Moving on from Gothenburg

Sweden’s Dark Tranquillity, along with In Flames and At the Gates, are recognised as the pioneers of melodic death metal ”“ the Gothenburg sound that till today continues to be the touchstone for the genre. The first band to combine melodies from power metal with death metal structures and progressive metal elements, Dark Tranquillity’s sound was a direct influence on the metalcore scene and bands like Killswitch Engage, Avenged Sevenfold, Trivium and Shadows Fall. “I guess the fact that people see us that way, shows that we did something right in the beginning,” says Dark Tranquillity frontman and vocalist Mikel Stanne of the band’s influence on the music scene. “This was an agreement between the six of us that this is the kind of expression or the kind of music we want to make for ourselves and for other people. And we always stuck to that and that’s still the main thing ”“ keep it intense, let’s put a lot of thought and emotion into it and make sure that it’s aggressive as hell and melodic and interesting. And if that’s what other bands are picking up from us, we couldn’t be happier.”

But in their 20-year career, the band have themselves stepped out the mould that they helped define, exploring genres from gothic metal to black metal in the nine studio albums they’ve released since their inception in 1989. Their latest album, We Are The Void, which was released In India last month, was a consolidation of elements from all their previous albums into what the band calls their most definitive record till date. “We felt like this album has to be the start of the next 20 years and not just another record, says Stanne. “It kind of has to kick off the next version of the band, the next stage in our career pretty much. So we had to think a little bit differently from previous albums.”

When Dark Tranquillity first came together in 1989, the black metal scene was peaking in Europe, the thrash metal scene was still going strong. It wasn’t the best time for melodic metal. What prompted you to take the melodic approach?

It was our love for extreme music in any form. We sat around listening to a lot of German thrash, lots of American death metal and German speed metal, power metal kind of stuff. And there was a lot of death metal that we were extremely impressed with but with a lot of stuff, we were like, “Uh”¦ this needs something more.” What we found fascinating and what our favourite things at that time were, were the guitar melodies from bands like Helloween, Blind Guardian and the intense screaming vocals from bands like Kreator and Destruction. We also loved the lyrics from bands like Sabbat that was way more poetic and intricate, so we decided to start a band on those premises ”“ to have something really extreme in terms of speed and aggressiveness and intensity but also incorporate lots of melody and to never kind of fall into the death metal cliché of writing about death and destruction and doom and war and horror. Originality and being unique was something that was on top of our list of priorities when we started the band.

And obviously, when our first album came out, people were very afraid. They didn’t get it at all and they told us, “What the fuck are you doing with all these harmonies and melodies in death metal? This is wrong; this is not death metal at all.” And we were like, “We like it and hopefully eventually you’ll get it.” We didn’t really care.

But your sound has also changed considerably over the years. You’ve experimented with practically the entire spectrum. You’ve gone from very aggressive and heavy to mellow and almost gothic on albums like Projector. What prompted this experimentation?

We don’t want to stagnate; we never want to keep doing the same thing over and over again. At one point, the whole talk of the Gothenburg scene really got to us and we felt that we were trapped within the genre that we didn’t really feel comfortable in at that time, because we felt like we could do more. That’s when we did Projector, to prove to ourselves and others that we’re not just another band from Gothenburg, that we can do something else as well. And it was important for us to break out of the confines of a genre, to do something else and that’s helped us along the way. And I think, without that album, we might not even exist today.

Dark Tranquillity just completed 20 years in the music business with very few line-up changes. What’s kept the band together all this while?

I guess one of the reasons is that we started pretty early. We were 14 years old when we formed the band and you’re pretty impressionable at that age; it’s usually when you decide what you want to do with the rest of your life. Since we didn’t know anything else, when everyone else started going into sports or studying harder or finding girlfriends or whatever, we just locked ourselves away in a garage and played music everyday for hours and hours because that was our thing. That was our shield against the rest of the world. We felt we were so special and everybody else was so stupid, that we knew what was right. We were all really pretentious like that.

And what was part of growing up eventually became a huge part of our lives and it’s been like that constant in our life that’s never going to change, something that we can always return to. No matter what happens in your personal life, outside of the band, the band is still going to be there. Sometimes people need breaks and we need to take some time off and do something else but we always return to this one thing and that’s kept us going for all these years. And there is also definitely fear in knowing that perhaps this will end someday and what the hell am I going to do then, you know.

How does your songwriting process work?

We usually start out with a skeleton of an idea for a song that either Niklas [Sundin, guitars] or Martin [Henriksson, guitars] writes. Then we sit around and talk about it and we comment on it like, “This is fair, this is good, this is alright.” Then we throw away the bad stuff and keep the good stuff and combine that with other stuff that we think would fit and then we just work on it for weeks in the rehearsal room together. And everyone adds their flavour to it, their own ideas to it and eventually when we feel it’s good, then we record a few demos, listen to those, change a little bit that needs fixing and when we feel that we’re pretty close then we start writing lyrics for it. Then I do a vocal demo and we perhaps change a little after that and that’s usually what happens and every song takes you know anything from four weeks to three or four months. It’s a lot of struggle, it’s a lot of arguments, and it’s a lot of anguish and anxiety and all that but at the same time we know that we have to live with these songs for a long time ”“ we have to be on stage and perform them, we have to show off this album to the world and it needs to be something special

We are the Void is your ninth studio album. Do you worry about keeping your albums current and relevant, making sure that the music doesn’t get stale at any point?

That’s always been one of the biggest concerns especially since we just completed 20 years as a band. We always try to start with a clean slate, to not think of what we’ve done before and to not put any pressure on ourselves. And again, we’re pretty picky whenever we’re writing and whenever something comes up where we feel, “Ah, this is not new, we’ve done this before,” we throw it away and we do something else. You’ve got to be really really critical to keep it fresh and interesting. We’re very critical of everything that we do and I think that comes from some kind of insecurity. We’re the kind of people who don’t really think we’re any good at all. We feel like we’re pretty crappy compared to everyone else and we feel like we have to struggle to prove that we have something to deliver. In my heart, I know that that’s not the case but somehow we have this mentality. I think it’s a very Scandinavian way of thinking. We always feel like we have to struggle so hard to do something that is appreciated and it’s always been like that.

What inspired the lyrics on this album?

Loss and grief and the fear that one day this all will end. My interpretation came from Scandinavian poetry about death and loss and I never really wrote about that. That’s always been a subject I’ve avoided; it’s too obvious”¦

It’s the death metal clich锦

Yeah, it’s a total cliché. It’s the ultimate cliché in this genre so I’ve always steered clear of this but after 20 years I felt it was time for a proper “death” metal album for real. So my inspiration came from reading a lot of Scandinavian ”“ especially Norwegian and Finnish ”“ poetry. It has this kind of bleak outlook on life that we seem to have up here in the North, where the long winter-cycle really affects us in a way that I think is good. It keeps us grounded and in check and there’s no grand scheme or idea about the afterlife. The general idea here is that let’s make the most of what this is and then the darkness comes over us and it’s the end. I love that kind of sensibility and I think that’s something that really inspired me to write the album.

Did age have much to do with this?

Exactly! When we started the band we were immortal. Nobody can touch us, you know, in your teens and your twenties. You never really think about it at all and it’s so far away. Now I’m 35 and I have a six-year-old daughter and all of a sudden I start realising that I’m responsible, so death really scares me to a certain degree, whereas 10 years ago I wouldn’t have thought about it. Now that I’ve seen a lot of relatives and friends die, I think that just makes it kind of real, all of a sudden. The album also deals with all the defence mechanisms that we build up to shield ourselves from this reality, the inevitability.