Interview
(Progressive Newsletter Nr.44 05/03)
excerpts from an interview with Fredrik Lindqvist (Bass)
"Superb birth" was officially released in the spring of 2000. Our contract with Musea was out and we decided that we should try to release the album and handle the distribution ourselves. Now, in retrospect, it is obvious that this was not a wise decision. None of us really had the time needed to run a small “record company”. Ritual is not the main occupation for any of us – we have other jobs, musical or “ordinary”, beside Ritual. But we made some efforts in the beginning to try to get the album out on the market and to promote the album, spending hours and hours on the phone and mailing and faxing. We did get some reviews and most of them were really good. But without a real record company and a real promoter the distribution failed. Which is a pity because "Superb birth" is not a bad album. It didn’t get the attention I feel it deserved. Another contributing fact was that too many years - Five! - had past since the release of our first album. And since people didn’t know about the album we felt there really was no point in touring. We played just a handful of gigs in England and Belgium. However, the creative spirit of the band was very high and so we decided to leave Superb Birth behind for the moment and to return to the recording studio. This was in the autumn of 2000. Another truly important thing concerning the last few years is that two member of Ritual, Patrik and Johan, became fathers in the summer of 2001. Patrik got a son and Johan a daughter. So the last two years have very much been a time of parenthood and children for Ritual!
Your current album “Think like a mountain” is released by Tempus Fugit. How did you get in contact with that label?
I can’t remember the exact moment, but we got in contact with Dirk Jacob of Tempus Fugit already in 2000. I think we actually had disussions with him concerning Superb Birth, but as I mentioned we really had the intention to release it by ourselves at that time. But we certainly got a very good impression of Dirk and Tempus Fugit so they stayed in our minds. So around the autumn of 2001, if I remember correctly, we called Dirk to discuss the new Ritual project, which was to become “Think like a mountain”.
“Think like a mountain” seems to me more “back-to-the roots”, more into the style of first album. Even though there are also song-orientated elements of the second release. Do you see “Think like a mountain” as a combination of both albums or how did the music evolve this time?
What “Think” has in common with the first album is the variation, where each song is very different from the other. Each song is a world in its own, with its own atmosphere and feeling. "Superb birth" is not quite as dynamic and varied. On the new album however, there is great variation in production, arrangement and instrumentation between the songs. But the recording process was guite different from that of our first two albums. It is very much a studio album: in most cases the versions of the songs we brought to the studio were very simple and sketchy, very basic. Then, in collaboration with our soundman and co-producer Hans Fredriksson, we tried different approaches, different arrangements and sounds, giving each song time to find its specific mode. Some songs needed to be more complex production-wise while others needed to be kept simple. For some songs, like “Mother you’ve been gone...”, we needed to bring in guest musicians: strings: one violin/viola player and one cellist. The result is a musically adventurous and very dynamic piece of work.
Over which period of time were the 12 songs of the album composed and arranged?
The song "Breathing" is the oldest song; the first version of that tune was composed around 1997/1998. But the rest of the songs were composed, arranged and recorded between the autumn of 2000 and the summer of 2002. The title song, which was made quite fast, is the newest one, though it has elements in it which originates from music improvised by me and Patrik twelve yars ago! We didn’t record all the songs in one continuous period. Quite the opposite actually. As soon as we came up with a musical idea, an almost complete song or a more sketchy idea, we went straight to the recording studio to record it. It usually took about two days. Then we returned home to continue writing. A month or two later, when we felt we had one or two more songs ready, we went back to the studio to record them. This was how the new album was made.
How did you work this time? Did you jam and evolve the music together or did you start with finished ideas brought into the band by the seperate band members?
Well, Ritual’s music comes to life in many different ways. Some songs were quite finished ideas introduced by the seperate members of the group. Our singer/guitarist Patrik tend to write most of the basic musical material, but the other members may contribute with original song ideas as well. The rest, the arrangements and the production, is usually a group effort with a lot of jamming and experimenting with sounds involved in the process. Usually the words comes last, but that’s absolutely not because we take the lyrics less seriously. I write most of the lyrics and my passion for words and writing almost equals that which I feel for music. Or rather, they’re quite the same. The union between poetry and music can be more than the sum of its parts. When I listen to a band I like to be moved by the words as well. I don’t necessarilly need to know exactly what the song is about, as long as it makes me curious. The poetry doesn’t have to make sense as long as it is exciting and makes me wonder about things.
Is there a deeper meaning hidden behind the album’s name?
The title “Think like a mountain” refers to the ever present ecosophical lyrical theme of Ritual. Ecosophy is basically a philosophy based on ecological thinking; ecology + philosophy. It is ever present because it means a lot to us. Most songs on this album - and indeed on all our albums! - in one way or another express the need to identify with the natural environment, not only in order to reform and improve our very strained relationship with the living planet, but because we also could benefit on a more personal and “everyday” level, both physically and psychologically, from realizing that we are not strangers set apart, that there is substantially more to life than fame, fortune and human social affairs, that life itself is considerably older than man and more remarkable than anything man has ever invented or made up. Still, the history of man is intimately interwoven with the wondrous history of the living earth and all its manifestations. And we carry all this inside us at every moment no matter how urbanized, alienated and detatched we become. We need the presence of the natural environments, not just in a physical-biological sense, but to keep our spiritual health. People – humans – are of course as much “nature” as the pikes in the lake, the owls, the tiny plankton and phenomena like cloud formation and thunderstorms. This may seem spaced out and new age to some, but it is true regardless. With this perspective life becomes less dreary, dull and monotonous and more fun, varied and astounding. The diversity of expression in nature, in the landscapes of the earth, is just breathtaking – it makes life rich and truly magical. It can be quite a liberating feeling to let go of the anthropocentric world view. Maybe we all could benefit from learning to “think like a mountain.” The very specific expression “thinking like a mountain”, which is often used within the ecosophical movement, was first introduced by the North American forester-ecologist Aldo Leopold in the 1940s.
There were also talks in the past about releasing an totally improvised album. What happened to this idea?
The improvised album, which was recorded outdoors during two days in our drummer’s garden (back in 2000), is in fact mixed and almost ready for release. But for the moment all our focus is on "Think like a mountain", which is a “real” Ritualalbum, while the improvised recording is a special project. But the music is really interesting. We improvise a lot and some songideas evolve from improvisation, like the title track on the new album for example. I think we will do another improvised recording this summer and maybe “the improvised album”, whenever it will be released, will be a mix of music from this and the old session.
Ritual exists now for more than ten years. What comes you in mind about the band, be it positive or negative, when looking back?
I think Ritual is a very interesting band. We have stayed together and played music for ten years. Three of us has actually played together, contiuously, for 15 years! This despite the fact that we never have earned any money playing in Ritual. This band costs considerably more than it pay back if you look att it strictly economically. I think the reason we continue playing together is partly the creative climate of the band – that we always follow our creative instinct and that we go where the music takes us, which keeps it interesting and fresh – partly the fact that we are such close friends and appreciate each others company. This tells me that we are not in this band to become rich and famous, but because we want to stay true to our specific musical vision quest.
Kristian Selm © Progressive Newsletter 2003