AMON AMARTH (Eng.)

– Hello and, first of all, thanks for your time. «Twilight of the thunder God» ended up being really popular and successful; did that make you feel any kind of pressure while creating «Sutur Rising?
Yes. We always try to top the previous album and that was not an easy task,but I think we managed to do it.

– Getting into your new album, you chose a not so famous character from the Norse mythology. Why did you choose Surtur?
One of the first songs we wrote for this album was Destroyer of the universe. That is a powerful and aggressive song so we thought that Surtur would be a good topic for that song and the whole album.

– Surtur, if I’m not wrong, was the leader of the fire giants, and I think fire has always been quite important for the band, for example, we can see fire in almost each of your covers. Is, somehow, fire the AMON AMARTH’s element?
Yes.

– I noticed «Surtur Rising» is a more guitar driven, staright-forward and aggressive album. Was this something intended?
The intention was to make a more diverse and aggressive sounding album.

– The cover artwork is also quite powerful, so I guess you tried to make the cover fit with your sound and the whole album, and taking care about the artwork is somehing most current artist have seen to forgot about…
Yes we usually make the cover picture a story on the album.

– I could also say this brand new record is your most varied CD so far. Is it, maybe, a clearer mirror of all your influences? And which are they?
Yes we wanted to try some new stuff like acoustic sounding guitars for example. I think my influences comes from bands like Iron Maiden and Metallica that was the music that made me want to start making my own music anyway.

– Production sounds just great, has and old-school vibe still fresh. Was that the sound you were looking for? Anyway, after all these years working with Jens Bogren, I guess he knows what kind of sound you want to get…
Yes the album turned out as we wanted soundwise.

– We can find nice contrasts in the album, as the one between the raw «A Beast I am» and its poweful riffs with the menlancolic «Doom over Dead» and its strings. What could you tell us about them both and the remarkable string on «Doom over Dead»?
The instrumental part was made to give the listener a breath of air after A Beast am I. So its basically a intro for Doom. The strings was an idea that Jens came up with.

– And finally, you have recently announced an European tour that will start next May. Will more dates be confirmed? Will we see you guys once more in Spain?
We will come to Spain later this year,but not on the tour that is announced for may.

– That’s all, thanks once for for taking the time. if you want to add anything else to our reades; last lines are yours.
We will se you on tour.