Interview with Fredrik Andersson, Drummer of Amon Amarth

Critically-acclaimed, Billboard-charting metal unit, Amon Amarth, will be reconquering North America this Fall, in support of 2013’s Deceiver of the Gods. This time around, the band will bring fellow Swedes, Sabaton, along for the ride, as well as Skeletonwitch once again opening the show.

We will be covering the Hartford, CT stop of the tour on October 15, so look for that soon after. Better yet, come out to the show, say hi, and see one of the hardest working heavy metal bands on the planet! I had a chance to speak with Amon Amarth drummer Fredrik Andersson in advance of this tour, and hear some touring stories, talk a little bit about the differences between touring the US and Europe, and more!

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New England Music Blog: It’s cool to see you guys back in the US so soon. Do you find that the crowds in the US respond differently than the crowds in Europe do?

Fredrik Andersson: No, I would say it’s about the same, it’s not that much different. The biggest difference I guess is that the US, well North America in general, is it’s such a big continent so you can never really tour too much over there, you have to constantly come back.

NEMB: In Europe you tend to get, just heavy metal in general seems to draw bigger crowds. I guess it’s because everything’s closer together. With the bigger shows, you guys tend to have a larger production value with the show. It was pretty cool last year to get a taste of that on Mayhem Festival, even if it was just kind of a shorter set while the sun was still out. Are you guys doing any sort of stage show this year, or is it just going to be in-your-face heavy metal?

FA: Well, I think, in general the main reason that the shows are bigger in europe is thanks to all the big festivals we have over here, which draw big crowds. For us, specifically, it’s because this is where we are located, so we are able to store stuff that we make and we are able to keep big productions. The problem we’ve had in North America is it’s been so expensive to either try to ship it over or to make a completely new set to have in North America. That’s been the main issue for us, bringing production to North America. The only big production that we’re able to do, the thing that we did on Mayhem, but since that boat is so huge, we’re only able to do it in certain venues, and the only venue we can do it in on this run is at the Best Buy Theater in New York.

NEMB: I missed your headlining tour earlier this year, when you were in the US. The last time I saw a headlining show was on the Sutur Rising tour. On that tour, the band played two sets, with the entire Surtur Rising album as the first set. This year you guys are going back to the “standard format,” one set, with opening bands. Did you enjoy that tour, where you played the whole album up front first?

FA: Yes and no. The truth is, the benefits are it’s very easy production wise. Since we’re the only band, it’s very easy to accommodate just one band at the venue, and we can take all the time we want for soundcheck and preproduction. But it’s also quite tiring to play for two and a half hours each night. Also, even if the fans we have, they have been appreciating the long sets that we do, if we continue doing that, we are just accommodating to our fans only. You kind of want to be a little bit wider than that, we don’t want to be a band that is limited to just our own fans. So it’s a combination of both. We do both, and it’s possible maybe we might do something in the future where we do “an evening with…” again, but we’ll see what happens then. For now we do this.

NEMB: Deceiver of the gods is your highest charting album to date. What was it like working with Andy Sneap as producer on the album?

FA: It was good. It’s always good to do something new, to keep yourself on edge a little bit. I found that working with Andy Sneap was very smooth. It was a very easy for us to be in the studio with him. We felt that we worked well together with him. So yeah, it was good to do something new, and it was good to work with him.

NEMB: How have the live crowds been responding to the new material?

FA: I think it’s been really good. This is the first album in a long time that we felt we can pretty much do any song from the album and it’s pretty much the same reaction for each song. It’s been really good, it’s true. It’s very nice every time we start up with the title track, “Deceiver of the Gods,” the crowd is singing along with the melody and it’s been a good reaction.

NEMB: Amon Amarth has a history of doing some cool guest appearances on albums. On this album, you’ve got Messiah Marcolin performing on the song Hel. One of my favorites is Apocalyptica’s contribution on Live for the Kill. If you could have any guest appearance, singer, musician, living, dead… You could have anybody collaborate on a song, who would it be?

FA: For me, personally, I guess it would be Rob Halford. He’s just one of my all time idols.

NEMB: You guys have recorded a handful of covers as bonus tracks on albums. This time, you guys did the “Inspried By,” and I thought that was really cool. I dig those tunes, and hearing your take on the song styles of Sabbath or Judas Priest. Whose idea was it to do it like that this time?

FA: I don’t exactly know where the idea spawned from, but we had been talking for a long while within the band that when it comes to bonus material, what to do, and what would be fun and what would be cool. We thought it would be boring to just do covers again, since we’ve done that. It’s also a bit of a, I guess, a little kick in the ass to some bands that we feel are, maybe plagiarizing other bands and trying to get away with it, as opposed to unique material. We kind of want to show that we can also make other band’s music, but still make music that sounds like ourselves. But it was just, I guess it was just a fun idea that spawned into this. It was a good idea that we went through with, and we had fun doing it. I think it came from someone in the band originally, but obviously when we come up with ideas like this we discuss it with our label and management and everybody, people we trust, so it’s difficult to say exactly where it came from.

NEMB: What’s your writing process like? Do you write while you’re on the road, or do you wait to get home, and then you start thinking about the next album?

FA: We’ve been thinking about it, but in general we usually finish touring, and then we sit down and begin really working on new material. Obviously, if you get an idea and if you’re feeling creative, then you probably get some ideas and start riffing. But as a band, we generally start looking at the new album when we’re done touring for the last album.

NEMB: When you get home from the tour, what’s your home life like? Do you have day jobs back home, or do you just focus on the music, spend time with your families?

FA: Well I can’t speak for everybody else, but I think usually after a long tour, you obviously have regular life to take care of. You have to take out the trash and do the dishes as well, pay bills, it’s not any different from anyone else. But I think in general you try to not live too crazy, take it a little bit easier than you do normally on tour, take care of things that you need to take care of at home. There’s a whole other life that keeps on rolling at home, and everything catches up eventually.

NEMB: I have a little bit of touring experience with a band, and whenever I watch This Is Spinal Tap, I find it hilarious how close to home some of the crazy situations hit. What’s a good Spinal Tap-esque story of something crazy that’s happened when you guys have been on the road?

FA: It’s hard to pick just one thing, but actually last week I went on the metal cruise that is an annual thing here in sweden, and I met up with Erik from Vomitory, who we toured with way back, and we were talking old memories. There’s one thing that keeps being the most bizarre thing that ever happened, to me at least, touring. It was this one bus driver we had who was… not very good. He managed to back into a building in Spain, so we had bricks from the balcony fall down on our roof, and we drove around with those bricks until we were in france, where we actually went up on the roof and brushed off the last couple bricks from the top of the bus. He also smashed into a couple of cars, and lost two tires off the bus on the highway. So it was one of those bus trips from hell.

NEMB: Last question, who’s your favorite modern drummer?

FA: Oh, that’s a good one. I get inspired by drummers who have finesse, and I was actually very sad to hear when Daniel of Katatonia left the band, because he is one of my favorite drummers when it comes to that finesse, he has a very good feeling. But I mean it depends on what mood you’re in, so it’s really hard to pick just one that is a favorite of all time. But I guess when I started playing drums, I was probably very influenced by Adrian Erlandsson of At The Gates at the time, and he still is one of my favorite drummers, so I guess I’d go with him if I had to pick one.

NEMB: Well it was great talking to you, and I’m looking forward to the show in a couple of weeks!

FA: Yeah, thanks, it should be fun.