Dark Tranquillity released their twelfth album Moment in 2020, but at the time were only able to stream a gig from an empty theatre. Finally they are back on tour in America which is hopefully a sign that things are becoming more normal. It is a 14 hour round trip to Anaheim, but for my 15yo son Dexter and I it was worth it. We were honoured to speak to lead singer Mikael Stanne before the gig about life, the universe and everything.
AN: The last couple of years have been full of covid and a bit crazy. What’s the difference for you being on tour between before covid and now?
MS: I thought it was going to be way more different, I suppose. We did a couple of shows this summer in Europe; Belgium and such. And it was kind of strict. And then we got here and we figured, ok, we’re gonna get tested every day. But it seems like this is not over yet, but it’s loosening up. I thought it was going to get canceled every single day. Every day I woke up and was like, oh, it’s not gonna happen. It’s not gonna happen. And I still do I still think about it like, probably there is going to be a new variant and we’re gonna have to go home. But so far, so good. It’s been fantastic. Today, or yesterday was halfway through the tour. And so it’s been fantastic. Like, cool. People coming out. Sure, a lot of people are staying home as well and I totally get that. But at least we’re doing it and it’s just great to just be back on the road.
AN: We’ve had Atoma beer, and there and has been Dark Tranquillity beer. When are we getting the alcoholic essence of Moment?
MS: Because of the pandemic no one was going out, so it didn’t make sense to do one. But we are in May. We’re playing one of my favorite venues in Gothenburg. We’re doing two nights. So, we’re doing a special beer just for that night. And I’m brewing it together with Daniel (Svensson) and Peter (Iwers) from Odd Island Brewery, also from ex-In Flames and The Halo Effect. So, we’re doing that and it’s going to be available just for two nights and just there. So, everybody’s gonna see the show and be drunk on the beer that I brewed. For me it’s an absolute dream come true. I cannot imagine anything cooler but, but I’m talking to some other breweries as well. And something’s going to happen. I have good contacts with an Italian brewery which is fantastic. So, we’ll see. but it’s good. It’s going to happen.
AN: And will it be available internationally?
MS: Well, that’s always the problem like if you brewed it in Sweden, it’s an issue. If you do it in Italy, maybe it’s better. In Denmark, it’s even better. So, it’s that kind of thing. Stupid alcohol laws.
AN: You mentioned The Halo Effect. Did that come out of the pandemic?
MS: No, we started earlier. We started like, two, two and a half years ago, three years ago, something like that, talking about it. And it was just an idea of just like, Hey, it would be fun to do something together. You know, it’s my old friends that I’ve known since I was 15 and haven’t been playing music in a while. So, we were like, wouldn’t be cool to do something. And I was like, Yeah, sure. But then, all of a sudden, I had all this time when we finished the Moment album. I was like, Okay, we’re not touring. We’re not doing anything. Let’s do it. And then we just got into writing and recording a new album which took another six months, which is crazy.
AN: When is the album coming out? Have you got plans to tour yet?
MS: The album is coming out in August and we are touring September, October in Europe. We haven’t decided on America yet.
AN: Are you writing the lyrics for The Halo Effect?
MS: Yes
AN: Because I love your lyrics. You talk about very existential things. For example, emptiness and surrender to pain and loss. Is that the experience that you live or that you have lived?
MS: My main thing I think, for most of the time that I’m writing is to kind of make sense of what I’m feeling and make sense of what I’m experiencing and what I’m going through. Trying to put it into words so that it makes it easier. And yeah, of course it is a huge thing. With Moment it was like losing friends losing people around me. That kind of thing. With The Halo Effect it’s like reconnecting with friends but also realizing what has kept us apart, and also what is the reason we actually connected in the first place? You know, trying to find that thing that actually made us want to be part of this kind of metal community thing and we that we never looked back from 30 years ago.
So, I’m trying to find the right mood and feeling for each song or project or whatever. To have it matter, you know, and make sure that it’s something that feels genuine for the moment and for the song that we’re writing.
With The Halo Effect, for instance, there’s so many things that happened since we met when we were 14, 15 years old, until now, and then I want to scream about that too. Like what the fuck, you know? We all have kids, you know, and how our kids been affected by what we have done in our lives. You know, I’ve been in America for two whole years of my daughter’s life. Just by touring, two entire years of her 18 year old life, and in Europe even more. So, what the fuck, that’s not cool. But at the same time, you know, I have a life where I can be home with her a lot more than most people who work regular day jobs. So, I think I’m fine with that. But you have to justify that sometimes. And that’s what we think about, because all the other guys of course, are my close friends and we talk about these things all the time. Like how do we balance our lives, you know, and how does it work?
AN: Atheism is a theme that runs through your lyrics, with truth and science. I wonder whether you think there’s a there’s a space for God (not religion, not anything organized). Like in the space where science doesn’t know. For you is the only just a void or is there space for something?
MS: I don’t believe in anything that I don’t know. I mean, that’s kind of like being me. Being atheist. I don’t believe in any faith. There are like 6000 different faiths there in the world. I don’t believe any of those. And of course there are tons of things that we cannot explain, but we will eventually. And science is the best way to get there. So, it is weird.
And I think through experiences like dreams or fucking drug experiences, you can experience something that you believe or think of as being more than what we can see in the natural world. I get why there’s a natural need to explain that seeing something supernatural, but I don’t think it is. We just don’t know our mind and the way our brain works enough to fully understand. So, when we see things like in nature, like you’re on a hike or whatever, and you see like that double rainbow, and it just clicks and you go that’s a sign directly from God. It is not. But it’s fantastic for you, and it’s an incredible experience, but maybe you shouldn’t attribute it to anything supernatural. It just like, that’s just what happened. And it was magical for you. And I’m fine with that. That’s what I’m saying. Like, I think there’s so much stuff that it’s like in nature, in life that is so amazing, and you don’t have to attribute it to anything else. What happens is good enough for me.
AN: I suspect that belief in god is genetic. Because I am science all the way. I am a scientist, but for some reason I believe in god. It’s like, what the fuck? To me it is something above science, above the universe. Like what sparked the big bang, you know? I mean organized religion can go fuck itself.
MS: But also I think it can disqualify you sometimes in certain conversations. If you say I’m a Christian, and I think this. But what you believe is something that cannot be proven. But then then you still have a strong opinion on something and to tell them disqualifies you. Like if I say I believe in Thor and the northern gods. I believe when thunderstorms happen it is Odin. you would think I’m crazy. Everybody would think I’m crazy. And then whatever I said would be like it is crazy. But if it’s God, it is fine. How’s that?
AN: Sometimes your lyrics feel like they’re talking about somebody specific. For example “Wherever I am, I call to you” (Standstill). I feel it in songs from all your albums.
MS: Yeah, it absolutely is. I mean, sometimes it’s my friends. Like the people in my life. I remember for instance, like a song like Encircled that we’re going to play tonight. It’s about how I’m not comfortable talking to my daughter about what the world is right now. And it was after terrorism became a threat. How do I explain to her when she was six or seven? Like, how do I talk to her about like, it’s dangerous in the world. Of course, it’s not dangerous in Sweden, but it’s still something that we need to address. So that was how do how do I tell her what the world is really about?
And then it’s a lot about interpersonal relationships, like people that I love and people that I don’t agree with. Sometimes I go, there are certain lines. It’s not about you. Being in a band and doing this, you meet so many people, you have so many connections with people and you learn a lot. You make fantastic, beautiful connections with people. But at the same time, you also meet a lot of people that you just don’t get, or you go why do they think like this, why is this a way of thinking.
But it also informs me, and it makes it easier to understand why the world is what it is. Because obviously if me and my friends and everybody around me would rule the world, everything would be fantastic. But then there are all the other people who just don’t think like that or work in a different way or come from a different place and you have to be open to that. But also, it makes things very frustrating and you can be very angry with that. And I am. And that’s what I want to write about. Many of the songs are about some of my friends and they don’t even know about it. I still haven’t told them.
AN Dexter: I follow you online and I know that you are a big gamer. What games are you playing at the moment?
MS: (Horizon) Forbidden West.
AN Dexter: That is out already?
MS: We bought it yesterday. Martin ubered an hour just to get it. So, we started yesterday. It’s amazing. I’ve played like four hours so far or five, something like that. I brought my PS5 with me because I knew there was no way I could get one here. It’s gorgeous. I mean, we’ve been playing Rocket League. Just because it is fun and It Takes Two.
AN Dexter: I’ve played that with my sister
MS: Yeah, I mean, you have to play together. That’s the beautiful thing about it. It is made in Sweden. Some of my friends made it and it is a fucking gorgeous game.
AN: How do you choose a setlist for a tour? Particularly since you currently have a session drummer and a session bassist.
MS: It’s impossible, yeah. We’ve got a session drummer and a session bassist. The drummer is going to stay on for a long time because he’s fantastic. The session bass player is American. He’s from LA.
So, we had 26 songs that we wanted to do, which is more than we’ve ever prepared for a tour. And Joakim is great. He was like fuck it, yeah. And then Mike who’s the bass player, he was like, no worries. Whereas we’re like aaah we’re going to have to work like crazy. We figured that we want to play a lot of new stuff, a lot of old stuff, and we picked up some songs that we haven’t played ever before. So tonight, we’re actually playing one song we haven’t played since 2008. Ever. Actually, two songs that we will play tonight that we haven’t played ever before here in America.
Yesterday there were many people who said I am coming tomorrow too because it’s only an hour away. And we’re like alright, cool. So, we changed the setlist. Totally. So, we will play six songs that are totally different from what we did yesterday. I’m really happy about that because we have never done before and that’s something I’ve been looking forward to doing. And it helps having super professional musicians. They can fucking pull it off. And we can all do it. We can play anything, and that really hasn’t been the case before. Now we can and I love it.
AN: Do you get time to listen to music? Being on tour and on the bus and everything, do you have that space to be able to do that?
Of course. Ok, maybe some days you don’t, but I absolutely have time and space but sometimes you just don’t. I mean that’s my highlight, every Friday a new album coming out. So yeah, I absolutely have time. That’s what we do. We are all super music geeks so we sit around and play music to each other.
We had a day off the day before yesterday in Paterson in like, a cornfield. It was great. I cooked for the entire tour party. I was barbecuing and we were listening to music. It was great.
AN: With showtime rapidly approaching it’s time to cut things here. Thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us.
(Interview Abe and Dexter Grahame)
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