Veriteras' upcoming release, 'The Dark Horizon,' marks a significant evolution in sound. Santtu and Sean discuss the intentional shift towards blackened melodic death metal, collaborative songwriting, and diverse influences.
1. Congratulations
on the upcoming release of "The Dark Horizon"! How would you describe
the evolution of Veriteras' sound from your previous album, "Shadow of
Death," to this new record? (Santtu) Thank you, we're very excited to
release the album! This album is a step forward in almost every regard for
Veriteras. The songwriting is more mature, the lyrics are better because Sean
wrote most of them instead of Santtu, the recording is fantastic, and the mix
and master is spot on. With Shadow of Death we were overjoyed to just record an
album, whereas with this one we'd been through the process once before, and had
more of a concept for what we wanted to do and what sort of a sound we were going
for. It's just a better album in almost every regard, at least in our opinion!
2. "The
Dark Horizon" seems to embrace a more blackened melodic death metal sound.
What influenced this shift in style, and how did it impact the songwriting
process for the album? (Santtu) Oh it totally is a more blackened melodic death sound. It
was quite intentional - we took the sound of prior songs like
"Vertigo" and "Endless Unknown" and tried to expand on
them. I remember, while recording Shadow of Death, talking about how we wanted
the next album to have a more blackened sound, and while writing songs for The
Dark Horizon we listened to a lot of melodic black metal. I've found that the
songs I write are very influenced by the music I'm listening to (which seems
pretty obvious). The influence shows up! We're happy with where the overall
sound landed - very melodic, tons of tremelo picking, blast beats.
3. Santtu,
you mentioned that the album leans into Veriteras' old school melodic death
metal roots. Can you share some specific musical elements or influences
that played a significant role in shaping the sound of this album? (Santtu) Early-era In
Flames is probably the biggest one. The song Stand Ablaze is one the best
melodic death songs (in Sean's and Santtu's opinion, at least), and by today's
genre classifications it'd be considered blackened melodic death or maybe even
melodic black metal. Other influences are Dawn, Dark Tranquillity, and Kalmah.
There's some Nightwish influence in there too, along with Children of
Bodom.
4. The
album credits highlight the collaborative effort in writing and arranging the
music. How does the creative process unfold within Veriteras, and how did it
evolve during the production of "The Dark Horizon"? (Santtu) The song-writing
process for us usually begins with Santtu or Sean writing a song and recording
a demo of it. This gets passed around the band to confirm that we like the
sound and direction of the song. From there Santtu and Sean typically
collaborate on the music and arrangement of the demo - sometimes the changes
are pretty small, and other times just a kernal of the original demo remains in
the final arrangement. Once the demo is probably 90%-95% done in terms of
arrangement we queue it up for when we start rehearsing new songs. As we're
rehearsing the song for recording there are some additional tweaks, typically
to the transitions between parts or small adjustments to the drums. For The
Dark Horizon there was more collaboration than on Shadow of Death - part of
that was because we're no longer in the COVID era, so there was more
opportunity for collaboration. Part of it was intentional too - many of our
favorite songs are the ones where there's been more collaboration among band
members. Collaboration also provides more diversity in our sound, which is
important so that our sound doesn't get stagnant.
5. Sean,
you took the lead in writing most of the lyrics for this album. What themes or
subjects inspired your songwriting, and how do they contribute to the overall
atmosphere of "The Dark Horizon"? (Sean) The primary lyrical theme on
this album is the tension between hope and hopelessness as felt through the
human experience: war, politics, creation, destruction, faith, and doubt. The
lyrics are reflections on these contrasts, zooming in on personal conflict, and
zooming out on civilizational conflict. The backdrop for all of this is the
vastness of the universe and how it evokes a sense of existential dread or
crisis; in the midst of finding meaning in our struggles, there's an incomprehensible
and unknowable nature of existence beyond the horizon.
6. Major
Bruno, Eligio Tapia, and Adonis Reed-Boulos contributed solos to the album. Can
you tell us about the dynamic of working together on the solos and how each
guitarist's style added to the diversity of the record? (Santtu) Working with guest
soloists was one of the best parts of this album. It adds so much richness and
diversity to the songs when someone who's not in the band writes and records a
solo. Adonis plays in Bellingham (WA) based melodic death band Inpathos, and
Eligio plays in Bay Area (CA) melodic death band Crepuscle. Having them provide
solos made it feel like there's a little piece of the Inpathos and Crepuscle
sound in our album, which is so fun to hear! With Major, he just really gets
our sound - this is the 3rd solo he's written for us, and we just love the
stuff he comes up with. As it turns out Major is now part of the band as our
bassist!
7. Maria
Mannisto provided vocals on "Light in the Darkness." How did this
collaboration come about, and what do her vocals bring to the overall sound of
the track? (Santtu) Having
Maria provide vocals on the final track was really special - we've never had
any songs with female vocals. We wanted to try new things with this album, and
having Maria singing was one of the ways we did that. As I was writing Light in
the Darkness the concept for a woman's voice at the end just seemed to
naturally emerge from the song - it seemed like such an obvious step for the
vocals that we couldn't not do it! Her vocals add a sprinkle of Nightwish to
the song, and demonstrates that melodic death metal can be both heavy and very
beautiful at the same time. I've known Maria since we were little kids, and
she's a professional singer / musician. She graciously agreed to provide the
vocals - I believe this is her first time singing on a metal album!
8. The
album was recorded by Don Gunn in Seattle and mixed/mastered by Dan Swanö in
Germany. How did the choice of these studios and producers contribute to
capturing the essence of "The Dark Horizon"? (Santtu) Working with both Don
and Dan was absolutely fantastic. Both are top notch professionals and such
great people. We worked with Don Gunn on Shadow of Death, and he lives a few
miles away from each of us in Seattle, so tracking with Don was a very easy
decision for The Dark Horizon as well. For the mix we decided to reach out to
Dan Swanö because, well, he's Dan Swanö and an absolute legend! We
wanted to hear how our album would sound in the hands of someone who lives and
breaths metal, and we love the way it turned out! Through the course of
recording our two EPs (2020 and 2021) we learned that the people who record,
mix, and master have a huge influence on the sound of an album. Working with
professionals in those spaces has greatly elevated our sound, and it's a lot of
fun to hear how working with different people changes the result.
9. The
album artwork was created by Sean Osterberg. Could you share the inspiration
behind the artwork and how it complements the themes explored in the
music? (Sean) The
core concept of the artwork is found in the lyrics of "Celestial
Darkness," which explores hope and despair when thinking about the cosmos
and our place in it. I envisioned and started with a sketch of a
mysterious nebula that gives life to new creation on other worlds. To me, it
evokes the wonder of what other consciousness exists in the universe, and
whether they look to the skies and ask themselves the same profound questions
about the nature of existence. In many ways, this is a general theme across the
album and the other lyrics.
10. Veriteras
has its roots in the Scandinavian melodic death metal scene. After touring in
Finland in support of "Shadow of Death," what experiences or insights
did you gain from that tour, and how did they influence the creation of
"The Dark Horizon"? (Santtu) Touring Finland was such a
wonderful experience! Melodic death metal is so alive in Finland - even towns
of 50k people have half a dozen really good melodic death bands. It's really
pretty amazing! I think overall the tour confirmed that 1) we as a band enjoy
spending time together (which is pretty important when spending hours and hours
in a van together), 2) we felt like our music and sound was validated, because
it seemed like the Finns we played for, who are the utmost connoisseurs of
metal, enjoyed our performances, and 3) we wanted to do another album / tour
cycle, which has led us to The Dark Horizion!https://veriteras.bandcamp.com/album/the-dark-horizon
Santtu Winter (@veriteras) • Photos et vidéos Instagram
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