You ever see that meme Angry Hulk versus Peaceful Hulk from the MCU and comparing it to that of metal acts when they’re on stage versus backstage? I kind of feel like that’s the case for Hateful Abandon, which is two dudes making some of the most oppressive industrial metal you’ll hear regarding the world around us, the politics of it ruining it all for everyone, corruption, so on and so forth. A social statement on the world we see around us. Behind it all are two friends who laugh and drink and create music together for fun with a storied history spanning twenty years. With the release of their latest album THREAT we got a word with Martin and Tom in this edition of INTRODUCING.
Give us a brief about your band. Who are you and what do you do?
We, H/A, are a duo based in the South-West of England. Martin (Vice Martyr) resides in Bristol, and I (Tom) live in the countryside 50 mins south of the city which is where our studio is. We’ve somehow been active for 20 years making whatever sounds we like, no limits. It just has to move us. We’re both multi-instrumentalists of the lowest calibre, with myself usually focusing on drums and electronics, and Martin on bass, guitar, and vocals. Having said, we can end up trying to use almost anything we can get our hands on.
When did you first launch the project and how has it come along since?
We first got together around 2007 after meeting in a pub in Bristol a few years prior to that. We were both already making music at the time, Martin had releases out with his solo black metal projects BASILISK, and ABANDON (which would later morph into HATEFUL ABANDON) and I had released an album under the name SWINE (Von worship) but my main band was SALUTE (thrash/bm/punk style stuff) which is still going to this day, on and off. We would meet a few times a year at various pubs, bars, and gigs, and got on very well together. Same sense of humour and obsession with music etc.
One evening, after copious amounts of lager, Martin had the idea of us recording together under the name HA, with a plan to blend a lot of the post-punk, black metal, and Industrial sounds that we both loved together, to form something ultra depressive. I instantly agreed as I loved the idea of working on something different, something without limits, and just wanted to work on as much music as possible.
We booked in the first of a handful of sessions at my tremendously low budget studio in late 2007 to record the initial songs that Martin already had ideas for. All songs from these sessions made up our first album FAMINE, which was released in December 2008 on Todestrieb rex. We stayed with the label recording a further 2 albums, all at the same studio, and the studio we still work in today. It’s a good sized albeit ultra crusty old barn, with very basic equipment. We’ve talked about what it would be like working somewhere else, but funds would never allow this. Also, the space is dripping with our own history. You can still feel and smell some of our old recording sessions in there, along with stale beer spillage and tobacco smoke.
Going back to our Todestrieb days – this was/is a great label, with the owner also creating all of the artwork for us at the time. He was really good to us, but we had an offer to join a larger record label just after out third album LIARS/BASTARDS was released. This decision turned out to be disastrous.
Following on from this period, we set ourselves up to perform live and started recording our 4th album. We only played a bunch of shows, but these turned out better than expected and it was the first time we’d actually met people that’d heard our music that we didn’t already know haha! A cool, but short lived period in time. Then our record label folded, and health issues/other various life events forced us into early retirement around 2015. We still kept in touch over the next 10 years, meeting up to hang out, and even did a few more recording sessions, but it wasn’t until late 2024 after finding our lost and unfinished album, that we understood we must return! So here we are today.
What bands and artists influenced you the most and why?
There are so, so many. We are both music fanatics and spend as much time listening to music together as we do creating it, almost. I’ve picked out some bands/artists that inspired us to form HA in the first place, along with a few others thrown in. Otherwise, we’ll be here all day, haha.
Amebix, Discharge, Swans, Dead Can Dance, Killing Joke, Suicide/Alan Vega, Beherit, Throbbing Gristle, Old dub legends like The Scientist, Coil, Von, Bethlehem, Soap&Skin, Agnes Obel, Johann Johannsson, Napalm Death, The Stooges, Whitehouse/Consumer Electronics, Early Detroit techno and early 90’s breakbeat, Late 80’s/early 90’s free party sound systems, Scorn, Broadrick, Vangelis.
I could literally go on forever. What influences us about all of these? They’re pretty much all pioneers and have all tried and created something different/unique. I would never ever announce that we too are ‘pioneering’, but we at least aim to sound unique. Whether or not it works, who knows.
If you could pick a single song from your discography to explain your music, which song would you pick and why?
That’s a hard question as there’s been so many we’ve enjoyed creating over the years. Some good memories. We’d both probably pick something different, but I’d say either The Test from LIARS/BASTARDS, or Shithouse from THREAT. The Test because we really touched on a certain cold and empty mood that has always been within us and our sound. I also remember being pissed up and laughing our tits off creating the computerised voice at the end of the track. Shithouse because it’s so aggressive sounding, and again something we’ve have always wanted to get out of us. This was the track that inspired us to keep going.
What is your most recent release and what is it about?
Our most recent album is THREAT, which came out in September on Sentient Ruin, a fantastic label. This album features songs that were recorded back in 2014/15 before our break, along with some fresh cuts from last year. I do not write any of the lyrics, but in short, the album is about all that is wrong in the world, as always. Constant panic, constant pain!
Take us through your creative process. How do you compose a song from start to finish? Where do the ideas come from?
We primarily start with drums and bass guitar, to capture a live take of the bare bones. Once we’re happy with a rough structure, we record. We always have an idea of how we want the song to sound, or what style of song we’re going for beforehand, but this almost always changes once we start layering sounds on top of the basic recordings. Anything can happen and usually does. For example, we recently recorded a track that sounded like Miami speed boats and cocaine in ’85, all by accident. Although this was funny as hell, it didn’t work, and we reimagined the song at the next session. That’s the good thing about what we do, we really are open to trying anything, and have immense pleasure in doing so, often breaking out into manic laughter!
Although we make extremely negative sounding music, we really do have a good time with it. It’s intense, we work long hours in a session, and rarely stop for a break, but its great. We hardly disagree, as in, I literally can’t think of a time that we have. Having said that, if one of us is unhappy with the way a song is going, or the direction it’s moving in, we stop and move on to something else. We don’t try to push ideas onto one another; we let things happen as naturally as possible.
So yes, the bare bones are recorded first, and then we start adding textural layers to help capture a certain feel, which is usually followed by a lead of some sort, and this where all the magic happens. You feel the energy lift in the room, we’re locked in! Once we’re happy with the arrangement, vocals are normally recorded, and almost always one take, maybe two. Martin has great lyrics, and an abundance of them so he’s usually editing them whilst we’re organising the song in preparation. Samples, found sounds, and our own SFX usually come next, but can also happen at any given moment.
Ideas – these can come from anywhere at any point. It may be a song title, a film/documentary that one of us has watched, a sound snippet, some weird ancient audio, a random hellish sound, photographs of decay, a place one of us has visited. Literally anything, as I’m sure is the same with most creative people. For me being a drummer, a lot of my ideas start with a beat. Usually waking up at night with some horrible drum pattern going around in my head.
What’s your current favourite song, band, or album within your scene? And vice versa, what do you enjoy the most that’s completely opposite of what you make?
We’ve never been part of a scene per se. Not that we have anything against scenes whatsoever, we’ve just always been out on our own in isolation. A band that springs to mind instantly is Rigorous Institution from Portland, Oregon. Sentient Ruin also released their album, and its heavy! I first heard it a few years back via Martin, and its always being played over here. Although they completely have their own unique sound, they’ve encapsulated that ancient mystery that Amebix had, which is something that nobody else has ever come close to. In my opinion, that is.
What is on the horizon for your project? Upcoming gigs, tours, merch, videos, etc. Name it, link it, show it off.
We stopped playing live 10 years ago and have no current plans to start again. We enjoyed it, and it makes total sense to do it in some ways, but with us both working full time, and me as a parent, it wouldn’t leave any time for creating new music, which is our priority. Being a duo makes it super hard to create our sound live without using additional musicians, and without just playing to a pre-recorded backing song or something. We put a lot of effort trying to get it right last time, and we feel it worked, but we’d rather just keep on writing and recording new music for now. Maybe in the future?
Therefore, we’re currently writing/recording our next album, and this will continue well into next year. In the meantime, there are talks of re-releasing our back catalogue on Sentient Ruin which is great for us, and really exciting. This will hopefully be in all formats and the first time any of it has been released on vinyl.
Regarding merch, we have some old stock which can be bought at hatefulabandon.bigcartel.com and we’re also in talks with creating some fresh designs for our latest album. Cheers!
Hateful Abandon’s THREAT is available now via Sentient Ruin in Vinyl, Cassette, and Digital Formats. You can grab your copy HERE.
