EMQ’s With SENKI
Hi everyone! Welcome to another EMQs interview, this time with Hungarian extreme metal band SENKI a. Huge thanks to guitarist and songwriter Ákos Rikter for taking part.
What is your name, what do you play, and can you tell us a little bit about the history of the band?
My name is Ákos Rikter. I am the founder, vocalist, and guitarist of SENKI, and I also write the songs and handle much of the production. SENKI is a Hungarian modern/extreme metal band. The project originally started as a solo project and gradually grew into a full band. We released the Hűség EP in 2023, Disztópia in 2024, and the Szilánkok EP in 2025, which was released under licence through WormHoleDeath. We have also played a number of shows, including dates with Ektomorf. The current lineup is Ákos Rikter on vocals and guitar, Adrián Szabó on guitar, Olivér Takács on bass and Adrián Miskoltzy on drums. We have now completed a new album in both Hungarian and English, and with the English version we are beginning a much more deliberate international chapter for the band.
How did you come up with your band name?
The name goes back to well before SENKI became a band, even before I first appeared as a solo artist. At that point in my life I was very interested in self-knowledge and spiritual questions. One day I was walking down the street and had this sudden realisation that underneath all the labels we attach to ourselves and to each other, I was simply nobody. It hit me almost like a lightning strike that my artist name should be ‘Csak Egy Senki’, which roughly means ‘Just a Nobody’. That is how the project began. Later, when it became a real band rather than a solo project, I shortened the name to SENKI. I wanted to keep the original philosophical meaning, while the change in the name also reflected the fact that the project itself had changed and developed.
What Country / Region are you from and what is the Metal / Rock scene like there?
We are from Hungary. There is a committed rock and metal audience here and many good bands, but it is still a relatively small market. For a band playing heavier music, I think it is especially important not to think only within national borders. We are now building internationally much more consciously. That does not mean we want to erase our Hungarian past. We simply want the songs to be understood by people who do not speak Hungarian as well.
What is your latest release? (Album, EP, Single, Video)
Our latest release is ‘Contrast’, a single coming out on 2 October 2026 together with its official music video. It is the first song from our new English-language era. Contrast looks at a world where comfort and deprivation exist side by side, often very close to each other, yet remain almost invisible to one another. While some lives are shaped by excess, others are defined by the struggle for food, water or basic survival. We are not pointing at this from the outside. We are part of the same contradiction ourselves. The song is not meant to create guilt or to judge anyone. It is more about awareness, gratitude, and responsibility.
Who have been your greatest influences?
When I was younger, Slipknot and Soulfly were the two bands that meant the most to me, and they stayed with me for a long time. There was also a period when I listened to a huge variety of music, often just a few songs from many different artists, but those two always remained special. What inspired me most was the creative freedom they represented, and the power and dynamics in their music. You can probably feel some trace of that in what we do, but I have never wanted to copy them. Interestingly, I have hardly listened to other music at all for around fifteen years. Since I became deeply involved in this project, I mostly listen to my own songs while they are being written, recorded or finished. I think that is partly where my creative freedom comes from. I do not have constant outside references in front of me. Music just seems to come out, and I feel I can translate almost any emotion or thought into some kind of musical form.
What first got you into music?
The first rock bands I really started listening to were Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park, and Slipknot came not long after. I was immediately drawn to that whole sound, especially distorted guitars and the physical power of metal. Almost straight away I felt that I wanted to learn how to do it myself. I started playing guitar at sixteen, and that is really where everything began in a serious way. The urge only became stronger over time.
If you could collaborate with a current band or musician who would it be?
It is difficult for me to choose one name. A collaboration would only really interest me if something genuinely new could come out of it, rather than simply putting two recognisable names next to each other. There are many musicians and bands I would be happy to work with if there were a real common point from which we could create something that neither side would have made alone.
If you could play any festival in the world, which would you choose and why?
There are obviously some huge festivals where it would be incredible to play one day, but for me the name of the festival itself is not the most important thing. I would be more interested in playing to an audience that does not know us yet but is open to what we do. Even at a major festival, the real success for me would be if we were strangers to people before the set and something from SENKI stayed with them afterwards.
What’s the weirdest gift you have ever received from a fan?
Honestly, we have not received a fan gift yet that I would describe as truly bizarre. It looks like we still have some room to grow in that department. We are waiting for the first package that makes us stop for a moment and genuinely ask ourselves what is going on. 🙂
If you had one message for your fans, what would it be?
Maybe this: think, question things, and do not automatically believe everything. SENKI does not exist to hand out ready-made answers. We live in the same world and deal with the same contradictions and mistakes as everyone else. If one of our songs makes someone look at something differently for a moment, even at themselves, then writing it was already worthwhile.
If you could bring one rock star back from the dead, who would it be?
Joey Jordison. To me he was an instinctive genius and a real pioneer in what he did. It was not only his technical ability as a drummer. There was an energy and instinct in his playing that made him instantly recognisable.
What do you enjoy the most about being a musician? And what do you hate?
There are two things I really love: the process of creating and performing. They are completely different experiences and almost impossible to compare, but each is cathartic in its own way. In one, something that did not exist before suddenly starts to take shape. In the other, that same thing comes alive in front of people. What I like less is how much of running a band today happens outside the music itself. Organisation, administration, technology, promotion, social media and a hundred other things. Sometimes it genuinely feels as if making and playing music has become only one part of what a band has to do.
If you could change one thing about the music industry, what would it be?
I would like the music itself and the human connection around it to carry more weight than algorithms and the constant pressure to produce content. I understand that a band has to be present and communicate today, and we do that too. But it is a strange system when a musician sometimes has to think more about how to serve a platform than about what song they want to write. I would like there to be more room again for a good song to find people simply because it affects them.
Name one of your all-time favourite albums?
Slipknot – Iowa. That one is easy for me. If I had to name a single favourite album, it would be that.
What’s best? Vinyl, Cassettes, CDs or Downloads?
Honestly, I do not feel as much difference between formats as people often describe. Vinyl, for example, just crackles to me. I do not hear some special mystical warmth in it. I listen to music, and it can affect me the same way from a cassette, a CD, vinyl or my phone. I do not really have any rituals or preferences around the format. If the music is good and it reaches me, I do not care what it is playing from.
What’s the best gig that you have played to date?
The shows we played with Ektomorf are definitely among the strongest experiences we have had so far. It was a small taste of a life that, before that, you mostly only imagine: playing on consecutive days, travelling by tour bus from one stop to the next, setting up, playing, moving on and doing it again the next day. The audiences were great, but the whole touring experience was what made it special. It is difficult for me to pick one single show from those dates.
If you weren’t a musician, what else would you be doing?
I would probably put roughly the same amount of energy into becoming as self-sufficient and independent from the system as possible as I currently put into music. I am very interested in how independent a person can become and how much they can reduce their dependence on the systems around them. If music were not there, I would probably go very deeply into that.
Which five people would you invite to a dinner party?
Arnold Schwarzenegger, Corey Taylor, Abraham Lincoln, Osho and Dan Millman. It would probably be a very strange dinner, which is exactly why it would be interesting. Five people from completely different backgrounds, with very different experiences, ways of thinking and life stories. I am sure there would be plenty to talk about.
What’s next for the band?
This is where a new chapter really begins for us. Contrast will be released on 2 October together with the official music video, and more songs from the completed English-language material will follow. The current planned sequence is Contrast, Nobody, Unreal Reality, Fuck the System, I Cry Inside and Endless, followed later by the full album. At the same time, we are building relationships more deliberately with international media, radio, partners and live opportunities. The goal is not simply to ‘go abroad’. We want to find an international audience for whom the music and the things we are talking about genuinely mean something.
What Social Media / Website links do you use to get your music out to people?
Website: https://senki.band
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@csakegysenki2018
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/csakegysenki
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senkibandofficial/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@csakegysenki2018
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3SDCmmCsPKq6jhvjqdQfg4
There’s a long-standing food-based debate here in the UK. And we’d like your help. So… A Jaffa cake – is it a cake or a biscuit? Discuss!
Going by the name, I have to say cake. But if an entire country has managed to debate this for so long, it is probably dangerous to sound too confident about it. As a Hungarian band, we would rather not cause a diplomatic crisis with our first British interview. 🙂
Thank you for your time. Is there anything else that you would like to add?
Thank you for the opportunity, and for giving space to bands your readers may not know yet. Contrast comes out on 2 October, and for us it is not simply another single. It is the beginning of the next chapter of SENKI. If someone is discovering us for the first time through this interview, we would be very happy if they listened to the song and decided for themselves whether it means something to them.
