Soilwork - Björn “Speed” Strid
Posted on February 20, 2008 at 10:00 pm by admin

Soilwork

Way Too Loud: Did you have an idea of what you wanted “Sworn To A Great Divide” to sound like?

Björn “Speed” Strid: I guess in a way. For the first time, the whole band has been involved in the process of making songs, so I don’t think we had a plan. Maybe to capture the balance we had on “Natural Born Chaos” a little bit, and not make a “Natural Born Chaos” part 2, because that would be pointless. We wanted to capture the vibe of that album and take it to a new level. We didn’t really have any structure or plan, we just started writing songs, and it ended up sounding very Soilwork in the end.

WTL: What was the writing process like this time without Peter Witchers [former Soilwork guitarist]?

Björn: That was certainly a challenge, and it took a little bit of time to get over it and turn it into something positive and creative in the end, which we managed to do. Daniel [Antonsson, guitars] came in the middle of the writing process and brought some fresh blood into the music as well. We were, as usual, sitting at home writing our stuff, having our meetings, and presenting our stuff to each other, giving each other input, and for the first time we also started writing material on the road, which was quite interesting, bringing the laptops and Qbase and all that stuff. If we have a good show, we could channel that into songwriting.

WTL: Do you bring whole songs to the table, or little bits and pieces?

Björn: We usually write everything separately, but there was this one time with me, Ola and Daniel sitting at a table, and Ola had an idea, and there was something missing, and Daniel came in, and he didn’t have to adjust to make Soilwork music, it came out really natural, and he had a lot of good ideas, and a lot of times me and Ola were sitting down together, and most of the other guys were writing stuff separately. Then we’d meet up and get some feedback from the other members.

WTL: Do you have any way of working around writers block if the situation arises, or was that simply not a problem?

Björn: There are of time times when you don’t feel like writing songs, but sometimes you come up with a really great idea. I usually come up with great ideas when I’m not at home, and need to pick up the guitar for some reason! I try to record the ideas and then come home. I think it’s the same for Ola, he had several ideas in his car, then he’d come home and get it down.

As far as writers block, with lyrics, strong liquor definitely helps!

WTL: So you’re a guitarist as well as a vocalist?

Björn: Well, I play a little bit of guitar, and I’ve contributed some stuff on this album as well, which was a challenge.

WTL: On this album, does anyone else have any input on the lyrics, or just you?

Björn: On this album it was just me.

WTL: In the past, would someone give an idea, or write something down?

Björn: In the past, Peter would write some lyrics as well for the first two albums. Henry [Ranta] former Soilwork drummer was sometimes giving me some material and input for the lyrics.

WTL: With the lineup changes that would make you and Ola Flink [bass] the only original members?

Björn: Ola Frenning came into the band right after the recording of “Steelbath Suicide”.

WTL: So he’s been a long mainstay to the band?

Björn: Yeah.

WTL: It looks like you’ve had a big break for this album, but in the past, it appears you’ve been workaholics doing tour after tour and new albums all the time.

Björn: Well, back in the day, we released one record a year, and there’s been bigger gaps for the later albums. I guess the only reason is that we’re touring more now. Back then, we didn’t do much touring. It was only, after I’d say after “Natural Born Chaos” when really serious touring started.

WTL: Was it mostly weekend shows in the past?

Björn: Yeah, going down to Holland, Belgium, stuff like that, and France I think, and in the beginning we did some two week tours, and stuff like that, and I think the first long tour we ever did was with Annihilator and Nevermore in Europe, which was like a five week tour.

WTL: That sounds like a big jump! Most other bands would have to start a lot smaller when touring.

Björn: Yeah, that was definitely a really good tour. It was right after Nevermore released “Dead Heart In A Dead World”. They were really big in Europe too, so that was a good tour.

WTL: Why did you have four albums released every year [between 2000 and 2003, Soilwork released an album every year].

Björn: We didn’t tour much back then, we were only writing songs, all the time writing songs. Now it’s been insane! We’ve done 250 shows for “Stabbing The Drama”, so there wasn’t that much time to write songs, although we did have some gaps between tours. I think we’re going to continue to bring laptops on the road. It’s quite interesting.

WTL: I did an interview with Full Blown Chaos, and they’d really like to share the stage with you.

Björn: We’ve run into those guys a couple of times. We just heard a couple of songs, and it would probably be a good tour. I don’t know how big they are, but I do keep hearing about them all the time. Could be cool!

WTL: I’ve noticed that there’s been some safe tours lately, where bands tour with other bands that would appeal to similar fans. Is there any plans for Soilwork to tour with some bands that would expose fans to something different?

Björn: We’ve got some offers from Dream Theater and stuff like that. That would be interesting for sure! Of course you want to reach new people. In a way, I think it’s boring when it’s the same thing, like 5 very similar sounding bands, you’re not going to gain anything like that. This tour, the bands don’t sound very similar, and with Killswitch Engage and Lamb Of God, we will be reaching new fans for sure.

WTL: Would there be any interest in picking up bands for a headlining tour?

Björn: That’s something we’re going to look into. I think we’ll do a headlining tour right after the summer, but I think we’ll come back and do another tour in the spring.

WTL: Since bands get asked about their band name all the time, have you made up any good lies about your band name?

Björn: Not really. It was Peter coming up with that name, and I don’t know what he had in mind, but we were listening a lot to the “Heartwork” album by Carcass a lot, and he just happened to like the word “work”, and just found this random word “soil”, and he just put them together. But it’s like working from scratch in a way. I don’t know if that came out later, like “Oh, that’s what it means!” But it’s a good name that represents the band.

WTL: You’ve really been getting a long sleeve with the tattoos there. Have you been getting them all over, or from someone in particular?

Björn: I’ve done most of the work in Sweden in my hometown, and I’ve also gotten hooked up with some tattoos with a guy from Kentucky who was travelling with us on the tour bus. It’s probably not a good idea getting tattoos on a tour bus with all the germs going around, and then going on stage, but they turned out pretty well! I’m happy!

WTL: Is that one finished, or will it be getting colour?

Björn: It’s finished. I don’t know, it seems like everyone is getting colour. I’m not sure it’s going to look that good with colour when I’m in my 70’s or 80’s.

WTL: Are you going to do the other arm too?

Björn: Probably. It’s quite addictive. This arm [the tattooed arm] feels stronger! (Laughs)

The Official Soilwork Website
Soilwork at MySpace
Soilwork at Nuclear Blast

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 20th, 2008 at 10:00 pm and is filed under Interviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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