INTERVIEW: Nils Molin - Dynazty

Back in 2009 when Dynazty released their first album ‘Bring the Thunder’ and followed it up two years later with ‘Knock You Down’ you could have been forgiven for thinking that they were a band that revered the magical 80’s renaissance of rock above all else. Now that may have been true at the time and those two albums are great additions to any collection but by ‘Renatus’ in 2014 things had started to change, and interestingly this coincided with Dynazty starting to produce themselves. Three self-produced albums later ‘Firesign’ could just be their crowning glory but to misquote the Wizard of Oz “We aren’t in the 80’s anymore”…

We caught up with Nils Molin to talk bout the new album ‘Firesign’ and also about how Dynazty’s sound has changed over the years leading us to what just might be their most essential album to date…

Nils: Hi Mark it’s Nils from Dynazty how are you?

Mark: I’m very good thank you> Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us today. We’ve enjoyed talking to the band over the years and we were there when you released that very first album. But things have changed significantly since those days as far as sound goes and the new album ‘Firesign’ which is out worldwide on 28^th September just might be your best yet. Tell us a little bit about the album, it’s a step further than even ‘Titanic Mass’?

Nils: Well this album we started writing last year early, actually we were playing Tokyo when we first started discussing ideas for the album. One of the first ideas that we had was that we wanted to make the album more dynamic than the last one in terms of song-writing, but also in terms of production. We also wanted to make something that was quite different from the last two albums and introduce some new elements. So that as the game-plan so to speak when we started writing the album. And I actually think we achieved this, I think it’s a more dynamic album I would say than most of what we’ve done before., and production-wise it’s a bit more organic and natural than the last few albums.

Mark: One of the things that has always intrigued me about the band is that you have really never been afraid to change your sound, your first albums are a world away from ‘Firesign’ and ‘Firesign’ itself is a step away from the last two, let’s talk a little about that?

Nils: Well first and foremost I think you can push something to the maximum. And after the last two albums ‘Renatus’ and ‘Titanic Mass’ we felt that we’d gone as far as we could especially with the production on the last album. And we found that the performances we lacking a little with that kind of production so we brought the performances more to the fore and I think that is helped by the more natural production, I think.

Mark: Is part of the reason also because you wanted to more closely reproduce the sounds of the album more closely live? I imagine that even though it still sounds huge ‘Firesign’ might be a truer reflection of the band’s sound live?

Nils: Well this is always the tricky part when recording an album, nowadays almost any band can sound good on an album. There are technical ways to get bands to sound extremely tight and metronomically perfect. Then of course when these bands play live the sound is not that close to the album. I think the case with Dynazty is more been that we’ve had difficulty in capturing how good the band sounds live on album! The studio vibe can always be a bit stiff and you can never capture how the band moves in the live environment in the studio. But on the other hand an album should sound ‘produced’ it shouldn’t sound like a live album unless of course it is a live album, so we try to find that balance. Keeping a balance between the organic and the space that provides the band but also keeping a polished studio product as well. It’s that balance that we’ve been trying to achieve with this album.

Mark: It’s always great to see when bands get their own Wikipedia pages, but mystifyingly your page refers to you as a Swedish Power Metal band, have I missed something?

Nils: (laughs) Well, I don’t know, these labels that people put n bands they drive me crazy. To me it’s Hard Rock or Heavy Metal of whatever you want to call it. But I guess everyone has their own opinions about how band’s sound and I see endless discussions on the internet about what labels they should put on a band and what is correct. I don’t know to me it’s Melodic Hard Rock or Heavy Metal or maybe add ‘Modern’ or something, but other than that I don’t know (laughs). Call it whatever you want.

Mark: When I first heard ‘Bring the Thunder’ back in 2009 there was a real 80’s flavour to your sound, the scent of the Sunset Strip lasted I guess for those first three releases but you’ve really come into your own especially with this latest album, Is there a sense now that you are really doing exactly what you were put here to do.

Nils: Yes I think so. Those first albums were basically the first songs we ever wrote as a band and I was 19 at the time. So I’d say that then this band was in its infancy. Then there was this whole revitalization of the whole ‘Retro-80’s Rock’ especially in the Stockholm area where we all were and almost all the bands were doing that kind of stuff that sounded very 80’s. So we got kinda caught up in that and played that kind of style in the beginning and as the years go on you develop as a musician and you develop as a person and perhaps you want to do something a little bit different and you learn all the time. I’ve always thought that the progression of Dynazty has been very natural but some people say that it’s been quite radical, but to me there hasn’t ever been a preconceived plan to do something different it’s just more or less flowed that way by itself.

Mark: I can see that I guess, and being so close you must have a very different perspective to an outsider, but I always felt that it was with ’Renatus’ in 2014 when you started to produce yourselves that you seemed to sound more comfortable in yourselves?

Nils: Sure that was definitely a turning point for the band that we decided to stop having too much outside influence. There were definitely some people in or organisation in the early days that wanted to push us in a certain way and who saw a different vision or image of what the band was – one that we didn’t really agree with at all. When we started writing the ‘Renatus’ album we decided to say “bye, bye” to those people and move forward on our own. And that’s when we also decided that we would not have an outside producer or anything more than an engineer assisting with the album and coming up with suggestions with the music and the mixing. But we’re producing the music 100% ourselves so that we can really find our own character of the band. And it was a great learning process – learning about production, song-writing and arrangements and we’ve been on that path ever since. But especially with this new album where we really dug deep into the production and arrangements, and I think it’s really paid off. I think that the band has really found its personality and character along the way.

Mark: If we can get to the songs, and I guess the two that people might have heard already are the opener ‘Breathe With Me’ and ‘The Grey’ the first two songs on the album, there are hints of a symphonic element or streak that goes beautifully with the melodies that you are putting together, that you hear a little more pronounced on other songs, but let’s start with ‘The Grey’ what can you tell us about that song?

Nils: Sure ‘The Grey’ was one of the fastest written songs on the album. We had the idea for the main theme of the song for a long time, the guitars and the symphonic part were laying there somewhere and we never really fully picked it up to finish it but when we did it went extremely fast and we really put it together effortlessly and you sometimes have that when you get a great flow with a song, we didn’t have to force it to work. With regards the symphonic element you talked about I agree, I wouldn’t call us a symphonic band at all but there are those elements on this album and they are quite apparent like you say in a song like ‘The Grey’ or for example in a song like ‘Ascension’, so yeah it’s definitely there. And it’s something that developed naturally on this new album. It came out of nowhere and we started experimenting with those symphonic elements.

Mark: It adds something really nice to the mix and gives that real depth to those songs in particular. So take it all back for us if you can. Where did it all start for you? What got you into a life of music in the first place, was it a gradual realisation or a moment of clarity?

Nils: In a way it was something that I discovered for myself. I wouldn’t say that I come from a musical family because there wasn’t really anybody in my family when I was growing up who was really listening to music but still my mother has always been a big fan of classical music and opera and even some rock music but there was nothing that was circulating in my home at all. But I discovered Rock music when I was about 8 or 9 years old and it sort of took off from there, and then on my own I started to discover more in this world of Rock music that I totally fell in love with.

Mark: So what were you listening to in those early days?

Nils: Well the first band I really discovered back then was Kiss. I hear this all the time when people talk about the bands that they first discovered and I think that with Kiss they have that appeal to children with the visual aspect. That is something really striking immediately when you’re young. But I remember that this was around ’96 or ’97 when Kiss was back with their original line-up and the original costumes and make-up and all this. So I saw that on TV and from there I became a Kiss fan and started discovering other bands. But in the early years apart from Kiss I think I discovered the Swedish band Europe, Iron Maiden, and from there you have a whole world of hard rock music to dive into and I did that.

Mark: How hard is it for a band these days to make a living? I sit here in Australia marvelling at all the wonderful music out there but being so far away from it all I know I’ll need to travel if I realistically want to see half these bands. There are so many markets out there and social media bombards us all the time, it’s hard as a listener to keep up with it all, so as a band trying to get heard it must be a nightmare?

Nils: Today there are benefits and there are drawbacks. The labels have little to zero power anymore, they don’t have the means to push more than a few bands. Back in the day they might have long term plans for bands, they put in money and sometimes didn’t expect to see a return for years. These days you get one chance and you’re on your own. The positive aspect though is that you can actually reach countries that you couldn’t do back then. And everyone has that through the internet. Sometimes you hear back from such obscure countries that you never knew you could reach out to. So if you play your cards right you can actually make a career online and push your band yourself. So that’s the positive aspect but at the same time all the money has been drained from the industry in general so that makes touring for example if you want to go outside of Europe much more difficult.

Mark: You’ve got a domestic Tour lined up for September and I know in the last couple of years I know you’ve been over to the UK, France, Germany and other places n mainland Europe. Do you have anything planned for further afield to promote this album?

Nils: Sure we’re going to hit mainland Europe late this year and early next and the target is Europe this year as it’s easiest for us and then it’s all about finding the right opportunities to get to more places than that. I mean we went to play Tokyo last year for the first time. I’ve been to Australia once, about ten years ago but I wasn’t there playing just visiting the country but I always wanted to go back and play. So if we go to Asia again then we might be able to make it happen, it’s been a goal of mine ever since I visited.

Mark: Well let’s see if we can make that happen.

Nils: We will.

Mark: If you could be a fly on the wall for the recording of any album in history, just to see how the magic happened in the studio what album would that album be?

Nils: There are quite a few! Let’s see! I’ll start from the 70’s I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall for the creation of ‘The Wall’ by Pink Floyd, I think that might have been an interesting process. And I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall seeing a band like Deep Purple when they were at their peak recording albums like ‘Machine Head’ and ‘Burn.’ To see the working dynamic between Ritchie Blackmore, Jon Lord and the other guys that would have been something. I would also have liked to have been a fly on the wall for the recording of Dream Theater’s ‘Images and Words’ too. And I guess I could go on and on, but from the 80’s I would have liked to have been there during the recording of ‘The Number of the Beast’, no I’ll change my mind ’British Steel’.

Mark: Two albums that really shone out in that whole New Wave of British Metal period. And ll great choices. We do always save the easy question till last though: what is the meaning of life?

Nils: Ahh! Well you really did save the easiest one till last! I guess that’s a very subjective question and the answer lies in t ever subjective nature of how your view the question. To find the meaning of life might be the meaning of life! I guess it’s something like to try to find your place in the world and to try and find something that makes you enjoy the time that you spend here. Maybe not worry too much and to try to enjoy your time because you have no idea what happened next and this might be the only chance. So finding meaning in life is the meaning of life!

Mark: That’s a great answer, very nicely thought out, I like that. Thank you so much for your time today Nils, all the best with the roll out of the new album – which everyone should now rush out and buy.

Nils: Thank you Mark, take care and hopefully we’ll see you down there one day. Bye.