Interviews

MR: First of all, thank you very much for taking the time to do this interview for us. Your debut album is very impressive and the review scored an 88 / 100 here at Metal Reviews. Those of us who are into Power Metal really love the album!

Lars: That's great to hear, thank you.

MR: I would like to know a bit about the past history of the band members. What other bands have they been in and what types of music were they playing?

Lars: Well, Andre our former drummer played and still plays in Dark Age (that's also the reason why he left Stormwarrior). They play a kind of Melodic Death Metal. Scott had a band called Ring of Torture which was placed in the Thrash-/Speed Metal style. Jussi's last band was In Distress (also Melodic Death Metal) but he also played together with me in a band called Northern Rage which played the style we now do with Stormwarrior. Falko our new drummer plays also in Seelentanz, that's a "Melodic Dark Metal" (?) band and I played like I said before in Northern Rage. Right now I also joined the reformed Thrash-/ Speedmetal underground cultband Minotaur.

MR: I would like to discuss the obvious Helloween influence to your music. I think the band has captured the sound and fury of the classic Walls Of Jericho album. What are your thoughts on this? Also, how did you get involved with Kai Hansen and how was it working with him and Dirk Schlachter from Gamma Ray?

Lars: The Walls of Jericho album was my main influence in songwriting, I think that's obvious to hear. Most of the Melodic Heavy Metal bands sound like the Keeper stuff and no one pays honour to the best Helloween output, Walls of Jericho. That also means that mostly the aggression and roughness of early Speed-/Heavy Metal has gone and everything sounds too soft. It was great working together with Kai and Dirk because they are both real good guys. The contact to Kai stands for quite a while now, since I met him in a metal pub in Hamburg and gave him our first demotape.

MR: I think that your music has all the speed and power of modern Power Metal but the vocal style is more like an 80’s metal style. Is this an accurate assessment and what about the 80’s metal styles do you incorporate into your music?

Lars: I think there is a difference in the sound between us and all the modern Power Metal bands. We don't have any ballads, they don't have the roughness and wildness in their sound that was so great in the eighties. And I think for a production in these times the album sounds very rough. Other bands I listen to are bands like Omen, Warrant, Axehammer, early Running Wild, Overkill, and so on. And of course that influences me as well.

MR: I see that Markus Grosskopf plays bass on the digi-pack bonus track, a remake of the classic Heavy Metal Is The Law song by Helloween. How did the collaboration with him come about?

Lars: Markus is a funny guy and he stayed normal as well. It was Kai's idea to call him and when he played the bass, we got really drunk in the studio and talked about their early Helloween times. In the end Markus was so drunk that Kai had to play the last few notes,hehe.

MR: I mentioned in my review of your debut album that your music shows influences from Grave Digger, Running Wild, older Blind Guardian and even some of the 80’s classic bands such as Accept and Saxon. What are your thoughts on this?

Lars: Yes, that's ok. I can live with that. All bands had some classic outputs. (But sadly some of them turned out a bit strange).

MR: I see that the band has adopted single names for themselves (i.e. Thunderaxe for yourself). Lost Horizon has done this as well. I just recently checked your website and the band members are now listed by their real names. Are the singular names now a thing of the past and if so, what was the reason for this?

Lars: I don't know yet. The thing is that our former bass player came up with the idea and we all liked it and created some names for us. Meanwhile half of the band has changed and we actually had so much work to do that when the new line-up pictures were done, we forgot to create some names for the other two. So we just put the real names on the homepage. But I don't know yet, if there will be the other names on the next album. So actually there is no particular reason for that.

MR: I see that you played some dates with Iron Savior. How was that experience and what kind of response did you receive?

Lars: It was the first time live with the new line-up and it went ok for us. There were not too many people at the shows, but it seems that the ones who had been there liked it.

MR: How was the Wacken Open Air 2002 experience? Was it a good one for the band and how were you received by the festival fans?

Lars: Yes, it was a great experience for us. The first time on such a big stage. That's a big difference to the youth club's or pub stages. We played very early in the morning so not everyone who wanted to see us could see us like I heard. But when we finished the set there were quite a lot of people in front of the stage and it seemed that they liked it.

MR: There was a rumor going around that Kai Hansen was to perform with you. Was there any truth to this or was it a wild rumor?

Lars: It was planned to play Heavy Metal is the Law with him at Wacken, but Kai forgot that he had some shows with Gamma Ray around that time so we couldn't arrange that. But Gamma Ray play the next Wacken, and maybe Stormwarrior is going to play there again and if that takes place we will recover that of course.

MR: Has it been a difficult struggle for Stormwarrior thus far? I see that you released 2 independent demos (Metal Victory in 1999 and Barbaric Steel in 2000) before signing with Remedy Records. Even then, 2 E.P.’s were released (Possessed By Metal and Spikes And Leather) before we saw your first full length album. Was it difficult trying to get signed? Also, even with Remedy Records, were they reluctant to commit to a full length album in the beginning and hence the E.P.’s?

Lars: We wanted it that way. When we released the first demo tape we already had an offer for a deal by another label. The deal was good, but we wanted to do another demo tape and some 7"s before we would release a full-length album. And so we waited and continued to release our plan. The deal with Remedy records was not difficult to get for us, because I know Jörn (the owner) for a long time now, so that was no problem. But presupposition to sign a deal for us always has been to have guaranteed that there are vinyl releases included and so far it has been realized.

MR: How is it for you in a live situation as far as guitar playing and singing at the same time? Is it fairly easy for you and has the band ever thought of hiring another guitar player at least for the live situations?

Lars: No, in the beginning of Stormwarrior we searched for a singer because actually I couldn't sing. But that didn't turn out well and so I continued singing (or shouting) and tried to improve that. Meanwhile I am used to doing the vocals and the guitar so it's not a problem anymore. Sometimes of course, there are some difficult parts but then the guitarline is changed a little bit or Scott takes over the main guitarline.

MR: As far as the songwriting process, do ideas just come to you as far as a guitar riff and you build a song around it or are there times when a particular phrase or vocal melody is the starting point of a song?

Lars: It is different. Sometimes I have the whole lyrics done before I even have one note for the guitars and then I start creating the guitar riffs around the chorus or the verseline, sometimes I only have a song title and build a chorus and then a whole song around that and sometimes the whole song is recorded and I have still no idea for the lyrics. When I write songs and lyrics I always concentrate on one song as long as I get ideas for that. If that stops I take over the next song and finish the other one later, so I always have about five or six songs running at the same time.

MR: Do you see a renewed interest in your style of metal music and why do you think this latest rebirth of metal has really failed to catch on in a big way in North America like it has in Europe, South America and Japan?

Lars: There is a renewed interest in clasic Heavy Metal for sure. I don't know how the underground scene in North-America worked but in Europe it kept the scene alive and built the basis for the return of Heavy Metal in a "bigger" way. Maybe that's the reason for Europe. But for the rest of the world I don't know.

MR: Are there any plans underway for a second album? If so, when could we expect to see it released?

Lars: In summer of 2003 we will enter Kai's studio again and the album will be released in autumn I think. At the moment we're writing songs and I'm thinking about a concept album dealing with old northern rituals and practices. It won't be another album about northern mythology by retelling the ancient sagas, like so many did already. It will be more about historical and ritual things. The album will probably be called "Lindisfarne" after the first northern raid on a monastery in 793.

MR: Are there any live gigs/touring plans coming up in 2003?

Lars: Yeah, maybe Wacken again, then Headbangers Open Air in July. Concerning touring, there is nothing confirmed yet.

MR: Any last words for our readers and fans of Stormwarrior?

Lars: Hail to all who received our debut album so well. "By the iron religion we're bound!"

MR: Again, thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us.

Lars: No problem, thank you for the interview.

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