Landlocked by the Pyrenees lies the small nation Andorra. A left-over of past struggles throughout Europe, the nation is a rarity, ruled by the French president and the Bishop of Urgell. The country also has the highest life-expectancy in the world. It is home to the act De Veneficas Inferi.

The country is known as the setting for various myths and legends, giving it a particular aura and attraction as one of those places where something else may still hold sway. The voice of De Veneficas Inferi speaks in mysterious words, befitting this high place in the mountains.

You would imagine that the mountainous nation generates a very specific sort of sound and experience. That is very true for this one-man band. Séan B. is its sole member and kind enough to answer some questions about his project.

Andorrean black metal from the Pyrenees

Could you be so kind to introduce yourself and your project? Are there other people involved in De Veneficas Inferi?
De Veneficas inferi is a one-man act, a spiritual and philosophical representation of a resilient ‘ars moriendi’, that at some point draws a line as a transcendental ritual. It may be narcissistic art. The futility of pleasure. But the ego of oneself acts in a work that ends in vain, in conjunction with the same life as the chaos of this; madness and the symbolism of nothingness. A nihilistic expression of the evolution of a person or a destiny of kindness to learn. I, the path of a sorcerer in hell, will be the one to narrate this path. This is what De Veneficas Inferi represents.

How did you set up De Veneficas Inferi? Do you have other projects going?
De Veneficas Inferi arises from the return to my roots, In Ignem Aeternum. It might be a homecoming to the black metal that I once shared and composed with Manu Rodríguez (TFWM, Morth Wyrtha and Torb Key’s Master) at the end of 2007. It could not be another melodic project and as truly elegiac as it was then, but the balm is the same. So I differ from another solitary project that I started in 2010 and that I coexisted until 2016: Aessênce. Declaration of a trip in the light and noisy, depressive and tempestuous urban modernity.

I’ve listened to your 2016 EP. Is there more work by you out there? How would you describe your specific music style?
No more than what remains from the ashes of my beginnings, Bloody Violent Little Red, and its conceptual core in Aessênce. A single recorded in 2008, rescued and released along with the consequent and subsequent works of Aessênce. Although, for my consideration, it’s an endeavor in hiatus.

As far as the style of music is concerned, with De Veneficas Inferi, I do not differ from a genre like black metal, as feeling. I could specify the style as Pyrenean Black Metal as part of the concept. It would not be erratic, in that there’s a representation of where I was born and I’m currently living in, winter passages through the Pirene mortuary monument. Part of its elder or modern histories and cantatas, non-sees or popular experiences and myths.

Your project has a very specific aesthetic in the artwork you share and use. Can you tell more about that and the general idea or concept behind De Veneficas Inferi?
De Veneficas Inferi might be faceless, non-image aesthetic that merges with the arcadian medieval iconography. Inspiration, partly, of those who agreed with the individual mysticism. Incentive, greatly, of the land I’m from. The impetus of draconian tales. Catalyst aside Luciferian visions. And encouraged by Anubis dexterity. All, or none of them.

The Great Decay appears to follow a narrative through the record. Could you tell more about that?
The Great Decay as a first unique concept, set, differs from each part in allegories represented by demons or fates, somewhat they were once, the Roman genii.
The first demon is ritual (“Daemonic I, Stone Witches”). The second is vanity (“Daemonic II, Altar Of Vanities”). The third is a circle (“Daemonic III, Nemini Parco”). Just as the first demon is belief. The second is conflict. The third is eternal return. Memento mori, Vanitas and Dansa de la Mort. Three concepts in order to the beautiful and concise adoration of Death. Concepts intimately related to Western society, whether in the contemporary pseudo-medieval times we live in or in past ages. Concepts in Aristotelian dyes. Concepts of the most glorious Rome. Death is, has been and will be godsified. Choose to feel dread or dance with the terror. That might be what life is for and what you leave behind for the future that you will never see.

Separately each piece of music has its own idea. The first demon, a witch anthem, a replica of those that once sounded in the Andorran mountains and lakes so, therefore, the Pyrenees, performed in sort akelarres and coronations of witches; lost pagan bonds or effusive carnal adorations. The second demon, a song to the memory of the belligerence that, still, this old Europe drags. The third demon, a song to the Dance of the Death, a rhythm of drums and dance of skeletons, histrionic representations of those Danse Macabre that still serenely vibrant between the valleys and the Mediterranean Sea.

How do you go about creating your music? What does the writing and recording process look like and what sources do you use for inspiration?
As it is absolutely an art without limit there is no process other than the equal limitation in our life. The same music is a personal experience. And it is the same inspiration that manipulates the process, which can last a short period or years. But the whole makes the concept as a product: once I have in mind this concept is practiced in influences and experiences. It’s a no more. There is always the intention to go to the nucleus of the idea since technically there is an experiment in the composition, the lyrics, and the background; to later or during the recordings.
Aside, the inspiration is the own project in question although I nourish of external sources and influences as any other kind of. If don’t, you kill every form of creation. Random or deliberated.

Does hailing from Andorra play any part in how you shape your music? As in, is your location part of the art you make?
The Andorran monolithic society has been an influence, of course. But it is his legacy, inheritance of the dark age, that I embrace in its rustic emblem. From its imperative nature to its black history, whether in the past or more recent come together in misfortunes or fantastic jeweled tales, processions of its feudal people, summon the soul of a Romanesque past. Not its religious aspect, but its dirt that emanates each individual that forms the place, its anachronistic hierarchy in harmony with the remains that remain of that dark age.

Is there something like an Andorra metal scene or is it mostly connected to the Spanish and French scenes? What places would be required visits for metalheads visiting Andorra?
There was, then, a strong Death Metal scene from the beginning and middle of the 2000s in affiliation with a sort of melodic bands like Persefone, Perseverance, Egophobia or The Ethereal. In relation, others kind of played core or trasher like as Umbrella Corpse and its entourage Far From Beyond or It Never Rains Eternally. Many of its members co-segmented in their interests as bands and evolved to reach the Prog Collective that coexists today with continuity with its greatest exponents, Persefone or Nami in its Death Metal side and others more colorful(ed) by rock and soaked in funk, psychedelia or darkwave as Experiments or Redthread.

Chapter and verse and more or less at the same time Morth Wyrtha and Torb loyalized their concept of Black Metal in the Principality Valleys. They were those who idealized the concept of Legions Pirenaiques (inspiration may, in advance, come from Les Légions Noires of France and/or the Norwegian Inner Circle), lyrically inspired by the winter and the Pyrenees so parse a Pyrenean Black Metal Circle.

Strong dishes such as Guturalfest or Testarrock were concerts showing many of these bands. Usual concert organizations such as Dijousderock still have continuity today. And as far as I know, there are certain groups related to the noisy and melodramatic panorama of the Catalan Black Metal (Foscor, O.D.I, Maleït or Entropia). Fuzzed concerning it’s gothic and anarcho-satanist contour, more precise from Barcelona, such as Akollonizer.

Although many of the places that were stalked by metal music already disappeared, there are some places in the capital city, like the Rockódrom or the Harlem Bar, where some formations are exposed Metal bands, among others styles that do not share anything with this genre. The Harlem Bar also recently exhibited and disseminated graphic artists, such as Print This Valley Collective composed by societies such as Dead Flag (artistic contributions made with bands like Persefone, Witchthroad Serpent, Malämar or Belzebong) that have done really spellbinding prints.

Are there other bands from Andorra that people should really be checking out?
Even though they are directly or not directly related to the orbital of metal’s genre there are formations that personally for his style of music associated with the drone and darkwave electronic music I might recommend.

The adroit conceptual musical project in several facets and faces that Nazo Fushigi builds includes a dark music, sometimes cacophonous sometimes lucidly melodic, which I appreciate in its artistic whole. Thespian performance of the Soizu proposal, by a  member of Akollonizer, is powerful and hypnotic in its system plus drone and subtle, clearly inspirational. Also, in addition, would like to praise the satirical sort of humor indeed, hard rock blended core of Mordigans done on “El Sabor de una Taza de Té”, and so the jazzy experienced productions of the veteran band Hysteriofunk.

What future plans do you have for De Veneficas Inferi?
I am involved in the slow process of a subsequent LP, mainly lyrically and aesthetically related and inspired by the principle of Prometheus, a myth torn apart in time and countless as names as the Devil has; a lecture of those Bearer of Light, following a Luciferian journey to the Abyss to present ourselves in a Hellish Dante’s way a ethos of his story. May I continue my path.

If you had to compare your product to a dish, what would it be? And why?
Maybe compare it with wine. That sour wine that when you’re satiated invites you to vomit, but you still drink it to quench your thirst. It is worth concomitant it with few lemon stems, as more acid better. The reason is the fun of the same drink and a long night.