Rocco (Bankrupt – vocals/bass/lyrics)
SPB: You release albums both in your mother tongue and in English. Which do you prefer and why?
Rocco: The original concept when we started the band was singing only in English, as most of our influences were British and American punk rock bands.
But while this made it easier to play abroad, it was a huge disadvantage in Hungary, so we had to do something about it.
Writing good Hungarian lyrics that fit this style of music is a lot more difficult, so it's been a long learning process, but I've figured out eventually how to do it.
I remember that it felt weird when I started singing in Hungarian first, but by now it feels more natural, especially because now there's a crowd singing along with me.
Our Hungarian fans also like to check out the English versions, and there are also non-Hungarian speakers who listen to the Hungarian versions because of the unique sound of the language, so it's worth doing two versions of each song, even though it's a lot of extra work.
To answer the question, it depends on the song. In some cases I prefer the Hungarian version, in some cases the English and sometimes I like both the same.
It's probably the same with the others, apart from our Italian guitarist, who doesn't speak much Hungarian, so he prefers English. :)
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