Using My Religion

Christian rock was crucified in the eighties. Wytch Hazel may be believers, but their righteous influences and almighty folk metal rocks harder than Gabriel's judgement day trumpet herald.

- Words: Polly Glass

Wytch Hazel get on famously with Satan.

A kinship forged in the club nights and all-dayers of the heavy metal underground scene, it's just one way in which the Biblically inclined rockers subvert expectations - cheerfully pushing back against notions that faith and the devil's music can't be friends.

Of course, we're talking about Satan the 80s metal stalwarts from Newcastle upon Tyne, not Beelzebub himself.

“They’re great, I love those guys!” Wytch Hazel’s singer/ guitarist and mastermind Colin Hendra enthuses.

“I remember we were at Muskelrock and Satan played, and then we played, and then Antichrist played straight after us. I thought that was quite funny.”

Hendra, 33, is calmly open about his Christian faith in a thoughtful, grounded way not always seen in religious public figures. It’s a refreshing counterpoint to the (by no means unfounded) assumption that the God-fearing come with a certain amount of baggage.

Hendra doesn’t actually call himself “religious”, and he certainly doesn’t call Wytch Hazel a Christian rock band. Back home near Morecambe, his ‘charismatic’ church feels more like a family, he says.

“I can see people would say if you go to church, read the Bible and pray, those are religious things,” he muses.

“Whereas for me, if I say ‘I’m in a relationship with God’, that’s very different to ‘I’m going to do some Hail Marys’ or something. I feel like the experience of being in relation to God is this spiritual thing. When I think of ‘religion’ I think of rules and rituals, and it kind of rubs me up the wrong way. It works for some people and that’s fine, but I can’t get on board with organised religion.”