The Gauntlet: Well, these are comparable digs. A nice backstage area, but a little more urban I guess.
Ivar Bjørnson: Right. We had been playing at The Pearl Room.
(Grutle Kjellson emerges from dressing room wearing an "In The Court..." King Crimson shirt and sits next to Ivar)
The Gauntlet: Wonderful shirt. I approve very much.
Grutle Kjellson: Thank you.
The Gauntlet: Well. Welcome to Chicago. How many dates of the tour are you into? Is it a fair bit in?
Ivar: No, the sixth.
The Gauntlet: You know, that's almost the same as when I got you the last time around [with Dark Funeral]. So, how has it been so far? It's kind of a different package than it was the last time.
Ivar: Very different package. It's been—(pauses and picks up recorder) let me just move this…dead center.
The Gauntlet:(laughs) Thank you.
Ivar: I think this is, for us, the optimal package.
Grutle: And people have been requesting this package for ages, both our fans and the Opeth fans. So finally, we made it happen.
The Gauntlet: And did that have something to do with now being on Indie Recordings?
Grutle: Well, not really. Both of us, especially Mikael Åkerfeldt, had been pushing for years to get us on the bill together, instead of bands they've toured with who are a little different from them. I think it’s actually the perfect billing for both the bands.
Ivar: And I guess both bands are not really related to other bands in the genre—where Opeth comes from the death metal scene and we come from somewhere on the outskirts of black metal, or whatever.
Grutle: The Norwegian extreme metal and they come from Swedish extreme metal.
Ivar: Yeah. But at the same time, there are no real relatives. So that's how those two bands keep coming up, I guess.
The Gauntlet: Absolutely. When I heard this tour announced, it was amazing. Since, as you say, Opeth and Enslaved have helped define what metal can be for fans and a lot of other bands. Speaking of tours, the last time we spoke [Ivar in January of ‘07], you had yet to go play India. So I'm curious to hear how that went, the Great Indian Metal Fest.
Grutle: It was amazing. The first show we did was a small showcase with Indian journalists and, not record companies, but watchmakers or something…? (Looks to Ivar)
Ivar: Yeah, watches. They made a special edition called Heavy Metal and they had us pose with these watches on.
Grutle: Yeah, yeah. And we got these watches that still work perfectly—they're good watches—but they're so heavy (mimes a weighty bracer around wrist)
The Gauntlet: (Laughs)
Ivar: And a motorcycle company.
Grutle: Yeah, yeah. A lot of weird things happened there (laughs). We had this press conference with the director of…which company?
Ivar: Timex, actually. Timex India.
Grutle: And also with the Great Indian Rock festival boss. And there were no questions. Well, two questions at first. But after the press conference was over all the journalists were like—(makes a beeline and thrusts out fist holding imaginary recorder) “I want to ask a question.” It was weird.
The Gauntlet: (Laughs) They waited until it was over to come talk to you?
Grutle: Yeah. I guess that’s the thing they do in India.
Ivar: That was the showcase, and then we did the Great Indian Rock Fest.
Grutle: That was insane. Eight-and-a-half thousand people.
Ivar: --plus two thousand people outside with no tickets.
Grutle: Yeah, at least. And the people, too: women wearing saris and guys wearing turbans and Darkthrone, Enslaved, and Venon T-shirts (laughs).
Ivar: And they were all sober. There was no alcohol there. But they were so crazy, and when we were on stage we could feel the whole crowd moving. Everything was crudely built, so when the crowd went—(headbangs)—we could feel the stage moving.
Grutle: They even had a huge catwalk.
The Gauntlet: Wow. Sounds like quite an experience.
Grutle: Oh, yeah. A fabulous trip.
Ivar: It was great.
The Gauntlet: And definitely different from the American experience…
Grutle: Different from everything else we’ve ever done.
Ivar: They were not only hospitable—you know, you get that everywhere. They’re hospitable at the House of Blues in Chicago. But there was something different in the fact that they’ve not gotten a lot of bands down there. They listen to all these bands, and we were one of the first Scandinavian bands to go down there and play for these people. And it was going both ways, because we were so grateful and blown away to fly for twenty hours and meet people who tell you that your songs and your career have really meant something to them. So we felt totally grateful to them and they were really grateful to us for coming there. The whole thing was a big cliché, but at the same time a big tribute to the concept of clichés. They’re clichés because it’s true, you know?
The Gauntlet: So it seems evident that you’d be inclined to go back, given the chance.
Ivar: Oh, we’d love to.
Grutle: Absolutely.
The Gauntlet: On a related topic—another new experience—you’re with Indie now. I’ve read a little bit about how you followed guys who had been at Tabu, but aside from that, how has it been working with a new name?
Grutle: Well, the most important thing is that they’re pretty young, so they believe in the stuff they’re doing. They’re enthusiastic and decided to only sign their favorite type bands, so they really want things to work out in the best possible way. Now it’s very difficult to release albums because of all the downloading going on all the time, so it’s been very difficult to actually sell an album, a product, you know? But they just want to make things work and are really on top of technology and stuff like that. I think that independent labels, like Indie Recordings, are suffering not half as much as the bigger labels. Metal is not the genre that suffers most from the downloading conflict, anyway, because it still has a very…
The Gauntlet: --loyal fanbase.
Grutle: Yeah, exactly.
Ivar: And I think also that they are people who aren’t looking for work—they’re working to change something. The whole idea of having a career is secondary.
Grutle: Yeah. They’re into it because of the music.
Ivar: When you mention a lot of the hardships of bigger labels, it’s the fact that they’re facing a shift in paradigms among listeners, where it’s not so much about the product but philosophy, lifestyle, and attitude. So these smaller labels, I think, will survive indefinitely.
The Gauntlet: Mm-hmm. And they are often more capable of changing their means and picking up on things like technology, as you say. So, I’ve seen that you’re releasing ‘Vertebrae’ as a gorgeous collector’s edition, and I hadn’t noticed you really doing that before. That is, at least, not with the triple LP sort of approach for prior albums. Is that a new thing you’re trying to do?
Ivar: Let’s say that we’ve been open to it all along, but I like to attribute that to Indie. They really have the same attitude as people into the music, so when we discovered that we had this really great recording of the Hard Rock Festival, it just made sense to do a special thing with ‘Vertebrae’. When we got that recording, we could have just put it out as a live record and I guess that could have made us and Indie some more money. But we added it as a bonus disc on the very limited edition of ‘Vertebrae’, and that’s what I think this is all about.
Grutle: They’re just as crazy about collector’s items as we are, you know (laughs). Going into the vinyl stores and stuff like that, they’re into making something special. We’ve been around for so many years we still have an appreciation for owning a product, instead of just buying or stealing a file from the net.
The Gauntlet: Indeed. It’s nice to hear you guys are involved with a group that appreciates what you’re doing and are pursuing it for that appreciation rather than the money. That seems like the environment that can really promote and foster the creativity that has been central to your music for so long. Encouraging to hear.
Ivar: Thank you.
The Gauntlet: A final bit about companies before we dig into the new material. I’ve just read about how you guys are now backed by Gibson. That’s awesome. How did that come around?
Ivar: Yes, totally. It’s always been like that. Well, not always. “Always,” in quotation marks. But since ‘Blodhemn’, I think, we started using Gibson guitars. And when you talk to people about “What is Enslaved,” most of the time the feedback is the sound of the guitars and the vocals. Since, obviously, [Grutle] can’t get endorsed by—
Grutle: Gibson microphones? (Shakes head and mutters)
(Laughter)
Ivar: No, I was thinking of vocal chords. The guitars is something you can change, you know, but we’ve been sticking with them and it’s just been amazing. We were approached by them we because we talked a lot about it and were interested in making it official. Of course, if you have the chance to get your favorite guitars—being really expensive—and have them be…not expensive—
The Gauntlet: (laughs)
Ivar: You’re going to get on that. So in Norway I think right now it’s us and Hellbillies?
Grutle: Yeah, folk/country band called Hellbillies. Good band.
Ivar: Right. The two bands endorsed by Gibson right now in Norway.
The Gauntlet: That’s great news. I work at a music shop and keep up with who’s endorsed by whom. So I see, for example, how a sponsoree like Zakk Wylde’s got his Epiphone model, and now you guys are right up there, too. Great to see. So, turning now to the new album…when I was preparing for the interview I was thinking about when I first heard the new album. It was on a cross-country trip to Phoenix, Arizona and back, which is about 4,000 miles.
Ivar: (whistles)
The Gauntlet: And the CD’s we listened to the most were the new Cynic, the new Death Cab For Cutie, a Minus the Bear album, and the new Enslaved. Those were the soundtrack four, and it’s been growing on me ever since, as all your albums do. I buy them and say, ‘This is good, but I don’t know whether I get it you.’ And then six or seven spins later it hits me, and every time after that I’m thinking, ‘Why didn’t I like this immediately?’
(Laughter)
The Gauntlet: But one of the first things that struck me was the doubling you would do between the guitars and drums. For example, ‘Ground’, where there’s that descending riff Cato does on the toms that reflects the guitar. That seems to be stepped up from before. He’s always had an interesting approach and fits in very well, but I’m hearing more of that doubling between guitars and drums now. Would you agree with that?
Ivar: Absolutely. I guess that was part of the reason why we changed the lineup after ‘Below the Lights’. We were looking to find that companionship with the drummer, to get more into it, not only rhythmically and mechanically, but also for a musical depth. And then we got Cato into the band, him being a fishing buddy of Grutle’s. I knew about Cato—I’d read about him in magazines—and I said, “Please, can we get this guy in to do an audition?” Because at the time we were looking for a session drummer.
Grutle: Yeah. And me and Cato actually agreed years ago to not be in the same band, because when we get together it becomes crazy. The humor and—
Ivar: It’s yang-yang.
Grutle: Yeah, exactly.
(Laughter)
Grutle: So, [Ivar] really had to talk me into giving Cato a call and asking him. And he was like, ‘Ehh, I don’t really like this idea, but I’ll give it a try.’ I was like, ‘You don’t like it? I really don’t like it. I hate this. But, okay, we’ll give it a try.’ And it actually worked out after a couple of gigs. You were pretty shocked in the beginning (laughs).
Ivar: Yeah.
Grutle: But he’s been playing drums since 1979. There’s so much music in him.
Ivar: That’s the thing. When you have a riffs, it’s all about how to position yourself as a drummer towards that riff: really fast or really cool, or whatever. Cato just picks up on riffs and finds a way to amplify them.
Grutle: Exactly.
Ivar: So, after ‘Isa’ happened really fast, on ‘Ruun’ we gave it a couple shots [with him] and tried to put down these feelers, lay it open, and say ‘What about doing this or that’? And the way it followed up on ‘Vertebrae’ was that a lot of the riffs were just put out there to make him react to it with his drumming. When people see his kit with all the toms and all that, they think, ‘Ah, an extreme metal drummer.’ But he’s actually using it all for tone.
The Gauntlet: Right. The guitar solos on this album are also tremendously expressive, especially combined with the strophic, kind of droning riffs you sometimes employ. With Ice Dale’s really emotive touch over that, it’s really rather beautiful. There’s one track, I want to say it’s ‘Reflections’, that has a solo at the beginning—
Ivar: And one a bit after?
The Gauntlet: Yes. And the one at the beginning just sounds like it’s disintegrating. It starts melodically and is enharmonic, but then it sounds like it’s just falling apart as it goes on.
Ivar: Yeah, that’s mine.
The Gauntlet: That’s yours?
Ivar: Yeah. It starts out as a solo and becomes the third riffing guitar. And it adds a little more echo all the time, so, yeah, ‘disintegrates’ is exactly the word for it.
The Gauntlet: Exactly. And I thought it was Ice Dale because it just had a bit of his feel to it. I may also be thinking of the other.
Ivar: He’s got the next one.
The Gauntlet: That makes sense. Because I generally don’t think of you as a lead guitarist. I’ll have to go back and listen to that again. Also, the last half of ‘The Watcher’ and ‘Ground’, to me, are moving beyond words. When you’re writing that kind of material that hits that groove and rides it, how does that happen? I know that you [Ivar] do a lot of the blueprints for the songwriting, but what’s the dynamic like when you guys are working together and trying to find that emotional point?
Ivar: I want to say it’s really natural. I write a blueprint, have an idea…like what we talked about with Cato. Now I feel so confidant that, if I want something to groove, I can just play it out with a metronome or click, show him, and he’ll come up with whatever drum beat will make it swing. I also try to make it as open as possible, because Grutle and Herbrand are going to work on the vocals. It’s not easy, you know, because on a lot of our songs the guitars are so up there that they’re not leaving any room for the vocals. I don’t really have any regrets, but sometimes I feel that some of the older songs should have left some more room for the vocals. I guess that’s maybe age, too. When you’re 22 and you have a guitar—
(Laughter)
Ivar: --you want it to be all over the place. But when I hear the stuff they’re doing now on ‘Center’, ‘Ground’, or ‘Reflection’, well...I think we’ve come to the point where I write riffs that try to not scale down, but widen out instead. I try to distribute the fullness and leave some room for the vocals to go on top of that. So it can’t be described in formal terms or as any literal approach—just a feeling. I’ll make a riff, and now I know how much Cato, Grutle, Herbrand, and Ice Dale are able to put on top of that, so, it is actually a matter of subtraction. I like the analogy to old synthesizers; some of them are created by adding signals and some of them are about taking away certain wavelengths to make the sound. I think we’re working on the latter. I have these really wild ideas on guitar, and then it’s about stripping the idea down to make room on top, because they’re going to make their contributions to it. And because the ideas are coming from someone and somewhere else, it’s going to make the whole thing so much bigger.
The Gauntlet: And, in listening back to some of your older works…. Well, I think of ‘Below the Lights’ as marking the beginning of your modern era. Is that fair, would you say?
Ivar: (nods, looks to Grutle)
Grutle: Oh, sorry. I was listening to Opeth. Sorry, what was the question?
(Laughter. From our position in a backstage dressing room, Opeth’s ‘Hessian Peel’, and the rest of their set, is clearly audible.)
The Gauntlet: Me, too, a little bit. I was saying that I think of ‘Below the Lights’ as the marker for your modern era.
Grutle: Exactly.
The Gauntlet: And how, going back to listen to that album, ‘Isa’, ‘Ruun’, and then this album, especially with this lineup, everything is so well integrated and inviting. I’d say it’s the most mature and balanced album. And I think the production reflects that as well. I know you guys have done some switching around there and that you [Ivar] were really pleased with the result. I think it sounds wonderful. Another thing about that balance—it seems that I hear more overlays of clean and harsh vocals simultaneously, whereas before you might do clean and harsh more alternatively.
Grutle: Oh, yes, exactly.
The Gauntlet: Especially at the end of ‘Ground’—Herbrand doing his thing and you doing yours on top…that combination is outstanding.
Grutle: Yeah. Well, we’ve been working together for three albums. Back in the day I was doing all of the vocal arrangements by myself and I kind of missed out on a different opinion. Herbrand is a perfect companion because we’ll listen to a lot of different kinds of music. I’ve been listening to a lot of old progressive stuff, Elvis--
Ivar: (laughs and nods) Yeah.
Grutle: Elvis, and 60s and 70s stuff, King Crimson, Genesis, stuff like that. And also newer stuff like Alice in Chains or Faith No More. So there’s a lot of inspiration going on there. What we’ll do is, before we meet, get his blueprints and sketches and just listen to them. Then we’ll meet, and for the first twenty hours we’ll just listen to his stuff again and take notes individually. Then we try to make a plot of each song: ‘Which is the vocal part?’, ‘This is going here.’ It’s an ongoing process for a couple months before we start doing the preproduction vocals. A lot of long nights, a lot of cognac.
The Gauntlet: (laughs)
Grutle: So, yeah. I’m really satisfied with the production of the album’s nowadays. It’s a lot more conversational. We have some disagreements, but I think we have a perfect mix in producing the albums between me, Ivar, and Herbrand. A good unit, absolutely.
The Gauntlet: Alright. I think my time is about up, so a final question, if I may. I had wanted to ask you about Trinacria, because that album blows my mind, and your [Grutle’s] performance on it was great.
Ivar: Oh, thank you.
The Gauntlet: But, anyway. People often like to talk about genre you fit into a lot, and you often prefer to say ‘We just like to think of ourselves as extreme metal.’
Ivar: Right.
The Gauntlet: Which I think is fair, particularly considering how you’ve gone from being in the black or Viking metal scene to more progressive, and also in how your lyrics have sort of continued to focus on Norse mythology and runic lore, et cetera. You really seem to be finding your own space now, but I wonder how you would categorize yourself emotionally or thematically. Whether you see yourself to be making happy music, melancholy music, triumphant music…where you think your fit is in that sense?
Grutle: I think atmospheric music. Because we're not as concerned as much about genres; we’re just concerned about music, and our inspiration could be anything. It could be pop, it could be drone. It could be anything from Darkthrone to Beach Boys, really, so long as they have that vibe to their music.
Ivar: Atmospheric, and I think triumphant is a good word. I like that. It’s about trying to find yourself and achieving it.
The Gauntlet: I like that. I like that very much. Thanks, guys, I appreciate it.
Ivar: Thank you.