DAVIDE COTTI - HYPERION

#interview

DAVIDE COTTI - HyperioN

💿 Hi, it’s a pleasure for us to have on Hardrockheavymetal Davide Cotti of HYPERION!! You're Welcome!

Thank you for having me Hardrockheavymetal! I'm the guitar player and main songwriter of the band.

💿 Your new full-length, INTO THE MAELSTROM, out a few days ago on April 21st, was positive received on our pages.. Would you describe in a few words your new fatigue?

With “Into The Maelstrom” we tried to achieve a fresh and powerful take on the traditional heavy metal genre, blending fast, thrash-oriented riffing with catchy melodies and shredding guitar solos, all mixed together with modern production sounds.

Our songs are based on very different topics, spanning from science fiction to World War One, from ancient japanese ninjas to mind-bending videogames and much more.

💿 Inside your songs what’s the role of lyrics in the composition process? Words follow music or vice versa?

Most of the time the lyrics come first: usually I begin with a couple of lyrical lines that eventually will become the chorus of the song, then I try to find a melody that fit the general mood of the lyrics.

If everything works fine, I follow up adding different riffs and verses to see where the song is actually headed, until I come up with something good enough to be featured on an Hyperion album.

I have to say that is nice to be able to talk abut this, because most of the time the focus is centered around the music rather than the lyrics, but in reality I spend the same aumount of time (if not more) working on rhymes and verse structures then I do creating riffs and melodies.

As a matter of fact, leading to the album release I wrote a bunch of posts on our Facebook page titled “Dave's Lyrics Diary”, were I explain why and how every lyric on the new album was created and developed - check it out! (www.facebook.com/hyperionbandheavy/)

💿 How much is complicated to make music at the time of a global pandemy? Are you scheduling some concerts for the second part of the year or is too soon?

Unfortunately right now it's still too soon for that, nobody really knows when it will be feasible to schedule new live events.

This terrible pandemic has struck hard on many people, but it has also been bad on us as a band: we wanted to play live as much as we could during 2020, and while we were waiting for the album release, we had to watch the situation in our country getting worse every day, until it was clear that every plan was to be canceled, and every concert postponed.

💿 We love the cover of INTO THE MAELSTROM . Can you tell us somethin'about?

The artwork was done by the amazingly talented Alberto “Akirant” Quirantes, a great illustrator who is actually the current artist for the likes of Iron Maiden, Blaze Bayley, Star Wars and many more. It was early 2019, when we had finally decided the album title and the kind of “vibe” we wanted out of the cover.

The boss of our label pointed us in his direction and he was immediately enthusiastic to work on our project. This collaboration has been one the most enjoyable parts of the whole production process, and I personally believe that he came up with a serious contender for “artwork of the year”.

💿 INTO THE MAELSTROM is out on FIGHTER RECORDS. Can you tell us somethin’ about the birth of this partnership?

Our relationship with Fighter Records dates back to 2017. We had the promo version of our first album “Dangerous Days” sent to many labels all over the world, but between all the different contracts we were offered, the one from Fighter was by far the most serious and professional.

We feel very lucky to have the opportunity to work with a label that truly respect the bands and their music, and they allowed us to reach a very wide audience with both our records.

💿 On our pages we're “true defenders"of physical music, because we think that a CD or vinyl provide a complete experience that goes beyond single songs. What's your opinion about?

Being as “old shool” as it gets myself, I couldn't agree more! Yes, the digital format is really handy with the way music is consumed today, but I love the feeling of listening to a whole album while reading the lyrics in the pamphlet. “Into The Maelstrom” comes with a nice 16 pages booklet, with all the lyrics, the beautiful photos of Paolo Cavanna, and of course the cover artwork made by Akirant.

💿 Can you tell us somethin'about your fist approach with music? Which bands or artists influenced you the most?

We were all influenced, one way or another, by the great metal bands of the eighties.

Personally, as a songwriter I believe my main influences come for NWOBHM bands like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Angel Witch and Satan, but my guitar playing style is more rooted in the first albums of american thrash metal bands like Megadeth and Metallica.

In fact, the very first thing I did when I was trying to teach myself some guitar skills was to learn all the riffs on “Kill'em All”!

💿 Thank you so much for your time! See you soon on Hardrockheavymetal!

Thank you for having me! I'd like to end this interview speaking with all your readers: guys, if you like traditional heavy metal, you can listen to our new record for free on multiple platforms (YouTube, Bandcamp, Spotify), give it a try! Then, if you liked it and you wish to help and support us, you can buy the CD version (and get a free Hyperion patch all along) on our Bandcamp page (https://hyperionbandheavy.bandcamp.com/).

See you soon!