Aethyrien is a musician that makes music that often takes you on an intense journey mixed in soundscapes and instrumentation surrounding the Old Norse world. We had the pleasure to make this very open and honest interview…
I am happy that you have found the time for this written interview, and we are all looking forward to hear more about your life and music
Would you like to tell us a little about yourself?
I am from the Oregon Coast in the US! I am turning 39 this year. I am own my own beard care business called Valkyrie Beard Care and all the music I write is to help build this world of mine. This is the only way I make any sort of living for myself is my shop and my music and I am honestly blessed beyond belief to be able to say that… however the sacrifices I have made to get this far I can’t see many willing to go through. Much of this has been possible due to the ‘double-edged’ swords consisting of my ADHD, depression and dark insomnia I get. Much of Aethyrien has come out of some really dark and sleep deprived episodes in my life, almost from a source of inner madness. I am unfortunately ending a 5-year long relationship with the love of my life to move back to isolation and drown in my own insanity to further my Valkyrie shop and Aethyrien/Æthyrien X.
What does “Aethyrien” mean and does the name mean something special for you?
“Aethyrien derives from the term ‘aether’ which can be defined in Greek Mythology as the ‘upper sky’ or the material element of the cosmos itself. It was essentially the essence that surrounded the gods themselves. Adding ‘ien’ at the end loosely translates to ‘Aether-like’. Aethyrien has always stood for something ‘more’ than just music for me. There is actually an Old Norse term ‘Óðr’ I feel describes what I go through when writing music and the name Aethyrien represents the closeness I have with the gods when creating these tracks.
How long have you been producing music and how did it start for you with producing your music ?
“Ever since I was a kid I was fascinated by drums. When I hit my teens, I grabbed a pair of drumsticks from a kid at school and set up some buckets outside and started to teach myself drumming. I was terrible. Later on, my parents gifted me a VERY cheap drum set and by the time I was around 15 I began playing in metal bands around the area. Fast forward to my 20s and I am doing small tours in hardcore straight edge bands in central US. I later got really into creating trance/house music and that evolved into delving into really intense cinematic/ambient experimental music in my 30s. Aethyrien has been a work in progress my entire life considering you can listen to and hear influences of metal, dance music and cinematic soundscapes throughout my songs .
And how did it start for you with producing music and how was your journey?
“I am always on a journey. That’s the whole point. To constantly be evolving and delving deeper into your mind. For me, darkness plays a very big role mixed with some pretty hardcore ADHD, I will go through periods of hyper focus where I will write music for 30 hours straight without stopping. While that’s not exactly healthy, I always create my best work through sacrifices. Always. Every one of them is another step along this journey I am on. And while I know perfection is impossible, I long to strive for it regardless.
Do you make other kinds of music than what we know you for now a days?
Yes, at the moment I have two more projects in development. These projects are in a completely different stylistic format, distinct from what I’ve worked on before. They open new horizons for my creativity, allowing me to experiment with various genres and approaches to music. However, at this stage, I prefer not to reveal all the details—not because it’s a secret, but rather because everything has its time.
When a project is just beginning, it needs space for natural development so that it can find its own uniqueness. These ideas are still taking shape, and I want to keep them in silence until they are fully mature. I’m confident that when the right moment comes, they will surprise listeners with their freshness and originality. But for now, it’s something personal and creative that I’m nurturing and developing.
Do you sing?
“Nope. No one wants to truly hear me sing. I can metal scream slightly, but no one wants to hear that either ha-ha. I will however use my voice in weird ways in my tracks and manipulate it drastically to get various effects in the background. The ‘Old Norse Soundscapes: Nastrond’ track features quite a bit of my voice that I altered to truly sound like the dead crying out in fear and being chased by Nidhogg. But actual singing, no thanks ”
Have you made collabs and with whom? Do you have any plans for more collabs?
“I have only done a single collab so far which was with Bjorth. I am open to collabs with others, however I am extremely ambitious and have SO MANY THINGS I still need to do myself that the idea of collabs with someone seems unrealistic with how little free time I have to do one. I have a collab with Eolya that is put on hold until my life slows down, but that song is a very special and dear one to me and look forward to finishing it in 2025.”
After all, music is about enjoyment and creativity, not about figuring out whose guitar sounds cooler. For me, the key is to maintain harmony and avoid unnecessary tensions.
Do you have a favorite track yourself or maybe a band?
“One of my all-time favorite tracks is Kingborn from Fleshgod Apocalypse. If you know anything of them, especially their older stuff, you know where I get a lot of my intensity and orchestral influence from <3”
Do you believe in the old ways yourself?
“My spirituality and beliefs are complicated. The old ways inspire me, especially the Norse. It is just extremely unfortunate the amount of lore and information that has been destroyed or lost to the ages of the Norse people. On a pagan level, there is something ethereal about nature for me that I feel modern civilization is just completely blinded by. I am moved in ways much deeper than anything else in life when it comes to nature, especially the brutality of the Pacific Coast.
As for the Norse pantheon themselves, two figures truly inspire me to my core. Odin with his inner madness, as well as his obsession for knowledge and the sacrifices he is always willing to make has truly left a mark on not only my work, but also my personality. Hel though has truly represented my darkness, how much death has surrounded my life since I was a kid, and how misunderstood I have always been. She has always represented the cycle of life for me. Without the right words to truly describe this feeling, it’s as if her presence surrounds me … always.
Where do you find your inspiration and you feel its easy to find inspiration?
“Honestly I am overwhelmed by it. It can’t escape it. I brought up Óðr earlier because to me inspiration comes at me like a frenzy, a madness I can’t escape. My head fills with so many things in order for me to be free of them I must create them. I get overwhelmed and it leads me to sacrificing sleep, food, social, etc. While you have people who complain about writer’s block, I have the opposite issue: I am way too ambitious, and I can’t control it. It is honestly a double-edged sword that has led me into mania and insomnia at times.”
Do you have any music education, or have you learned yourself?
“I am 100% self-taught. I took 2 drum lessons as a kid and had way too much ADHD for me to stick around doing those lessons and just taught myself everything I know today. I don’t learn like others normally do, and when I realized this as I got much older I understood how to wield this weakness into a strength of mine.”
Do you play any instruments?
“For Aethyrien, I play the tagelharpa, shakers, bones, etc. I can also play the drums as well as the guitar/bass/ukulele sort of. If there is not an instrument I know how to play, I will learn it until I do. I am obsessed with knowledge and knowing how to do something I didn’t know before is extremely appealing to me.”
Can it be hard to find time for the music when work an life in general comes in?
“Yes and no. I am self-employed running an online beard care shop online for a living, and since the birth of Aethyrien and now Æthyrien X, I make a living off quite literally my creations. That being said, it has caused me to sacrifice so many things in its path, including one of the hardest ones most recently: my love life.”
Busy with your company this time of year?
“Absolutely. Between Oct-Dec, I don’t sleep much. It will be hard for me to write music at any point during this because I will be fulfilling orders or in the lab cooking soaps and balms and mixing oils. It’s an insane time of the year for me… and I mean INSANE.”
Do you have any other interest like sport, crafting or carving – maybe gaming?
“I am very heavy into competitive games. It’s how my brother and I keep in touch with each other even though we live in different states. Sports, not so much. Crafting…. I think my entire shop is basically crafting to an extent ha-ha. I really get into growing trees and odd plants though. I have 9 bonsai trees I have grown since they were tiny little seedlings. These trees are mostly native to Oregon, some being Giant Sequoias, Coastal Redwoods, and Dawn Redwoods. Surrounding myself with nature is extremely important for me, more so than I think others, which is why my studio is filled with life, including rare carnivorous pitcher plants.
I was at your great premiere with Ætherien X the other day, would you like to tell us about that project?
“The goal behind this new project is simply to retell the Old Norse lore through a modern lends. It will never be bound by any genre and essentially serves as my little sandbox where ANYTHING goes… as long as I am telling a story. It was very inspired by Braggi and the entire idea of him. Each song goes through a very complex process that I currently don’t see many people doing. With the dawn of AI, I have seen many people use it as an end result instead of a tool.While I think AI is incredible and is only getting exponentially better, it is also not going anywhere. I use AI for almost everything in my life now from building bots to help with gardening advice to help with lyrics and …. well, Æthyrien X now (the X stands for experimental). The process involves me rendering hundreds of tracks trying to ‘fish’ for what I am looking for in my head I then take many of these, separate them into STEMS and quite literally build the track myself using all sorts of separated AI rendered tracks. I then add all my own EQ and effects as well as my own instrumentation and any added atmosphere the song is calling for. The lyrics are assisted using AI, but I always have to go back and manually adjust them to get EXACTLY what I want. Again, striving for perfectionism knowing damn well I will never acquire it. It’s an obsession of mine. Haha.
While I think AI is incredible and is only getting exponentially better, it is also not going anywhere. I use AI for almost everything in my life now from building bots to help with gardening advice to help with lyrics and …. well, Æthyrien X now (the X stands for experimental). The process involves me rendering hundreds of tracks trying to ‘fish’ for what I am looking for in my head I then take many of these, separate them into STEMS and quite literally build the track myself using all sorts of separated AI rendered tracks. I then add all my own EQ and effects as well as my own instrumentation and any added atmosphere the song is calling for. The lyrics are assisted using AI, but I always have to go back and manually adjust them to get EXACTLY what I want. Again, striving for perfectionism knowing damn well I will never acquire it. It’s an obsession of mine. Haha.
Any releases soon?
“I have approx 3 songs for Aethyrien I am sitting on until I have the time to truly design the artwork and also do the videos for them. Since I literally do all of this myself, 24 hours in a single day is never enough sadly. I also am getting close to releasing a new track called “Gefinn Óðni (Odin’s Sacrifice)” for Æthyrien X. It’s a unique story told of Odin’s sacrifice, who everyone knows, but this story is told from the perspective of Huginn watching Odin on the 9th’s night… the moment Odin begins to lose sense of the world and slip into madness and insanity. It’s an emotional song for me personally since it symbolizes much of the sacrifices I make in order to acquire my own knowledge and creations, the mania and frenzied inspiration I experience.
I would like to thank you for answering my questions about your music, and glad we could do this
written interview, and I am sure many are interested in getting to know you better….
Links: www.valkyriebeardcare.com
YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN8KKtR6NipRC9Re52b5XHA
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3SjKcooGsog55741vulfJE?si=AcGTl8MAQmuxl7iTcfZZsw
