Skip to content
ASTRAL NOIZE
Forward-thinking, noise-ridden curation.
  • Home
  • Reviews
  • Features
  • Gaming
  • Book Club
  • Shop
  • Label
  • Events
  • Patreon
  • Contact
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Reddit
  • Search
Uncategorized
by Astral NoizeSeptember 17, 20192:12 pm

How Cult Of Luna Pieced Together the Jigsaw

When it comes to innovators and trailblazers, the name Cult Of Luna may not be one which jumps to the tip of the tongue. But for more than two decades the Swedish behemoth’s have been working on their craft, making slight tweaks here and there, all the while making one hell of a noise. Look a little bit closer at the band’s history and they are among a special breed, which has collectively helped refine the genre of post-metal, influencing hundreds of artists and thus aiding the subgenre’s evolution into the fruitful state it finds itself in today.

For their ninth studio record, A Dawn To Fear, which is now rapidly approaching release, the band have stepped out of their comfort zone in order to come at the record from a different angle. “From working on [2003’s] The Beyond right up until [2016’s] Mariner we have had the same process for each record,” guitarist and vocalist Johannes Persson tells us. “We always start off with the idea of narrative or a story arc and that is our starting point.”

“We then work out how we want to go about and what we need to do to tell that story with all the music production. Whether that is artwork or videos or live production, everything has to head towards the same goal. But during this record we wanted to explore what would happen if we let our instinct dictate the natural course of the writing. It was a lot more of an experiment.”

Persson explains that this is the first time in a long period where the band hasn’t come into the recording process with a clear idea of what the intended outcome was. Instead the guitarist came to the record with fragments of ideas and, whilst writing, attempted to piece it all together to create a Cult Of Luna record. 

“I thought to myself, ‘What would happen if I just sat down with my guitar and wrote without aiming for anything?’” Persson says. “I would sit down to write and write down the first sentence that comes to mind and go from there.”

“Previously we would have had the big picture that we are working towards and we would work out a path of how we would get there and piece it together. This time it was a lot more like a jigsaw. We had all the pieces but just had to work out how they all came together. Especially lyrically, there were words that initially made no sense but now they are super clear to me. We just had to figure out what these songs are telling us, and we quickly found it was all about finding home from different perspectives.”

adIn adopting this fresh approach, the band’s seven members decided that what would yield the best results was to live in each other’s pockets throughout the recording process. Spending eleven days at the remote Ocean Sound Recordings in Norway, Persson admits he took the opportunity not only to write music but to catch up with friends. The result was a more collaborative writing process. 

“When we approached this record we worked out that every song needs its creator,” adds the guitarist. “That creator needs to fulfil their vision of what the song will be before someone else can come in and edit. There is a lot of the time where it is me, but that being said the songs never end up how I first see them in my head. Everyone in the band has their role to play and that is why we wanted to have a more collaborative working environment.” 

“Luna is a product of its members, and that is one thing that was very important to us. That is why we took the decision to meet up and we lived [at Ocean Sound] for two weeks. For me, this was a very effective way for us to work and one of the best memories I have had with the band so far.” 

However, the vocalist insists that working as a democracy doesn’t always work, admitting that it could sometimes lead to arguments. “During the recording of [2008’s] Eternal Kingdom there was a moment when we tried to write and work as a democracy, but it led to a number of arguments. If there was ever a moment where Cult of Luna could have broken up that was it. What we learnt from that experience is that every ship needs a captain, but every member of the band now has their role, which is something which is unwritten among us.” 

With the band forming in 1998, they’ve witnessed a shift in the musical landscape, but they have not changed their perspective. What Persson finds strange, he explains, is that people consider the band as innovators, or on the flipside are only just discovering their music. 

“It is odd,” he begins. “Because with Mariner we didn’t really have any expectations of it other than we had this idea of what we wanted to do for the record, and it gave us the opportunity to work with Julie [Christmas]. But if you look at the streams and plays that record is our most played so it certainly put more eyes on to us. But then you have the people who have been with us 20-plus years and see us as this ground-breaking band, and we are seen as originators when we have basically been doing music that we like.” 

With the new record and a UK headline tour on the cards, it seems that Cult of Luna are set to be pushed into the next level of ascension. 

However, Persson said that because the band has been sat on the album for some time, there is no worries about what comes next. “It has been ready for such a long time,” he explains. “We finished [recording] it in January and I’ve kind of got used to it being in the background as we are looking at what we are doing next. We usually need six months to trying to figure out when we are able to meet up and practice but right now, we are just wanting to enjoy where we are.”

A Dawn To Fear is out 20th September on Metal Blade Records. Purchase here.

Words: Tim Birkbeck

 

 

 

 

Liked it? Take a second to support Astral Noize on Patreon!
Tagged with: cult of luna doom drone experimental feature Features heavy interview metal post post-metal post-rock rock sludge

1Comment

Add yours
  1. 1
    The Top 20 Astral Noize Albums of the Year 2019 – Astral Noize on December 24, 2019 at 1:36 pm
    Reply

    […] As with every Cult Of Luna release, A Dawn To Fear needs to be given the time and attention it deserves. With eight songs and a runtime just shy of an hour and a half, it’s a striking and momentous body of work. Sonically, A Dawn To Fear sits in the gap between the mechanical, Orwellian monolith Vertikal (2013) and the organic, woodland nightmarish soundscapes of 2008’s Eternal Kingdom. From the opening bars of ‘The Silent Man’ the listener is struck by mountainous riffs that create the peaks and valleys of the album’s distinctive sound. A poignant and spiritual journey, with a depth of sound and meaning to drown in, A Dawn To Fear also closes with arguably the greatest song the band have written to date. Indeed, ‘The Fall’ is the perfect way to end a glorious, monumental work of art that stands proud as both Album of the Year and Cult Of Luna’s crowning achievement in a career lined with greatness. (Learn more about our AOTY in this interview) […]

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Top Posts

  • Curating Resistance: A Guilt-Free Guide to Black Metal
  • Curating Resistance: Antifascist Black Metal Network
  • Shreds of Sanity: Bolt Thrower's Entire Discography Ranked
  • Bloodsoaked: The Definitive Obituary Album Ranking
  • Curating Resistance: The Ultimate List of Anti-Fascist Bands
  • Amplifier Worship: The Ultimate Guide to Boris’ Crazy Discography
  • The Forgotten Trailblazers of Heavy Metal: A Study of Underlooked Proto-Metal
  • Fighting Colonialism With Crushing Riffs: A Profile Of Worldwide Indigenous Metal
  • Drama, Tension and Pathos: 21 Brilliantly Weird Film Scores
  • The Summer of Thou: A Round-Up of the Most Vital Band in Modern Metal

Recent Posts

  • The Stink of Influence: In Conversation with The Melvins’ Dale Crover
  • Video Premiere / One Leg One Eye – Glistening, She Emerges
  • Festival Review and Photo Gallery: Amplifest 2022- Part Three
  • Festival Review: ArcTanGent 2022- Part One
  • Interview / Ggu:ll – Grumpy Existentialist Doom
  • Review / Acausal Intrusion – Seeping Evocation
  • Review / Candlemass – Sweet Evil Sun
  • Review / Trevor Dunn’s Trio-Convulsant avec Folie à Quatre – Séances
  • Review / Fuzznaut – Apophenia
  • Review / Epectase – Nécroses

Follow us on Twitter

My Tweets

Playlist

Begin typing your search above and press return to search. Press Esc to cancel.

 

Loading Comments...