Looking forward by going back: a conversation with Senti from Ephyra and Balmora

If you’ve been to a hardcore show in the last year, you’ve probably noticed some things feel different. There’s a notable influx of young people dressing in a mishmash of nostalgic trends: baggy JNCO style pants, y2k hairstyles and fashion accessories, and a plethora of vintage t-shirts (or at least modern merch made to look old). The music is decidedly not traditional hardcore. They’re playing metal riffs with emo inspired vocals, but there’s also some influence from nu metal, early metalcore, and everything in between.

Once you get past the throwback aesthetics and sounds, it’s still a true hardcore show. Kids dance from wall to wall, throwing their bodies into each other. They stage dive aplenty or rush to the front to tear a mic away and yell along. They two step when prompted. It looks identical to archival footage from Hellfest or Ozzfest, and that’s partially by design. But to those who may be cynical and label it cosplay, they really mean it. There’s a sense of community here, even if a lot of them are united both by their love for Korn and Linkin Park, as well as Prayer For Cleansing and On Broken Wings.  

Two unavoidable names in this movement are Ephyra Recordings and Balmora. You’ll probably see a band logo from Ephyra’s roster at nearly every hardcore show, whether it's on a hat or shirt or even pants, and it seems like Balmora are playing every festival possible these past couple years. I sat down with the one guy responsible for a lot of this, and we talked about how both the band and label started out, going beyond “just” revival, fulfilling a lifelong dream of bringing back Hellfest, and people’s need to constantly label everything.

Let's get started with some introductions. For people who might not know, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

I'm Senti. I sing in a band called Balmora and I run a record label called Ephyra Recordings.

So, what is Ephyra?

Ephyra started as a project with a couple of friends pretty much just to put out homies’ bands. I think it originally started with the Razel Got Her Wings LP. They were talking about submitting it to different labels and who's gonna put it out. We were on a Discord call, and we were just kinda like, yo, why don't we just put it out? We'll figure out a name. I've been wanting to call something Ephyra for a while. I think that would be cool. We were just like, yeah, let's do it.

Our buddy Andy had a band called Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which was a solo deathcore project. He was like, yo, I'll be the first one. If you want to test it out, see how it goes. And we were like, fuck yeah, let's do that. And so that's where it started.

Similar question, how did Balmora get started?

I wanted to do a band because I'd been booking shows for a while. We had started the label, been going to shows for a long, long time, I pretty much had done everything except for being in a band myself.

I was asking some homies, do you want to do a band with me? I got some that were down and we started writing. Originally, it was gonna sound nothing like how Balmora sounds now, it was gonna be kind of like Dead In The Dirt or Nails. And then, as different people joined, it molded the sound and we ended up with that first EP.

And now, you're here. Balmora and Ephyra have kind of blown up a little bit, at least in the past year or so, how's that been treating you considering a lot of it is just you?

As far as Balmora goes, it definitely took a few tours to get used to it. I would tell people that I wasn't really into touring, I didn't really like it. I like being home. I am a homebody. But the more that we go out, the more that I enjoy it. Getting accustomed to the routine of touring and stuff like that, it's really nice to see the country and all the different scenes and the bands that they have.

Running Ephyra while doing that is very difficult. I end up having to cram a lot of work into a very small period of time when I'm home. And then sometimes, if I'm home for a prolonged period of time, let's say if I'm home for a couple of months, then it's a different kind of struggle to be like, all right, I want to take some free time to myself, but also I still have to get this work done. It's finding a balance between everything. I am slowly figuring out how to run the label as well as tour full time.

Do you have any thoughts of possibly expanding the label in terms of hiring more people or just getting help?

It originally started with seven people. And then, as the label grew over time, it kind of became less of a fun, friend activity and more of a legitimate thing. As Ephyra grew, the workload grew. These dudes have full time jobs and lives of their own, so they kind of parted ways from working with the label. It usually ended up just being me. I'm open to expanding and getting help, but also, I'm very particular about how I do stuff.

How hands-on are you with the bands you work with? Like, are you working with them closely, or are they just kinda people you come across that you like their music?

It varies. A lot of them are my friends' bands. Some of them are bands that I was into before that I would just reach out to and be like, hey, are you working with anybody? Do you want to work with us? Others have been friends that will send me stuff and be like, I think this would fit. And if I listen to it and I agree with them, I'll just hit them up. It's all very hands on though. Obviously, I'm the person that talks to them, gets everything in order of what they wanna do, like, what do you wanna do for this release? Do you wanna do a merch item with it? Do you wanna do tapes and CDs? Whatever you wanna do, I'm on board to try.  

Yeah. Looking at the bands on your roster, they’re all kinda connected by their sound and aesthetic in a lot of ways. It’s that whole metalcore revival thing happening, what do you think is pushing it forward nowadays?

I think a lot of the youth have access to an archive of pretty much every time period with the internet. They get to see what they really resonate with. A kid who's like 15 years old today can go and find a Hellfest 2000 DVD upload on YouTube and watch it and be like, Whoa, this is insane. This is what I want to do. And then another kid could find Ozzfest 99 and be like, okay, Korn is the coolest thing I've ever seen. It’s just that there's so many different styles and genres and everything is just like right at your fingertips. It's really easy to find your niche now.

Would you say that you have a personal limit for the type of stuff you'd put out for Ephyra, like, it all has to be a revival of some sort, or it all has to be metal or hardcore? Would you put out an indie rock record, or a djent, progressive metal kind of record, or what?

I think as far as what we put out, it's not necessarily genre specific, but it's if it fits a certain vibe. Not necessarily revivalism, it doesn't have to be a sound from the past, or modernized sound from the past, It kind of just has to be a band that's doing something cool, doing it well, and honestly if they have swag or not. If they look cool doing it. And if they're passionate about it, that's something that I look for. There's definitely sounds that I would not go towards. I'm not really super into a clean and over-polished sound. Djent would probably be a no go. I'd put out a country artist if anybody wants to send me some country shit. I'd be into putting out a rap project. Anything that catches my ear, I'm down to do it.

Ephyra definitely has an online presence in terms of people finding out about music through show videos and social media, not to mention the whole internet merch hype, but at the same time you also have a pretty close relationship with the hardcore scene and of course there’s Ephyra Fest. What do you think are the differences between building an online community and a physical community?

It's all about putting it into practice. I would like to be considered a hardcore label. I don't want to be pigeonholed into being just metalcore when a lot of bands that we put out aren't metalcore. Like Cross of Disbelief, that's hardcore, Khasm, that's hardcore, Deal With God, that's hardcore.

A lot of the bands that we put out that aren't hardcore are all hardcore kids that go to shows and dance and support pretty much everything in their scene. I've been quoted as saying hardcore is a mentality as opposed to just a caged-in music genre. If kids bring the hardcore energy and they go to shows and they support their scene and they support other bands then they’re a hardcore band to me.

There's a huge amount of variety in the sounds of bands you work with. They all kinda are in the hardcore scene, like you said, but they still have metal parts. It seems like there's not really a division as much in terms of genre, bands sharing the stage with different sounding acts and that kind of thing.

I think there's a lot of unity right now and I think it’s important. It’s always been a staple in hardcore.

For example, with Balmora at FYA this year, we covered On Broken Wings and we covered Breakdown in the same set. I think that's cool. That's unity. I think that you could have a mixed bill and the energy could be hardcore all the way through.  

Speaking of On Broken Wings and also Breakdown, do you think there's a connection between younger people making new bands that sound old school and older bands coming back? Is it just an older band seeing that people still care about them, or is it more cynical?

I think it’s definitely the former where an older band will see a younger band do a cover of their song or name their band after an older song or see more people talking about them and realize woah, people care about us again.

There's a lot of older bands now that are kind of more popular now than they even were in their prime. It's really cool to see. I know a lot of people frown upon a comeback. I think some people will view it as cashing in on a trend, but I think it could be just as simple as the bands are hyped that people are fucking with their music again, and want to play shows with the younger bands that are putting on for them.

It's easy to be cynical about that kind of stuff, but I don't know, why bother doing that?

Yeah, there's a lot of cynicism, there's a lot of jadedness, I don't know if that's a word, but a lot of people are jaded or bitter towards things. I don't think that's the route to go down. There's definitely better ways to be a hater.

Any good examples for the haters in the audience?

I would say look out for something that's disingenuous. Hate on shit that's contrived, don't hate on kids that are making music that they feel like making.

Speaking of comebacks, are there any bands that you kind of are hoping will receive a second look?

I think most people that are reading this are gonna see a lot of the bands that I'm about to say and be like, the fuck are you even mentioning that band for? That's so random. Being from Connecticut, I would love to see Die My Will come back and play a show, Hamartia, Invocation Of Nehek, not in Connecticut, but A Black Rose Burial, stuff like The Juliana Theory, bands that I think nowadays could definitely get their roses.

I can definitely see comparisons to modern bands that are succeeding and those bands and vice versa.

Yeah, like when xNomadx was active, they were covering Die My Will. A band that will probably never come back that happened a few years too early, where if they came out now they would be one of the most talked about in the scene is Cast In Blood from Connecticut. They could have had it all.

What do you think is the best part of the scene as it is today, and what do you think is the worst part of it?

I think the best part is people genuinely care. You see a lot of people going to a show, especially the youth, and they're interacting, they're dancing, they're buying merch, they're starting bands, and it’s bands of all different kinds. It's cool to see, like how I was saying earlier, the access to different genres. Kids also aren't pigeonholing themselves into only having a band that sounds like this. 

And for the worst? I guess, maybe thinking that every band should sound like music that you like, and going out of your way to not support a band just because sonically it's not what you're into. Not to the extent of being like, oh, that's not for me, but going to the point where you’ll say I will not support this band, this band should break up, they should be making this instead. I just think that's that's whack.

Even if you don't enjoy their music, you know, you can at least appreciate the things they do for the scene and whatnot. That reminds me of when I was interviewing Josh from Trustkill, and we were at the Bayway show, and he was saying that even if you don't like Bayway with their brand of rap hardcore, they're still doing a lot for this scene. You have to at least appreciate that.

Dude, absolutely. Shout out to Jayway, he's one of the nicest people I've ever spoken to. That dude genuinely cares about his scene, genuinely cares about music, both new bands and old bands. That dude is 100 percent legit and what you see is what you get. That's a stand up guy.

He's doing a lot right now being in Shattered Realm, Bayway, doing production for like every other New Jersey hardcore band. It's pretty sick.

25 to Life.

Yeah, I forgot about that too. So, I mentioned Josh already, nothing's been officially confirmed yet but how has it been working with Trustkill for the upcoming festival this summer? How did that come about?

It's really cool to have looked up to Josh and everything that he did, and then meeting him, putting a face to it, and just genuinely becoming his friend. The talks of doing the Trustkill and Ephyra fest in the summer just came from natural conversation between friends. It was something that we were like, oh, that would actually be really cool. We should try to do that. Obviously, the Ephyra showcase was modeled 100 percent after Hellfest. It was supposed to be like the vibe of Hellfest. That was the blueprint.

Being able to work with him on something together is huge. It's sick. It's me and Josh, and then also, I can't take any credit away from Greg from Takedown Records. Greg is helping with everything as well.

Yeah, I mean, it's just a culmination of a couple different scenes all working together. It's pretty sick.

Yeah, it's great.

Well, speaking of fests, what do you think makes a good fest, and what do you think makes a bad fest? You know, as someone who's planned them before and has obviously been to a bunch of fests?

I guess for one, you have to know your crowd, you have to know who you're appealing to, and get current bands and some older bands that fit in with the current scene.

A centralized location is good. Things that are accommodating to fest goers like bathrooms, food, stuff like that. A good dance floor, and good stage height for stage dives. Good stagehands to make sure it moves smoothly and on time, cause if you're doing a lot of bands you wanna make sure that no band is taking too long or you're taking too long on the changeover. Gotta make sure that your day runs smoothly.

Let's go back a little bit to Ephyra and Balmora. A lot of the bands on Ephyra weren't really around for long, like Adrienne and Razel had a couple EPs and albums, did some touring, and then called it a day. Do you think Balmora is gonna hopefully be around, or are you guys not looking too far into the future?

I think I speak for all of us when I'm down to do more as long as it makes sense. As long as we have music to write, as long as it's fun, as long as we're all friends, I see no reason why we couldn't continue. The way it's going right now, all three of those things are a green light.

Yeah, you've got the tour coming up, the DAZE one, that's going to be pretty interesting to see a larger scale exercise in a bigger tour like that.

Yeah, we started out with a couple of smaller ones, and then we did the Pain of Truth and Dying Wish tour. That was awesome, that was incredible. I'm looking forward to The DAZE tour. Everybody on that tour, all the bands, we're all extremely close friends.

A lot of people are saying that it's reminiscent of the Summer of Fear tours and I'm super down with that comparison.

It's a cool lineup. You all share members and are all associated with the same couple labels and it's pretty cool to see that.

Yeah, I think every band shares members. I could be wrong about this, but I'm pretty sure There's like 14 or 15 people going on that entire tour playing in all of the bands.

It's pretty economical. I mean, obviously you're saving a little money.

Definitely saving money on vans and hotels and whatnot.

What are you most excited for about the tour?

One of the one of my favorite things about touring in general is seeing the different scenes, not even necessarily playing it, but just going to a show where I normally wouldn't be, like going and seeing what's up with the scene in Kansas City, what's up with the scene in Sacramento. Seeing how they mosh there, the type of music that they're into, what they're about, and just meeting all the people from there and all those different places. That’s the coolest part. Other than that, just going on cross-country trips with your friends.

Besides maybe a hometown Connecticut show, what do you think's your favorite show you've ever played?

FYA last year was my favorite show that we've ever played. FYA is my favorite fest that I've been to just as a fest goer. It was awesome to be asked to play and we were hyped. We saw that we were opening. We're like, I hope people show up, I hope it's cool, I hope people dance.

Actually showing up and seeing a line completely around the building before doors even opened kind of fucked my brain up. I was like, this is crazy. Maybe it's like that every year, I don't know, we'll see. Getting on stage and not turning around to the people until we started and then to see a completely packed room at 11: 30 in the morning was insane. Seeing people's reactions, it was the first time I realized, oh shit, people care about what we're doing. People really like this band. Or maybe the Since My Beloved final show In Dallas or in Denton, that one is probably right up there with FYA.

That must be surreal, standing out there and everyone is in there to watch you play specifically. They want to see what you have.

Yeah, and I know Bob [Wilson] has said that he put us first to bring people into the door early because we had some buzz at the time and people were talking about us. He took a chance on it and he was like fuck it, yeah, let's try it, we'll get them first. Going to other fests, sometimes the room is just filling in around maybe 12:30 or by 1pm, you know the third, fourth band.

And then seeing the energy that people were bringing at 11:30 in the morning on a Sunday, after like that day one was just it. It's indescribable. It's insane.

So, both as a guy who runs a label and also as a person in a band, what do you think up and coming bands should be focusing on right now in terms of their goals and ambitions?

Just make music that you genuinely enjoy. Make music that you want to play whether it's a trend or not. Let's say if a music genre is trendy at the moment or it's a hot genre right now, if you genuinely want to make it, don't be shy. To the fact that people will say, Oh, you're just trend hopping. You're hopping on a trend. If it's something you want to do and you're genuine about it, do it. And then at the same time, if it's completely outsider shit, if nobody's doing it, do it anyway. Do what's true for you.

I don't make music with the goal of getting on a label or making money off of it or doing all this shit. Just make a band with your friends, play shows with your friends, and whatever comes from that will come from it. I don't think you should go into it with any sort of preconceived ideas of what you want it to become.

Yeah, I guess you gotta do it for yourself.

100%

If you could join any band or start a new band that's not Balmora related, what would it sound like? Like, your dream, perfect combination of sounds?

There's this band from Pennsylvania, they put out a record in, I think 1999 or 2000, they're called Inkling. That band is so insanely unique.

I would love to have started that band in 1999. I also would love to talk to those dudes and see what they were thinking and what they were listening to when they wrote that. I don't even know how to describe it. There's a lot of emo influence, but it's down tuned. There's a lot of nu-metal bouncy kind of parts. There's some unhinged metalcore parts and deftones wall of sound parts. It's just all over the place, but it all fits together. Something like that would be insane.

This is something I've been wondering just by going back further to nineties and early two thousands bands, but do you think bands were more diverse in their sound back then? Like, you know, you had bands like On Broken Wings who had crazy mosh parts and blast beats, but they also had singing and electronics and kind of goofy nu metal parts. Do you think it was just different back then in terms of diversity of sound?

I think a lot of what maybe contributes to that is more bands taking risks back in the day. It could be related to not caring what people were saying about them or caring what people would think. Just genuinely putting a part in a song because they're like, Oh, this is cool. Fuck it. Put it in the song. There was never a conversation of what do you think people on Krate will say about this? I think back then it was just bands listening to a bunch of different shit and being influenced by that, or genuinely creating something new because there was no influence.

So, I guess Metalcore is kind of big again. It's a cool little moment where you can play 90s or 2000s Metalcore and you can be accepted, it's not as stigmatized. Where do you think the scene is going to be in 5, 10 years? What trends do you think are going to start popping up?

I've been saying that there's going to be a resurgence of  post-hardcore as the next thing.

We did the Gothenburg-core style stuff, like the Prayer for Cleansing worship. And also can I take this moment to just say that not everything with a tremolo riff sounds like Prayer for Cleansing. Almost everything that you people say sounds like Prayer for Cleansing doesn't at all. Stop comparing things to Prayer for Cleansing. It doesn't sound like that.

It's better than the “for fans of Kickback” or whatever.

Yeah, like, bro it doesn't sound like kickback.

It does not. It's just heavy, moshy hardcore.

People learned a buzzword like Kickback and Prayer for Cleansing, and they're like, oh, anything with this vocal style must sound like Kickback, Alot of them aren't even the bands telling you they sound like Kickback. The bands are like, yo, no we don't. I'm going off on something completely different now.

Anyways, does Balmora get called Prayer for Cleansing worship?

Yeah, all the time. The first EP, there's a lot of Prayer for Cleansing parts on it, but there's a lot of parts that sound nothing like Prayer for Cleansing.

I'd be a hundred percent lying if I said that they weren't an influence. But, not everything in that style of metalcore is Prayer for Cleansing, or sounds like it.

But back to what we were saying, I think the next thing to come back is gonna be post-hardcore. I've been saying that for a while, there's really no bands now that sound like Thursday, there's no bands that sound like Thrice. There's no bands that sound like Finch. Or even if you take it a step further, like, there are no bands that sound like Alesana or Chiodos or Saosin. I did recently get an email from a band that was like, hey, do you want to check out our demo? A lot of things in the email, I'm gonna be honest, I skip past them, but I also saw people that I trust sharing it and being like, whoa, this is crazy, so I'm like, all right, I'll check it out. I was expecting metalcore but what I got was straight 2004 melodic post-hardcore. I don't know who they want to be compared to but Saosin’s EP is what it sounds like to me. They're called Rosasharin, one word.

That dude is singing. He's doing the high pitched singing, there's screams over it, there's melodic sections, there's not much mosh, it's melodic, and I was just kinda like, yo, this is what the fuck I'm talking about. It fit Ephyra perfectly. Instantly I was like, yeah, you're on, what do you want to do?

It’s these kids’ first band, they're like 15, 16 years old making music that I was obsessed with when I was 15 and 16 years old. First release and they did it, picture perfect.

It's been a long time since post-hardcore has been in the forefront. In my opinion, I think the Dance Gavin Dance, swancore kind of thing gave it a bad name and made it sort of where you don't want to be too melodic and technical at the same time. Maybe it's been long enough.

Yeah, I think it's finding a balance and it's all about putting your own spin on it. I think the first A Static Lullaby EP is unbelievable. The Alesana demos, the Hawthorne Heights demos, all that type of thing.

And this band, this Rosasharin band is, I forgot how I described it, but I think I said that it was influenced by, but not a tribute to, that sound. It very much has its own thing going on, but rooted in that influence. I think that separates it from other things going on. Another perfect example would be Sinema. It's influenced by things but it kind of doesn't sound like anything but Sinema.

We're talking a lot about reviving sounds and taking inspiration, but you do have to look forward to the future and think of synthesizing all of that and making something wholly unique.

For sure. I think it's really hard to create something that isn't rooted in what you like. it could be completely unique sounding, maybe in the way that you combine two influences or multiple influences, but it’s really hard to be a band that's not comparable to anything, and I think that's why I was so drawn to that Razel record. I don't think that there's a single other band before or current that sounds anything like them. I think they’re a completely and totally unique sounding band.

Yeah, they take so many different influences and mix it all together and then the outcome is totally new in some way.

Yeah, for sure.

I feel like I saw maybe a Balmora account posting that you don't want to be called deathcore because you were called that at some point. Where do you draw the line between deathcore and metalcore, if there's even a debate there?

It's a tough line to draw. I don't think that Balmora is deathcore at all. I think a lot of the early deathcore-ish bands could be considered metalcore.

I think the Bring Me The Horizon EP is metalcore. You get into stuff like Deadwater Drowning; is that deathcore? Is that metalcore? I don't know. I would say it’s metalcore. As Blood Runs Black is super rooted in The Black Dahlia Murder style riffing, metalcore-ish stuff, but gets the deathcore label.

I've seen people calling The Black Dahlia Murder a deathcore band. Blows my mind. It's not deathcore. Early on, they were metalcore, melodeath as they went on. It's all semantics. You can call Balmora whatever you want. I think people get really caught up with genres and labels and comparing bands to each other and previous bands. It's fun.

I like debating genres and categorizing shit. We spent, I don't know, a quarter of this interview doing that, but, I don't know, I guess you gotta focus more on just actually doing stuff with your life.

Yeah, I mean, I love over categorizing things and I love a nice debate of what genre this falls into. I love that. But, some people just take it too seriously when it should just be like a fun sort of conversation between friends or a friendly debate. It doesn't have to be so serious. We could be a deathcore band if you want and it's fine, but don't call us deathcore because we're not.

No harm, no foul, they're still listening to you I guess.  

yeah, I agree. At the end of the day, it's whatever.

I was just talking about social media. How do you navigate using social media, both for band promotion and telling people about your life in the modern age?

I think it's an incredible tool for promo. With the click of a button, you could let people know anything. And I think with a click of a button, there's a lot of people that let you know just too much. I think there's a lot of things on social media that you don't have to post. I think people take it way too seriously a lot of the time when you can just make it fun and shitpost.

Everybody kinda has their own thing with social media, but to use it as a business thing, it works well. It's the easiest way to get information as quickly as possible to as many people as possible. It's also a way to connect with fans. You could talk to them right there in your messages, they could ask you questions, and you could answer them. There's upsides and there's downsides depending on how you use it.

What's one piece of advice you'd give to a kid or someone who wants to start their own label?

Start it with your friends. Make it for your scene. Put out your friend's bands, make some DIY tapes, make a burned CD, screen print a shitty shirt. Do it cause it's fun, don't do it as a business thing. Ephyra got to the point where we are right now by pure accident.

I'm learning more and more that it's a business and not just fun, but it's still fun. It is pretty much my full time job now, running the label. Go into it with genuine intentions, go into it with fun in mind, and see where it takes you.