If you are even remotely interested in underground metal, then you couldn’t have missed Sexmag over the past year. Not only was there a lot of enthusiasm online, especially for ‘Sexorcyzm’, the band’s debut album, but Sexmag was also impossible to avoid in printed fanzines; almost every fanzine I read that focuses on old school Black/Thrash/Heavy Metal had Sexmag in its pages. Although I have been a fan since the band’s inception, that rush of underground popularity prevented me from conducting an interview. In the end, as you can see, I changed my mind. Not because I like to follow trends, but because ‘Sexorcyzm’ is simply too good an album not to fire a few questions at the band, based on a kind of semi-pride/contrariness. Singer Jacek “Truposz” Wojno was my target and he guided me through the world of Sexmag.
Hi Jacek, welcome and thank you for freeing some time for this interview. Let’s just start with going back a little. I have to admit that I was first drawn to Sexmag because of the band name. Sex sells! But I was definitely enamoured by your music right from the start, I thought it was a great mixture of styles played in a rather authentic way. Yet, I could’ve never imagined that the band would become as popular as it is now. You might not (yet) be the next Enforcer, but Sexmag definitely has a bit of a buzz going in the underground metal scene. How are you experiencing this current phase of the band?
Hail Satan! First of all, big thank you for the opportunity to talk about our unholy crusade on your zine’s pages in blood! I think our name fits us very well and definitely is easy to remember, which is good. It’s short and powerful, and of course is taken from an important Kat song “Mag-Sex” where in the chorus Roman Kostrzewski screams “My name is Sex-mag, mag”. Nevertheless, we were not aware that in Germany there’s a porn magazine called “Sexmag”. At the beginning, I saw some sarcastic comments on the web that this name is very cringe because of that. Also because of that, people thought that we are some shitty-funny grindcore band or something like that.
But in a short time, when people listened to our music and got into it, they understood it’s for real and we are doing everything with passion and without compromise. The band is now 6 years old. We did 2 demos, one EP, and finally now a full-length. We did one small tour in Europe in 2023, organizing everything ourselves (Sex and Witchcraft tour) + we played a lot of concerts at small events and pretty big festivals through the years. We played in countries like Germany, Spain, Finland, Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Austria… – that was possible only with the help of underground maniacs who invited us or helped us organize events. We are forever grateful for that. It turned out that underground animals appreciate our vomits. That gave us big motivation to do even more sacrifices. I wouldn’t agree that we got some big “popularity”. Mostly deep underground creatures listen to us, and probably it will always be like that. I think our biggest accomplishment is playing at some big festivals like “Thrash Nightmare”, “Dying Victims”, “Old Grave” and that headbangers comes to see. I think people can feel and enjoy that the music is played from maniax to maniax and that it’s authentic. We play in a band but mostly we are Metal fans active in the underground. I think people can feel it in our music.
Honestly, at some point I more or less decided not to include Sexmag in these pages, simply because there is hardly any fanzine around that did not feature Sexmag at some point in the past months. But, well, here we are. I am bringing this up because I am wondering how you think about this. Aren’t you a bit afraid of a Sexmag overkill?
I probably can understand what your “problem” with Sexmag is, I had this few times in my life. When I’ve listened to a band from the beginning, from the first records, and out of nowhere I saw this band’s name everywhere, I started to lose attention to it. First example in my mind is the Polish band Mgła – when they started, I was encharmed by its cold atmosphere and awesome hypnotizing music. I kept my eye on them for 3 great EPs: “Presence”, “Mdłości”, and “Further Down the Nest”. After this came the full length “Groza” and suddenly they were literally everywhere. I open my fridge and Mgła was there. They started to play live shows – I was at one of them, I didn’t like it very much. Now they are very big and at the same time I cannot care less.
But again – you cannot compare us to any of the big names and probably will never be able to do that. I agree we have some listeners and headbangers who support us, and that’s awesome. We play for those true metal corpses who go wild and who live the hard Metal life. I hope our conquest will continue, and there will be some people who will be involved in the future. I hope we will be remembered by Metallians as a true band when we are dead and cold.
In the end, as you see, I changed my mind and decided to include Sexmag anyway. Simply because ‘Sexorcyzm’, your debut album, is one of 2025’s clear highlights. Now that we are a good few months after its release, how do you look back at it? Did it turn out how you envisioned your debut LP?
Thank you for those words! I appreciate it even more because “Sexorcyzm” was born in pain. We all had full-time jobs, so setting the rehearsals + playing live shows + creating new music was pretty hard for us. Usually when we met it was also hard because often rehearsals became wild parties, and sometimes we waited a few weeks to rehearse and after it was only hangover and 0 new riffs. This way or another, we finally managed to complete all the music. Time of recordings came (it was beginning of June 2024) and due to low budget we decided to record everything in our rehearsal room. Our friend Tomasz (Devilpriest, Deus Mortem) came with professional mics to help us. In the rehearsal room (it’s in the attic) it was like in a fuckin’ oven. Temperature like 40 degrees or more. It was very hard to record vocals. Also, two days before recordings, our (former) bassist Sabat told us that he wasn’t prepared for recordings at all. So our guitarist Maniac practiced bass 2 days and did it instead of him. After the recordings, we tried 2 different mixes. Finally, we chose a mix made by our good friend Galin (Armagh, Bestiality). I think he did an amazing job and the album sounds powerful and dirty. I think you cannot really tell it was recorded in a rehearsal room. We were really happy with the final effect and can’t wait till maniacs will listen to it. I think, as for a band like ours, the album got pretty good feedback from the underground. There were a few good reviews, a few interviews. We played only 3 shows last year in Poland in 2025 + 3 shows in Germany (Wurzbürg with Hexenbrett + day after Battle Cry Fest in Essen and Morbid Catacombs fest in Berlin), but for 2026 we will be much more active and already have set up some shows outside of Poland, so hopefully some new maniacs will hear about us and check out our new album.
Subjectively, I think the album is good. Wild and ugly, but I am not the one to judge. Time will tell if the album defends itself or it will be forgotten.
Sexmag is a band that is wearing its musical influences proudly on its sleeve. Talking about which bands inspired the creation of Sexmag therefore adds little, and you’ve already had interviews where you had to answer this question anyway. But since this seems a rather inevitable subject anyway, let’s do it slightly differently then. If you were sentenced to life on a lonely island, Napoleon style, and you were allowed to take five records with you, no more, which ones would you pack?
Even if I choose 5 best albums, I think listening to only them over and over again I’ll finally puke. I had this situation with “Reign in Blood” when I was a teenager. I’ve listened to it a million times and at one moment some switch in my brain moved and I couldn’t listen to it anymore for like 10 years, till I finally forgot most of it. Then I got back to it and it still kicked ass haha. Anyway, I think I strategically should choose the longest albums, but fuck it, from my heart I would take:
Slayer – “Show No Mercy”
Running Wild – “Port Royal”
Judas Priest – “Sad Wings of Destiny”
Something sad to sit there alone, maybe Candlemass “Epicus Doomicus Metallicus”. Maybe some classical music – Mussorgsky “Pictures of Exhibition” or Tchaikovsky “Swan Lake”. Or 5 first Bathory albums.
I hope I would manage to make some distillation of coconuts and get drunk sometimes to avoid dying from boredom.
When we look at your imagery, with the swords and axes, the black cape with red lining, the proto corpse paint, the boots, the leather, the spikes and, not in the least, the stunning classic 60’s/70’s horror comic artwork on your releases that breathes Hammer Horror’s heydays: it all seems very strictly orchestrated. I love it and it even reminds me of old Root and Master’s Hammer, but, aren’t you a bit afraid it might get a little too gimmicky at some point?
I don’t think about it too much if someone likes it or not. We choose to look different on stage than in normal life. There’s plenty of bands that play just in battle vests, leather jackets, etc. So they look on stage the same as they look in normal life. I think people “eat” the sound, but they also “eat” with their eyes. The whole live experience must be complete in every aspect. I think our look is coherent with our music and lyrics: dirty, ugly, metal, medieval, horror. I must also admit that changing clothes before the show personally helps me a lot to get into a different state of mind. It’s like a ritual and something changes and the mind gets prepared for annihilation. If I had unlimited money, I’d push it even further. I would wear spiked armour under a cape alike Rob Halford on the “British Steel” back-cover LP, maybe some chainmails or bone shoulder pads like those Mayans in the movie “Apocalypto” directed by Mel Gibson. But we don’t have the budget for all this, neither skill to DIY, so we operate with what we can get. As Lemmy said, “People don’t want to see the guy next door on stage, they want to see a creature from another planet.”
The whole image and style of the band befits the music seamlessly, but on the other hand, Sexmag sounds much heavier than one might expect. At least, this is no corny, pseudo-occult The Devil’s Blood-like stuff. In fact, Sexmag turns out to be quite a wild bunch. Recently your drummer was involved in a bar fight that resulted in some injuries that preventedis the band from playing for a good few months. So, the manifested evil real? No more Mr. Nice Guy?
All of the band members have been into Metal for a very long time. We knew each other many years before the birth of the bands that we are involved in. I think we just live the Metal way – meeting each other, listening to music, banging our heads together, going to the shows a lot (I can’t count how many Metal concerts I’ve seen in the last year, but a lot), so naturally some ugly situations happen like to everybody who lives the Metal life. Doing substances pretty often also doesn’t help in normal behaviour, but it is what it is. I think these days everyone is really calmed down. I remember times long before Sexmag when we met each other to drink – Lord Violator was involved in fist fighting at every party. I don’t know if it was him, or he just had a strange aura that gathered trouble, but he fought all the time. I think through the years he became a pretty good street fighter because of experience. Quite fast and quite brave. Now he’s calmed down a little bit, but as you can see some shit still happens. We still can’t play rehearsals and we plan to start slowly at the end of January. He has 8 screws in his arm. He got hit by a chair, as he told me. Personally, I prefer to show respect to other Metallians. I think it’s just a few of us these days and we should focus on spreading Metal into young metalhead brains. We need the next generations to take the torch and for our culture to survive. So yeah, good to be wise in the interview and the shit happens again and again… Btw, I am a huge fan of The Devil’s Blood.
I already mentioned the rather large number of fanzines I’ve read in the past year or so that featured Sexmag. Do you consider that a part of the old school aesthetics you all seem to live by? Is answering questions for a printed fanzine merely a sort of returned gesture to those induvials that pay interest in the band or is it something you truly believe in and see it as a vital part of your “rise to fame”?
To get any kind of “fame” was never a goal in the context of playing music. The main goal is to carry the black flame of Metal and to deliver our music to Metal people. About fanzines, I think they are the core of Metal culture and I respect all zine creators very much. Zines are like roots for a tree: you can’t see them, but without them the tree is dead. I released a printed fanzine myself many years ago and I know how much time and work it costs. I think zines are important in two cases- first, to spread the word and to merge the underground. It’s vox populi – if not for fanzines, only big promoters would try to tell you what is good and what is not. Secondly, fanzines are important for archives. In old fanzines, there are much more interviews, gig reviews, or pictures than on the internet, and they can’t be “cancelled” or “censored”. So it’s important for Metal to live forever and remember history. Zines will be like ancient scripts.
You are currently mostly working with Dying Victims Records, a label truly dedicated to everything with a genuine vintage sound. I couldn’t have thought of a better fit. Since ‘Sexorcyzm’ was also released through this label I assume that the collaboration is still working smoothly?
We are very honoured to be in conspiracy with Dying Victims. Florian is the right guy in the right place. He has supported our curse from almost the beginning, and I hope this pact will continue. He really supports us on every front, and an additional benefit is that he is a very good guy to party with, so he has everything he needs, including a strong head to drink with Poles. I think Dying Victims has become a leading label in Europe to support bands, even if controversial bands, and they make very good promotion for the bands (he organise 3 very good festivals, he’s releases are high quality, interesting merch, helping to find contacts for shows etc.).
Speaking of labels and releases. Now there’s a bit of a global spotlight on the band, are you perhaps considering to reissue some of the older and/or sold out releases?
Personally, I really would like to release the demo “Żelazna Dziewica” on 7-inch or even better 10- or 12-inch vinyl. We could add the new single “Krwawa Wendeta” on the B-side. The rest is up to Dying Victims, but I think only the “Żelazna Dziewica” tape is really sold out. You can still buy the “Sex Metal” picLP and CD (if I am not mistaken), and of course the new album on LP and CD. I think it’s too early to think about it, but time will tell. As I mentioned before, if Florian would want to do that, we are totally fine with it.
With a very appealing festival (Black Silesia) and lots of equally charming bands like Gallower, Devilpriest, Brüdny Skürwiel, Black Hosts, Pandemic, Hadesalia, Nekkrolüst and Abyssal Condemnation your home region of Silesia seems incredibly fertile. How would you describe your home scene today? And do see Sexmag as one of your scene’s instigators like many claim, or do you rather see the band as a product of it?
Not every band you mention is from Silesia. Pandemic is from Kraków. It’s a different region of Poland – south, not far away, but anyway. Silesia has always been a strong region in Poland in the context of Metal bands and events. In the ’80s there were a lot of bands, now classics, like Kat, Dragon, Destroyers, Stos. In Silesia (Katowice) in the ’80s there was a very famous festival called Metalmania, that was one of the few places in Poland where fans could see big Metal names back then. To mention a few – Running Wild, Helloween, Nasty Savage, Atomkraft, Overkill…
So I think our region is really a Metallic region in Poland, but you are right, in the last few years we have a true renaissance of very young bands here (without even a demo tape, but they play live shows here and there). Also, much more people come to live shows than a few years ago, especially young people – that makes me very happy.
I think we have our part in that also. Our label/organisation Dziadostwo is pretty active in the underground. We organise live shows (last year we organised Venator, Hexecutor, Sexmag, Nekkrolust, Instant Death gig in Silesia), before we organised some gigs like Bunker 66, Sphinx, Frightful, Black Hosts, Gallower, Hadesalia. Next year we will organise the first Warrant show in Poland + Sphinx, Bestiality, Lead Injector, and Genocider (one of the new, young bands in Silesia). We made some merch for bands (rubber patches for Bulldozer, Sabbat, Phantom (Mex.), Kat, to mention a few), we released some demo tapes for bands (Hadesalia, Black Hosts, Sexmag). We also made some posters and stickers for the bands, produced tickets for the shows of other organisers.
So I think we are active and we do everything we can to spread the Metal disease. I am proud of what we have done for the Silesian underground, and we have plans to do even more. So as you can see, we are not just talkers like a lot of other people, but we really do our shit.
Now that I have mentioned the Black Silesia festival, I want to move the interview towards your live shows. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to catch you live yet, but judging from the live reports it is said to be wild and energetic. So, I am assuming it is more than an extra rehearsal before the show and the casual on-stage headbanging and smoke machines… Can you describe what a Sexmag show is like and how you generally prepare for gigs?
I think live action helped us very much. A lot of people really go wild at our shows and I don’t remember any concert where people weren’t entertained (even if not big a crowd), which I recognise as a big compliment for our music and performance. To be honest, we are very far from playing everything perfectly (even on the records hehe), and at almost 100% of the shows we are hammered, but it’s all about ruthless power and merciless whiplash. Most of the shows I don’t remember too much, more like some short cuts of what happened. Adrenaline and alcohol together are very powerful. Usually, before the show we try to do one rehearsal and play the set a few times without pressure, to unleash full force the next day.
Although discussed a good couple of times in other interviews, there’s still something about your band name that I like to have cleared. By now it should be known that Sexmag is derived from ‘Mag-Sex’, a song by Polish legends Kat. Still, how did you turn that into Sexmag? I can see a bit of a musical resemblance as well as your shared regional background, but that Kat song is about a witch and seems to have nothing to do with sex at all, or am I completely mistaken?
Partially, I’ve already answered this in the first question. The Kat title is “Mag-Sex” but he sings in the chorus the opposite: “Sex-mag”. You are very mistaken about Kat lyrics. A lot of Kat lyrics are about sex, but mostly not in a vulgar way, rather more poetical. I mean Roman Kostrzewski’s lyrics are very intelligent and high level, that’s why probably Kat is so famous in Poland. Not only musically, but lyrically they are TOP.
The song “Mag-Sex” is also very related to sex. The story of this song is about a child who was found half-dead in the cemetery and then raised by witches. They taught him and gave him knowledge and power to give sexual pleasure and satisfaction to others. These lyrics can be interpreted literally or as a synonym of the power and freedom of human instinct.
With a mild underground buzz behind you and having delivered such a strong debut album, I can imagine you feel a bit of pressure for whatever your next steps will be. Have you already thought about where you’d want to lead the band next? What is there to expect?
We are just after releasing our first full length, so I think we need to focus now on the live acts to give the new material a chance. We plan a lot of gigs in 2026, and already have a few booked (Chaos Descends Festival already announced) + if Satan blesses us, there might be a European tour in the fall of 2026. So beware, because EVIL might come to your neighbourhood!
Thanks a lot for your time Jacek, although you guys are waiting for your drummer’s recovery, I am already on the lookout for new Sexmag material. In case you have any last words, they’re yours…
Thank you very much for the opportunity to talk about our crippled art on your pages and for the clever and interesting questions. It was a pleasure! To all bloodthirsty Metalheads out there – see you soon on the tour! Till then… 666
