Cyrence – The Highwire Daze Legacy Interviews

The Thrash Metal Ward of Cyrence

New Introduction by Editor Ken: Another amazing band presented for coverage by my friend Markus Eck at the almighty Metalmessage.  Cyrence was from Munich, the city of delicious beer and kickass metal.  And Cyrence present their thrasing amthems in the grand tradition of all things Metallica and Megadeth.  Their one and only album to date is called The Hospital and it’s a gem well worth seeking out.  Here is the interview I conducted with band founder Tim Grathwohl back in 2015.

Band: CYRENCE
Musiker: Tim Grathwohl (Vocals, Guitars)
Magazin: Highwire-Daze-Online

Introduce yourself, tell me what you do in Cyrence, and how long the band has been together.
Hi folks, my name is Tim Grathwohl, I’m the singer and guitarist of Cyrence! Cyrence was founded by myself back in 2006. After writing, recording and producing the demo EP “Endtime Stories” all by myself, I searched for fellow metalheads to form a full band in 2009. Several personnel changes followed until the current line-up of Dominic (guit), Tom (drums) and Chris (bass/backing vox) joined the band in 2010, 2011, and 2012, respectively. Since then, we have written new songs, played gigs all over Bavaria and recorded our EP “The Hospital“, which was released on 27 March 2015.

Where is the band based out of and what is your local metal scene like there?
We’re based in Munich, Germany. We have a very fine little metalscene in Munich. There’s some metalbars and clubs and many venues where metalbands can play. The local bands in Munich are all a bunch of very nice guys who love to play and party, and we’re friends with lots of them. Yes, the Munich metalscene is awesome 😀

Is there any story or concept behind the EP title The Hospital?
Unlike our demo EP „Endtime Stories“, which was a concept-EP about a girl who tried to survive a nuclear attack and it’s aftermath, there’s no concept behind the EP-title „The Hospital“.

Select two songs from The Hospital and what inspired the lyrics.
First, there’s „Dystopia“. Dystopia is an apocalyptic song about a man who tries to rebuild society after mankind almost destroyed our planet. That man tries his best but fails like mankind has failed before. There’s plagues, there’s corruption, there’s social inequality. So there’s a riot and the lower class wants to punish him for his failure. The Song is highly inspired by the stories of William Gibson and computer games like DeusEx and Bioshock.

The second song is „I won’t fall“. The lyrics are about people, who won’t give up fighting. I had the pleasure to meet some very amazing people with serious health issues. They just didn’t give up fighting, even in their darkest hours. I have nothing but respect for all of them, and „I won’t fall“ is a song about (and for) people like them.

Who did the cover art for The Hospital and how much input did you have on it?
The picture itself is by a very talented young photographer from the UK called Rob Walker. Rob did a lot of urban exploring, and the photograph which is now our cover-picture is a hallway inside the abandoned „Severalls“Mental-Hospital in the UK. There also have been experiments on patients, so the photo was nothing less than a perfect fit for our EP.

What could one expect from a live Cyrence show in 2015?
Energy! Sweat! And lots of fun with big fat grins 😀 We love to play live, and that you will witness if you come to a live Cyrence show!

Any strange or scary happenings while on the road or at a show?
I’d love to give you a great story here, but fortunately nothing strange or scary ever happened to us, sorry guys 🙂

If you could open up for any band or artist either now or from the past, who would it be and why?
I think that would be Youthanasia-era MEGADETH. Together with Alice Cooper, they’re my biggest influence, and in that period their setlist was a monster! I’d choose them for two reasons. First, I think their audience would also love our music, so it would fit perfectly. Second, I’d love to see that Line-Up perform a setlist like they did in Chile back in 1995!

What is your favorite beer of choice and why?
That’s a Weltenburger Anno 1050. I just love that beer! Tastes delicious and you get no headache the next day if you drink too much of it 😉

What’s up next for Cyrence?
Since all our spare time went straight into finishing our EP „The Hospital“, we didn’t play many concerts for about a year. So, that’s about to change soon! Also, we’re very happy with our EP, so we try to get it to as many people as possible. We think we did write some amazing songs that every metalfan will like, so we need to find out if we’re right 🙂

Any final words of wisdom?
Be excellent to each other!

Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions! Hope to see Cyrence here in the States sometime soon!
Of course, thank you! A Cyrence show in the states would be awesome indeed! So spread the word of our EP the Hospital (http://cyrence.bandcamp.com/) and maybe we will be there soon!

(Interview by Ken Morton)

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