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Komodo Rock Talks With Niklas Sundin Of Dark Tranquility |
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Friday, 18 January 2008 |
 Dark Tranquility are widely regarded as one of the key pioneers of melodic death metal, and the Gothenburg sound. Since their formation in 1989, Dark Tranquility have led the way, forging an unrelenting path, and slowly refining their sound into what we have today from their earlier thrash roots.
The band released their eighth studio album, Fiction, in April last year, to acclaim by fans and critics alike, and will be heading back to the UK in February to play a selection of intimate small venue concerts.
Komodo Rock's Mike Elliott caught up with gutiarist Niklas Sundin to talk about the album, touring, and the future of the band.
Mike Elliott: You've been on the road in Japan alongside The Haunted. How has the tour gone?
Niklas Sundin: Everything has been truly excellent so far. We played
the first show yesterday, in Osaka, and right now we're on the
Shinkansen train heading for Nagoya and another night of metal mayhem.
ME: With those dates concluded, you're heading over for a headline tour
in the UK, playing smaller, intimate venues. What can fans expect on
those dates?
NS: These will hopefully be pretty special shows. It's our first
headline tour in the UK, and it makes sense to do something a bit more
small scale and intimate, so people that have seen us on festivals and
bigger stages will hopefully see some difference. We don't know quite
what to expect, but the hopes are high and we'll make the best out of
it.
ME: You've spent a huge amount of time on the road over the last few years. Is it something that as a band you really enjoy?
NS: There are ups and downs for sure. Sometimes it's great, like on
this trip where everything is extremly well organised and comfortable.
At other times, when you've been living on a bus for five weeks and the
days are a blur of alcohol, disease and insanity, it's not so smooth.
We always love playing live, but there's no point in denying that
touring life can be pretty harsh.
ME: Your last album 'Fiction' came out last April. Almost a year on, are you pleased with the response that it's had?
NS: Absolutely! The response has been truly excellent both from fans
and critics, and I think we succeeded in making a challenging and
interesting album. Also, some of the songs have went down way better in
a live setting than what I expected.
Dark Tranquility's Fiction was released in April 2007, and is available now via Century Media Records
ME: The cover art from 'Fiction' is very minimalist. Was that the intention?
NS: Yes, I've been wanting to create a more simple and minimalistic
cover for D.T. for quite some years now, but this was the first time
that the music and lyrics actually would allow for such an approach. I
like the idea of just presenting the bare essentials on the front cover
and then have the usual detailed artwork inside the actual booklet.
ME: You released the video for 'Focus Shift' from the album, and it was nominated for an award from MTV2. Any news on that?
NS: No, I haven't really followed that up, but I guess these industry
nominations serve a purpose to keep the buzz going. I'm a bit
ambivalent; most of these things are pretty silly and don't really mean
anything, but at the same time you have to appreciate all sorts of
public acknowledgements, as they do translate to getting more people to
the shows and to generate more interest in what we're doing.
ME: Any plans to cut any other videos from the album?
NS: There are lots of ideas, but at the moment nothing is 100%
confirmed. It depends on different factors, but it's pretty likely that
there will be at least one more video from "Fiction". There is an
incomplete clip of "Misery's crown" that might see the light of day in
the future.
ME: To the future, do you have plans for a followup to 'Fiction' already underway?
NS: We've started working individually with new riffs and ideas, but
the process has just began, and there's still a long way to go before
we even have one finished song. We prefer to focus solely on the
songwriting when at home, and so far we've been too busy touring and
playing live to actually sit down and get some real work done. But I'm
sure that things will start happening in the next few months.
ME: You've now produced your last two albums yourselves. Why did you make the decision to keep things in house?
NS: Actually, this is a bit of a misunderstanding, which is caused by
the somewhat ambiguous term "producer". We've always done 99% of the
studio work ourselves, and the people credited for production duties
have basically been there to set up the basic sound and mix the albums
(which of course is extremely important), but we've never had a
"producer" in the true sense of the word - i.e. someone that plays an
active role in arranging the songs and song structures. At the point of
entering the studio, all the music, lyrics and arrangements are totally
complete, and on every album we've done all the tracking and recording
on our own.
ME: And you plan on sticking with that formula for the future?
NS: It's impossible to say, but I personally have a very hard time
seeing that bringing in an external "producer" would work for us. There
just isn't any point. If we were looking to make the music more catchy
or aim for mass appeal, we could have done that ourselves years ago.
Streamlining music to cater to the lowest common denominator is hardly
rocket science, and most of the times a producer is used in this genre,
it's just to ensure that a wider range of people can enjoy the music.
Dumbing things down, adding some forced sense of diversity and
eclecticism and "modern" ideas that will sound hopelessly out of date
in a year or two...that kind of shit. We're already six members with a
lot of opinions on the music, and every single note or beat has been
analysed to death already.
Bringing in a 7th person that would have to live up to some kind of
creative role and present ideas how to make the music more sellable to
the kids would likely result in said person being thrown out of the
studio window with a burning tyre around his neck. No thanks.
ME: You're regarded as one of the pioneers of melodic death metal. How do you feel about that?
 NS:
It's flattering to a certain degree, and noone can deny that we helped
to forge what eventually become a whole metal subgenre of its own, but
at the same time it's the future that matters.
ME: As a band, you seem to be fans of youtube. Is it a tool you think is really valuable to you?
NS: YouTube isn't essential by any means, but I like the idea of direct
communication. For example, we played our first show in China a few
days ago, recorded it on video and uploaded to our YouTube account a
few hours later, and naturally it's a great way of sharing music. I can
only imagine how cool it would have something like this back in the day
where we were rabid fans of older bands ourselves.
We were all into the tape trading circuit, and if you compare that
process (sending a blank VHS tape with return postage to some trader in
another part of the world and then wait for a month or two to get it
back) with the ease of the Internet, it's hard to not be amazed.
I'm not a huge fan of the site as such - all sites with a lot of user
content showcase the fact that most of humanity is completely retarded
- but for band purposes it's great.
ME: The internet in general has changed the music industry dramatically
over the last few years. How have the changes affected you?
NS: Tricky question. There are a lot of pros and cons, and it'd take
forever to give a thorough answer. I'm not even sure if I know exactly
what I feel. File sharing can be an excellent promotional tool -
especially for bands that don't have great distribution everywhere -
and I've met lots of people who first heard our music via downloading
and then got hooked. At the same time, people tend to simplify the
whole issue by assuming that the only ones that get hurt by downloading
are the evil record labels, but the whole picture is much more complex
than that.
I really want to avoid the business aspects as much as possible, so I
don't think too much about it. We're happy for everyone that listens to
our music and gets something out of it, no matter if it's legally
obtained or not. But people can't expect bands to be able to continue
at the same level of commitment if they don't buy the records.
ME: Influences are always talked about, but who do you feel has influenced the band the most over the years?
NS: It's hard to tell...during the first years, all the members had
rather similar music tastes, and back then there were a handful of
bands that could be pointed out as more influential than others.
Kreator, Sabbat (UK), Atheist, Nocturnus, Morbid angel, Merciless (SWE)
and Atrophy are all examples of acts that we all loved. These days,
everyone listens to all kinds of stuff, and we actually have very
different tastes. Martin, who is the main songwriter, basically never
listens to music, whereas some of the other members are true
audiophiles.
ME: Can you give our readers any important Dark Tranquillity related web links please?
NS: Sure, here goes:
www.darktranquillity.com
www.myspace.com/dtofficial
www.youtube.com/dtofficial
A big thank you to Niklas for taking the time to talk with us, and
offering some insightful comments to how the music industry has been
changing over the years.
You can catch Dark Tranquility on tour this February, as previously
mentioned, starting in Cardiff at the Barfly on February 2nd.
Full tour dates are:
2nd Feb 2008 – Cardiff Barfly
3rd Feb 2008 – Liverpool Barfly
4th Feb 2008 – Birmingham Barfly
5th Feb 2008 – Aberdeen Barfly
6th Feb 2008 – Glasgow Barfly
7th Feb 2008 – Nottingham Rock City
8th Feb 2008 – York Fibbers
9th Feb 2008 – London Barfly
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