Barbonus

German electronic artist Barbonus discusses HABIT, a restrained and atmospheric electro-pop album transforming decades-old writings into reflections on routine, emotional distance, adaptation, and the quiet patterns shaping modern life.

1. HABIT transforms text fragments and poems written over 30 years ago into a modern electro-pop album. What was it like revisiting those early writings, and how did you decide what to keep, reshape, or leave behind?
Revisiting those texts was strange because I originally wrote them long before I ever seriously thought about making music. I was around fifteen at the time, writing poems and short text fragments in German — mostly intense, socially observant pieces that probably sounded far too serious for that age. Some of them were published in small literary magazines, and after that they more or less disappeared from my life. I never expected anyone, including myself, to return to them decades later.
While searching through old archives for ideas, I suddenly came across those texts again — some published, some handwritten, some only unfinished sketches. What surprised me was not the writing itself, but how familiar many of the themes still felt: pressure, emotional distance, routines, adaptation, silence.
At the same time, I didn’t want to preserve the texts as historical artifacts or teenage statements. Many of them were more dramatic, abstract or confrontational than what eventually became HABIT. The process was really about reduction: keeping certain images, moods or observations while translating them into a quieter and more restrained contemporary language. In a strange way, the album became less about the past than about realizing how little some emotional and social patterns have changed.

2. The album carries a strong sense of emotional restraint, where soft melodies hold heavy themes. How do you approach balancing accessibility with such introspective and weighty subject matter?
I never wanted the album to feel oppressive, even when the themes are heavy. A big part of the idea behind HABIT was that difficult thoughts don’t always arrive through dramatic music. Sometimes they’re carried by repetition, calmness or even beauty.

I’m interested in that contrast — melodies that feel almost comforting while the lyrics slowly reveal something more uneasy underneath. If everything becomes dark and intense all the time, listeners stop hearing the details. Restraint creates space. It allows the emotional weight to arrive more quietly.

3. HABIT feels deliberately colder and more minimal compared to your other projects like BC25 and World’s Away. What drew you toward this reduced, rhythmically constant sonic direction?
BC25 and World’s Away are actually very different things. BC25 is a separate music project built around collaboration and a much more open emotional dynamic, especially through the presence of Vela Sorell. World’s Away, on the other hand, is another Barbonus album currently taking shape in parallel to HABIT, but with a very different atmosphere — more cinematic, more reflective, more concerned with distance, memory and movement.
What became interesting during the process was realizing how clearly certain songs belonged to one world and not the other. Some texts that initially seemed possible for HABIT eventually moved toward World’s Away because they carried too much openness, narrative movement or emotional warmth. HABIT kept pulling in the opposite direction: repetition, restraint, routine, emotional compression.
That’s really what shaped the sonic direction. The album seemed to work best when it stayed inside a very narrow emotional and musical space — steady rhythms, restrained vocals, recurring synth textures, very few dramatic shifts. Instead of building toward release, many of the tracks simply continue moving forward. That felt more honest for this particular group of songs.

4. Themes like routine, pressure, silence, and quiet resistance run throughout the album. Do you see HABIT as more of a personal reflection, a social commentary, or something in between?

Probably somewhere in between. The songs are personal in the sense that they come from observation, emotional intuition and the way people absorb the environments around them. But I didn’t want the album to become confessional. At the same time, it’s impossible to separate private emotions from the environments people live in.
A lot of the album deals with the small compromises people make every day — socially, emotionally, professionally — until those compromises start feeling normal. One thing that gradually became clear during the process was how naturally many of the original texts written decades ago still fit into the present moment. Themes like pressure, emotional exhaustion, silence and adaptation didn’t really need to be modernized. In some ways, that continuity became part of the album itself.
So even when the songs are quiet, there’s still a social dimension underneath them.

5. The production focuses on atmosphere, repetition, and unity rather than complexity or variation. How important was it for you to maintain this cohesive emotional space across the entire record?
Very important. I wanted HABIT to feel less like a collection of separate tracks and more like moving through different corners of the same emotional space. Even songs that worked individually were left off the album if they disrupted that atmosphere too much.
The consistency wasn’t accidental — it became part of the meaning of the record. Repetition, restraint and continuity are all connected to the themes themselves. The album gradually found its identity by staying inside a consistent emotional space instead of constantly shifting direction.

6. You’ve said, “HABIT isn’t about dramatic collapse, but the quiet ways people adapt.” Do you think listeners will find comfort in that perspective, or does it challenge them to reflect on their own habits and environments?
Maybe both. I don’t think the album offers solutions or clear answers, so I wouldn’t call it comforting in a traditional sense. But there can still be something strangely familiar in recognizing certain patterns in yourself.
At the same time, I hope the record encourages reflection — not through accusation, but through recognition. Many of the songs deal with situations people quietly accept because they’ve become normal over time. HABIT is interested in that space where adaptation becomes almost invisible.

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