Berlin’s La Haine are giving us the full first listen to “Spilling Raw” one day before its September 11 release. Across five short tracks, the band move through fast, melodic hardcore punk, with tom-heavy drums, a low bass push and EDIE.’s screams opening into cleaner vocal passages. Softer sections appear briefly before the songs snap back into their quicker pace.
The hand-painted 3m x 3m piece of fabric used for the cover is one visible part of a much bigger DIY job. Guitars were tracked at home, friends recorded drums, bass and vocals, the band are self-releasing 200 vinyl copies, and one day after this premiere the profit from their release show will go back into the Berlin community space beside their rehearsal room.
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Most of the work on “Spilling Raw” happened before and after the tracking sessions. La Haine made a demo themselves and played the songs around a hundred times before recording, working through the dynamics long before the proper sessions began.
FPünkada recorded the live drums and bass, EDIE. tracked guitars at home, and Hugo Trémorin recorded and edited the vocals. Noss, a longtime friend of EDIE. who works at Studio Sovaj in Rennes, France, mixed and mastered the EP.
“I think most of the informal labour happens before and after the recording,” Antoine said. “Crafting the dynamics in the songs, playing them a 100 times so that you’re confident the day of the recording. Working on the artwork (EDIE. drew a custom font that we then painted on a 3mx3m piece of fabric. We did a photoshoot in a vacant lot in Berlin. We designed the sleeves), the promotion, finding vendors, putting the release show together. We’re lucky to be working in creative fields and have a network of people who were able to help.”
EDIE. and Antoine both work as graphic designers, which meant they could keep the visual side in their own hands as well. EDIE. makes many of the drawings used across La Haine’s artwork and merch, and screen prints the merch personally.
“I guess what I take from the DIY spirit is maybe quite old-school, but I really like making things by hand. For the SPILLING RAW cover, for example, I drew a typeface that we then painted by hand onto a huge black sheet over a couple of afternoons. It was a lot of work, but we had a lot of fun doing it!”
Antoine shoots analogue photography, so they took the camera into places around Berlin that are part of the band’s everyday territory. More hours went into the sleeves, the artwork for “Fierce” and its cassette edition, promotion and putting the release show together.
For EDIE., DIY also means doing as much as possible themselves and working out fair exchanges when somebody else needs to get involved. Friends may trade services, or the band find another form of compensation that works for everyone. Many of those people are musicians and artists themselves and know exactly how little money can be floating around these projects.
“So yeah, DIY is a lot of hours of work, but it’s also really rewarding to see your project grow from an idea into a finished thing,” EDIE. said.
Video by Pulp Lemonade Video, @pulp_lemonade_video
Leandro Solagna (@leandrosolagna) shot the promo photos. This year’s live photos come from Oyèmi Hessou (@noheroes.jpg), Leandro and Andre Zulley (@herrzulle), who also photographed La Haine at Berlin Breakout. The “Spilling Raw” artwork is by EDIE. and Antoine.
La Haine started with a few songs EDIE. wrote and released as an EP in 2023. Antoine Mauron heard it and got in touch about joining on drums, with Elia Pedersini coming in on bass. That lineup recorded “Spilling Raw” last year.
Elia later focused on his other projects. Lu and Letis joined at the beginning of 2026, leaving the current La Haine as EDIE. on vocals, Antoine on drums, Letis on bass and Lu on guitar.
On the record, EDIE. handled vocals and guitars, Elia played bass and Antoine played drums. Elia also added extra guitars to “Never Enough (And Still Quite The Same)”. La Haine wrote, produced and performed the record themselves, with lyrics by EDIE.
The band’s own description of “Spilling Raw” keeps returning to identity and the masks people wear: those we choose, those imposed on us, those built for protection and those used to hide. Survival and resistance sit inside that same idea, with personal struggle treated as something that can become collective.
“Fierce” came out on May 29 as the lead single, and La Haine made 50 cassette copies. “Spilling Raw” is self-released on 200 vinyl copies. Digital distribution goes to selected DSPs, with Spotify excluded by choice. Subvert and Bandcamp are getting the main focus. Vinyl will be available directly from the band at shows and through Bandcamp, Refuse Records, Coretex in Berlin and selected Berlin record shops.
On August 23, La Haine played Neue Zukunft with Drink Deep, Blockage and Sorry I’m Late. Neue Zukunft has managed to move from Ostkreuz to nearby Stralau while retaining much of what made the previous location work. Its programme stretches outside gigs too, including an outdoor cinema and a broad mix of events. EDIE. calls the programming “incredibly sharp and diverse.”
Development projects around Cassiopeia put that venue under imminent threat of closure this summer, even though it remains a regular stop for international bands. La Haine played Berlin Breakout there in June in front of a sold-out room. Cassiopeia has since been given a reprieve, and the band are due back on October 4 with Loma Pietra and Deshialo.
Antoine said, “For me the idea that Berlin is a vibrant creative city where artists come to seek a sense of freedom still holds true, but it’s shrinking, it’s being challenged and it feels more like a constant struggle to keep it alive than an underground paradise.”
“Most of the venues where we play are under some kind of pressure or threat,” EDIE. said. “I’m not telling you anything new by saying that this is basically a miniature version of the dynamics happening on a much larger scale across cities, particularly in Berlin; the classic pattern in cosmopolitan cities: artists move there because it’s affordable, build collectives, collaborations and community projects, and then capitalism takes over and slowly drains them of what made them valuable in the first place.”
Some of the smaller places stay unnamed because they work through word of mouth. “Ask a punk,” as EDIE. puts it.
“It’s really DIY 101: lifers, people who have put music at the centre of their lives, who make it a priority and organise their lives around it.”
For people who came to Berlin from elsewhere, including people from outside Germany, those rooms can become a home and a place to meet others. La Haine rehearse, play and organise in these spaces themselves.
“It also gives us the courage to fight for and defend these spaces, without which we wouldn’t exist.”
The September 11 release show happens in the same building where La Haine, Aptera and Malmequer rehearse. The three bands have shared stages before, see each other regularly and became friends. Aptera play metal and doom. Malmequer play punk rock and riot grrrl. EDIE. likes mixed bills where people coming for different kinds of music end up in the same room.
The building has rehearsal rooms, pole dance classes, clubs, workshops and other community-led projects. La Haine spend enough time there that EDIE. simply calls the release show a gig “at home.”
“The whole thing is happening ‘at home’, in a place we really love that’s right next to our rehearsal space,” EDIE. said. “We’re there regularly, and it’s become a real part of our everyday life as a band. The whole area has been under pressure from investors for years, and keeping spaces like this alive is becoming increasingly difficult. So, together with the people running the space, we decided to combine both things: make it a celebration of our release while putting the full profit back into the space to provide some financial relief.”
Aptera and Malmequer both agreed that the money made from the show would go back into supporting the space. After the October 4 Cassiopeia date, La Haine also have another Berlin show on December 10.
Antoine said, “They became friends, and since we’re putting this show together, who would be better to complete the lineup than friends? It’s a celebration and we want to be surrounded with people who want to share this moment with us.”
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