During a conversation with Metal Wani, Amon Amarth drummer Jocke Wallgren talked about the band’s creative process behind the latest album “Berserker.”
The musician talked about how the songs were crafted via email with all band members at different locations, explaining how it made the process a bit more difficult.
“Yeah, we send them by e-mail – the riffs – to each other, and it was kind of hard,” Jocke said, adding:
“First I took the guitars that I got and then I took it to my studio and then I played along with it, then I recorded on my computer, and after that I just, like, transferred the drums – the real drums – to MIDI drums.
“And then I tried to adapt them with the foundation that I did for the song, and then I tried to spice it up on the computer, to see what’s going to sound best. Then I tried, as I’ve said, to spice it up pretty much and see what’s actually working and what’s realistic to play.”
The drummer said that not being able to see the instant reaction of his bandmates was one of the key hurdles, adding:
“It’s kind of hard to see the other guys’ reaction when you don’t actually see them. If we were to play in a rehearsal room together, then I could see the guys’ reaction to this particular part and this particular song and they could say, ‘No, try this instead,’ or, ‘Try that.’
“But we didn’t do that, and they just reacted to my programmed drums, which could be a bit hard because it’s really hard to say over the phone, like, ‘Try to change this in another way.’ It’s, like, ‘Okay, but what other way?’.”
Jocke Wallgren added:
“We did two pre-production recordings of this album: one in Stockholm and one in Northern Sweden, so we had a chance to actually play the songs together, of course. Otherwise, it would be really weird.
“I could see the people’s reaction, but by then, my muscle memory was quite set to these particular parts. I had to start all over again pretty much if something was wrong.”
