Hour of Penance. Photo: Hour of Penance

Unless you’re me, Italy is not a country you associate with supremely technical death metal with an anti-dogmatic message. You probably think of pasta, Barolo, works of art, perhaps Rome. And in 1999, it was out of Rome that Hour Of Penance blasted their way, playing a fast, technical style of death metal that was embraced by fans all around the globe.

The band were set to play at next week’s Malta Deathfest III alongside fellow Italians Eyeconoclast and a host of death metal outfits from all over the world. Unfortunately, flight schedules made this impossible – not that this has affected the band’s local following, of course.

I ask Giulio Moschini who has played guitar for Hour Of Penance since 2004, about the band’s latest release, their songwriting process and a few other things.

Regicide, the band’s sixth studio album, was released earlier this year. What was the reception like?

“Regicide scored high on a lot of magazines and webzines and our fans loved it. We worked on the album pretty much as we did with the others, but what changed is the fact that this time we had a rock solid line-up.”

Of course, such strong synergy has its advantages in the studio. Moschini writes pretty much everything except for the vocal patterns. Vocalist Paolo Pieri takes over that responsibility, “because he can do that better”, chuckles Moschini.

Everything is recorded in Moschini’s home studio and, once the song has a structure, the other band members learn their parts. Half jokingly, I ask whether the band has reserved some kind of limit in terms of tempo for double bass drums.

This is partly because incredibly fast double bass parts are omnipresent in Hour Of Penance songs. It seems the consensus is that anything over 280 beats per minute just sounds ridiculous.

“It’s not humanly impossible,” says Moschini. “While we definitely try to push ourselves on every record we still keep in mind that we’re writing a song first and we’re displaying our technicality after, and not vice versa. People want to hear music, not speed exercises.”

There’s a very strong feeling of continuity and natural progression in all Hour Of Penance releases.

Each one has a slightly better sound than its predecessor, slightly more majestic artwork, slightly better songwriting, yet always staying true to Hour Of Penance.

Such strong synergy has its advantages in the studio

“It’s something that comes naturally along with the progression of the band. We improved on every album, sometimes thanks to the line-up changes we’ve had.

“The fact that the songwriting pretty much followed the same path during all these years is due to the fact that I’m the only one responsible for it since 2005.

“Most of all, though, we know what the identity of Hour of Penance is and we also know what it means to play death metal.

“We don’t like to introduce elements in our music that don’t belong to the genre. We know our fans wouldn’t care for that and as fans of the genre ourselves, neither would we.”

In terms of lyrical content there is a lot of anti-authoritarian and anti-dogmatic material in Hour Of Penance’s tracks. I ask whether there has been a progression in the lyrics as well.

Moschini readily admits that to be the case, “especially with the last two albums, because Paolo started writing lyrics and he’s definitely better than me at that.

“He has a different approach than mine and he can write great things without sounding too cheesy like most death metal lyrics nowadays.”

Death metal, as vast as it may seem to the uninitiated, is in fact rather tight-knit, admittedly over continents. Listeners hail from all over and Hour Of Penance are no stranger to this. They’ve played to audiences all over Europe, Scandinavia, even in front of 40,000 people in Indonesia. Along the way they’ve made friends with local bands too.

“Take Beheaded, we’ve known those guys since 2005 . We played with Slit a long time ago in Portugal and with Abysmal Torment too, of course.”

Having been active for over a decade of death metal, have the members noticed a scene change since the band’s early days?

“Definitely,” says Moschini, “Today there are so many releases each week that it’s impossible to keep up with that from a listener’s point of view. An album is old after at least two weeks.”

That’s not to say that Hour Of Penance are about to give up. There are developments everywhere you look.

I mention crowd-funding, to which Moschini replies that he finds this an interesting proposition.

“Going back to DIY worked great for some bands, especially nowadays where CD sales don’t count anymore. What matters is the connection between fans and bands and how you can keep the fans’ attention and support.”

And to do that you must be ready to deliver a solid slab of live death metal, which is where Hour Of Penance excel.

Quizzed about the band’s plans, Moschini fires off an itinerary. “We’re immedietly flying to Australia, where we’re going to tour with the almighty Cannibal Corpse. Then, we’ll have some more shows here in Italy and hopefully a tour this fall!”

Malta Death Fest III is being held on Saturday and next Sunday at Chateau Buskett. The full line-up is available online.

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