Whispers From Poland's Darkest Doom - Interview with YSIGIM - 4/20/2026

Whispers From Poland's Darkest Doom - Interview with YSIGIM - 4/20/26

    It is my pleasure to have been able to speak with Polish underground doom metal legends and funeral doom pioneers YSIGIM regarding their new material and a bit of their background as a band. Thank you, YSIGIM, for the wonderful answers and of course, the great music!

    

        - Rusty

    

    Thanks for taking the time to do this interview with me. You may answer as many questions with as much detail as you wish. Since you have a pretty extensive interview for your Ain Soph Or CD release booklet, most of my initial questions were answered! But I will try to touch on some new topics, maybe some more interesting questions with interesting answers, we’ll see. 

1. First of all, how are you doing nowadays? Besides the new music, has anything of interest happened to you lately?

    Cheers Bryaden, thanks for reaching us! We are pretty well, thank you. Considering the long hibernation for YSIGIM, we have started with a huge jump off from the coffin :) Besides the music - we are happy with our families. Besides the music… we are not sharing that much from private stuff.

2. I understand you’re now doing new material, having put out some singles and teasing a new album. How smooth has the process been leading up to the release? Is it still projected to release this year? 

    That's a pretty interesting one as we work totally differently. Let’s say we have “resurrected” or become awakened or just come back to music as YSIGIM in 2023. At the end of the year we published the original recording / mastered as it was done by Robert Brylewski (unfortunately Wild Rags release had something done out of our scope over that, it sounds different). After that in 2024 we started to write new music. Our first attempt was to make one new track just to confirm we still can do this. Also we wanted to state how we are now different, as musicians, persons etc. so it ended with three tracks, including 2024 version of Self Blessing from Ain Soph Or, and two more tracks I started in late 90s in pure sequencer tools, so not guitars but just the harmony. This followed with our finding of older mixes/remixes from 2006-2012 period of our experiments with more dark electro but the whole thing was for us a proof we can work again and make music. That’s why we self-pressed the CDs as Wicca Sound, and made a Minidisc edition (that was my idea, as I'm a big fan of this format).

    Late 2024 I started to record whole new material, drafts, sketches - so by 2025 we were doing initial mixes, vocal recording (this is the most painful and slow process from my side). But this is slow process. We have too comfortable a situation right now, we have eliminated all the problems we had in the past, so we just do music. I have the whole setup next to me. Literally I can touch it now while writing these words - I just need to power up my Apollo x6 from Universal Audio, open Logic Pro, connect guitar, check tuning and start recording. I do not need to go somewhere, pay for anything as I have already paid for it to have it around me. If I have an idea to record 2am, I can do it.

    We went finally into one platform, so no compatibility issues, we have organized a kind of production pipeline - we work through cloud, so I do my changes, saving to a new file with a new name, numbering and notes and Marcin can pick it anytime he is comfortable with. We both have jobs, families, but what we can organize is surprisingly smooth. There is no rush, but just to be proud of: we have over 50 minutes of music recorded for the album “Sins”, we are mixing now, changing some arrangements etc. Finalizing. That’s the state of it.

    Also - worth mentioning - we have already recorded two tracks (almost 18 minutes and 2nd is over 15 minutes) for the next release, so after “Sins” we already know what will be next :) 

3. How many times do you record songs and test different ideas before reaching a final product; more generally, how long does it take to finish a song?

    It depends, but let’s just see one example. Endless - first single. 52 versions (by version we track session changes done either by me or Marcin) before the single release, then after the release we have done 22 changes (towards Sins mix). To complicate a little - if you just take my solo over the bridge in the track, which is 4 bars long, I did 57 takes it in the loop, but it was not needed like this, I just love to play guitar, so I played for a while until I realised… I have spent too much time on that :) So - first version of the song was recorded on 2024.03.30, the release for this single was 2025.03.09 so almost a year. But this is because we needed to redefine a lot of things in the process. How to record, change equipment, learn new equipment, tools. 

4. In other interviews you talk about influences/ real life experiences that contributed to the writing of Ain Soph Or. 30 years later, how many of these influences still affect your current material, and what are some new influences you are bringing in?

    It’s hard not to say the influences from life and life experience are always present. But now we deal more with things like depression, death, pain, loneliness. The world outside shows us not only the bright sky and sun. We lost friends, family members, sometimes we are losing ourselves but the music is the thing that keeps us breathing, loving, feeling.

 

5. Has there ever been any inspiration from works of film? If so, how did you implement that into your music?

    It always was. As the film music tells the story by its layer. So this is a great approach to build the atmosphere, tension, even - for most of the time it’s the background, but from time to time - it takes the wheel. So Badalamenti, Morricone but also pure jazz tunes like Miles Davis did for “Elevator to the Gallows” (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud by Louis Malle). So long list. 

6. What are your lyrical influences?

    

    It would be a different answer in the 90s, probably I would say then Bauldaire, Rimbaud, Verlaine, Mallarme, Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe. Nowadays I do not see much impact we can define as influence. I just write what I have in my head. When we started as YSIGIM, I was 19yrs old, we shared this lyrics writing with Marcin, I mean we were writing both lyrics for our projects, then - as it was more comfortable to make them easier to “sing” so I took the whole responsibility, same for SEASON we were playing after. I think they are shorter now than before. It’s more psychology oriented, I dig deep in my mind, fears, death, passing away, depression - unfortunately some of them are from real life experience around us, or strictly personal experience. 

7. Are there any notable people you’ve met while doing music/gigs?

    

    While making music - rather not. It was a closed / hidden process. During gigs, yes, I mean everyone was kind of notable. Some contacts persisted until now, some needed refreshing, some people are gone forever. As you know we had the privilege of working on mastering with Robert Brylewski. For the period of 90s this music area for me was connected with my job then, graphic artist, so yeah, I have met many people by this connection, from jazz players like Michal Urbaniak to pure death metal dudes from Vader. I was also once on the same stage with Bonne M - but I was on the private party - so not sure if it counts :)

8. Modern funeral doom (or metal in general) bands tend to have very thick, monstrous production to convey heaviness and space, however the early works such as Stream From the Heavens, Stormcrowfleet, and of course Ain Soph Or have quieter guitars in the mix. Would you say the quieter production favors the funeral doom style or does a louder, more modern production fit the vision better?

    

    We have many aspects of production nowadays. LUFS are ruling the world of streaming and social media. Modern “metal oriented” recordings are typically 2 or 4 guitar takes per each guitar, so you have a wall of guitars, but this also makes many records very flat in terms of dynamic. But there is also a tendency I think from pop kind of mixing to put in front the pulse (drums) and vocal. I love the pre “grid” era of recordings. The micro tempo changes within the track. 

    For the sound we have now - we are not doing this dual/quad doubles for guitars, however - after “Sins” we will have different production for guitar, as there will be more open space for guitar, and it won’t be like on “Sins” two guitars dialogue. For the Ain Soph Or it’s different due to technology of recording, and we have there only two guitars, no bass, no keyboards (just our voices). I do not know what is best for the funeral doom metal, never considered we were playing that, it came after, when we were far away from playing it. Also this is also about the skills I think - after years of playing you need something more fresh, more complex. Take a listen to Self Blessing from 2024, we recorded it intentionally, it contains all the harmony from the original, but it’s that different. As we are that different from 1993 and two 19yrs old folks that recorded “Ain Soph Or” in a flat in a temporary studio.

    So answering your question: it depends. Are we the target? People around 50yrs old? I do not like too much “overproduced” sound. As I like to hear my amp, my guitar, my small mistakes/glitches that make it not AI sounding. 

9. Is there a significance of the cover images for the new singles? 

    

    The first idea was to keep it monument/cemetery sculptures oriented, but the last two ones are totally different, drawn ones and they will be a persistent part of our merch. The “Don’t wake me up” is created by Katarzyna Siwiec, my friend and great artist, previous one “Downward Spiral” was created by me, but I’m no longer graphic artist, so it was long process to make it (it was drawn as vector image).

 

10.  Regarding your project Tem:OHP-AB, despite stating that your side endeavours more or less merged into YSIGIM, is there more material from this project we have yet to hear? If so, do you plan to release it?

    

    There is an idea to make a release of all these things from 91-93, it’s 50 minutes and 15 tracks altogether. I have never thought about this that way, but recently a few people told me it was kind of a Mortiis project in Poland… and also Tem:OHP-AB was started before Mortiis left the Emperor to start as a solo project.

 

11.  Outside of your music, are you in touch with the modern metal scene? Do you desire finding new music, or do you prefer to stick with the classics?

    

    I like the edge of metal and goth music, same as folk and metal mixture, but this is actually nothing new, it’s still something from the 90s. That’s actually funny in some way - people reinvent the wheel thinking they really do something new, and this is just recooked soup that we know for 30 years. Like LoFi sound for funeral doom - in early 90s or even before it was because of lack of quality in equipment during recording or reproducing, and people trying to recreate it as “style of sound”. A bit crazy that limits, the roof of something can be later the target.

12.  With the current state of music production, do you think creativity still pays off?

    

    I hope so. What is lost most of the time is the message. This was pure and honest, now it’s more marketing oriented. That’s sad actually. Same for music production - you do not need to be able to play something, or sing. AI will do it for you. For that rat race - I’m off. I have the best pleasure with playing, recording it myself, same for production, I like to sit, move the faders, feel the layers of takes we did. Everytime I open sesion in DAW I like to find something new (so now you know why we had so many edit versions). It’s not about perfection, it’s about journey with sound, rediscovery. That’s something like endless pleasure.

 

Some oddball questions to end:

1. What’s an album from another band/artist, any album at all, that you wish you had written?

“Disease” from GGFH. I love this album. 

2. Have you ever worn corpsepaint?

I cannot say I never did as a few times for Halloween I did it :)

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?

In terms of feeling something yes, in terms of seeing something - no.

Thank you very much for your time in this interview! I hope I got to know you a little better and I am eager to check out the new material when it arrives. If there is anything else that you would like to add, you can do so below:

    Thanks Bryaden for your support and for this interview. To the readers - if you like something old, Dying Sun Records released our “Ain Soph Or” material as 2CD (with all demos of OBNOXIOUSNESS, the project that precede the YSIGIM), so it’s like our anthology of 1991-1993 with 20 pages booklet including long talk between me and Marcin and some stuff from archives. There is also an MC release by Dying Sun Records and we have also released “Ain Soph Or" as picture Minidisc, and a few copies have left if you are a fan of this medium. The latest thing to tell about our 1993 material is that the vinyl edition done by Black Flame Rebellion is coming this May, packed with a 20 A4 pages booklet. We are after listening to testpress and it sounds awesome. 

    If you want to check our newer stuff, we have “Dead God Lies” CD packed with 3 new tracks and remixes done between 2006-2012, and by listening to our new singles you can expect more less what will be on “Sins” coming this year. \m/