Insineratehymn is an absolutely crushing underground band and here is an interview with band member Abraham Garcia.
Have you always lived in LA, CA? If not where did you grow up?
Yes born and raised in Los Angeles, CA
What sort of kid were you growing up? Did you have many friends and what did you want to be when you were growing up?
I was a chill kid and made a good amount of friends going to school. My crowd of friends was quite mixed I was pretty cool with everyone. However even as a kid and later on as a teenager I tried to keep my circle small and hang out with my friends I was most close too. To this day my close friends go back since elementary. Frank Montero, our guitarist, and I have been friends since third grade. As far as what I wanted to be growing up I honestly had no clue. Once I turned 18 I ventured out to see what was out there for me. Of course music is something I wanted to do but I wanted something else career wise. I’ve grown interest in the medical field recently. Maybe later on once I have the funds to attend a good school Ill jump on it.
When did music start to enter your live and what were some early bands that you got into?
I got into music the day my cousin brought home a copy of AC/DC Live in Donington one of his friends let him borrow. We used to play it quite often and just kick back. I got hooked on AC/DC and they are the reason I wanted to play in a band. I bought my own copy of that same CD and heard it religiously. When I met Frank in third grade I started to get hooked on Slayer, Megadeth, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Venom, Kreator, Sodom and list goes on. We had a lot of music available to us because his parents are metal heads so it was quite easy for us to learn this genre. Whether it was thrash, heavy metal, death metal they had it. We got into the heavier bands pretty quick but one thing is for sure, when it came to the underground, we had to go on our own to discover the real deal.
Now how did you end up discovering the underground side of metal? Did you take to it right away or did it take some time?
I started to get into the underground before I started high school. Out here in LA there was a scene that was picking up around 2006 but I didn’t discover it until 2008 and one of the first local bands I got into was a band named HORRID. They were a Blackened Death/Thrash band and had a demo called Worship of Death/Invokers of Satan. The minute I heard that demo I wanted to dig in more into the bands they were into and the rest of scene was playing. That’s when I started to learn about bands like Sepultura, Sadistic Intent, Morbid Angel, Massacre, Obituary, Darkthrone’s “Soulside Journey”, Mortuary (Mex), Cenotaph (Mex), Unleashed, Immolation and the list just goes on. I definitely took in the heavier and underground bands right away. Anything I had played before discovering this was just not enough. Later on when I started jamming with Frank and other people we met we started to learn about Swedish Death Metal, Grindcore, Blackened Death Metal and anything from Europe and other places around the world from the 90s within that realm. We just wanted to put out a release and become part of the underground like the upcoming bands that were leaving their mark on the scene and the bands we looked up too.
Do you realize that were the band is based out of was “hair metal” city back in the mid 80’s until Nirvana came along in 1994 and crushed it?
Haha! Yes LA is the city where Motley Crue and a lot of those other Glam/Hair Metal bands got big.
Now at what point did decide you wanted to form a band and how did you go about looking for members?
The idea of starting a band goes way back to when Frank and I were kids. Growing up we wanted to jam and it happened once I bought my drum set when I was thirteen or fourteen. We would just jam in my apartment when the neighbors weren’t home doing a few covers we knew and write some original material. It wasn’t until we were eighteen when we put together our first serious band which was Transcendence in 2012. I put that band together with Frank after I hung out with Miguel Perez one summer afternoon. At the time he was in a death metal band named Detest. I like Detest’s music and just asked him if he wanted to jam. The rest is history. As for Insineratehymn, I decided to put this band together because I wanted to take a new path as a musician. Our former vocalist wanted to start a band with me so that’s how we started this and I just reached out to some friends to see if they were down to jam. I wanted Frank for sure in the band when a former member, Alexander left. I met Demitree when he came over to the studio and has been down to jam and keep this band going since day one. I had a good network of people I had met or Demitree had knew about and we’d bring them in to jam.
I read that there is not a lot of early info on the band and that there's not much information on the band, but that between 2008-2012 that Mauricio Lopez was the only solid member. The band had lack of stable members from 2008-2012 and he postponed the band in 2012. In 2016 you joined and he put the stable line up together and now even Lopez is gone. Please fill me in on the early days of the band and members.
From what Mauricio has told me the early line up did not last long and he decided to postpone the band because he couldn’t find serious members to jam with and also there wasn’t anyone in his hometown who had the same musical interest as him. Mauricio is a longtime diehard death metal fan and around 2008 to 2012, LA was big on the thrash revival bands and shows that were going on. I met him in 2014 I believe so. I wasn’t there when he first put this band on his own. He’s always lived up in San Fernando Valley and I’m from South LA so I can’t tell you about the early days since I didn’t meet him until years later. What I can say is Insineratehymn became official when I put it together in 2016.
How did you end up finding singer Hugo Gomez?
Hugo and I have been friends since 2010 or 2011. I met him at a show his first band Detest played. And since then we just always stayed in contact and hang out at some shows. For a while we used go cruise up to the canyons when we got into the car scene. Anyhow, during the recording of our first album our vocalist who had replaced Mauricio, Marco Tocsain, wasn’t cutting it. So I hit up Hugo to come down to do the vocals.
What were the early practices like? Did you just do cover tunes and when did you start to write originals?
When I started to get Insineratehymn going with a solid line up I already had ideas and songs written. By that time all of us in the band had experience from our previous bands so we went straight to originals and writing some new songs from the ones I already had written. We didn’t ever think of doing any covers and it still doesn’t come into our thoughts or bring it up about doing a cover. Just not something we do.
Who pens the lyrics and what are some of the topics the band covers in them?
Demitree our lead guitarist writes the lyrics. The topics are pretty straight forward. We like to write about humanity in all aspects and details we don’t put much attention too in our daily lives. This could be anything about humanity from diseases, depression, feelings, death, mental disorders, poverty, spirituality just things in life we don’t put much attention too sometimes. We know in this genre the lyrics won’t be understood with the low deep growls but if any listeners out there like to read lyrics maybe there is a song they can relate too because of a situation they’re going through or went through it.
Who came up with the band name (Insineratehymn) and where any other names thrown around?
Mauricio came up with the name. Him and I like the name for the reason that we didn’t find another band with that name whenever we searched it up. We also like Deicide and he got off the album entitled “Insineratehymn” and even though we dont like that album like many other fans, the name to us sounded cool. Once he shown me the logo I liked the name even more.
Who came up with the bands logo?
Once again Mauricio had the logo done by an artist he contacted online. I can’t remember the name and where he was from
Did you put any demos or stuff prior to the release of your debut album?
No demos were put out before the album aside from a pre-production track of Seeking Immortality with Marco on vocals. We uploaded it to our Bandcamp and used it for promotion purposes to get on shows.
Tell me what your 1st live show was like? Were you as a band nervous at all and how do you feel it went after you were done?
Our first show was pretty cool. We played some popular west coast death metal acts such as Disembowl from Portland, Skulls, Mysticism and my previous band Transcendence. We were a bit nervous at least for Frank and I just a bit. It was our first time playing alive after a cool while so we just had to adjust to it again. As for Demitree we are his first band he’s ever played live with but he did good. That first show was a good turnout.
Now your debut release is out and it is called, “A Moment in a Vision”. Any meaning behind the title?
The meaning behind the album title is basically someone who is passing away and as they are dying they are having a good vision of everything they lived. The persons dream is joyful at first but slowly all of that starts to fade away and things start to look dark. The end to their dream is death. Tears start running down his/her face and in the reflection of their eyes is a graveyard.
How was it going into the studio for this release and around overall how much money was spent recording it?
Going into the studio was great. We worked with Allen Falcon. A guy that likes to get things done properly and will tell you without hesitation to get your act together if something in the song isn’t working well. Very blunt dude. But those are the people who are best to work with. We learned a lot about some of the flaws we encountered and fixed it. Definitely someone we recommend for any band or artist out there. As far as costs it was under $500. Also Chris Monroy of Skeletal Remains recommended us to go to him because Allen has good deals for good quality recording in LA and like most bands we have a tight budget at first but we are glad we were able to find the right place.
How did you end up working with Narcoleptica Productions and how have things worked out so far considering they are from Russia.
I was looking for a label to release our album and Andrey (who runs the label) picked up on it quick. He was very helpful in making the packaging for the CDs and showed us the progress on how the booklet was coming out and the same goes for the CD layout and Jewel case inlays. Because of the label we started to pick up more of a fan base out in Russia and other countries in Europe.
How do you feel this release stacks up against all the other new music that comes out in the underground daily?
I can’t answer that. That’s something a listener would be able to tell you and they would be the best to ask that question. (I think it stacks up quite well myself-cf)
For someone who has never heard the band before, describe what you think you sound like?
We many influences but for the sound of our first album for anyone who’s into bands like Edge of Sanity, Death, Pestilence, Entombed and early Unleashed then give our album a listen.
Around how much time in any given week is spent doing band related stuff?
We jam very often during the week. About 2 to 3 days in the weekdays.
How do you plan on promoting this release so it doesn’t stick in with all the other mediocre death metal and underground metal bands out there?
In these times definitely through social media. It’s a tool we gotta use now to get anything known out to the world. Aside from that also building a network with labels, show hosts and other bands within the scene. We’re also doing a North West Tour in August with Pestilent Death. Getting on the road is a must for any band.
Please plug any websites you have.
For anyone that wants to follow us on social media you can follow us at www.facebook.com/insineratehymnofficial, Instagram at insineratehymn_official, YouTube at Insineratehymn Official and our Bandcamp at https://insineratehymn.bandcamp.com/. We are also on Narcoleptica’s site at https://narcolepticaprod.bandcamp.com/album/a-moment-in-a-vision.
If someone wants to purchase your great death metal release, how can they go about it?
You can purchase our album on digital format on our Bandcamp at https://insineratehymn.bandcamp.com/. For CDs you can pre order your copy on Narcoleptica’s site at https://narcolepticaprod.bandcamp.com/album/a-moment-in-a-vision. We will also be have Cassettes by Nexcro Records in Asia and we are currently talking with Analog Overdose Records in South America for a Cassette release too. So follow us on our pages to stay updated if you like a copy of that as well.
Any last words, horns up for doing this interview.
Thanks for reaching out to us and interest in the band. Shout out to our friends, Narcoleptica Productions, Nexcro Records, Metal Vault, old and new listeners for your support! Cheers!
June 2018