Hi Andreas! What's up in Vasteras?
Every things cool here! I just got back from the Roskilde festival in Denmark and I'm feeling a bit tired, but I'm alright. While we're waiting for the album to be released we're creating new blasphemous music and answering interviews.
I have to say that "Neither OF Gods" is a real monster of death metal! How does it come, that you sound so similar to DEICIDE?
I want you to be totally honest with you here, do you really think it sounds that much like Deicide? I mean, of course we're influenced by them but I still don't think that the new album is sounding that much like Deicide... Who else except for us are sounding this way today?? I think that we've created something of our own with „Neither of Gods", you can still hear influences, but that's only our way of bringing forth our herritage into the future. People are getting back into Death Metal and there's a lot of new kids who haven't heard about bands like Deicide, Cannibal Corpse or Morbid Angel. Let's show them what Death Metal is all about!
By the way, which album do you prefer from this band and what do you think about their latest album "Insinerathehymn"? I would say, that you are mostly influences by "Once Upon The Cross"?
I don't like the last two Deicide albums, they're just not comparable to "Deicide", "Legion" and "Once Upon the Cross". I don't know if we're mainly influenced by "Once Upon the Cross", in the past we sounded more like "Legion" and then we've just evolved from there. Personally I think their first LP is the best, but we've expanded our views a lot since our mini-cd, which is 3 years old, so I don't think you can define what our influences are anymore, it's just everything that surrounds us that forms our music.
You also have blasphemous lyrics like them. Are you also so evil as Mr Benton or do you use it only for a special image?
Define evil!? We live by our own laws and we don't believe in God, does that make us evil, then I guess we are. But I don't think it's as easy as that, you have to look at it from a human point of view, christians will always call us evil 'cause we're a threat to their empire, but the more enlightened people will get, the more they will understand our way of living. Sometimes you have to let out all your anger and kick someone and I believe that the church deserves a damn good beating.
The cover and also the bandfoto is in the same way. With siluetes of you. How is the guy on the cover and is there a concept behind it?
I guess we're going to hear this question a lot the next couple of months, ha ha ha... The thing is, we do have a concept and it would be nice to tell you all about it, but we've decided to keep it to ourselves. You see, since I made that cover, we have heard lots and lots of different interpretations of it and I feel really satisfied when the cover proves to be so multi-dimensional. Revealing the concept now would definately take all the pleasure out of it and we don't want to do that, no.
With Hammerheart you got one of the most promising labels this time. How did you get in contact with them and are they doing a good job?
I remeber sending a copy of our "Carnage" tape to Wilko when he had his Fadeless Records, he replied that he was interested in signing us and we kept in touch. Eventually we ended up on Helgrind Prod in Denmark and released our first mini-cd through them. However, in 1999 we did a show at the Dist-99 Festival here in Sweden, it turns out that Wilko was there together with his old pals in Mangled and he e-mailed me a couple of days later informing me that he was the label-boss of The Plague (Subdivision of Hammerheart Records). I told him that we had lots of new material and that we were searching for a good label and later we signed to them. I think that they are doing a good job, but I guess only the future will tell, we'll have to wait and see. Hopefully we've made a kick-ass album that will sell good with the proper back-up.
OK, let's go back in history. Roger started the band in 1991 but under an other name. How was the band called and what happend until you changed your name in 1995?
It was a stormy period one might say, I think 15 people joined and left the band between 92-94. I honestly don't know the first bandname and I hardly believe that even Roger remembers, some of the names were Shadows At Dawn and Autumnal before we changed to THRONEAEON in 1995. I became a part of this band in 1994 at the same time as mr Eriksson. Our new guitarist Jens replaced mr Eriksson shortly after he left in 1999. I think that the interesting stuff in our history begins with our "Demo-95" tape, that's when we started getting real focused.
Did you play in other bands before you joined in THRONEAEON?
Yeah, a couple of smaller acts, nothing interesting. It was mainly only an excuse to booze at the old rehearsal-place.
In 1995 you recorded your first demo simply named "Demo´95 and soon after that you got an contract for a Split CD of Voice Of Death. Why weren't that CD released and with which band was it planned?
It was planned to be with a Swedish Black Metal act called Blasphemous. It's nothing interesting to talk about, we backed out 'cause we couldn't raise the money to do a proper job in the studio.
In 1997 you released your second demo called "Carnage" (yeah!) and got many very great reactions on it. How differes the material from your first demo?
Yeah, the "Carnage" demo was a really good move, we got lots of great reviews etc with that one. The difference from the first demo-tape is that the material is better structured, it's tighter, the sound is more powerful (recorded 1996 at Studio Underground), cool cover artwork and everything professionally printed. It was at this point people really started to compare us to Deicide and I can understand why. On the first tape the influences were a bit confused but then we started to think at the tracks as a whole unit and that each track had to fit to the other and that's how we made the "Carnage" demo.
Then in 1999 the Danish Hegrind Prod. released your great MCD "With Sardonic Wrath". Sigtyr told me, that the MCD didn't run very well. So, how were the sellings and are you still satisfied with his work and your material?
I don't know the sales-figures, but what's done is done and I am personally very satisfied with most things concerning our part of the deal. I think the first three tracks are killer and I believe that this album will sell a lot more in the future. Sigtyr is a cool dude and I think he did his best, you can't expect more than that, but of course a lot more could have been done in order to put the record on the streets. I know now that mini-cd's are especially hard to get through to the distributors, so it's not an easy job, but maybe the record will start selling on its own when the full-length is out...
And back to the present. In your info stands that you will make a tour in October this year. Do you have news about the tour and with which bands will you play the tour?
I actually don't know anything about this, we've been discussing with Hammerheart about a tour, but I think they've had some trouble with the booking-agancy or something. More info about this will come, in the meantime we're planning on going on tour through Scandinavia together with Exmortem (dk) and Blood Red Throne (no).
You also played many gigs till now with tons of famous bands such as NAPALM DEATH, ENTOMBED, VOMITORY, LUCIFERION, ... How is a normal Show from you?
The liveshows have differed throughout the years, so it's hard to say what's normal. We've used tons of spikes and blood etc to enhance the experience in the past, but nowadays we're usually letting the music speak for itself. I know that it sounds somewhat boring, but I think you should see it for yourself, we're trying to stand out as a tight unit on stage delivering an imoprtant message through our music and lyrics.
Did you only play in Sweden or do you also made some gigs in other countrys like Denmark or Finland?
Nothing outside Sweden yet, but I'm sure we'll be doing some shows both here and there as soon as the album gets spread around the world.
I think, everybody knows that you like DEICIDE, but to which bands do you listens and what do you think about the (mostly) gay melodic Death Metal in Sweden?
We listen to all kinds of music, I myself am a huge Sabbath fan and has been since I was 8 years old and heard the "Vol 4" album. It's actually easier to mention what we DON'T listen to instead and that would be euro-techno, chewgum-pop, dance-music and gay melodic Death Metal.
OK, that's it. I hope you enjoyed my questions and I hope to see you soon on tour.
Thanks for the interview! I want to encourage everyone to visit our website and sign up for our newsletter to always get first-hand information... See you all on tour!
Throneaeon
PO Box 3091
720 03 Vasteras, Sweden
www.throneaeon.com
info@throneaeon.com
Interview: Leif