Mikael Stanne is not only one of the most accomplished vocalists in death metal, but also a workhorse: with DARK TRANQUILLITY, THE HALO EFFECT, GRAND CADAVER and CEMETERY SKYLINE, he now sings in four bands, all of which also perform live. Before GRAND CADAVER’s show at the Dark Easter Metal Meeting, Mikael and his GRAND CADAVER colleague Alex Stjernfeldt talked to us about all four projects.
Welcome to Munich. You have been here only two weeks ago with THE HALO EFFECT and you will be back in October with DARK TRANQUILLITY. Do you like Munich?
Mikael: I really do. I love it here. I just did the last show in Cologne two days ago. I had one day off and then I came here. Busy. Busy times.
Now you’re back with GRAND CADAVER. The band was founded in 2020. So, how did that come about? I mean, you only founded THE HALO EFFECT in 2019, in addition to DARK TRANQUILLITY. How did it happen, that you started another band?
Mikael: Me and Alex [Stjernfeldt] are neighbors at home …
Alex: Yeah, and I used to play in a band called Mr. Death with Stefan [Lagergren], the other guitarist. That was like 10 years ago. I felt that I missed playing with him. I got a text message from Daniel [Liljekvist] a couple of years ago. And he said, do you want to start a death metal band? And I thought, yeah, I do! And I want to play with Stefan. And we were like: yeah, and we need a vocalist. And as Mikael said, we are neighbors. The pandemic just hit, and we were out, having a beer and I asked him if he wanted to join a death metal band. And we kind of started that evening. Because we called Christian when we talked. And he was like, yeah, I’m in!
Mikael: With Alex other Band Novarupta I did one song together, and then we did the first ever show together. And then Christian was on the bass as well. Christian is a really old friend of mine from back in the days, like the origins of the Gothenburg scene. So it was so cool to be on stage together. And I was like: Yeah, he should join. And he was like: I haven’t played death metal ever, so let’s do that.
Alex: So he took his death metal virginity at 50.
Mikael: So it was really cool. We had just finished the DARK TRANQUILLITY album, and I was writing the first THE HALO EFFECT album at the same time, so I kind of felt like, yeah, why not? I have nothing else to do, this is fun. And it was easy to be in a good creative mood. When you know you don’t have anything on your calendar. So that really helped. Knowing that I’m not going anywhere, so I can just focus on this. That made it so much easier. Normally I would say, yeah, it would be fun, I’d love to, but I probably can’t.
Lucky coincidence! You only played 14 shows so far, today is number 15. With DARK TRANQUILLITY you played around 1,000 show. Furthermore, you’re playing some different style of music with GRAND CADAVER. Is it different for you to hit the stage with GRAND CADAVER?
Mikael: It is, of course. But I think that’s the fun part about it. Writing the songs is also very different. You get into a different mode. I’m so used to working with the same people for 20 plus years. 30 plus years. Doing something new is awesome! But then also being on stage with other people that you know and love … that makes it an even better experience. And even though you play in the same ballgame, but it’s still different. So you get to learn a lot. We’ve only played in Sweden and Norway so far, but these have been amazing shows. Some really intense, cool shows that we’ve loved.
Alex: Really sweaty and really intense!
Mikael: So DARK EASTER METAL MEETING is our first time outside of Scandinavia. And we play one more shows in Germany this summer.
Alex: So it’s an honor that we’re here.
Mikael: And in a very familiar place to me!
You’re used from DARK TRANQUILLITY to switch from growls to clean vocals, and you maybe also use a bit of a softer growling style. Did you try to adapt your vocal style to the music of GRAND CADAVER? Or do you just do your thing?
Mikael: With the way Alex writes and with the sound that we use, which is very traditional, old school Swedish death metal, it just came very natural. Because this is what this kind of music should sound like. We put our spin on it, but it’s not about reinventing something. It’s about making it our own…
Alex: Paying homage to the old gods of death …
Mikael: … in our way. So it was just amazing fun to do it. But also the way we record. We record in a week, or over a weekend like we did with the first EP „Menace Comes“.
Alex: That was a weekend, yes. And it was actually the first time all the five of us met. We met for the first time in the studio. Like „Hi, my name is Daniel.“ „My name is Alex.“ „My name is Christian.“ „My name is Michael.“ Let’s hit „record“ and see what happens.
Mikael: That was a weekend. And then the first album was a week, I think, or six days. I just came from two, six and nine month recordings. And then doing it in a week, was like: Yes, this is the way it should be! This is so liberating.
Alex: Not overthink it, just go primal.
Mikael: And I wrote the lyrics and stuff just in one day. And no changes. Just make sure that it kind of feels good and then go for it. And I can use all the clichés that I’ve avoided my whole life. (laughs)
So when you’re talking about the „gods of death metal“, are there any role models or bands you wanted to pay tribute to with GRAND CADAVER in a subtle way? Which ones would you mention?
Alex: I don’t think it’s subtle at all! Entombed!
Mikael: I got to see Nihilist when I was young. And that blew me away. And then Entombed, the first demo, I was like, this is the coolest thing ever. And of course Dismember and Tiamat, Grave.
Alex: I think a lot of the Stockholm scene bands, but as Michael said, we do our twist on it, since the members in GRAND CADAVER come from Gothenburg, Stockholm, and Falun, which is in the middle of Sweden. So we have different backgrounds, and we have a different approach to death metal, but we all share the same love for the genre. And that means we pay homage to Entombed, but we do it in our style.
Mikael: So you can tell the difference between Necrophobic and Bewitched, because Bewitched are from the north, they are very different from Necrophobic, who are from Stockholm. And if you listen to early 1990s death metal, like if you listen to Dismember and Entombed, that’s a very distinct style. And if you listen to DARK TRANQUILLITY and In Flames and At The Gates, it’s a very distinct sound as well. Alex grew up in Stockholm and I in Gothenburg, so it made sense to combine the two a little bit.
Let’s switch over to THE HALO EFFECT: You have now been here with that band on its second run, the first one was with Amon Amarth and Machine Head in 2022. If you compare those two tours, what were the main differences?
Mikael: Amon Amarth and Machine Head were co-headlining an arena tour, so that was fun, that was great. And I think the Amon Amarth crowd definitely got us. This time we played the main support, that was awesome, of course. But I was a bit concerned that Meshuggahs crowd might not get our stuff. We did a tour in Scandinavia with them last year, and that was great, but that was in Sweden and people know us there. But I think that for us this was an amazing tour, really cool people who were very open to it, and it was sold out almost every night, so that was amazing. And the Meshuggah guys were super happy, the Mantar guys who opened were super happy, so yeah, we loved it, it was great.
THE HALO EFFECT could be considered as a „traditional team“ of In Flames: Every one of you was in that band at some point in his career, which is a quite funny coincidence I think. Did you make jokes about that when you started, or was it just a coincidence, which was quite natural for you?
Mikael: It’s not a coincidence, because of course we’ve known each other since before In Flames. So it kind of made sense. When Niklas asked me if I’d be interested in singing on some of his stuff, I was like, yeah, sure, I’ll try it out. Pretty much like when Alex asked me, he was like, hey, do you want to start something? And I was like: Yeah, I’m in the right mood, I’m feeling it, let’s have some fun, let’s see. But then Niklas sent me a demo, and I was like, this sounds actually really good. And then we said, maybe we should ask Peter, Daniel, and kind of get the „old gang“ back together again. It was kind of like that. I never played in any band with Peter or Daniel, and I’ve known them since I was 15. And Jesper, of course, a little bit in the beginning of In Flames, but never with Niklas either. So for me, it was kind of like, I have a chance to hang out with my friends that I rarely get to see, and let’s see if we can put something together. We didn’t have any idea of what it was going to be, or if we were going to take it anywhere. It was just like, hey, let’s write some songs and have fun.
That’s very interesting, because I think many fans had a really concrete idea of what it „should“ sound like when the lineup was announced, because everyone had in mind: OK, those are the old In Flames guys – especially because Jesper was in it – so it has to sound like old In Flames. And maybe it didn’t hit this expectation for everyone, because it’s kind of a bit softer and sounds different. Did you think about that in beforehand, or did you see this risk of being compared to old In Flames too much?
Mikael: Of course we knew that that was going to happen. So the idea was to make it our own. And of course it is Niklas who wrote a lot of In Flames songs, and it’s Jesper who wrote a lot of In Flames songs. So it’s going to sound like that, but we can make it different. At the same time, we want to do what we’re good at and what we kind of play to our strengths, and that’s what we figured out: Not overthink it, just have fun. No expectations, no nothing. Just make an album. And that was really liberating for me, having a band for 30 plus years. Every new album is like: How the fuck do we do this again? How do we come up with something new and fresh after so many years? That’s the hardest part, but doing it like something new was very liberating. And I haven’t done that in forever, that experience was great. It’s the same with the first GRAND CADAVER album. I was like, hey, you get to do this kind of thing for the first time. And that’s awesome.
Talking about coming together with and hanging out with friends: Jesper is still not doing the tours with you guys? How is he doing and is there any chance he will join THE HALO EFFECT live as well at some point?
Mikael: He really wants to, and we really want him to. But it’s up to him, when he feels kind of ready and okay with it. And it depends on the circumstance and stuff. So we said: We are always ready and whenever you want to, let’s do it. But it depends on how he feels.
Daniel didn’t join you on this tour either – why was he missing out that run?
Mikael: He has a lot of work with this brewery that he runs, so he just couldn’t take time off. But he’s joining us for the rest of the shows all summer, and the tour coming up next year …
And both will be heared on the new album I guess? Any news on that in general?
Mikael: Oh yeah, they will. It’s done and recorded and mixed and everything. We don’t have an official date yet, because we just recorded more songs for it a couple of weeks ago, actually. So it will be released … somewhere in between now and then. (laughs) No, it’s coming early next year, because the DARK TRANQUILLITY album comes out in August, so we don’t want to interfere with that. So right after the DARK TRANQUILLITY album is out, we’re going to start promoting the HALO EFFECT album. It’s all my fault. (laughs)
Talking about the DARK TRANQUILLITY album, „Endtime Signals“: The first single „The Last Imagination“ is already out there, but how would you sum up the album in its entirety? The last one was overall a bit more quiet than the one before. Is that a trend that will go on the upcoming album as well?
Mikael: It goes in many different directions. This was one of the most difficult albums to write in a long time, because we felt like we really had something to prove. We got some new members in the band, a new drummer, a new bass player. Martin Brändström and Johan Reinholdz have written all the songs, or most of the songs. And that became kind of like, okay, now we need to prove that we are still the same kind of entity, but it’s different. We just finished it a couple of weeks ago, I could not be more proud of it. It’s really heavy, it’s fucking fast, insane, and it also has some of the most mellow and melodic things that we’ve ever done. So it is all over the place. (laughs) But in a good way! It’s a long record, it has a lot of songs, a lot of different moods and vibes. There are more singles coming!
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Sounds very interesting. You’ve already touched on the subject of band’s lineup: You’ve had a lot of line-up changes in the last few years, and I could imagine that it’s pretty rough for a band if you always have to seek replacements and when you constantly have to adapt to each other as a band in new constellations. Were there also moments when it was frustrating, when you perhaps even questioned whether continuing was still the right thing to do?
Mikael: No, no, never. It was always about what’s best for the band. And if someone feels that they have to leave the band, or leave for some reason, then maybe that’s for the best, because you don’t want someone in the band who doesn’t want to be in the band. Or if you start having internal problems, you have to solve that and move on. And of course it’s difficult finding new people, but it’s also exciting. Christian, who plays in GRAND CADAVER, he’s in DARK TRANQUILLITY now, and he’s amazing, and it’s such a joy to have him around and having his playing be part of our sound …
Alex: You stole him! (laughs)
Mikael: And Joachim, who plays drums, is just insanely talented. So now we can do anything. We can play every song from our catalog. That’s part of the excitement as well … so going forward we can play pretty much everything in our discography better than it was on the records when they came out. That’s exciting for me.
Whether it’s because of the lineup changes or just because – your style has changed a lot over the years, and not everyone is happy about it. For example, on Metal Archives, the ratings for all your albums since „Fiction“ have only a rating of about 60%. Is that something that affects you when writing a new album?
Mikael: No, it doesn’t work like that for us. Sure, you can look at Spotify numbers. I hate doing it, but it’s still going solid. But Metal Archives, I never even thought of that. I never checked that, actually. But if you start thinking „Oh, what do people want?“ you start second-guessing yourself more than you already do. And that’s just a recipe for disaster. That means you won’t get anything done. So it’s about finding it yourself and making sure that it’s something that you can be proud of and feel good about. Otherwise, what’s the point? If you do something just for everybody else, then it takes away all the integrity of the band.
But at this level of a band like DARK TRANQUILLITY, isn’t there at least some economic pressure as well? I mean, I think it’s your job, isn’t it? So.it has to be successful in some way …
Mikael: Sure, yeah. And it always is, in terms of sales and streams and everything like that, it’s always going up. So it’s a constant growth, which is fantastic. So I can’t complain about that.
But it is your main job, isn’t it?
Mikael: Yeah, I don’t do anything else. (laughs)
With all those bands playing alternating shows and going on tour, it’s also a pretty tough job with a lot of time away from home. Were your friends and loved ones happy when – in addition to DARK TRANQUILLITY – first THE HALO EFFECT and then GRAND CADAVER came along?
Mikael: Not super happy about it. (laughs) When we started all this stuff, it felt good, and it was the pandemic, and it was easy, and I was like, no, it’s fine. And then all of a sudden, after the pandemic, I did 165 shows in one year. And I was away for 200 days. And that’s not cool. So I’m going to try to not do that, I’m going to kind of limit it somehow. THE HALO EFFECT is not touring that much. We’re going to do one tour a year, maybe festivals, but also shorter ones. DARK TRANQUILLITY will always tour a lot, because that’s what we do. And with GRAND CADAVER, I think we’re going to do cool shows, and maybe we’ll do shorter tours when we can …
Alex: The whole thing about GRAND CADAVER is: We do it because we love to hang out, the five of us. And if all the schedules fit, we do the show. And there’s no hard feelings if we can’t tour due to someone being on tour or some clashes. Because due to this, every time we do a show, it becomes something special for us, and hopefully for the audience too. So for us, GRAND CADAVER is only about having fun and playing death metal.
But that means that you spend a lot of time in the buses and planes anyway. Do you love it or hate it? Do you get used to it at some point? Or do you cheer it still?
Mikael: I can look forward to it. I go like, oh, it’s going to be nice. I was really looking forward to this, THE HALO EFFECT tour. I was like, oh, this is going to be great. Just get away from everything, and not have to work, and not have to write, and not have to record. But of course I had to do office work every single day. It fucking stressed me out. There are so many releases and stuff like that coming out, so I had to manage all that. We only play for 40 minutes a day, but it becomes a stressful thing anyway. But it was great, of course …
Alex: I think we have to say that when the clock rang at 2:30 this morning, none of us were happy.
At 2:30?
Mikael: 2:30! My flight was at 6:00 from Cologne.
Alex: You flew from Cologne, we flew from Gothenburg. We met at 3:00.
Mikael: And I’ve been on tour, where I get up at 1 or 2 in the afternoon. So my timetable is a little… So those things, of course, are crazy.
Alex: It’s part of the job. (laughs)
Mikael: Yeah, but it’s going to be like that. I’m going to be home for two days, then I go to Turkey, then I’m home for two more days, and then I go to South America for three weeks. And then the festival season starts, with shows every weekend.
Alex: I will be happy being home. (laughs)
Mikael: What we have, too, is GRAND CADAVER in one weekend, and then sometimes it’s DARK TRANQUILLITY and THE HALO EFFECT at the same festival, but different days …
And on top of all that you started another band, as I just found out yesterday when I did the research for this interview: CEMETERY SKYLINE. And this band is also not only a studio project but will be active as a live band as well, you’re playing the first show in July at John Smith Rock Festival in Finland …
Mikael: I was very much against this! (laughs) Why should we do that? Yeah, but we got this great offer, and it’s good money, and it’s fun. Okay, fuck it, let’s do it.
But will it only be this one show, or are you planning to go on tour as well? Because the lineup and everything sounds really interesting …
Mikael: It is really interesting, but I hope we won’t tour. But we’ll see …
That’s not a „No!“, huh?
Mikael:No, no, no. Can’t say no. (laughs) But it was great. We started around the same time as THE HALO EFFECT, but it has been such an ongoing, long process, figuring things out, and trying to get it right. I was really nervous about it, because it’s basically a rock’n’roll album, but it’s goth rock, and I’ve never done that before.
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So only clean vocals?
Mikael: Yeah. And it’s super cheesy and melodic, and emotional and gothy and shit. But it’s fun, I mean, Markus Vanhala and I have been friends forever, and Santeri [Kallio] of course, and Vesa [Ranta] I’ve known since we toured with Sentenced back in the day. Victor [Brandt] lives as close to me as I live to Alex. We were on the same tram track. So it just made sense. And it was fun, because Markus and Santeri are amazing songwriters. It’s genius stuff. So I couldn’t say no. I tried to say no many times, but then they pulled me back in.
Alex: I think that you and I, we are competing on who can have the most bands.
Mikael: Yeah. Okay, I have four. You have five, six?
Alex: Five … I think.
So one to go for you!
Mikael: Yeah. I have to also start another grind band or something. (laughs)
Any plans? Or are you satisfied with the four bands you have now?
Mikael: It’s probably too much. But it’s a matter of managing time, and also making sure that you don’t do everything. Because I rarely do: We have a lot of great people working with us and for us, and stuff in DARK TRANQUILLITY, of course, and with HALO EFFECT. So a lot of that gets taken care of. But you’re still part of all those emails and stuff. I think that’s maybe the hard part. It’s a lot of meetings and a lot of talks. And I try to stay away from stuff, but I also can’t help myself. Because I want to make sure that the artwork is awesome, and the logos are great, and this looks like that and stuff like that. (laughs)
So that was my last question. I just have a short brainstorming left. What comes to your mind first when it comes to the following terms:
Slayer Reunion:
Alex: No.
Mikael: Nah … I saw the last show in Europe at Hellfest, and it was perfect. It was so cool. I had the best time ever. I was up on the VIP thing, drinking a cocktail, watching Slayer for the last time, and I was like, I’m fine. I don’t need to see them again.
Alex: They have always been so consistent and just being direct. So when they said, we’re going to quit, I believed them. And I respected it. So for me, it’s a no.
Artificial Intelligence:
Alex: No.
Mikael: Uh … scary. It’s really scary. Scary for real. Like, interesting and challenging, and I’m super curious, and I love reading about it, but the more I know, the more scared I get. Used as a tool, awesome, but it’s not going to be used only as a tool.
Alex: Well, let’s say like this: Skynet!
Judas Priest:
Alex: Awesome. The new album is amazing.
Mikael: Oh, awesome. I’m so happy with the new album. We’ve been listening to it in the tour bus every night, and I can’t wait to get home and buy it!
Alex: And one more thing: There’s one song on the new album that is exactly … no, not exactly, but it’s really close to „God Of Thunder“ by KISS.
The Grave-Split:
Mikael: They split up? Really?
Alex: Yeah, they all left. It’s only Ola left. I haven’t read any reason why …
Mikael: Oh fuck … That sucks. I didn’t know. I missed it.
Alex: I can’t say anything. I don’t know the reasons why they left. I don’t know the new lineup, so pass.
Last one: In how many bands will you play in 10 years?
Mikael: Hopefully … at least one.
Alex: Three.
Mikael: Yeah, three.
Thanks guys for your time – have a great afternoon and all the best for the show!
13. April 2024 Moritz Grütz
Fotos von: Afra Gethöffer-Grütz
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