EVERGREY Seeking New Label Home

Justin Donnelly of Blistering.com recently conducted an interview with EVERGREY drummer Jonas Ekdahl. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

On the band's last release, "Monday Morning Apocalypse":

"Some of the old EVERGREY fans thought that we were too commercial-sounding on the album, but then there were the newer fans that really thought the album was awesome. Now, a year later, I think the album has grown on people because there are fewer complaints now. There will always be people that tell you that you should have done this rather than that. You'll always hear criticism, but sometimes that's a good thing. But if it's not constructive, then that's another thing."

"The groove aspect of the music was becoming more and more important to us. The music was now a little more than just being able to show off your skills as a musician or simply an avenue to play all this cool stuff at certain moment. For myself, locking into a groove and playing that in a synchronized manner is far cooler than simply showing off the technical side of my abilities. It's actually quite hard to make a single and easy beat sound groovy. Trying to get that feel and all the other members within that same zone so that you feel like one big unit is a challenge in itself. It's a good feeling when you can achieve that. I mean, I love the technical side of the band as well, but I think being able to find that AC/DC-like channeled groove is amazing. AC/DC don't do anything fancy whatsoever, but they keep everything within the frame, and it sounds so great.

"We also focused on writing songs that were more direct-sounding, sort of rock structured songs in a metal sense, while incorporating a lot of cool melodies and extra parts and expanding them for three or four minutes. We just wanted to do something new, just like we always do when we go in to make any new album."

On the band's upcoming CD:

"It's a bit heavier-sounding. I would even go as far as to say that it's perhaps not as direct as 'Monday Morning Apocalypse' was. It's also a lot more guitar-sounding and structured. Perhaps you could say that we're gone back a step, but in another way we haven't as well. I think it sounds new and fresh. We're using a lot of guitar melodies and a lot of cool riffs. The bottom line is that there are a lot more guitars."

On the band's bassist situation following the departure of Fredrik Larsson (who has rejoined power metal act HAMMERFALL):

"As of right now, we don't actually have a permanent bass player in EVERGREY. But having said that, Larsson has agreed to play the dates that we have scheduled until the end of summer [July]. After that, he's going to do some HAMMERFALL shows. So we're secure in the knowledge that we don't have to find a new bass player straight away. That takes a little bit of the pressure off us.

"In regards to a replacement, we don't have anyone lined up. There's been so much going on with the writing of the new album that we haven't really turned our attention towards that yet. We're very grateful that Larsson is willing to help us out with the shows throughout the summer, so we have time to discuss a new replacement."

On the band's label situation after fulfilling its contractual obligations to InsideOut Music:

"Right now we don't have a label. We have been in contact with a bunch of labels, and there are a lot of interested parties out there at the moment. It feels really good. We'll just have to see what happens. We have one that we're very interested in, and hopefully we can figure something out and make a good deal for the pair of us."

Read the entire interview at Blistering.com.