MIDNIGHT NIGHTMARE is the Goth-Industrial Band We’ve Been Waiting For

I had the chance to interview one of the several amazing bands that opened for Wednesday 13 at the Whisky-a-Go-Go in West Hollywood. Amongst a slew of traditional metal bands, Midnight Nightmare brought something new, creative, and electrifying– and put on one helluva show.

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L to R: Krock Drums, Freeze Fhenix, Angel Nightmare, Stian Sapiens, Alyx Gravez

Taking inspiration from industrial bands such as Psyclon Nine all the way to hip hop and trap music, Midnight Nightmare is the brainchild of singer/songwriter Angel Nightmare, with their roots in the southeast US. But now they’re kicking ass and taking names in sunny and plastic-injected Los Angeles, bringing a new level of darkness to the underground goth and metal scene since 2014.

[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRO_gA1tuiE[/embedyt]

I spent some time with them in their dressing room at the Whisky as they put on their trademark theatrical makeup and as Angel figured out how to put on some kind of a strapped harness bodysuit (seen above).

So first of all, I love your look. Would you mind just telling me a bit about what your band is all about and maybe describe your sound?

Angel Nightmare: Midnight Nightmare started as a performance art project that was a manifestation of all oppression that you’d deal with on a daily basis just for being different, so it’s pretty much just an artistic release of anger and how mad you are at how close-minded the world is. So our imagery changes a lot from horror, to drag, just stuff that’s completely different than what would be socially acceptable.

I just actually listened to your albums and I really love your music, you remind me of Psyclon Nine! And I’ve listened to them for a really long time. What were some of the main influences on your overall sound and lyrics, are there any bands you take inspiration from?

AN: Psyclon Nine is actually a big one, but a lot of the influence for the music I wrote in the beginning actually comes from a lot of hip hop. I listen to a lot of generic trap music that just sounds, like, evil, so I kinda use that as the basis of how I wanted to sound. I really like video game sounds and 80’s synthesizers, so I program a lot of keyboard sounds based off of that. We all kind of have our different styles of music, there’s different types of metal like death core and death metal influences in our songs. Our new stuff is more like black metal and also has more dark ambient stuff in there.

Freeze Fhenix: I’m a huge Psyclon Nine fan, they’re a legend. What industrial band ISN’T influenced by Psyclon Nine?

Angel, I like your voice better, cause I can actually understand—

All: WOAAHHHH.

Hear me out, hear me out.

AN: You’re not the first person to say that, either.

Your voice is a little deeper, which I like, and I could actually understand everything you’re saying. I can hear ALL the lyrics.

Alyx Graves: That’s news to me. *laughs* Old Psyclon Nine is classic, but new Psyclon Nine, I feel like Nero’s voice is going out, so…

AN: Actually I’ve been working on my vocals for almost ten years now, and I decided to do more pronounced vocals because of the fact that people can understand it, and it kind of kills the stigma of “oh, you can’t understand what they’re saying” when people talk about metal.

So how did you all meet and was it difficult getting the band together, especially with such an underground genre? Because wrangling people together for a band is the hardest thing ever.

AN: The final lineup we have now was actually the easiest time I’ve had finding members for a band, but I guess part of that is because I’m in California now and there’s a bigger demographic for this type of music. I met Freeze through Facebook nearly six years ago. And my bass player Alyx and my guitar player Stian both found me by looking up my makeup tutorials on YouTube. Stian reached out to me asking to do a collar project together, and in the beginning the guitar player that we had just flaked out on us without any warning. So I just went ahead and asked [Stian] if he wanted to play for us. And he came through! We met Krock [the drummer] here at the Whisky the last time we played here, they had asked us to fill in a spot where a band had dropped off of and Krock’s band played first. I watched them and I really liked their music, so I added them all on Facebook. A week later I made a post looking for a drummer for a specific set of things that are hard to find, and Krock completely met the criteria for it, he learned the songs in like less than 3 days. He’s the most professional drummer I’ve ever worked with in my life out of all the bands I’ve been in.

Drummers are a blessing. So where have you guys toured so far?

AN: We haven’t done a complete tour. When Midnight Nightmare first started, it was in the southeast when I was living in Mississippi, so we had always played shows in Tennessee or Birmingham or Atlanta. When we moved out here we’ve just played in Southern California and Vegas, but we’re looking to do Northern California and San Diego and Arizona. We’re waiting till our album’s done first, we’ll push and promote it when we go out.

When’s your album gonna be done?

AN: We’re thinking about releasing it probably around October.

That’d be appropriate. So do you have any favorite stories, and this is a question for all of you.

AG: You go first, I haven’t got one right now.

F: Well, Vegas was fucking intense, that’s the full truth. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

AG: You mean me and him getting lost in the hotel.

F: That was kinda funny I guess. We were drunk as shit on the Vegas strip.

AG: I was not that drunk.

F: Well I was drunk as fuck on the Vegas strip. I did end up getting lost in the wrong hotel and Alyx had to come and find me.

AN: Pretty much what happened is that we had a room on the 14th floor in the Four Queens, our guitarist was on the 2nd floor in room 254, and we were in room 1438/40. Freeze went to the wrong hotel room looking for our room—

AG: –In the wrong hotel.

AN: The number he was looking for was like 1257 which didn’t even exist in that hotel. So we called Stian even though everyone was pretty much passed out at this point and they were getting ready to go to bed, and he was like “Hey, I’m on the second floor, come get me” so Stian goes to the 2nd floor to look for him and he’s not there.

AG: So now he’s calling ME and crying, saying “Alyx I don’t know where I am, come find me.” I’m on the fucking strip, you want me to come get you?

F: Yes, I did. I wanted you to stop everything you were doing and focus on your friend.

AN: They ended up finding him, he was in the Fremont which is about two hotels over. So that was funny.

AN: (while putting on bodysuit) Am I getting too fat for this now?