Interview с HammerFall : DARKSIDE.ru

Hammerfall are in Russia for the first time. What do you expect from the Russian fans?

Well, Anders – our drummer playing with Yngwie Malmsteen and he was here in 1986 or 1987, I’m not sure. They played for three weeks in Leningrad and Moscow. And he said it was unbelievable. Yes, it’s twenty years ago and it’s different story now, but I have a lot of expectations from the Russian fans.

Did he tell you anything about the Russians?

Yeah, a little bit. I mean that things are completely different now as compared with twenty years ago.

And why did it take you ten years to get he

re? I know that you wanted to come here in April, 2005, but the show was cancelled because the same time Cradle of Filth were performing in Moscow…

Yeah, there was something of the kind, I don’t know to tell you the truth. We have our booking-agency that’s taking care of booking the gigs everywhere. And they should know the reason why the gig was cancelled. But I think it’s also a matter of finding the right people to work with in different countries. And now I think we’ve found the right people! (laughs) Since we are here! And they are doing a very good job for us.

A lot of fans were very disappointed that you are not performing in St

.-Petersburg. Why do you give the only concert in Russia – in Moscow?

Well, here I should again refer to booking-agency and the promoters. I mean no musician can say, “Well, we’re going to play there, there and there.” What happens is the booking-agency goes to promoter and says, “What do you think? In what cities can we do shows?”, like the local promoter here. And the say, “Moscow, maybe St.-Petersburg, and maybe this is only Moscow this time.” So the local promoter is always the one who decides where the show will be, what venues and all the stuff.

Did you want to play somewhere else?

Sure, why not. I look at it this w

ay. Now we are here just to feel the taste of it. And the next time we come, there will be a much bigger tour.

What venues do you prefer? Big or small?

I like both! Big stage it’s big fan, cause it’s a big stage and you can run around wherever you want, you don’t have to watch out that you’ll bang on somebody else’s guitar. And that’s really nice. W.O.A. for instance is such a big festival. And the stage ends here and there is a big gap between you and the audience. You don’t get the intimacy. And the club – it’s another thing. I can tell you it’s the first time we perform ion such a small stage for many years! So it’s gonna be something esp

ecial.

On your web-site there was a contest, where anyone could shoot his own video-clip for your music. Did you choose the winner yourselves?

No, that’s was the business of our company. But I’ve seen some of them, and I should say they were rather funny.

And what’s your idea about the best power metal clip?

Well, whatever fits the music. I don’t know really. In general I think it depends on the melody. If the melody is slow, then the clip should be slower, too. But there’s no rule from this point of view.

This year you celebrate the 10-th anniversary of you

r band and you release the CD “Steel Meets Steen - Ten Years of Glory" and also make a great tour. Aren’t you tired of neverending tours?

Heh. Yeah, we’ve been touring a lot this year – since January basically all the time, but right now I’m not tired of it anyway. And this tour is not long – there 3 shows in Germany and two shows in Sweden. So it’s not very big. But that’s gonna be fun, cause it’s like going back to basics. Because ten years ago we played in the same places during our first tour in Germany and in small places. Well, just in small clubs like this, with a small stage, with something about 600 people. So this is like going back to the roots. This is for the

real fans – you know, the ones who really want to go to the show, and still we are celebrating we are going to have some after show parties where we’ll be having fun and talking to people. So this’ll be something like, “Thank you guy for being with us for these ten years!”

Did you have time to write the new material during these tours?

Time of course, but I don’t have the peace of mind to do that. I need to feel relaxed and calm. It’s not like, “Well, now I must go and write music”, no. When I don’t feel like writing music I can go for a walk somewhere and do something else.

Do you have plans to release a book

about the warrior from all your covers? For "Crimson Thunder" you made some comics. Maybe you’ll continue this tradition…

(laughs) You never know. We haven’t anything planned so far. But I like the idea!

What was the reason for Magnus Rosen’s departure? He was with the band from the very beginning…

Yeah, he didn’t play on the first album, but he was with us on tours and he was in the band since 1997. I think he and the band a little bit grew apart and there was a big distance between him and the rest of the band. It didn’t happen at one moment, it happened gradually, it took a while. We’ve been together for ten years

, and during ten years no matter what kind of relationship you have, but people are growing – sometimes in the same direction, but sometimes unfortunately in different directions.

And what direction did he choose?

He was a little bit different, he didn’t feel connected like the others did. For him it was musical thing, too. He wanted to write songs and I don’t know actually. These are the excuses that he used. He didn’t have any creative influence in our band and he wasn’t like that.

Magnus once said that in spite the fact that most of the songs are written by you (Oscar and Joacim) every band member is impor

tant for the group and if someone left the band, Hammerfall would never be the same and would never sound the same. Do you agree with this?

Yes. Absolutely. When you play together for so long as we have done and then somebody leaves, it’s definitely something different. You know that now we have Fredrik Larsson and he brings whole different level of playing. To the rhythm-section. He plays bass together with Anders and again Magnus never did this. They sing together and play much tighter than it was with Magnus. We get united that is really important. This is a huge difference and the difference is for the better of course. He is much more active on stage than Magnus was.

And of course it’s better for the band. Another pleasant thing about Frederic is that we were on tour with him for quite a time and we were getting pretty well with him all this time, which is also very important. We all on the same level basically now. So we hang out, we are partying together, we are more like a unit in the back stage and off the stage as well as on stage. And that’s the most important thing in having him in my band.

HAMMERFALL supported Swedish national women curling team at the semi-finals with team from Norway. They also filmed in the HAMMERFALL clip "Hearts on Fire". Whose idea was that?

Well, I’m not sure, but it wasn’

t our idea. It was interesting to do this. We didn’t have anything to do then, so we agreed and it was a real fun to do this! And curling maybe not my favorite sport, but The Olympics has a great force in Sweden and in Russia too, well everywhere I suppose. So for us it was like to be the part of all these. We felt it was an honor, really! We felt that we contribute to this!

The first single from the album "Threshold" became "Natural High". Who was the author of the plot – it’s rather unnatural for your band – there are vampires, bats, castles…

Joachim was writing most of the lyrics. I wrote the music for it. Then I gave Joacim the demo of wh

at I’ve done, with a title “Natural High” and he took that title and for him “Natural High” meant getting higher, if you are the vampire then getting higher on blood is your natural high. Yeah, I agree it’s a little bit different, but I like it.

You prolonged your deal with Nuclear Blast for the release of 7 more albums. So what do you think – what will you be like in 7 or 8 years? I mean the band.

I have no idea! (laughs) Hopefully we’ll be still around, but I don’t know. It’s impossible to say. I can’t even say anything about the next album. I have no idea of how it will sound, really. But it’s interesting to live and see what the future brings to us. I think if anybody of us could for a few seconds go the future in five years, I thing he’ll be really surprised.

When you started your carrier you must have had some goals. Did you manage to reach them by now?

When it all began, it was really very small, we didn’t think that we’d be in Russia for example. The idea from the beginning and up to now is to do what we like – to play heavy-metal. Then we got a record deal and we raised expectations a little bit and we thought, “Maybe we’ll sell a few thousand copies. Maybe we can do some shows outside Sweden, in Germany for example. That’ll be great!” And then it suddenly took off with “Glory to the brave”. We just continued to raise goals all the time. We began to dream what we’d like to do with the band and we’re still doing. We’re gradually growing.

Do you have any plans about the new record? Maybe some ideas?

No, not really. We’re planning to perform a new song today. It’s from best of album “Steel Meets Steel”. There are several new songs on it and we’ll play one of them tonight.

Interview by Konstantin “Bonez” Viktirov
Questions also composed by Blindman, Ksenia “Wolfin” Horina
18 сен 2007 the End

HammerFall

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