The Nwothm

Celebrating 20 years of heavy metal resistance, Switzerland’s Sin Starlett stand tall as masters of twin-guitar firestorms and defiant steel. From their chaotic early demos to festival stages across Europe, the Lucerne five-piece have forged a legacy of unfiltered fury. In this interview, they look back on their journey, share the stories behind their records, and reveal what’s next in their fight to keep true heavy metal alive.

Interview

TheNwothm: Hey Sin Starlett, please introduce yourselves and where you are from!

Sin Starlett: Hey man! We are a 5 piece band based in Lucerne, Switzerland. The group was founded in 2005, means this year we celebrated the 20th anniversary of the band.

TheNwothm: What sparked the formation of Sin Starlett back in 2005, and how did the name come into play? Was it a slow burn or a lightning strike?

Sin Starlett: The band was formed out of the urge to play raw Heavy Metal music the way it was meant to be. Before Sin Starlett, the singer Elias and I (Reno) played in a Hard Rock/Blues Rock Band called Man on the Moon. Around 2003/2004, we were more and more attracted to old School Heavy Metal such as Judas Priest and Saxon, so we decided to start a new band fully dedicated to the the spirit of the early 80s Hard Rock/Metal. Also, both of us were just going through break-ups with our girlfriends at that time, and we found out that our girlfriends teamed up together and the whole break-up turned out to be a coordinated action! What a disgrace! So we said: Fuck it, we’re going to have a band, play concerts all around the globe & live the dream of the independent, modern day warrior! So, look at us now, hahaha…

So you can say, it was a mixture of defiance and youthful recklessness that brought us to the band.

There are several legends surrounding the origin of the name “Sin Starlett”. The most common one is: We wanted to find something memorable that sets us apart from the rest of the scene, but also Sin, Damnation, and the judgement day itself was always a central topic of our lyrics, especially in the early days.

TheNwothm: For those just discovering Sin Starlett, how would you describe your sound and spirit in one sentence?

Sin Starlett: Sin Starlett is pure, high-voltage heavy metal, strictly ignoring any trends in or outside the scene – no fashion, no gimmicks, just true Heavy music.

TheNwothm: Lucerne’s known for its lakes and medieval charm. What’s the most metal thing about your hometown? Has Lucerne’s music scene shaped your identity as a band, or do you feel like you’ve carved out your own lane entirely?

Sin Starlett: The most metal thing in Lucerne would probably be our rehearsal room, a place where space and time does not seem to exist, where we praise the glory of the VHS cassette and keep the cult of the schnapps-infused coffee alive…

No, let’s be serious, Lucerne is a very beautiful city with a lot of primordial charisma. We love our city, even though not all of us live in the town itself. When we started the group, the heavy music scene was dominated by Death- and Black Metal bands, and we had a good relationship with most of them. Due to the small size of Lucerne and the limited numbers of venues, the only possibility to play live was to play together with harder bands. So, the scene in Lucerne helped us to grow and evolve as a band, but musically speaking, our hometown did not had a strong impact on our songwriting or did shape our sound. 

TheNwothm: Switzerland isn’t the first country people associate with heavy metal. What’s something about Swiss culture that fuels your music? Do you think growing up surrounded by mountains gives Swiss metal bands a different kind of intensity?

Sin Starlett: You’re right, Switzerland seems to be more famous for extreme Metal like Celtic Frost, Coroner etc.

These are the bands that have put Switzerland on the map of Metal listeners, and due to this fact, some people think that the only good swiss bands are the extreme ones.

The international Heavy Metal community does not pay much attention to classic heavy Metal bands from Switzerland, with a few exceptions. 

German and swedish bands are definitely in a more favourable position. But we are ready to take up the fight!

I don’t think that the surrounding mountains had any impact on our music, but the typical swiss “narrow-mindedness” has definitely influenced the way we approach Heavy Metal.

TheNwothm: If Sin Starlett were a Swiss product, would you be more like a precision-engineered timepiece or a fondue pot bubbling over with chaos?

Sin Starlett: Haha, good question! I’d say we are definitely a booze injected fondue bubbling over, with a hardly burnt grandmother at the pan bottom! (explanation: the “grandmother” is the slightly burnt part at the bottom of the fondue pan that is being scratched off and eaten at the very end  🙂

TheNwothm: Let’s rewind to your 2006 demo. What do you remember most about putting that together, and how did things shift by the time “Call to the Punisher” dropped in 2008?

Sin Starlett: The Demo in 2006 was our first attempt to record some of our songs in our rehearsal room. This compilation of tracks was recorded under very primitive conditions, between dead frogs & mold. We had no idea what we were doing at that time. To record the drums, we used chairs instead of microphone stands. Our first Drummer Dany “King” Schilliger recorded the drums without any backing or pilot tracks, he just played the whole songs by heart, and we added the guitars and vocals later.

Considering the whole recording process, the demo turned out quite ok.

Shortly after the demo was released, our drummer tragically passed away. This was definitely the bands darkest hour, we were devastated and could hardly think straight. After approximately 6 months, we decided to continue and started searching for a new drummer, who was luckily found pretty quick in the person of Oli “Sin” Schmid.

For our debut album “Call to the Punisher”, we decided to book a record studio near Berne, Switzerland. The song selection for that album was more or less the same as on our first Demo. However, this first album did not turned out the way we hoped, the audio quality is still pretty poor and our performance on this record is definitely not top notch, compared to how we sounded live at that time. Still, it has a certain unpolished charme to it, and there is an undoubted quality to the songs itself.

TheNwothm: The 2010 split “Black Magic Sky / Hellas” and 2012’s “Throat Attack” both hit hard in different ways. What did those releases represent for you creatively, and how did the band evolve between them?

Sin Starlett: “Black Magic Sky” was recorded as a project for a friend who studied at a sound engineering school in Zurich at that time. We were able to record a song in a studio at their school facility, and of course we took this opportunity to record a song for free under professional conditions.

The result was the first decent recorded Song of SIN STARLETT and was released on a vinyl split single with our Metal Brothers FEANOR from Argentina. Shortly after, we started the songwriting for the next album “Throat Attack”. This was a very creative and productive era of the band. At that point, our Drummer Oli “Sin” left the band and was replaced by Elias “Bandana” Burri, who brought a burst of fresh energy into the group.

The songwriting began to become more focused and effective, and we invested more time into writing catchy vocal lines and memorable riffs. This can definitely be heard on “Throat Attack”, which is our first full length release with a consistent quality. This album also opened some doors for us as band, allowing us to play some international festivals such as Up the Hammers in Greece or at the Festival of the Pounding Metal Union in Spain.

TheNwothm: “Digital Overload” came in two waves — first as a single in 2015, then a full album in 2016. What sparked that concept, and how did it grow across formats?

Sin Starlett: Actually it’s the very same recording on both, single and album. We were recording the whole album but since we love 7inch records, we really wanted to release a single upfront! Therefore, we have picked out two songs to finalise first and put them on a single.

With the single, we also wanted the people to have a first taste of what was to follow on the album. No teasers whatsoever, but a good old single! There was no bigger concept behind “Digital Overload”… Actually, by the time we finished “Throat Attack”, we already knew that our next album would be called “Digital Overload”! During the mixing and mastering of “Throat Attack”, our producer struggled with all the “Digital Overloads” on our audio tracks… He talked so much about “Digital Overloads” that at one stage we thought this might be such a cool name for a future Sin Starlett album! So shortly after finishing “Throat Attack” we wrote the song “Digital Overload”. The other songs followed within the two years which were to follow before entering the studio again.