Interview with Her Dark Heaven

Mar 31, 2023

Hey! Jack (Frontperson) and Camilo (Lead Guitar) from Her Dark Heaven here :)

What got you into music, and if you had not gotten into music what would you be doing today?

J: My Dad would give me “Rock History” lessons when he drove my sister and me to school when we were kids. He showed us everything from the 50s to the 90s. The Isley Brothers to Nirvana. It was in the backseat of the car that I fell in love with music and the way it makes me feel.
If I wasn’t doing music I would be an actor. I was trained as an actor from a young age, and I studied Shakespeare at the Globe Theatre. When I moved to New York City I craved the feeling that live performance gives me. I feel that music is more immediately rewarding in a live setting. And I knew that on my deathbed I would regret it if I didn’t fully pursue it, whether my acting career was successful or not.
C: I always loved music as a listener. It was not until I was 14, while playing Rock Band/Guitar Hero that my uncle asked me “are you getting anything in life out of that video game?” and I said, “Well, no”. He then bought me my first guitar. Love at first sight.
I’d love to be a Game Streamer if I wasn’t doing this. I owe it to them haha

What do you like to do when you are not playing music and how does that influence your creativity?

J and C: We love nightlife. One of our favorite things to do is go out dancing and partying. Electronic and dance music is beginning to influence Her Dark Heaven significantly. We’ve already made a melodic house remix of an earlier song of ours called “Something Like Thirst”

Where are you based out of and how did that influence your music?

J: We’re based in New York City. I think it contributes to the band’s fluidity of genre. We have two members who come from East Asia and Latin America, and those of us who were raised in the USA grew up in different places across the country. America is not always the melting pot it claims to be, but NYC is an exception. We’re truly from everywhere, so our ideas come from everywhere as well.
C: Agree with Jack Here, even though we are base in NYC, our ideas come from many other places, kind of like how NY works, people from everywhere are here.

If you could play any show with any lineup, who would be on the ticket?

J: I’d love to open for U2. I think they may have one of the most universal sounds in the entire world. They are a band that has brought entire nations together. Continents even. Their music strikes directly at the heart of the human spirit. Their message is love and unity, and that we are all more alike than different.
C: Weeeeeeell if you tell me any show any line up, I would play with Mozart, Nirvana with Kurt, and Pantera with Dimebag Darrel.
But if necromancer powers were not available, sharing stage with Muse, and Ghost would be a blast. Some people claim we sound like them, so I figured why not keep it on brand.

If you could go back in time and give yourselves advice, what would it be?

J: Sometimes to find artistic inspiration you have to stop working for it and start living for it. The best songs come from lived experience, not sweating away in your room. Take a trip. See the world. Fall in love. Stay young, go dancing.
C: Do not be so judgmental of other perspectives in music, you’ll see, that even those artists you claim suck, have a couple of things to teach you about this art and the industry.

Of your songs which one means the most to you and why?

J: The Curtain for me personally is the most meaningful song I ever wrote. The song would lay the groundwork of Her Dark Heaven. I wrote it during an artistic identity crisis. I was disillusioned with acting and frustrated with the music I was making. I felt that I had wasted all of my time, and that it was too late to start over. So I wrote a song about that fear, and by doing so, I was able to begin again. Writing that song inspired me to seek out help from others and collaborate. If I had never written it, I would not sought out the other members of Her Dark Heaven.
C: Crème Brulee. Wrote the original version back in 2015, and the name is a metaphor to how people are with our emotions. Years of experience comes with some unpleasant ones, and we slowly develop an armor to protect ourselves. Just as how Fire burns Sugar making a tough crust on the outside, we put on a shield to cover our soft, vulnerable heart.

What kinds of messages do you like to get across in your music?

J: I’m interested writing songs about universal truths that are filtered through a specific person or experience. One of the ways HDH writes is we interview each other. We tell each other stories about people we love, trips we’ve take, losses we’ve experienced. We get into the details. “How tall was she?” “What color were the walls?” “What’s one thing you would tell him if he were here?” We try getting all those beautiful details together and compiling it together into a song. Hopefully one that others relate to.
C: The message of an art piece is not often my concern. Any form of art is subjective, and sometimes people give it their own meaning. I like making songs that people can imprint their own value to them, make it their own, part of their own life story.

What are your plans for the future, and do you have anything that you want to spotlight that is coming up?

J and C: We’re playing a show on April 8th at The Bowery Electric in NYC at 10pm. We’re releasing a melodic house remix of our song Something Like Thirst that night. The bill is stacked with good bands: Paper Lady, Trophy Wife, and Christopher Norman. We’re very hyped.