In the heart of Stuttgart’s thriving metal scene, Axetasy has been carving their name into the underground with blistering speed-metal riffs and a raw, old-school sound. Formed in 2019 by brothers Johnny “Amon” Kröner and Chris Kröner, alongside Nik “Fetch” Mangold and Ben “Jaxxy” Kruska, the band fuses relentless energy with eerie, atmospheric themes inspired by subconscious horror. With their debut album Withering Tides now unleashed, Axetasy shared insights into their journey, creative process, and what drives their electrifying sound.

Interview

TheNwothm: For those who may not be familiar with Axetasy yet, can you introduce the band and where you are from?

A: Hello everyone, we are a heavy-speed-metal group from Stuttgart in Germany, consisting of me, Johnny “Amon” Kröner on vocals and guitar, my brother Chris beating the Drums, Nik “Fetch” Mangold shredding the guitar and Ben “Jaxxy” Kruska ripping the bass.

TheNwothm: How did Axetasy come together? What sparked the idea to form the band back in 2019?

A: Well, me and my brother had the idea to form an old-school, yet technically demanding speed metal band right after our first band “Shred Attack” has broken up in April 2019. While I was already singing and playing the guitar back then, Chris wanted to start this project as a drummer. Nik, who has been a good friend of ours since 2018 was instantly called in as a second guitarist and after testing out two different bass players, we recruited Ben, who was the singer and rhythm guitarist of Nik’s former band, in 2021.

TheNwothm: The name Axetasy has a powerful ring to it. Can you tell us the story behind how the band came up with this name?

A: We made a huge list of potential names and had some ideas about changing up badass sounding words like “Thryllize” and “Rayzor Bäth” and finally went for the blending of axes and ecstasy; “Axetasy”. The name basically stands for the celebration of the raw force and the ecstatic passion we all find in heavy music. But there are plenty of ways to interpret this name. For instance, “Axetasy” is also the title of one of our songs which tells about an axe murderer driven by lunacy who finds ecstasy in the act of killing.

TheNwothm: According to metal archives, you’re described as heavy metal with themes of subconscious and horror. How do these themes play out in your music, and what inspires you to explore them?

A: I guess these themes of subconscious and (cosmic) horror are coming forth in our songs through strange melodies that are often swaying in between minor and major scales and chromatic crescendos underlined by pungent pace, harsh vocals and an overall shady, retro vibe. These themes are also shown in our lyrics that mostly speak about tripping nightmares, morbid visions and encounters with strange entities that are slumbering in the hidden corners of the subconscious. 

A: We want our songs to make heads bang but also to convey some sort of unsettling, grotesque vibes that add up to a sublime depth in the music.

TheNwothm: Who are some of the biggest influences on Axetasy’s music? Are there any specific bands or artists that have shaped your sound?

A: We are definitely influenced by many rapid heavy metal bands of the eighties, especially “Helloween” (“Walls of Jericho-era”), early Metallica and Judas Priest of course. But also, we’re obliged to mention NWOTHM bands like “Skull Fist”, “Enforcer” and “Evil Invaders.” Each member has different favourites that probably each – more or less – have to be taken into account when thinking about what shaped our sound.

To me, for instance, musicians like “King Diamond”, “Morbid Angel” or “Bathory” who have/had a very dark and daring sound must be mentioned as influences while Chris would talk about more thrashy stuff like Overkill, Nik about more recent bands like “Bütcher” and Ben is more into extroverted acts such as Yngwie Malmsteen. 

TheNwothm: What can you tell us about Stuttgart where you are from? What is the metal scene like there?

A: Speaking of the Rock and Metal Scene, Stuttgart – just like most parts of southern Germany – is pretty fucking dope. In clubs and concert locations such as “Der schwarze Keiler” and “Zille”, you’ll find obscure HM bands like “Hellripper”, “Jag Panzer”, “Glacier”, “Tower” and many more playing there almost every two weeks! The scene is quite huge and very passionate compared to other parts of Germany.

TheNwothm: And what can you tell our readers about yourselves? 

A: Apart from music we can say about ourselves that Nik (25 y.o.) is a trained carpenter, Chris (25 y.o.) a car-mechanic – both now attending school to reach a higher degree, Ben (24 y.o.) is going to university to become a social worker, and I (22 y.o.) am studying education in the subjects English and Music. Other than that, we all love partying and the most of us are also involved into other (musical) projects… so you see we are very busy people, haha.

TheNwothm: Axetasy is currently signed with Dying Victims Productions. How has your partnership with the label influenced your music or your overall journey as a band?

A: Yeah, big shout-out to Florian, the man behind DVP! Until now, we can’t say that our partnership has directly influenced our music since our album was already recorded before we were signed. But the overall influence since then was absolutely positive. Having someone taking care of the production of our CDs and LPs plus making sure our album gets the publicity it deserves helped us A LOT.

TheNwothm: You have just released Withering Tides! What can fans expect from this album? Is there a specific concept or direction you explored?

A: Yeah, “Withering Tides” was released on January 17^th and if you haven’t listened yet, I highly suggest doing so! Anyone interested should expect an old-schooley speed metal album that not only explores atmospheric and eerie dimensions but also more extreme aspects of metal. Since “Withering Tides” is our debut, we had a very straight forward approach and didn’t have one specific concept in mind.

Thenwothm: After living with this album for so long, do you each have a personal favorite track from Withering Tides? What makes that track stand out for you?

A: That’s very hard to tell, we all stand behind every song one hundred per cent. But if we had to choose, we’d have the following list:

Ben’s favorite is “Voidcrawler”, because of its many riffs that go from straight up chaotic shred to Priest-like mid-tempo fist raising parts.

Nik would choose “Beyond all Order”. He has written most parts of the song already at the age of 16 and therefore has a nostalgic connection to the song. Also, it’s a banger track that stands out in the album.

Chris goes with “Nebulous Nightmares”, because of its switches from relentless speed to moderate heavy metal elements and eerie clean parts.

To me, that track would be “Fatal Maze” because I wrote most parts of this song when I was 15 and really obsessed with Annihilator and King Diamond. Pure nostalgia. Also, that song has a lot of drive, slow, eerie and epic parts and some very fun harmonic solos.

TheNwothm: How would you say the sound of Withering Tides compares to your previous singles and demo? What did you want to achieve musically with this full-length album?

A: Clearly, the album is more mature and enjoys a more advantageous production than our previous demos and singles. We view this as a logical progression of our abilities as musicians and our knowledge about music production. Overall, we’re very happy to finally present a full-length Album to the world and that was the plan in the first place.

TheNwothm: Can you walk us through the songwriting and recording process for Withering Tides? Did the creative process feel different for this album compared to your earlier releases?

A: Concerning songwriting, most of the Album’s songs – lyrics and music – were mainly created by Nik and me. One presents a riff, we doodle around, construct the intro, verse, pre-chorus, chorus and instrumental sections piece by piece and simultaneously think about possible vocal melodies. The result is then presented to Chris and Ben who both also play a major role in arranging and coloring the composition. If the song slaps and has a vibe according to our vision, Nik and I either have some lyrics already done or we sit down with some booze and write down our stylized associations with the music inspired by the fever dreams we recently had, the surreal paintings we starred at for minutes and our favourite Lovecraft stories and weird psychoanalytical and philosophic theories inspired by Jung, Freud or Nietzsche.

We tend to adjust and work on the songs until they are finally recorded. Even during the recording process there are often new ideas coming since we really take our time and record each instrument piece by piece. It surely felt different than recording our previous demos and singles since we had much more of a plan about what we’re doing and could rely on earlier experiences when it comes to experimenting with mic-positions, different sounds, effects and appropriate places for recording. As an example, all gang shouts, choirs and most backing vocals on the album were recorded in my dad’s huge car workshop hall to achieve a massive natural reverb and we placed many mics in different corners in order to compensate for the fact that we were only four people shouting. We already tried this out when recording the Deadly Witch Demo.

TheNwothm: With Withering Tides now available, do you have any upcoming tours or shows planned to promote the album? What can fans expect from your live performances on this tour?

A: Of course, until now we have already played two local gigs and at least 12 more are planned. It’s going to be four or five festival gigs which we are very stoked about. At the moment, no tour is in sight but there might be some gigs in neighbouring countries, this needs to be figured out first though.

TheNwothm: If you could collaborate with any artist or band, past or present, who would it be and why?

A: That would be any band or artist that we listen to privately. It’s always great to engage with musicians from which you know they’ve created cool stuff that somehow became part of one’s own conception of music. We haven’t really done a collab before but besides that we love sharing the stage with other awesome bands, no matter if they’re legends, moderately famous or newcomers.

TheNwothm: As a relatively new band, what advice would you give to bands starting out in the metal scene today?

A: Do as many rehearsals as possible, find a unique, honest and original sound and style and put serious work into your stage presence. There are for example already so many boring bands doing the same generic heavy metal stuff repeatedly and seem to care more about their clothes and social media presence than about delivering qualitative, meaningful music. Don’t get me wrong, outfits and social media are extremely important, but I experienced that attention in the scene is much more sufficiently created by having good songs, playing sick shows and making real contact with other metalheads and/or other bands.

Still, social media is of course an essential aspect to reach fans, advertise your merch and music but just don’t do these cringe tiktok clips/reels introducing the band and all that stuff that we’re always forced to witness as soon as we open social media. Other than that, have fun and don’t take yourselves too seriously. We, ourselves as well, still have a lot to learn, improve and figure out things ourselves. What you read is just my humble advice that I can think of right now.

TheNwothm: How can our readers buy your music and merch?

A: You can look up our bandcamp or – if you have the opportunity – come and see our shows and buy our shirts, patches, pins, CDs or LPs directly from us. We always highly appreciate it.

TheNwothm: Where can fans follow you online?

A: Feel free to follow us on Instagram and Facebook.

TheNwothm: Anything else you would like to mention?

A: Thanks for this cool interview, we surely had good fun answering. Also huge thank you to anyone reading this and showing interest and support for young underground bands like us. You keep real heavy metal alive and that must be honored.

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