future, even more. Already we have an industrial ballade on our album, which has really not much to do with the metal genre yet fits perfectly with our tailormade style. For our second album, we have a few songs in the pipeline that strengthen the evidence of our eagerness to experiment. And who knows, perhaps there will come more diverse influences that will permeate our creative style. Hang on to your seats kiddos, it’s gonna be an exciting ride! ;-)

11.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
Probably everything that we've been through and all the music that we've been listening to, since our childhood till today, has been a big influence, no matter if it's Michael Jackson or Cannibal Corpse. And we're still listening to very diverse music styles and artists. So it's really not easy to say, yet the biggest influences are probably lots of the metal subgenres and electro pop, bands like Pain, Zeromancer, Paradise Lost and Nine Inch Nails.

12.What are some of your non musical interests?
I'm afraid that's not so much, since music has a very high priority in our lives and we spend the majority of our time creating and experimenting. But if the music allows it, we just like to enjoy hanging out with our friends and families like everyone else. Sometimes we take a ride on our guitarist’s boat and just take it easy with a few beers and BBQ.

13.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?
First of all, we wanna thank you of course for your interest. It was a pleasure for us and we hope that you all have fun listening to our new album, even though it's called 'Dysphoria'. ;)
If you like our music, we'd be thankful for each comment, review, 'like' and 'follow' on the social media and our homepage. Hope to see you all soon when we hit the stage again!