In this interview, we sit down with Richard Wilson, the founder of Mourning Scars. Born and raised in Skövde, Sweden, Richard was surrounded by a thriving metal scene that influenced him greatly. After playing in various metal bands and touring with his singer/songwriter project Racingpaperplanes, he decided to return to heavy metal with Mourning Scars. The band's first single "Levi Black" was met with great response, prompting Richard to release more singles with childhood friend Stefan Nordmark on lead guitar. In this interview, we dive into Richard's background, his approach to music-making, and the future of Mourning Scars.
Can you tell us a bit more about the inspiration behind the band name "Mourning Scars"?
The name Mourning Scars is a nod to my first album with my band Racingpaperplanes. It was called “Morning Scars”. I wrote the song Levi Black around 2007 and was gonna start this project then and needed a name. Mourning just sounded more metal. For several reasons I never wrote more metal songs then. 14 years later I needed to get some feelings out after my mother passed and I re-recorded Levi Black and the name Mourning Scars made more sense. She was very supportive of my music and even if none of the songs is about her specifically I think she would be proud!
You mentioned that you re-recorded "Levi Black" just to test the waters. What kind of response did you receive and how did that shape the direction of the band?
Yeah. I always liked that song, and as I said I recorded it way back but I didn’t feel it came out the way it deserved. Back then I wrote it as a response to the Candlemass song “Edgar Grey”. I just got inspired by it and it’s not a rip off in any way, but that was the kind of style I was going for. So now it felt obvious to do a cover of the Candlemass song and kind of release it as a b-side.
I thought the Candlemass song would get some attention but wasn’t sure about my own song. It turned out people liked my song more. It could also be that I did a shitty cover though, haha! Levi Black is sort of a mix between Candlemass and Slayer. That middle part with the solo is a total Slayer-rip off.
I started the Facebook page and had about 30 of my friends as followers and I thought that would be it basically. But somehow people found the song on Spotify and I tried to do a little promotion for it and suddenly I had 100 followers. I thought OK, maybe I’m onto something here. I haven’t been writing metal for so long so I wasn’t sure I still had it. But song after song kept coming and all of a sudden I was thinking maybe I’m writing an album? I just passed 666 followers yesterday, which is the perfect number for any metal band! :)
Then Banks radio in Australia and Classy Heavy Metal Show in Brazil and Monster Shop Metal in the UK played some of my songs on their stations. People would include songs in Spotify playlists. It grew from there.
How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard of Mourning Scars before?
It’s heavy metal for sure! It has some doom metal influences and sometimes I’ll throw in a thrash-riff for fun! It is both influenced by bands I grew up with like Metallica, Slayer, Candlemass, Iron maiden, Priest, but also we had a great local scene in Skövde, Sweden where demos from local bands such as Act, Zanity, Master Massive, King Pin (Later Shotgun Messiah) influenced me just as much if not more! There would also be a live scene with local bands where there were many great bands in this small town! Most of us practiced at the same space as well and it was a huge gang of metalheads mostly!
Who are some of your biggest musical influences and how do they come through in your music?
I grew up on 80’s metal but mostly the Thrash Metal side of it. The wimpy poser stuff like Ratt and Dokken was not for me. I love it now though and probably did in secret back then… Over the years I kinda had a falling out with metal when grunge became a thing. It fit so perfectly with where my head was at at the time! So that scene changed everything for me. I think maybe you can hear traces of it in Mourning Scars as well.
You've played in a variety of metal bands over the years. How has your previous experience shaped your approach to Mourning Scars?
Me and Stefan Nordmark, my lead guitar virtuoso, started our first band Thunder Rain when he was 9 and I was 10! I wouldn’t say it was metal at all but we discovered metal together. He was always way more talented than me and still is but we kinda grew apart in our later teens. We had one band called “Rat Bat Blue” (I know), when we were about 16 or so. That’s when we started to sound a little better.
I got to join the best band in town, Master Massive when I was only 19. I was a drummer then. I lived in the countryside outside of town and these were older scary city kids. I was really shy and had very low self esteem, but I was an ok drummer I guess. It was a bit hard for me to keep up with these guys and I couldn’t practice a lot because of school so they decided to call in the drummer I replaced. It was right before my first big show. I was devastated.
I actually joined them years later as a singer for a few shows and demos, I think in 1996.
So I learned a whole lot from Jan Strandh, the founder of Master Massive and although he is light years better than me I’d like to think he influenced me a whole lot! He kinda set the standard in town for what was good and not, and he was very strict. I think that helped me even if it was intimidating at times.
What is the creative process like for you when writing and recording a new song?
Well, it varies, but usually I try to come up with cool riffs. I record them quickly in my studio and see if I can come up with a basic melody over it. I record that and try to write the chorus riff to that and so on. Sometimes the lyrics come first, like with “The Wayfarer”. It’s usually a quick process if the creative juices are flowing but some songs take longer to craft. I have a song recorded of what I call “scratch tracks” and I re-record everything more seriously once the song structure is finished.
You play everything and also mix and produce your own music. How do you balance all of those roles?
It’s a double edged sword sometimes. I get to do whatever the heck I want, but I also totally lack input from others so I only have myself to blame if it sucks! That’s why after a while I brought in Stefan to put down some solos. He has been super important in pushing me with the mixes. I can be a bit lazy and “grungey” and be happy with a mix fairly quickly, but he helps me a lot with that. “The guitars need to be lower”; “My leads need to be a decibel louder”. Shit like that.
Also I guess it would have sounded differently if I had other guys play instruments but I think I have found a sound that I am satisfied with!
I find it satisfying to do most of it all myself because I lack patience to wait for stuff to be finished! Thank God, Stefan is quick to record as well :)
What was it like touring with Racingpaperplanes and how did that experience differ from your previous experiences playing in metal bands?
Oh that is way different. RPP was a mellow acoustic based alternative country band. I sang and played guitar and wrote all the songs. I had talented people help me out on various instruments in the studio and live. It also ended up with me doing everything myself at the end of that thing. I’m a lone wolf like that.
I did a tour in the USA in 2002. It was a great experience. Fun thing was that we were double booked with metal bands a couple of times, and their audience hated us! It made me sing an acapella version of Manowars’ “Bridge of death”, which made them shut up, and they came up to me afterwards saying they were sorry and they didn’t know I was one of them! :)
Can you share any memorable moments from your time playing in Master Massive or Floodhorse?
The most memorable moment with Master Massive was when Jan Strandh called me and asked me to join! I couldn’t believe it! I had asked to get some drum lessons from him which he thought was weird because he was a guitarist. His music is very technical with odd time signatures and stuff which I always loved, but wanted to learn. So we did a practice session or two and then he called me and said they were getting rid of their drummer and could I join? It was surreal for me.
Floodhorse was a grunge/metal band that me and my friend Fredrik Björnstigen started in 1991. We were on vacation in America when the grunge broke and saw Nirvana and Pearl Jam in small clubs. When we came back to Sweden we wanted to start a grunge band but no one had barely heard about those bands back then. A couple of months later everyone was in a grunge band though…
One show we played I remember headbanging so hard I fell off stage. It was a bit embarrassing. I also remember doing the first proper recording in a real studio. It became our last recording sadly. It was a great band and if you like that kind of stuff you should definitely listen to Floodhorse on Spotify!
Oh and I also remember hearing back from a record company. We had this David Bowie-esque song “Comfort” that they liked and asked if I could write songs for a guy called Tomas Di Leva. He was considered to be somewhat of a clown so I took great offense! Ha ha! I might have been rich today if I had said yes because he’s a big star in Sweden. I don’t know how serious they were though.
You mentioned that most people have no attention span to listen to a whole album these days, which is why you've decided to release singles. Do you think that trend will continue or do you think there will be a return to full-length albums in the future?
I am an album guy myself, totally, but I find myself more and more making playlists and hit random and play. I can’t predict the future but I don’t think full albums are coming back in a big way once us dinosaurs die out. Kids today are used to listening to the hits only. I am relearning the game and I don't know what’s right or wrong. I try to release a song every 2-3 weeks and once I have 10 songs I will compile them into an album. Maybe sell some cd’s and very much would love to release it on vinyl! It's mostly a matter of cost .
"Levi Black" recently passed the 1000 streams mark on Spotify. How does it feel to see your music reaching an audience and gaining popularity?
It’s so weird. 1000 isn’t that much for some but for me as a total independent artist, without any monetary muscles it’s amazing to think of that many people listening to my songs! “Pyromancer” is over 2000 now. I don’t really care about it that much but it’s super nice to know someone is listening!
What can fans expect from the upcoming singles and the eventual album release?
Yeah like I said I will write 10 songs to make an album, so I’m kinda releasing it in real time. I write a song and put it out and repeat. The next song is called “Void of time”, no one knows that yet so shhhh, but it’s definitely a nod to those local bands i mentioned earlier. Not that you would have heard them…
I will also re-mix and re-do some stuff before releasing the album, to the first batch of songs I released because over time I have learned more how to get the sound I want.
You mentioned childhood friend Stefan Nordmark playing lead guitar on a few tracks. How did that collaboration come about and what was it like working with him again?
Yeah he’s so great! Actually we have talked over several years to do something together again but nothing really came out of it until now. Once I had a few songs written I felt my leads were a bit samey. I'm not really a lead guitarist. So I thought of Stefan and asked if he could do the solo on “Dead Crows”. I had no idea if he still had the chops but he blew me away! I was just laughing! It really put a new dimension to the song. After that it was a no-brainer to use him more. I do a few solos because I think it’s fun!
What do you hope listeners take away from your music?
Wow, that is a tough question. I hope it can give them some kind of emotion, even if they hate it. Anything is better than a total lackluster reaction. I have a lot of fun making it and i am so happy to get such great feedback from both radio, spotify listeners and blogs like yours!
How has the music industry changed since you first started playing in bands, and what do you think the future holds for musicians?
It has changed a lot! When I was younger you HAD to live in Stockholm, our capital, to get a record company to even listen to your music. Everything else was unheard of in my town. After Shotgun Messiah got a deal things changed. People started to realize, hey we can do it too! At least we believed we could. When the internet came it started to change even more. Nowadays you can have members in other countries and send files back and forth. It’s amazing!
I think it’s even harder to be heard today in a way though, because everyone and their mama can record at home and there’s so many super good bands out there that are never heard because of the amount of competition. And like I said earlier, people have such a short attention span that they forget you in two minutes if you don’t promote or release something constantly!
Then I think bands need to promote each other more! Be supportive and get support from others! I have some new friends in great bands like AGBAT, Anger Overdose, Death Pigeon and Creeboåt just to name a few. They constantly promote other bands and I try too! We grow together!
Lastly, where can fans find your music and keep up with the latest news and updates from Mourning Scars?
My main place is the Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/Mourningscars,
I also have instagram and youtube but I’m not so active there. https://www.instagram.com/mourning_scarsband/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrZIUfX5iVvgmQ5mlymFM4g
And I have Bandcamp as well. https://mourningscars.bandcamp.com/
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