HammerFall – Oscar Dronjak

With their origins in the land and sounds of Gothenburg, Sweden, power metal band HammerFall have successfully carved a career out of songs and lyrical themes centred upon the glorified, warrior destined that bands like Manowar before them had only ever begun to tap into. It was an absolute pleasure of mine to have recently had the opportunity to speak with founding member and guitarist, Oscar Dronjak, on behalf of Metal Obsession. A charming and intellectual fellow, Oscar and I spoke about the new album, ‘(r)Evolution’, reuniting with old friends and acquaintances after many years, and Oscar’s love and passion for the literary works of fantasy author, George R.R. Martin.

Going on to speak a little of ‘(r)Evolution’ first, “it’s very difficult to summarise in a few words,” Oscar began. “But we really used this break that we have been on and that has done a lot for us to reignite the flame and find that hunger that has been missing from the recordings and songwriting. We used the time to re-energise ourselves and you can feel that in the songwriting as well as in the performance.”

But that’s not all. ‘(r)Evolution’ has been a real reuniting of past glories. This album marks the return of original cover artist Andreas Marshall – who created the character of Hector (who also sees his return here as the heroic cover mascot following his absence from 2011’s ‘Infected’) – and painted HammerFall’s first three album covers, as well as production wizard, Fredrik Nordström. When asked how he felt working with these old acquaintances again after more than a decade each, Oscar made the humble point early on about Marshall in how the band actually “never [really] had any contact with him”. “That has always gone through the label. Even back then.” Oscar stressed. Then adding, “But it’s fun. Marshall looked at the first three covers that he’d done and incorporated parts from all three in this one, and I think it’s fantastic. I’m really happy with what he’s done.”

When speaking of Fredrik Nordström, however, “it’s a little bit different”. “I’ve known Fredrik since the ‘80’s, way before HammerFall was even formed. We always kept in touch and have a special relationship. He’s fantastic with what [he does]. He really knows his job. And he’s a fun guy to be around, as well. So this recording was just amazing in terms of that.” He then added, “I think every part of this album turned out almost as good as it possibly could. I don’t see anything that could have been any better.”

I mentioned to Oscar how between ‘Infected’ and ‘(r)Evolution’ it’s been quite a departure musically. I asked him what formed HammerFall’s decision to return once more to the classic formula of their earlier material. “I think we all realised that ‘Infected’ was not what some people wanted to hear from HammerFall. It has a lot to do with the production. The production of an album does impact the way you feel about the songs and the songwriting.” It wasn’t long before HammerFall realised they needed a break from activity for a little while. “We [took] a break for about a year and a half away from everything. That’s the first time we’ve ever done that.” Further adding, “It was important for us.  I don’t know how much we realised at the time but we were kind of burned out back then. [This] was something we had to do to preserve the band. But what I didn’t expect was for this to have such an effect on the band. Because [of the break] we had a renewed love for everything, for all the details that go into being in a band. And that helped a lot during the songwriting. For example, the first two songs I finished in a week. And that’s never happened before in my life. Usually it takes at least a month for each song to mature enough and be ready, but I was so hungry that they just went like that. [That’s] always a blessing.”

‘(r)Evolution’ out August 29th via Nuclear Blast Records

Having been given exclusive access to ‘(r)Evolution’ prior to the interview, what immediately grabbed me about it was essentially what Oscar has been hinting at all along: that the band felt revitalised. “That has a lot to do with the break,” Oscar noted. “The break part cannot be underestimated for that.” There was a term from Oscar that popped up continually throughout our interview that I found noteworthy. A hunger that HammerFall had been lacking in recent years. “The ‘hunger’ was actually the mantra for us when we were recording the album: whether the take was good enough. ‘Was it hungry enough?’ If not, we’d say, ‘Okay, let’s do it again.’ That’s how it went. That’s what we wanted to achieve with this album: to get the ‘hunger’ and the ‘energy’ back into the music.”

When looking over the tracklist early on, one of the song titles in particular grabbed me. Entitled “Winter Is Coming”, as most may know Oscar is no stranger to his love of the book series, ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ by George R.R. Martin (even naming his own production studio ‘Castle Black’ after the homestead of ‘The Night’s Watch’ in the series). The ever-inquisitive soul that I am I asked Oscar what it is about this series that he loves or finds inspires him. “Oh, wow, how much time do we have?” he laughs. Oscar went on to talk about how he discovered the series “while [recording] the ‘Crimson Thunder’ album” when he was introduced to it by Andi Deris (Helloween). After being given ‘A Game of Thrones’ to read, “it took me ten, fifteen pages, maybe, and I was hooked,” Oscar commented. “It is by far – and I’ve read some really good books in my life – the most enchanting and encapsulating series, or world created, that I’ve ever seen. It’s just as rich as a real world. It has thousands of years of history placed into all these books. It is the best thing I’ve read and I’ve read it several times. Just because it’s so fucking great!”

““Winter Is Coming” is the first song that has a song title from the book series [where] the lyrics have anything to do with the books.” Oscar said. “Previously I’ve come up with song titles like “Take the Black” or “Dark Wings, Dark Words” but then Joacim [Cans] writes the lyrics that he wants; the way he hears it. But this time I wrote the lyrics myself because Joacim hasn’t read the books. “Winter Is Coming” is not actually about any events or any of the books, [however]. It’s more about a general idea of the world that George Martin has created and a possible outcome. It’s all very vague, but it does have something to do with the books, so I’m very happy about that. I think it was time to do that.”

As the interview neared its conclusion, I managed to fit in one last question. I asked Oscar whether Australia may see HammerFall tour our southern continent sometime soon. “I would say, ‘yes, definitely’,” Oscar replied enthusiastically. “There was a strong chance we would have done it this year, [around] September. But it didn’t fit it into our schedule unfortunately so we had to postpone it. But I’m sure that we will do it next year. I have no dates or any proposed tour or anything, but I’m sure it’ll happen next year. I can’t wait, though. I’ve never been to Australia, so I’d love to go there!”

And with that, we closed on pleasantries and said our goodbyes.

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