SORCERY (Eng.)
– Hi, thanks for your time. What are you currently up to? How is everything doing right now with SORCERY?
Well, everything is great with the band. We are just started to rehearse for some shows up here in the north in the middle of November along with the never-ending song writing for the next album.
– The band is now back after a long period of inactivity so, for all those who may don’t know about you; could you share some history of the band?
We started to play under the name Sorcery back in 1986 and after some demos in the eighties we found ourselves releasing a 7”EP in 1990, which eventually lead us to release a debut album in 1991. The band disbanded in 1997 and the members were occupied in different bands and projects up until 2009 when we got together again. Well, the only former member of Sorcery that still was in the band was Paul Johansson and I, both in the band from the very beginning. We had a great re-start of the band and after a couple of demos and a 3-LP release of the bands old back catalogue, we found ourselves releasing a brand new album in 2013. The album was followed by a US-Tour in April the same year.
– You have just released your new album after two decades, entitled «Arrival at Six». How is everything with this release working? How are you feeling about releasing a new opus after so many years?
It was great and we are really pleased with the result. It was nice to see how many people from the old days seemed to like the new stuff. The whole process all the way from the song writing to the final result was just joy.
– Over 20 years between your two latest albums is quite a lot and in several bands also mean a musical identity twist so, what differences are there between the current SORCERY and the old SORCERY (I’m not referring to the line-up changes)?
I think the new Sorcery is much more mature than the old one. We have grown both musically and in the sense that we know exactly what we want to get out of the music. Before we were more locked to fit inside the frames but now we don’t compromise. If we make something we like we will use it and don’t stop and think about if someone else will like it or not. I guess it worked this time but you’ll never know what will happen the next time. We still wanted it to be a new Sorcery album and not something completely different under the same moniker. I guess that was our only goal, except for making the best album ever, while we wrote the album.
– You have managed to keep alive your identity with a solid old school sounding Death Metal release. How easy is to keep this sound in these current days where technology has improved a lot?
Yeah, it is a bit of a tricky balance to make it sound both old and modern at the same time. We spoke alot about how and with which equippment we would use for the album. We didn’t want some shitty demo sound from the past just to stay true to the Old School Death Metal. We wanted a modern album that would sound like it was made 2013 but from a band that was already making noise in 1986. I think we captured both ways really well. It also helped a lot that we went down to Tomas Skogsberg, which we worked with on the first album, and mixed the album. The man is a guru when it comes to this kind of music and we will definitely not hesitate to work with him on future releases.
– And how do you manage to keep alive your passion for this kind of music? Have you broaden to new musical influences?
For me personally, I have always hade a much wider musical influence than just the kind of stuff I play. I started to by records in the earlier part of the eightiees when no one could anticipate that something like Death Metal would happen so I have a lot of the old Heavy Metal bands pounding in my spine. I basically listen to
the same music I did 30 years ago.
– Has the songwriting process changed for SORCERY? How was it like for this new effort?
We do listen to each other much more these days and everyone har a right to both input, opinion and delete. For this new album, John and Paul wrote most of the music and I wrote all the lyrics. But we all sat down and arrange the final result together. It might take some longer time that way but in the end we get a song that we all like and hopefully some other people do too.
– Lyric-wise you cover dark themes but with certain variety of topics. Would you mind to elaborate a bit on what do some of the lyrics on the album deal with and where did you take inspiration from to write them?
There are no theme that follows ever song in the album really. We have always been writing about several topics. A song like “We who walk among the dead” is just a zombie horror story while songs like “Warbringer” and “Master of the chains” is about how religion, all religions, is opressing people all over the world. “Beyond the wall” is about the Roman ninth legion which, according to the legend, suddenly dissapeared in the northen parts of britain a couple of thousand years ago or so. We mix history, politics, fiction, religion and sometimes, like in “Reborn through hate”, pure good old fasioned hate without any plan actually. I hear the songs and let it get me in the mood for writing. What it will end is often never what I planed from the very beginning.
– On the other hand, the cover artwork reminds to 80’s covers into he genre, isn’t too digilitalized and keeps the dark vibe and the dark yet intense colors. What did you want to depict on it?
We wanted to capture the whole feeling for the album on the cover. It is dark, eerie and it looks really great. We got in contact with this brilliant artist, Daniel Devilish, while he was making the cover to the re-release of the first album and he decided to continue work with us in the “Arrival at Six” as well. We didn’t want anything black and white, demo like, old school stuff for the album but rather go on something that would look modern by an old band, haha. Just like the entire album.
– This «Arrival of Six» has been released by Spanish label Xtreem Music. How did you hook up with them? And how is everything working thus far?
We made a pre-production CD with three songs that we were sending around to different labels. We got some offers but in the end we chosed to work with Xtreem. We had actually two criterias when it came to a label. We wanted it to have a good distribution network and also have the right channels to promote the album. Xreem seemed to have both and everything has worked very well with them.
– All this about «Arrival of Six»; how could you describe it in just 3 words?
Great fucking shit!!!!
– You were formed almost 3 decades ago, a really long time so, what have been both the best and worst moments for the band?
There are both many good and bad moments within the bands history. Of course the release of the recent album, the US tour and all the great feedback that the band recieved since the reunion is something that I can easily put there in the bag of great moments, memories and times. On the worse side you can count all the struggle with members in the past. That was one of the reasons that put the band to rest in 1997. We never got it together to last very long before someone left the band.
– You are hailing from Sweden, a country that had back in the 80’s a really strong Death Metal scene, but now there are a lot of interesting bands into the style coming out from there too. How do you think the Swedish Death Metal scene has evolved throughout the last 20 years?
Well, no one could imagine that it would stay strong so long over all these years, and it might be stronger now than it has been for a long time. Many great new bands are coming up. Both those who tries to sound like the old bands from the eightiees and the ones that find themselves a new aproach within the scene. Lots of people who werent even born back then is getting into the old bands and it fuels the whole scene and keep it alive. Things look bright for the darker kind of music here in Sweden.
– And finally; what are your near-future plans?
As I mentioned earlier we are planning some shows in November and we also are going to play together with a symphonic orchestra in February 2014. Apart from that we are working on the new album and will hopefully have it finished sometime during the next year.
– That’s all, thank you once more for answering our questions. If you want to add some final words; feel free to do it.
Thank you for this interview and hopefully we all meet somewhere along the roads in a future not so far away.
