Connect with us

Interviews

Hideous Divinity Vocalist Enrico H. Di Lorenzo on His Concept EP ‘LV-426’ and what Aliens Would Make of Earth in 2021

Hideous Divinity frontman Enrico H. Di Lorenzo talks about the new concept EP ‘LV-426’ while wondering what aliens would make of Earth.

Published

on

Italian technical death metal band Hideous Divinity has just dropped their brutal new EP, LV-426 (via Century Media Records), conceptually based around the second Aliens movie. We recently spoke to frontman Enrico H. Di Lorenzo about the record, the concept behind the EP, and his thoughts on what aliens would make of Planet Earth in 2021.

Thanks for your time. How is life treating you today?

Enrico H. Di Lorenzo: “Not bad, the sun shines, the beer is cold and the pizza oven is getting hot.”

So, you’ve just dropped your new EP, for readers who haven’t heard it, what can you tell them about it?

LV-426 is our first EP ever. It’s the first time we condense the elements of our sound in just two songs, plus a cover. A new perspective that gave us new points of view and new ways to express ourselves.”

The EP was inspired by the Aliens films. How did the idea come about to make LV-426 a concept EP?

“We have always been a ‘movie based band,’ all our albums have been inspired by a movie and the Aliens franchise was a recurring name during our numerous brainstorming sessions, but it’s such an enormous universe that it was very hard to choose what to focus on. Oddly enough, having just two songs to work on made the choice easier: we decided to focus on the relationship between Rebeca ‘Newt’ and the Xenomorph, interpreting it as one between the purity of childhood chased by the horror of reality.”

Tell us about the writing process of the songs, how did you select the concepts you wanted to write about?

“I think that describing the event flow from inspiration to songs would grant me a couple of PHDs in psychology, literature, and human studies (laughs).”

It’s inspired by Aliens as we said. What is it about this movie that you find so inspirational?

“We focused on the link between Newt and the ‘Monsters;’ she speaks of them like a young girl would speak about monsters under the bed, she’s upset about the big lie we’ve been told: ‘there are no monsters.’ It’s something everyone can rely on, trying to escape from the REAL monster, hiding in our nest, trying to keep the child alive. It’s not going to work.”

In terms of taking the concept further, will this be something that you will expand on in further material?

“I really don’t think so, we didn’t make ‘an album about Aliens,’ we just paid the due homage to a movie that we love and respect and told a story inspired by our reaction to it, as we always do. It’s full of horror out there.”

Artwork for ‘LV 426’ by Hideous Divinity

Given the nature of the film, could you see this being written into a full concept album?

“Why not?”

You also chose to cover “Delirium Trigger” by Coheed and Cambria. What made you pick this song? Are they a big inspiration on you as musicians and as a band?

“Actually… We picked that song because we love working on covers and it was the only ‘alien-related song’ we could find (laughs). BUT when you work on a cover you have to study very deeply the song and the band who wrote it in order to metabolize their style and rearrange it, make it your own. So, in the end, we studied and ‘discovered’ aspects of Coheed and Cambria that I didn’t expect and I was pretty impressed!”

Given the complexity of writing concept albums during normal times, what were the challenges of writing the material for the EP during lockdown?

“Our writing routine didn’t change that much: we don’t jam or write music in a room all together, but we’re used to send each other tons of demo versions, demo versions + voice, final.wav, final2.wav, thistimeisforreal.wav etc. etc.

So, although Italy had one of the most severe lockdowns, we didn’t change our routine. What really changed was the psychological approach: usually we write and arrange songs thinking of the studio and the live performance dimensions… but what now? We worked on these songs not knowing if and when we will play them live (now we know we definitely will). It has been strange.”

How often have you revisited Aliens during the last twelve months?

“A couple of times, as usual!”

In terms of a visual aspect, if money was no object, what would your Aliens-inspired live show be like?

“Wow, what a question! Probably it would be smoke, green laser, and a super wannabe Giger stage production. But, if money was no object at all, I’d rather ride the whole universe in search of the closest creature to a xenomorph and free her during our set. Is it death metal enough?”

If aliens arrived on earth at any point during the last twelve months, what would they make of the state of the planet and what would you say to them to make them realize that the whole planet isn’t completely insane?

“If by ‘planet’ you mean the people who live on it, there’s no way to prove it. Mankind as a whole is completely insane. Some suffer from having/eating too much food while others die for the lack of food. We destroy well-balanced ecosystems in order to find gold/lithium/petroleum/whatever and then we get upset if we have to face viruses like HIV and COVID-19. I mean… Dear aliens, are you sure you want us to be your problem? Look at Mars, take it before we destroy that as well.”

Thanks for your time and good luck with the EP. Over to you for the last few words…

“My last words were for aliens but thank you for the questions and thank you all for reading.”

I have an unhealthy obsession with bad horror movies, the song Wanted Dead Or Alive and crap British game shows. I do this not because of the sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll lifestyle it affords me but more because it gives me an excuse to listen to bands that sound like hippos mating.

Trending