Posts Tagged ‘melodic death metal’
Inferi
This year has been a rough one for everyone, even more so for Metal bands used to being road warriors. Some of them have embraced being indoors and have made productive use of their time. A few have done live stream virtual concerts and others have worked on new music. American Death Metal act Inferi fall in the latter camp. They wrote and recorded their latest EP, “Of Sunless Realms” that released earlier this month. Vocalist Stevie Boiser shared with us a few things about the experience and also their plans for the coming months.
Read the interview on The Metal Wanderlust
Witherscape
While doing research for the Dan Swano episode, I came across an interview I did with him a few years ago when released The Northern Sanctuary, the second album of his project Witherscape. This interview was initially published on Transcending Obscurity and I had collaborated with Chris Dahlberg on the question.
For those not familiar with the band. Could you tell us about how the collaboration between you and Ragnar Widerberg started?
I used to work in a music shop, and one day Ragnar started working there to, and we started talking about music and stuff and it turned out that we had a lot in common and one day I asked him for any ideas he had laying around, and I got a whole bunch of most of them was so cool that I decided to form a project with him
How do you and Ragnar bounce ideas off of each other, do you meet to come up with ideas or do you each separately work on parts and then bring them together?
For the 1st album, we did a lot of “face to face” writing and arranging in the rehearsal room, but since then I have moved to Germany, and a 15 hour drive to rehearsals makes that method a bit harder!
so for this album, I wrote most of the stuff alone. Ragnar supplied me with a lots of cool riffs, enough to make one whole track of all his ideas, and some of the best parts for the title track.
Your second album ‘The Northern Sanctuary’ is a concept album. Tell us a bit about it.
It’s based around the same house as n the 1st album, only 50 years ahead in time. The entity that possessed the main character on the 1st album, is now possessing the new owner of the place, the man in white. He opens a sanctuary up in the north of Sweden for people that needs to get away from the stress, or have physical or psychological problems etc. and since the man in white is so pure in body and spirit, the entity take full control and make him perform a special ritual to open a dimension vortex to the a dimension from where the entity once came, at the creation of the universe, but it got trapped in our dimension, and can now go home. And once the dimensions collide, hell on earth is here!
Paul Kuhr (Novembers Doom) has contributed lyrics to the album. How did he become part of the writing process?
I mixed the Novembers Doom stuff since 2005, and I loved his vocals, and he was up for the gruesome task of replacing the scratch lyrics of my particularly structured vocals lines with real lyrics! He always does a killer job!
The title track is a lengthy piece, coming in at almost fourteen minutes. Can you tell us more about the writing process for this particular song and how it compares to some of the shorter numbers on ‘The Northern Sanctuary’?
There were a bunch of really epic ideas that I felt always needed to be in a longer track and once I had written all tracks for the album, there were so many of these epic piece left unused, and after a series of events, I decided to get back to the album, throw a few songs out and replace them with a bombastic epic that used those epic parts as building blocks and then write bridges to make it all flow like a short track
What was the recording process for ‘The Northern Sanctuary’? What influence did you have on it as a producer?
I recorded Ragnars guitars and bass in Sweden at Ragnars own place, Studio Finesse..the rest was done by me all alone at Unisound in Oedt/Germany. I had more influence than any one ever had on this album as producer 😉
How did you manage writing and recording the album along with your production work?
Well, I don’t produce bands since almost 20 years, so that is not a problem. But to find time to write in my busy schedule was hard. Luckily there was a few down periods over the last few years where I could sit at home and play my acoustic guitars for a few hours in front of the TV without feeling that I got behind schedule. These days, I have no idea how I will manage to come up with good stuff, because I am booked beyond believe as a mix and mastering engineer, and I love that, that is my true passion…so I am not complaining, but It will be tough to find the time to write anything new…but I will make sure it happens. I still have a few more albums in me 🙂
You’ve worked with a wide range of record labels over the years. What’s made Century Media the right choice for Witherscape?
I am signed to CM, not Witherscape. Any project I come up with will be with CM or InsideOut. I have always been a fan of the CM label, and I know some key figures from way back in time (My wife knows them for even longer) and that makes it more of a family vibe.
Now they are with Sony, so technically I release my first album on a major label. How awesome isn’t that!!
The cover artwork by Hungarian artist Gyula Havancsák (Nightingale, Destruction, Tyr, etc.) looks awesome. Can you tell us about the theme behind it?
It’s the end scene of the whole album. I have had in my head since I came up with the concept and I wanted some modern take on a biblical H. Bosch kind of paiting-thing. And Gyula delivered like always!
The band is currently a studio project, do you foresee a possibility of play live in the future?
Nope. Strictly studio
What are the other projects that you are currently working on?
As a writer, I am soon to start working on a death metal style album. The plan is to write and record, and play etc. everything totally alone, like with Moontower in 1998. As a mixer I am alternating between the power-pop of The Sigourney Weavers and the epic hard rock death of Ancient Ascendant.
And a bunch of mastering projects!
What are your plans for the rest of the year?
Get our house in order, move my mix-room and my write/recording room there and get that in shape too, then have a nice holiday in Sicily with my family.
Thanks for answering all the questions. Do you have anything else to add?
thanks for the interview
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Insomnium Live in Dubai
The metal scene in Dubai has been quiet for the past couple of months. However that changed last weekend, Finnish melodic death metal band Insomnium performed at the Music Room.
I was expecting the gig to start after 10 pm but when I reached the venue I realised that the openers Smouldering in the Forgotten had already finished their set. It was good to finally meet the guys later in the night.
I have been listening to Insomnium for a decade now. The first album I heard by them was “Above the weeping world” and was really glad that they played songs from the album like “The Killjoy“, “The Gale” and “Mortal Share“. The band started off their set with tracks from their recent release “Shadows of the Dying Sun” and covered their entire discography. They were in top form and put on a great show. The audience were equally enthusiastic, I noticed a moshpit going during their faster songs. Here is the entire set list they performed
I was glad to see a good turnout for the show. It shows that metal is still alive in the city. Overall it was good night thanks to Metal East Records. Looking forward to Finish doom metal band Swallow the Sun next month.
Here are a couple of pictures of Insomnium I took on my phone.
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