Check out our recent interview with Budapest’s finest punks – The Hellfreaks!
1. For the unfortunate few who don’t know who you are, would you mind introducing yourselves?
The Hellfreaks: We’re THE HELLFREAKS, a band from Budapest, Hungary – which is in the middle of nowhere in the international rock world. We’re a punk rock band and are pretty unique in our country. There are very few bands who are into rock music with a girl in the front, but definitely no punk rock bands with a female singer. But somehow, with a bit of luck and a hell of a lot of work, we’ve managed to play way more shows over the border than in Hungary. We’ve played over 200 gigs across Europe and also made it over the big pond and toured in the US.
Our only original band member is our singer, Sue, who literally grew up with this band. Not only has the line up has changed, but also the music. It started as a hobby, with music that was way more ’billy influenced, but now the band has climbed so many levels, we’re able to do our modern influenced punk rock with a portion of metal thrown in that we call our own. We’ve released 3 albums and a few videoclips, which together have accumulated more than 6 million views. We’re very happy about how things turned out but we’re certainly far from the finish line!
2. In the effort of getting know each other better – if you could be a sandwich, what sandwich would you be?
The Hellfreaks: I would be a cat chilling in a hot dog bun who is not willing to understand your confused look.
3. Tell us about your upcoming release
The Hellfreaks: The last few weeks have all been about preparing and laying the nest for our upcoming album! At the end of 2019 we released 3 of our new singles from the upcoming record.
RED SKY: https://youtu.be/ciBz9iwiWc0
MEN IN GREY: https://youtu.be/4l0xzBQcZ6E
WITCHES HEAL: https://youtu.be/pFKqt1N74ew
A couple of days ago we released the last single that we wanted to reveal before the album is
out. The song is called “Adrenalized” and is an un-typical, happy song for us.
On the 7th of February, under the wings of Sunny Bastard Records, we’re going to release our long awaited 4th album God On The Run. We’ve been working on the new songs for over two years, fulfilling an old dream to work with foreign producers. Pre-production work had been with Paul Miner (New Found Glory, Atreyu, Death By Stereo) production/mixing with Evan Rodaniche (Escape The Faith, Powerman 5000, Lacey Sturm). The mastering with Tom Waltz provided us with the perfect final form for the band’s songs and ideas. You can already pre order it here: www.thehellfreaks.com/shop
4. You’ve been touring the UK/Europe/the world in support of Astoria. How have you found the tour?
The Hellfreaks: Our last album Astoria came out in 2016. We played many shows in Europe and also had a nice UK run with it. The biggest highlight was our first major festival, the EXIT festival in Serbia. That record gave us great touring memories!
5. Have you got any crazy tour stories you can share with the world?
The Hellfreaks: Uff! Hard to pick out one of them… The first thing that pops up in our mind was a punk festival called Force Attack in Northern Germany. The organiser of the event literally disappeared with all the income in the middle of the festival, so there were many bands and thousands of punks left without any kind of authority. Yeehaw!
We knew that we wouldn’t get the payment for it, but we decided to do the show anyway. The crowd was amazing, but so incredibly drunk. In the middle of the show, one of the punks came up with the genius idea to enjoy the concert naked – and many others followed him. In the end we played in front of so many naked guys (yes, just guys) which none of us expected! Try to stay serious while this happens, good luck!
6. Here at Upside Down Shark we discuss a wide breadth of pop-culture, including music, movies, TV, video games and the like. So with that in mind, if you could have a track featured in anything, whether it be any of the above on even a wrestling theme, what would it be?
The Hellfreaks: I would chose a song from our upcoming album called “Tabby”. It was not written with this mindset, but the minute we heard the first raw version of it, we all agreed that this could be the PERFECT theme song to a darker Netflix series. Check it out and you will know what we’re talking about.
7. Name one thing on your band bucket list
The Hellfreaks: Touring in Japan is a big dream of us.
8. What would be your inspirational quote to share with the world?
The Hellfreaks: Maybe it’s not the kind of inspirational quote and positivity you might expect, but it helps me through my harder days: “In the end, they’ll judge me anyway. So whatever” .
9. What does 2020 have in store for you?
The Hellfreaks: Beside the best album this band has ever released, we have some upcoming gigs:
21-02-2020 Germany, Frankfurt Am Main – Das Bett
22-02-2020 Germany, Essen – Don’t Panic
23-02-2020 Germany, Düsseldorf – Pitcher
05-03-2020 Germany, München – Backstage
08-07-2020 Hungary, Dunaújváros – Rockmaraton Fesztivál
10. What’s your favourite shark?
The Hellfreaks: Catshark!
Many thanks to The Hellfreaks for sitting down to talk to us! Make sure to check them over thehellfreaks.com
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