Philipp’s grandmother was born in East Berlin in 1943. She never knew her father, fled the GDR with her mother and two sisters to Hamburg, and met the first of three husbands there. He was an alcoholic and abusive. She fled him, too — this time with her two kids, Philipp’s mum and uncle, and as Philipp puts it, for them. The court “divorced guilty,” leaving her with no claim to aliments. She went on raising two children on a woman’s income in the 70s. Most of мир’s debut LP “molidae.,” out April 29th, is about her.
The Hamburg four-piece — guitarist/vocalist Philipp, bassist/vocalist Tobi, and drummers Laura and Lukas — work in blackened screamo, with a wider range than that label typically suggests. “molidae.” sits across that range: short, fast skramz songs next to lengthy guitar-driven pieces finished with choirs and spoken word.
The title came from a moment on a farm. While writing and recording the record there, мир read about a sunfish stranded on a California beach.
Sunfish were one of his grandmother’s favourite animals — she was fascinated by them — and conversation turned to her. “molidae.” stuck. Molidae is the family name of the mola, the Latin word for millstone. Philipp’s grandfather — his grandmother’s third husband of almost thirty years, and the man who always was, and always will be, his mum’s father, his grampa — used to volunteer in a defunct mill. He passed in 2017, leaving her behind.
The album, in part, brings them back together.
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The first two songs мир had musical foundations down for were “Ghosts (Honte)” and “Spirits (Vnschvld).” Laura wrote lyrics about the collective battles and experiences women have endured in patriarchal society — battles forced onto them. As she shared the lyrics, conversation turned to Philipp’s grandmother’s life, which had played out exactly along those lines: physical violence by men, juridical and psychological violence by state and society.
“Spirits” came out of the episode with her first husband — the fleeing, the “divorced guilty,” the years of raising two kids alone. Philipp speaks about the duty he felt retracing those stories:
“Not only did I find comfort and solace in retracing those stories, but I had a feeling of ‘duty’ retelling those stories my grandmother never held back. This sense of duty originated the way my grandmother told her stories, shared the injustices she endured: always as a strong survivor, sometimes even with the air of being ridden from guilt, she never lived up to give her kids a good life.”
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The album-as-grief-process didn’t start on this record. The first song to tackle the death and loss of a loved one was “Obituaries,” already released. Its lyrics were a two-week stream of consciousness following his grandmother’s dying. The process began with him trying to find words for what he was feeling, for what witnessing a loved one die meant. The conclusion he reached:
“Words don’t matter anymore, but the process of grieving, being close to one another, is so much more meaningful and incredibly precious.”
The title track came later, focused on retracing her life, her battles, the bond between them. By that point “molidae.” had become — in his words — “a kind of ‘final chapter’ of the lyrics set around passing, death and loss.”
The political angle Philipp draws is more careful than declarative. мир don’t write explicit political songs, though antifascism is a fundamental part of what holds them together as a collective. He sees subversive moments emerging from countermeasures to the prevailing conditions:
“In a society of alienated individuals raised, taught, and forced to be toughened up, hardened atoms, art should reflect on alienation thereby creating chances of shared anger, vulnerability, and grief. In loss and grief we may experience the sense of loneliness, and being incapable of bearing loneliness, not being able to make it alone. And that’s okay, no matter how much the individual is taught to be responsible for themselves and all of their success and failures — in art we should be allowed to be overwhelmed, incapable, and alone.”
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The wish is that anger gets channeled in the act of making, listening to, and enjoying music — “in order to maybe even commence change.” Or, as the album’s own description puts it, a record that hopes to share moments of solace in grief, strength in the face of helplessness.
мир started in 2020 as a three-piece, on the eve of COVID — three musicians from different punk backgrounds wanting something more emo, more hardcore-y. Their first release, “Embraced By All That Makes Me Hurt,” was closer to posthardcore; from there they moved further into skramz, postrock, and black metal. Lukas joined last year, making them a four-piece. He shares drums with Laura, which let мир play shows beyond Hamburg’s city limits.
All music and lyrics on “molidae.” were written by мир — Laura (drums), Lukas (drums), Tobi (bass/vocals), Philipp (guitar/vocals). The record was recorded, mixed, and mastered by Fabian Schulz at Sunsetter Recording. Band photo by Mareike Lange. Out April 29th on tape — self-released in the EU, and on Ten Plagues Tapes in the US, where label founder Clay is hand-numbering an edition of ten — and digitally on Bandcamp and streaming services other than Spotify.
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