Interview: TRIBULATION

Interview with Adam Zaars, guitar player of the Swedish gothic metal band, Tribulation. Adam talked the new album Where The Gloom Becomes Sound– concept, writing process, elements, Jonathan Hulten’s departure, future band plans.

I’m very suprised with Where The Gloom Becomes Sound result. Congrats! A first thing I remarked while listening to the album is the sound, and an influence to say so- The Sisters Of Mercy. Do you agree with this?
Thank you! I would say it’s more of an inspiration from the musical scene that Sisters were a part of. I like them, but I’ve never listened to them a whole lot. We’ve been more inspired by their copy cats Fields of the Nephilim to name one!

I also noticed an oscillation, from slow, and stept by step to a speedy rhythm of the guitars.
That was nothing we thought of, but when deciding on the song sequencing I guess that might have played a part in bulding the dramaturgy. We always play around some with that before we get it right, but there’s no big plan from the start.

Then, what is the concept behind Where The Gloom Becomes Sound? Can we say it is a follow up of Down Below?
There was no overall concept except to write another Tribulation album, to make sound out of gloom. But, in a way, it could be called a follow up to Down Below in the sense that it is a quite natural progression from that album, and from the one before that. It sounds similar, but not the same… hopefully!

Did the pandemic, somehow, affected the album recording or the album release?
Not a whole lot! We tried to be as few people in the studio at the same time as possible, and Jonathan recorded his guitars from home. Me and Jamie, our producer, would often walk instead of taking public transportation to the studio, Oscar would do the same or take his car. Johannes lives too far from the studio to be able to do that, unfortunately, but that turned out well anyway, no infection. We talked a lot about it, of course, and that would be a bit draining at times, since we should have focused on what we were doing, but that wasn’t really a problem. And we didn’t postpone the release because of it either. It affects what happens now that it’s been released though!

What are the other elements that inspires you for the lyrics and the writng process?
For the writing process it could be literally anything, and for the lyrics it it can be personal experiences, popular culture, litterature, history, myth and various kinds of metaphysical or ontological systems or understandings of the world and the universe. Mostly, I would say, the inspiration for the music comes from a musical foundation that we’ve already established, as well as from quite abstract ideas of what it should sound like or at least what we’re, or at least I am, aiming for it to sound like. That could be that it should have the feeling of dried up corpses or flowers, old bricks or stone, deep red blood, twilight, yearning, lush forests, dead forests, old parchment, fumes of incense etcetera in absurdum. That’s one side of it, and the other one is that we’re a metal band acting in a tradition of metal music. So we are trying to express something via the medium of metal, as well as just being a metal band. That’s at least how I would describe it.

Jonathan (Hulten) left the band, right after the album was done, and being replaced immediate by Joseph (Tholl). Were you guys surprised by Johanthan’s decision leaving the band?
We were not surprised that it happened, but I guess we were a bit surprised by the timing of it since we were just about to release the album. We kind of knew that it would, or at least could happen since we had seen the signs for a quite a while. It was hopefully the right decision for him.

I hope you, as well many other bands, can tour again soon and see you again on the road!
Me too!

And a last questions, is there anything else would you like to add, some band plans?
Band plans keep changing at the moment because of the uncertainty of the situation. But I can say that what I’m looking forward to, and am working towards, at the moment is some new music. Hopefully we can all get together soon and see where we can take it and hopefully the other guys have some ideas too.

Thanks a lot for your time answering this interview. Cheers and rock on!
Cheers!