ZONARIA – Interview with Simon Berglund

Zonaria, formed in 2002, has proved its potential between countless death metal bands in Sweden already with the debut album Infamy and the Breed. After just three years, all fans are eagerly awaiting the release of their third, so far nameless opus. The band is right now on the tour supporting its Swedish fellows Dark Funeral, and their Easter Sunday's stop in my hometown was a perfect opportunity to make an interview. The singer/guitarist Simon took a break from his busy schedule and answered few my questions.

So, how’s the tour going so far? You’re on the road for almost 30 days now…

The tour’s going good. We had a lot of big shows, you know. We played I think 25 shows, but now everyone is sick today. We’re about 30 people on the tour altogether and I think like 20 of them is sick.

How so?

I don’t know; it’s some food-poisoning, illness… At least I’m healthy so far. There’s some guy in every band that’s sick. But everything else is good.

So, at the beginning, just in case someone doesn’t know you yet – could you briefly introduce your band and its history?

Well, we’re called Zonaria, we started playing around 2003. We got our first record label in 2006 and then released our first album the next year. It was an American label, that went pretty well so we changed label for our second album, which was released in 2008 via Century Media. We’ve done a lot of touring, this is our eighth tour. I think we’ve played almost 200 shows now. We love tours and we like to give our best when we play live. It’s always a pleasure to play in the Czech Republic, you know. We played there like once or twice, the crowd’s good.

You’ve already played in the Czech Republic with Satyricon and Marduk…

With Marduk? Well, there’s a big difference between touring with Marduk and Satyricon. Personally I’m a big fan of Satyricon and the shows are bigger, but Marduk are actually good. It’s always fun to tour with a Swedish band, of course.

I’d like to ask you about the name of your band. I read somewhere that it comes from Greek mythology… but what does it mean to you?

Yeah, it’s something like path to the gods, or something like that. We usually don’t talk about it too much. We’re just Zonaria.

So, now you’re about to release your third studio album. You recorded it in Dimrakk and Abyss studios… when can we expect it and how was the recording?

We’re not done yet. We’ve done the drums and all the guitars, but we still have to do symphonies, vocals, basses, stuff… We’ve been in the studio for like seven weeks, or six weeks, but we’re not finished. We’re kinda slow. I don’t know when you can expect it, it’s like… we’ll finish the shape, work on stuff like the title of the album – we don’t have a title yet. So it’s too early to say when it can be released.

Could you maybe share some funny stories with us?

Funny stories? Well… it’s always funny and a pleasure to record with Jonas of Scar Symmetry, in the Abyss studio in Sweden. They’re really funny guys. But I think we’re trying to be kinda serious in the studio. We’re not joking around too much.

Emanuel giving advices in Swedish

Yeah, we came into the way of a robbery one day! There was a confectionery store that was robbed next to the studio. The police got aware and the robbers were like running around our house. Wasn’t too funny, but it was some kind of action at least.

What do you think is the biggest difference in comparison with The Cancer Empire? Please tell me some secret about it, something that I can’t read on the internet…

Some secret about the new album? Well, I think the main difference is that there’s more sing-along songs now, like hit songs I would say, that you can relate to. There will be the future good songs of Zonaria. We don’t have much hit songs on The Cancer Empire album; it was more like death songs that we wrote. And there’s more difference: the songs are more worked out, all the shapes of the songs, all the arrangements and stuff… we still have a lot to do. But I think the lyrics are better, the guitar riffs are better. We’re gonna work more with vocals, because we recorded The Cancer Empire in like three weeks, not even three weeks. And this one we’ve done for like… it will be at least ten weeks when we’re done. So that’s actually better.

Maybe we could get back to your second album for a while. The Cancer Empire, that’s quite a dark name, yet fitting for today. Why did you choose it?

I usually work at nights back home and I think about things like album titles, because I’ve got nothing to do. And that popped up in my head, you know. The Cancer Empire, that refers to a nation that peeps on other, weaker nations. So it was kinda… quick, right away.

One thing I noticed about your album is that you used quite a lot of sound effects for the vocals, reminding me the new Dimmu Borgir stuff…

Well, I don’t know. We don’t think that much about that we sound like Dimmu Borgir. We have the same instruments as them, but we try… I think the new album is less Dimmu Borgir actually, it’s more a unique sound for us. So it’s gonna be less reminding of Dimmu Borgir and other bands. I hope, at least.

It’s not so long ago that you signed with Century Media Records. Was that a big deal for you? Do you feel the difference?

When we got the message that they wanted to sign us we were like… wow, and we’re still happy and excited. But I think we didn’t do too much for The Cancer Empire, we hardly did any interviews. We did a few tours, of course, which is the best you can get from a record deal, you know. I have no idea how much the cd has sold, whatsoever. But we have attracted a lot of fans with that album, so everywhere we go on the tour; we’re still meeting many fans. Yeah, we’re getting bigger, I can see that.

How does the composing process in your band look like? Is there someone who does the music and someone who writes the lyrics or do you all participate?

It’s mainly me. I do practically everything and then we sit together and arrange all stuff. I write all the music and all the lyrics and all simply. But well, I suck at all other things when it comes to the band. We have our own tour manager, Emil, in the band. He’s really good at managing tours and managing everything else, with papers and stuff, which I don’t know anything about. We’re a good team, each one has own thing to do… like merchandise – one guy in the band, the signings – the other guys. We keep it like that.

So where do you find the inspiration?

Well, I take inspiration from… I don’t know actually, where do I take inspiration? (laughing and desperately looking at Emanuel). History, movies… a lot of movies actually, I’m kinda movie freak, I have thing from movies… for the feeling… like film scores, I love film scores. I don’t try to copy them, but I wanna catch the essence of the movie and get it to the music.

Zonaria was formed in 2002. What do you consider your biggest achievement since then?

I don’t know, we’ve done two tours with Satyricon. That was really cool, that they wanted us to come along on the second tour, because they liked that. Playing with Satyricon, that’s always huge shows, and they’re really good guys, so we had a great time. But there’s also a lot of other fun stuff, so many drunk stories to tell… (giggling)

Emanuel giving advices in Swedish

Yeah, and people who like us wanted to name one of their children Zonaria.

You recorded your first demo Illusionary Games at the age of 15, if not even less. That’s really an early age; I can’t imagine something like that would be possible here. How is it with the response and support for the local bands in Sweden?

It’s quite cool, but there are so many bands, it’s hard to get out. Many in Sweden think that they will get everything easily, but you have to work a lot and put some money into it if you want to get somewhere. But there’s a good chance that you get picked in Sweden.

You started the band playing power metal if I’m right. That’s quite a change… what led you to it?

I don’t know really, it was just one rehearsal, one day… we thought that maybe we should try some harsh vocals, because our singer couldn’t sing (laughing) and our bass player hated that, so we had to drop something out. It evolved to seven-string guitars, then keyboards, because I was playing piano in the beginning, so something like whole new electro dimension. So, it evolved and our first demo was not really death metal, with a lot of work tools, progressive stuff. But I think we found our own style on our first album at least. There’s a big difference between our first demo and first album.

You’re a rather young band and as a young band I suppose that you like and support other young bands as well. Could you maybe name some of your favorites?

I must admit that I don’t listen too much to new bands, I’m more like… I like old bands. I don’t listen to more than like twenty bands, but… there are some bands that came up, young bands that I really like.

Now I’d like to ask you if you think image is so important for musicians. You’re wearing those vests on every gig you play. Is there something behind it or is it just something that makes you recognizable?

We thought that we couldn’t really do this music in t-shirt and jeans, so we had to come up with something. We thought about getting something futuristic, but still… dirty and kinda like we’ve been in a war or something. It’s still in a development stage, I think we’re gonna do new stage clothes. I think it’s really important to have something unique in every band, everyone can’t play in t-shirts.

One more brief question in the end: Your favorite Zonaria song and why?

I must think about that… I like the new songs more than any other songs, but… I don’t know, they’re like my children, I love them. Pretty much.

So, is there anything you’d like to add and tell our readers?

Yeah, sure. It’s too bad we can’t play in the Czech Republic every day, it’s always a pleasure to get here. It’s way better than in the surrounding countries. Yeah, support death metal team! Buy our shit.

Emil: And our t-shirt!

www.myspace.com/zonaria