KRUPINSKÉ OHNE BY AS
Despite being from different cities, we all live a stone’s throw away from the Carpathian mountains. Their local part here is called Little Carpathians, Malé Karpaty in the Slovak language. Malokarpatan means an inhabitant of Small Carpathians. So it´s a purely local name paying tribute to our surroundings and culture. The great thing about it is, there is virtually zero chance any other band would take this name, as it often happens with English names.
‘Krupinské Ohne’ means The fires of Krupina. Krupina is a small town in south-central Slovakia; during the 17th century, there were the most numerous witchcraft trials on our territory (back then, it was called the Kingdom of Hungary). I always try to work with local culture and inspirations, so this story about the witches coven operating there instantly caught my attention, and I decided to make it into a full concept album. The fire has multiple meanings – a literal one of the inquisition pyres there the covens ended and the flame of knowledge that they carried on in their secret religion.
For me, our music is simply black metal, but that word today means different things to different people, and its original definition is forgotten. Black metal is simply metal music with Satanic/dark themes; there is no musical definition. So we are black metal in the early bands that all had their style, Merciful Fate (fuck autocorrect), Venom, Bathory, Tormentor, Kat, Root, etc. We take inspiration from many different sources, classic metal bands, progressive and psychedelic rock of the glorious 70s era, folk music, experimental/scenic music and music from old Czechoslovakian movies. I think a proper black metal should develop their style as it was in the good old days. There are way too many bands out there today that just sound like one specific band they idolise.
We are a black metal band. I follow this direction because it aligns with my personal spiritual beliefs, and I see black metal as one of the possible media to be used for the original pre-Christian spirituality of Europe (although this also applies to any forms of Left-hand path belies anywhere else in the world, from North America to Africa).
Mostly I am interested in local folk stories, the dark side of the spiritual world of our ancestors. I think it sounds more honest when you work with local inspirations, like those you always understand better than exotic themes, no matter how exciting those might be. Lately, I have also added some historical themes to our lyrics and will likely follow this on the next album or two. I have some concepts ready for the future, which will deal with local Central European history.
I would classify myself as a believer/student. I was interested in these topics ever since childhood and continue educating myself about them, but I am not a practitioner of any religion or cult. I firmly believe in forces beyond this world, and those also inspire my lyrics and music. Dark arts is more of a metal term, but it simply means a spiritual approach that is not afraid to look on the forbidden and use what standard religions consider taboo for their followers. To understand the world and its foul and sinister aspects and use it as betterment for your development.
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