Germany’s Haywire didn’t crawl out of the COVID wreckage—they came swinging. Born in the tight confines of lockdown, vocalist Manon and her partner found themselves suffocating under curfews, home offices, and the bleak weight of isolation. So they did what any restless soul would—they started writing. The result? A raw, unforgiving slice of hardcore that hits like a brick to the skull.
Their debut EP Rotten Earth isn’t here to impress you with its polished edges. It’s straight-up groove-heavy, mosh-driven fury with no sugar-coating. Haywire may have started as a two-person project just to burn off steam, but this thing’s mutated into something much bigger. From the DIY demos born in the dead of night to a lineup locked and loaded, their sound is now a force that rips through any room they step into.
Haywire’s groovy, beatdown-infused hardcore isn’t just about mindless aggression, though. The weight behind their tracks feels personal—whether it’s the isolation of pandemic life or frustrations of a scene that sometimes values appearances over substance. Tracks like “Born of Rotten Earth” slam hard on this. Manon’s experience as a female in the hardcore scene—fighting for respect beyond tokenism—gets laid bare, a gnarly testament to the grind behind the mic.
The EP digs deeper than just another angry outburst. “Life Half Lived” leans into the existential gut-punch of balancing passion with the brutal reality of adult life, while “Struggler” pulls inspiration from the graphic weight of Berserk, reflecting the band’s love for comics and storytelling. Each song is sharp, deliberate, with a sound that echoes influences like Suburban Scum and World of Pain but keeps it raw and real.
As 2024 rolls on, Haywire’s lineup is solid, their shows are packed, and they’re gearing up to tear through Europe, sharing stages with heavyweights like Madball and Arkangel.
Dive into the full interview below for a breakdown on the EP, the shows, and what’s fueling their fire.
Let’s kick things off with a bit of the band’s backstory—how did it all come together, and where do you see the project right now?
As I am sure many other projects that are coming out in these times, Haywire was also a “COVID idea”. Manon (our vocalist) and me have been living together in Germany since late 2018, so after about a year, at the end of 2019, all of that craziness started to go down, and shows were cancelled left and right. To top that off we were also no longer allowed to do any contact sports (we have been heavily into Kickboxing at that time) and there were curfews, as well as limits as to how many people you are allowed to meet at a time. Needless to say, our social lives and our mental health suffered heavily, as we were constantly stuck between home office and our TV.
We were both quite clear on feeling the need to do something with our time, and so Manon started developing her vocals, and I started figuring out home recording and writing songs. This turned out to be an amazing thing to occupy our bored brains in those years, and I definitely felt the itch to get creative again for some time. I am the kind of person to just zone out and start tapping on the table with my fingers without even realizing it, so there were some riffs that just needed to get out of my head. I wrote three songs, we did demos at home, and started to ask around for people that would be down to join us to learn and rehearse them.
Out tagline was that it was supposed to be “our project”, as in Manon’s and mine, and the other bandmembers were mainly there to help out. Since nothing was going on, we quickly found a couple of friends that were down to spend time in the rehearsal room with us, and we spent 2020 and 2021 rehearsing, before we went to Karlsruhe and recorded our demo MMXXII at our friend Jerome’s studio in Karlsruhe (@thecult_prod) in late 2021.
Suddenly shows were back on the horizon, and we played our first gigs in April 2022. It was a crazy feeling playing these songs live, as it seemed so unrealistic back in the day when I was working on them at home, but it simply felt great. We played quite a few gigs over the course of 2022, wrote new songs and recorded them as Promo 2022 – again with Jerome’s help – and while fun, we started to slowly realize that playing with members that had obligations in other bands made it tricky to get on the musical level we desired, especially if those other bands were their main focus.
More lineup changes happened in the course of 2023, and while there was no bad blood, there was no denying that more dedication and initiative from every member is needed for a project like this to function properly. Now, in 2024, we are down to a 4-piece, but I am proud to say that we have found a fully committed lineup for Haywire.
We just released our first EP, recorded by our friend Paul from Side2Side Records and Spiral, and it sounds massive thanks to him and David from 1408 Productions. We’re extremely grateful for the positive feedback we’ve received so far, both on stage and online, and it’s just extremely motivating and gratifying to see everyone get accustomed to the new tracks.
Of course I intend to evolve the project musically, and even though the lineup is now fixed, I still have a vision I want to follow, so you can expect the “handwriting” to be the same: hard, heavy, moshable hardcore, a bit of beatdown here and there, but nothing too dumbed-down.
Bands like World of Pain, Suburban Scum, Downpresser and Forced Order are huge influences. For the next release I want to experiment with shorter songs with lots of variation, while still keeping the general vibe we already have. We’re super excited for what’s to come, and you can be as well!
What kind of influences shaped this release? Any specific sounds or ideas you were diving into?
There is no real overarching concept behind “Rotten Earth”, every song deals with a subject that at the time of writing was simply occupying our minds. Be it the isolation we felt during the pandemic, fading friendships, people changing for the worse, general observations.
You see, we do not like “preaching to the choir”. While hardcore is inherently political, I do believe there are many bands that do this way better than we ever could. I choose to go the Hatebreed-route when I think of themes and inspirations for songs. Highly personal lyrics is simply something that I identify more with and that I can pour more emotion and authenticity in.
Concepts like overcoming adversity, trying to keep a positive attitude in the face of hardships and simply being annoyed at the world and its inhabitants comes more naturally to me when I write lyrics.
Of course, this is no way near to reinventing the wheel in hardcore terms, but it just feels more real to me. What I also like is referring to media such as books, comics and movies.
Growing up, these had a huge influence on my world view and my philosophy, and there is so much good stuff out there that is simply inspiring and allows for great perspectives on a multitude of subjects. So I do intend to incorporate more of that in future releases.
If you’re down for it, let’s break down the album track-by-track—just some quick thoughts on the meaning behind the lyrics and how they came to be.
1. Born of Rotten Earth
The idea for the lyrics actually came from Manon. Having a female singer in a hardcore band is still not the norm, even though we have more and more amazing bands in that regard, which is amazing. When we started out, we had a very warm reception from many promoters, which we ended up not questioning, as we as a new band simply loved getting this much attention. Doubts came in creeping at a later time, when some promoter told us something in the likes of “The main thing is not to have an all-male lineup”, which kind of felt weird.
Manon busted her ass learning how to do vocals properly, she battled and overcame stage fright, she had to completely get out of her comfort zone to actually be able to perform to the level that she does now. And after all this, all she is recognized for is her gender? This felt bad, and while I am sure that the promoter did not mean any harm, it made us question whether the good intention of bringing some diversity into lineup is actually not coming from the wrong place – thus, “from rotten earth”.
We want to be booked because of our music and the quality our live performance, as well as the effort we put into this project, and not because of arbitrary things.
2. Life Half Lived
All members of Haywire are now 30 plus, so we are in a very different stage in life than in our 20ies. Being in a band is everything but care-free anymore, we have stable jobs that we somehow have to juggle, and unfortunately music is a very expensive and time-consuming hobby.
There have been multiple instances in the past years where I asked myself “Is this all worth it?”, and this song was written as a reminder that no matter how hard things get, it is worth it. Our lives are finite, and doing what you love should never be sacrificed for the things we do out of pure necessity.
Returning home at night after a gig and knowing that you have a plane to catch the next day at 7 in the morning for a business trip might suck in the moment, but in the long run, you know you have done the right thing.
3. Struggler feat. Stef/CALCINE
This song was inspired by the manga Berserk. I re-watched the show, and somehow at the time of the pandemic, the underlying message of it resonated heavily with me. Going forward, no matter how hard the times seem. The main character Guts is probably one of the best-written and most inspirational characters in all of media in my opinion. I started reading the manga at that time, and I could not help but write lyrics inspired by it. If you haven’t had the chance, do pick up Berserk. It’s extremely graphic and even traumatizing in some parts, but it is ultimately a story about how to deal with trauma. And a damn inspiring, powerful and even hopeful one.
“Heed my words, Struggler. Soon a rain of blood, the likes of which you cannot imagine, shall fall down upon you. It will be a storm of death. But take heed, Struggler. Struggle, endure, contend. For that alone is the sword of one who defies death. Do not forget these words.”
4. Introlude
Not much to say, as it is an instrumental. We wanted to write an ass-beater of a set intro, and I think we succeeded with this one.
5. Skin Deep
The second song we re-recorded from our Promo 2022. This song was written in the middle of the pandemic, and it is extremely introspective. This one deals with the feeling of being emotionally drained, being bombarded with bad news from TV and social media, as well as trying to keep up with responsibilities. A sense of emptiness accompanied us in that time, as well as a loss of vitality and passion.
We went through the motions of working and staying at home, which felt devoid of substance, and the smallest things suddenly became burdens. I am sure many others had a complex relationship with all of this, as we tried rationalizing doing nothing and simply succumbing to our suffering. You’re aware that you should do more, but everything feels so oppressive, that you struggle finding the energy for it.
6. Gaping Void
One of the songs we have re-recorded from our Promo 2022. This song kind of turned out to be the antithesis to Life Half Lived, as it is about people that do let themselves be beaten down by routine, sacrifice all of the things that give them joy, and end up becoming husks of themselves, working themselves to numbness, just waiting for the weekend to come to indulge in whatever soothes them, which results in them becoming bitter and resentful to others.
Got any gigs coming up that you’re hyped about?
After having the opportunity to play our release show with Bodybag and Splitknuckle and share the stage with Born From Pain, Mindwar, Nasty and Madball in Holland, we’ve got a packed autumn ahead, with shows in Germany, France and Belgium (so far!).
The most exciting dates to us are the Sin City Fest on October 26th (with Arkangel, Chaver, Dethroned and many more) and the weekender with our friends in Bridge Burner and Moral Fever (31.10-02.11).
We are getting requests coming from countries that we never played before for 2024 and 2025, some have not been 100% confirmed yet, so I can’t say more at the moment, but the upcoming year will be blast!
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What’s next on the horizon for you guys—what kind of plans are in the works?
In 2025 we would love to conquer Europe. We are currently working on a weekender with our friends in Becoming AD in February, let’s see what this brings. Otherwise… More practice and more songwriting!
We want to keep working on our music, shape our sound and release new songs regularly. What matters to us is play tight live and write music that is worth listening to.
Give us a rundown of your local scene. How do you feel it’s changed since you’ve been a part of it? Any bands, labels, or other players you think deserve a shout-out? We love giving some spotlight to the local community, so anything you’d like to mention works.
Thank you for asking this, because our local scene is blooming lately and it is so important for us to highlight this! In total honesty, 2017-2018, the scene in our area (Western Germany) was at a low point, however, things took a very interesting turn post-covid: new blood both in the audience and on stage. We are lucky to be part of a new wave of motivated and dedicated people. We are located in Germany, however we see ourselves as part of the European scene.
There are many people worth mentioning, but to keep it short… Side2Side Records has been an important part of the current scene, booking legendary shows with a great mindset and releasing the coolest new German and Swiss releases.
We would have loved asking Death Farm Records to release our EP but the timing was unfortunately off, as Jason has temporarily closed down the label, but I believe he will come back soon and stronger than ever!
There are many local bands we love to share the stage with: Thrufall, Wonderful World, Moral Fever, Spiral and more.
Belgium is coming back to life with bands like Becoming AD, Life Turns Cold, Sales Belges…
The French are killing it at the moment: shoutout to Worst Doubt, Headbussa, Sorcerer, Calcine and everyone else…
European hardcore is flourishing and it is incredible to be part of this scene in 2024.
