If you’re an avid visitor to our website, you’ll know that we had an interview with Sim, the drummer for the London-based band The Nyx. If you’re interest in this band was piqued from that interview, you’re in luck because now, we’re back with more Nyx content in the form of a full band interview!
TT: What are your names and what do you play in the band?
TN: Becky – Guitar and vocals. Simone – guitar and vocals. Ruby – Bass. Sim – Drums.
TT: How did you all meet?
Becky: I knew Simone from a small music scene in the town we grew up in, we met at about 16. We wanted to challenge how male dominated rock bands were by starting a girls-only band. We couldn’t find a bassist so I ended up teaching Ruby how to play in 72 hours (Ruby and I met in a field somewhere when we were about 14). The three of us have been making music for about 4 years now. We’ve had two drummers so far but sadly neither worked out; so recently we got Sim on board. We met her on the internet about a year ago.
TT: How did you all decide on the band’s name?
TN: The Nyx is the name of the bad-ass greek goddess of the night. So that was very attractive to us; considering an aim of the band was to be powerful/empower women. It’s short, sweet and cutting. Also visually, the way we write the logo creates an image of a sort of mountain shape. All around power.
TT:What is your songwriting process? Do you all contribute lyrics??
TN: Because we have two singers & songwriters, both me and Simone, we have two outlets for songs. Lyrically, it tends to be quite a personal thing, but musically we collaborate with each other. Songwriting tends to start from the guitar for the both of us, a lick or a chord progression. Actually lyrics are often the last addition to our songs. But it always varies, I’ve recently written a couple tracks, demoed all the parts and then presented them to the band as finished tracks. Then other times we’ll jam out something in a rehearsal and create something from scratch. We try to let the songs write themselves as much as we can.
TT:’Fire Breathing Lady’ is a BANGER. What’s the story behind that tune?
TN: Thanks! Fire Breathing lady is an angry track but with a light-hearted approach. It’s supposed to slap you in the face, and then tickle you under the chin. So its got this strong feminist message, but then twiddley guitar riffs and mocking backing vocals in the second verse. I laughed when I wrote those bits but kept it all in because that’s part of the message too; believe in yourself but don’t take things too seriously, you know? It was actually one of those songs that sort of wrote itself. Within half an hour it was done; lyrics, structure, everything and honestly it has barely changed since.
The story….I guess it’s actually the fiery feminist story of my life. The first verse – ‘I’m a fire breathing lady, a burning woman made me’ is me being born to the strong woman who is my mother. Second verse – growing up, finding myself, falling in love: ‘When I was a young girl (at the age of five yeah), I was just a bottle (buried alive yeah), When I let you taste me (tastes so nice yeah) I felt the walls breaking (shattered inside yeah). Then final verse, coming of age, finding my band, my tribe: ‘Now I am a woman, I will stand for something, find my fire and fuel it, make my sisters feel it.’ Then the chorus’, a bit of a fuck you to expectations, not holding back and being completely, unapologetically a strong woman: ‘I won’t play the game, I’ll make you eat my name, I’m a fire breathing lady’.
Lyrically, thats the whole song. Its a simple one but says everything we need to. The guitars and the rhythm do most of the storytelling by being hard-hitting and I suppose, ‘un-ladylike’….oh the irony.
TT: There’s such an epic feel to your music. The vocals coupled with the hard-hitting instrumentals painted such grand images for me while I listened. Like, many times I pictured fighting the final boss in a video game while listening to your music. When you were gearing up to make the EP, what were some words, concepts and/or ideas you all decided you wanted this EP evoke for yourselves and listeners?
TN: Hell yeah. That’s the response we want. Empowerment! I think generally, getting people energized through our music is what we want to evoke, be that some hardcore head-banging at a show or making you stand up for what you believe in, either way we just want listeners to feel something.
This EP as a finished piece of work is actually an odd one, because it’s made up of some tracks we’ve been playing for years as a previous band, like Myself, and then new songs we wrote as The Nyx like ‘Hideaway’. So it’s capturing a pretty long stretch of time, with lots of changes musically and personally. That means it’s quite difficult for this EP to represent concepts – it’s really just a collection of singles. We’ve actually done our own artwork for each single to showcase how they’re quite personal, and standing alone from each other.
TT: Do you have any plans to tour the U.S.?
TN: I suppose more like dreams rather than plans right now. We’re still all trying to make ends meet, trying to balance full time jobs, usually struggling to pay the rent. We’re unsigned and pretty unknown and it’s fucking hard being young, creative and poor. But we’re keeping on, we know we’re capable of it, just finding ourselves pretty tied to London right now. We hope to be in you soon though.
TT: I watched the Camden Rocks video and you all are so much fun to watch! Which songs do you love playing for audiences?
TN: Our live shows are pretty dynamic, there’ll be guitar solos on our backs, someone will get into the crowd at some point, lots of falling over the kit and lots of sweat. And thats whether the room is packed or empty. Our live set is actually pretty versatile, swinging from overdriven, grunting grunge songs to pretty delicate soft-rock stuff, and it’s showcasing that variety to audiences that I like.
TT: Are there bands that you all want to tour with really badly??
TN: Anyone!! haha. Any tour big enough for us to quit our day jobs!!
TN: What are your ‘Band Goals’ for 2017?
Trying to get as much exposure as possible, getting out of our London bubble, playing lots of face-melting shows, writing and recording more music.