DIMMU BORGIR Working On 'Grand, Huge, Epic And Primal' New Album

Guitarist Silenoz (real name: Sven Atle Kopperud) of Norwegian black metallers DIMMU BORGIR recently spoke to U.K.'s Metal Hammer magazine about the progress of the songwriting sessions for the band's follow-up to 2007's "Il Sorte Diaboli".

"The words that come to mind, if we should even try and attempt at describing [the new material] at this point, would be something like: grand, huge, epic and primal," he said. "It has this eerie and haunting feel to it. Atmosphere and ambience!

He continued, "It's hard to say anything distinct or speak objectively about the new material when you're in the middle of the writing process — we're too close to it at this stage — but we'd be lying if we said it's not good. We're very confident in the new material and we believe it'll raise a few eyebrows. We might even have to trim our own!"

Regarding why the wait between albums seems to be getting longer for DIMMU BORGIR, Silenoz said, "Because we want the next album to be a better and stronger one. We're more critical of each process and we take the time it needs. Quality is, at the end of the day, in the eye of the beholder, but once we start rushing things, like trying to write music while on tour to speed things up — forget about it. We've tried it before and it didn't work. We focus 110 percent on one thing at a time. Plus, if we'd release an album every year, where would the expectation be? Where would the excitement be?"

The remaining members of DIMMU BORGIR issued a statement on August 31, 2009 confirming keyboardist Mustis' (real name: Øyvind Mustaparta) and bassist/clean vocalist ICS Vortex's (real name: Simen Hestnæs) departures from the group. The statement also downplayed the impact the lineup changes will have on the sound of DIMMU BORGIR next album, insisting that "the creative force in the band is highly intact, perhaps even more so than ever."

Mustis issued a statement on August 30 claiming that his dismissal from DIMMU BORGIR was caused by his efforts to "address the fact that many songs written by me had not been registered properly under my name in their credits. Without naming every single track, let us just say that a good majority of albums like 'Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia' and 'In Sorte Diaboli' would have been vastly different had I not composed and created as much as I actually did," he said. "Sadly, based on terrible gaps in the communication process and a failure to find logical rationale for why this had been done this way found me hitting wall after wall as opposed to finding a professional and reasonable solution to the problem. My inquiries and investigation into the issues which I wished to resolve and move on from would in the end find me being fired from the group. No discussions about it, just 'goodbye' (via text message)."

The 2008 "Blackest Of The Black" tour with DANZIG helped support DIMMU's latest DVD titled "The Invaluable Darkness", which debuted at No. 5 on the Top Music Videos chart in mid-October 2008. It was also the band's last North American tour promoting their eighth studio album, "In Sorte Diaboli", which debuted on Billboard's Top Independent Albums chart at No. 2, and on The Billboard 200 chart at No. 43.