Black Metal overlords Dark Funeral hail to Australian shores in September for three mighty shows in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. Touring their 2016 release Where Shadows Forever Reign they have travelled far and wide and now as the time draws near to these leather bound Lords of Hell touching their spiked boots to our soil after seven long years, I had the honour of talking with Lord Ahriman, original founding member from 1993.
Starstruck, dumbfounded, what do you ask Swedish Black Metal Overlords whose music you adore? So I started, simple, generic, are you excited to come back to Australia and Lord Ahriman gave me a simple answer, “It’s been quite a while since we were there and it’s always great to do Australia, it’ll be great to return.”
I pushed for more, enquiring, did you enjoy your time here in 2012, was there a highlight or is there something you would like to do here this time?
“We always have good shows in Australia I think it’s going to be great this time too. We’ve prepared a killer set list and we feel like the last two years we’ve improved a lot as a band and we’re a better live band than ever. We’re going to give you the most intense live show you have ever experienced so make sure to be there.”
As to having much time in between shows for exploring, “It’ll be a tight schedule as always but hopefully there’ll be a few hours here and there where we get to see part of the country. When we we’re touring there’s not much time other than to focus on the shows, but if we have time I like to get out and explore a bit of the city we visit.”
Dark Funeral are doing the big three Capitals with Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane shows but as usual Perth, Adelaide and Hobart miss out, I asked if they have any message to the fans there,
“We are ready to play wherever we are invited to play, we are not the ones booking the shows.”
So it’s just up to those small cities to prove to the touring companies they can make it worthwhile!
Enough mundane questions, I threw a random one in and asked Lord Ahriman if he has cuddled a koala?
“Excuse me? No I haven’t seen that, last time I was in Australia I saw a kangaroo.”
I advise if he has time to do it, they are cute and if you visit Australia it is the thing to do!
But coming back to the music, Where Shadows Forever Reign has been a massive success since its release in 2016 and Dark Funeral have toured the world spreading their shadow wide. As you were writing the album, did it develop as you expected – tell us your journey of writing and developing the album – were there any particular challenging or fun parts?
“It’s always a challenge, every time you start writing for a new album you have to go through hellfire and fucking brimstone, it’s always a real tough time but once I got into the flow of the last record, it’s the most natural and most honest and most deep album I’ve written so far.”
I find it to be a very powerful, uplifting album so I asked Lord Ahriman what does this album mean or represent to him. “The years before I started writing I was going through a difficult time in life. If you read the lyrics to As I Ascend, those lyrics really explain what I went through before and then when I got back into good spirits and could start writing again.”
Have you wondered how Lord Ahriman chose his stage name? I was curious so I asked him to tell us about the origin of it.
“I was reading a lot on black magic and the occult and I found this demon Arihman, this is from the very oldest myth of ancient gods and creatures. I found it very interested and I found it suited my personality at that time.”
The way he said that in past tense made me ask, do you still think it suits you personality?
“Now it’s become part of it, hard to explain, I’m not the same person as I was when I took that name but I still think it fits very well with me.”
Looking for an interesting tale I ask what’s the wildest thing that has ever happened on tour, but alas there are: “Not too many wild and crazy things, we try to focus on doing really good shows. The early days were very crazy and insane.”
So What can your fans expect from this show?
“We are better live than ever before, we’re more focused on really bringing out the best show we possibly can. When we put together the set list, since we’ve been around for quite a few years, there’s fans from different generations who like different records maybe so we try to have a decent mix of songs from each record so everybody may not get their favourite song but from their favourite album a song or two. So far I haven’t heard anything negative from the setlist so far but we’ve changed slightly and we’ll bring in a couple of more songs for Australia, so we’re changing it again. I think everybody will get their dose of Dark Funeral.”
The most interesting experience or country Dark Funeral has been to, “It’s hard to say, it’s always like to travel, the travel itself isn’t fun but the new countries and cities its always interesting to explore different cultures and types of food. It was quite exalting and different to play Bali a few years ago. Australia’s always great to play, that’s why I’m looking forward a lot to come back. In general, I think it’s interesting to be able travel a lot, even if there is not much time for sightseeing and stuff. At least we get to see a small glimpse of every country and we learn a lot about the world.”
The Australian shows are going to be smaller than the big festivals Dark Funeral has been playing, I asked Lord Ahriman if he has a preference to the bigger or smaller shows?
“Not really, we’re fortunate to be a band that can play both super big festivals and also smaller club shows, you get different kind of energy from them both. Smaller shows can be better than the bigger ones as you can get more connection with the crowd and you can exchange more energy with them. It’s something different to playing those super big stages.”
So Australia, there you have it, Lord Ahriman is looking forward to coming back to Australia, hopefully Direct Touring will get him to cuddle a Koala, Dark Funeral are giving out the best performances of their career so head to Direct Underground Fest in Sydney or Melbourne to catch a magnificent rare show and Brisbane are lucky enough to get a show too so Australian hordes gather your horns and prep those voices to show Dark Funeral the appreciation they deserve for returning to our desert island home.
DARK FUNERAL, IMMOLATION, Christ Dismembered and Descent
September 5th – Brisbane, The Triffid
TICKETS ON SALE immediately at www.oztix.com.au
DIRECT UNDERGROUND FEST 2019 with
DARK FUNERAL, IMMOLATION, Abramelin, Christ Dismembered and Reaper
September 6th – Sydney, Crowbar
September 7th – Melbourne, Max Watts
TICKETS FROM: http://soundworksdirect.eventbrite.com
