Interview
(Progressive Newsletter Nr.29 03/00)
excerpts from an interview with Mattias Reinholdsson (Bass) and Henrik Johansson (Drums)
Mattias: I feel proud.
Hendrik: It feels nice to finally have our music out on CD.
Mattias: The fact that our two demo recordings turned into such a good album is rewarding in itself.
Many bands needs two or three albums to get a correct sound and production, but in the case of Book Of Hours overcomes them with their debut cd. What do you think?
Hendrik: As Mattias said in answer to the previous question, the album is basically songs from our two previous demorecordings. We've had a pretty clear vision with what we wanted to do with our sound from day one.
Mattias: We have always thought in terms of production when we've been working out the songs and that might be the explaination to the homogenic sound. It think it was the combination of a clear vision and a stroke of luck that made the sound. You must know that none of us really had any major recording experience before we made our first demo in 1997. Let's not forget that Stefan Morén was a great help in the studio, being patient and helping us to try out our ideas although he didn't have a clue of what we were doing most of the time.
Hendrik: He was the perfect engineer. The studio is basically set up in a garage with very basic equipment. I think what he did, was he caught our sound on tape and we took it from there...
Your songs have a lot of emotional variations, tension and tempo changes. It could be categorized in the similar style of Anekdoten. How could you describe the music?
Hendrik: Symphonic folk metal. That's a phrase I've got used to using when people ask what kind of music we play. It says everything or nothing at all!
Mattias: Henrik is actually reluctant to admit that we're a metal band but that's the way I see it. A metal band doing things our way!
"Infinite" and "Den trettonde manaden" are a great compositions with lots of crimson influences. Do you agree if I say that a charasteristic from the Sweden music is the King Crimson influence and the darkish feeling. I'm not talking of a failure, maybe it comes spontaneous...
Hendrik: I can't speak for Swedish music in general but there is a certain melancholy that bands over here seem to put into their music. Personally I'm very influenced by Anekdoten and Landberk. "Den trettonde månaden" was more of my Landberk-influence than King Crimson.
Mattias: I don't think that King Crimson had any bigger influence on us than, for example, Iron Maiden. Maiden are not generally associated with this genre of music that we've been categorized into, but they played a big role in shaping our musical interests, and they were heavily influenced by bands like Genesis and Yes.
Hendrik: Our Crimson-esque side is more drawn from Anekdoten's Crimson-influence. "Nucleus" had a huge impact on Mattias and me. "Ångloksångest", who people recognize as a Crimson-type song is directly inspired by Höyry-Kone, if you're familliar with them. A Finnish band... Personally, I'm more into Van der Graaf Generator and Gentle Giant.
What are your plans for the future? What aims do you now set yourselves for the next album?
Mattias: We want to become a complete band, to be able to expand our sound.
Hendrik: Yeah, we currently don't have a vocalist and haven't had since just before the second demo. Stefan Zell was kind enough to lend us his voice for the bits we added for the recording. We'd really need a strong voice to get the songs and the sound right.
Mattias: It would be nice if we could establish ourselves as a live act. As for the next album, I want the mellow bits to be more mellow and the hard bits to be harder.
Hendrik: I think it's important to get the dynamics right.
Mattias: We'd also like the opportunity to spend more time in the studio to be able to realize our ideas to their full potential.
Juan Barrenechea Herrera © Progressive Newsletter 2000