by Alexandra Mrozowska
— Senior Columnist —
These days in almost every band there are at least one or two members having their side projects. More often than not, they treat it as a chance to express a different side of themselves musically. But if you accidentally came across the Swedish act The Night Flight Orchestra and their melodic-to-the-utmost Classic Rock sound with slight Pop and Disco vibes, would you suspect its members originate from such bands as Soilwork or Arch Enemy…? That is true, however, and what’s even more important is that it’s the very same songwriter behind both groups now – the guitarist David Andersson. So how different was the songwriting process for Verkligheten from that of Aeromantic…? Exploring which genre is more liberating…? And are there many musicians in the Metal world who have a soft spot for late ‘70s synth-laden retro Rock…? We caught up with David to find out all that and more.
Hardrock Haven: Let’s start from one of the “what-ifs”. If you could travel back in time to tell your younger self about what happened in your career, would a younger David Andersson be more surprised with his future in Soilwork or The Night Flight Orchestra?
David Andersson:I think my younger self would be quite surprised with both bands. I tried to have a career as a Rock musician and a songwriter when I was twenty, and made a few records with a band on the American label, but it just didn’t go anywhere and we split. I gave up on music for a while then and became a doctor but back in 2006 I got the chance to start playing with Soilwork and that was when my career sort of restarted. I didn’t see that coming ‘cause when I first gave up on my rock star game I was like twenty-two or twenty-three so it’s all been my surprise. I’ve been on this level for around fourteen years now and it just keeps getting better, I think… I hope! (laughs). I’m still surprised and also extremely grateful that I got the chance to do this eventually, ‘cause that’s what I always wanted to do growing up.
Hardrock Haven: So it’s like better late than never?
David Andersson: Absolutely! Of course I’m grateful of becoming a doctor and having a day job too. Especially these days it’s important to have a secure income and be able to work and not have to worry about that ‘cause working in a healthcare as a doctor is like one of the jobs that are kind of secure even during the pandemic… So I’m pleasantly surprised I guess my slightly disillusioned twenty-two-year-old self would be surprised as well.
Hardrock Haven: How does your and your bandmates’ previous experiences in bands such as Soilwork or Arch Enemy translate into something as drastically different genre-wise as The Night Flight Orchestra?
David Andersson: I think in The Night Flight Orchestra we all have very diverse musical backgrounds. It’s not like I grew up playing only metal guitar; I went to music college and studied classical guitar and jazz guitar and I played in all kinds of cover bands and big bands… And the same goes for the other guys in the band – and women in the band as well – like Sharlee D’Angelo of Arch Enemy [and The Night Flight Orchestra bass player]. Of course he’s famous for being a Metal bassist, but he’s also played Indie Pop in the ‘90s in a Swedish band (laughs). His taste in music is very eclectic and if you know him, it’s not really surprising at all, but I guess from the outside it might seem like a strange thing. That’s also why, when we started The Night Flight Orchestra back in 2010, no one really knew what to do with us, ‘cause back then no one really played this kind of music and especially a bunch of Metal musicians. So it took a while for everyone to figure out what to do with us… For instance, with Soilwork we’ve been on Nuclear Blast for a long time and when we talked to them [about The Night Flight Orchestra], and they were like “Okay, we love the music, we love the songs but we don’t know what to do with you because you don’t fit in anywhere.” That’s why we released the first two albums on a small Italian independent label ‘cause they were the only ones who gave us a chance to release our music. Then, after those first two albums, Nuclear Blast were like, “Okay, we got it. Do you wanna sign with us instead?” and by then, others bands like Ghost appeared and there was a whole new movement of bands trying to bridge that gap between Metal and Classic Rock. These days it’s become a bit more trendy and I guess we have quite a few bands trying to do what we’ve been doing for the past ten years. It might sound a bit preposterous, but I think we were kind of pioneers when we started this band and I do think a lot of bands playing ‘70s/’80s-influenced Rock have been influenced by what we have been doing.
Hardrock Haven: Do you think it’s not that rare for musicians primarily known from extreme Metal genres to have that kind of eclectic background as you have?
David Andersson: No, not really. I think we’re quite unique. I mean, I don’t know the backgrounds of all Metal bands, but I think most traditional Metal bands grew up playing Metal and they don’t have much knowledge about how to play other genres in convincing ways. We’re unique ‘cause we’re all quite old (laughs) and experienced and we all have diverse backgrounds as musicians. I don’t see many Metal bands out there being able to love this kind of thing.
Hardrock Haven: What differences in artistic expression and songwriting do you see switching from one genre to another?
David Andersson: The main difference when switching from Soilwork to The Night Flight Orchestra is that the first one is still very much riff-based or guitar-based. You can’t really base a Soilwork song on melodies only, whereas with The Night Flight Orchestra, if you have a strong melody, you can always come up with a good arrangement around the melody. Soilwork always has to have some sort of Metal riff to form a basis of a song, which is definitely a challenge ‘cause it feels like most Metal riffs have already been written. It’s really a challenge to do something new and interesting within that Metal context, which is what I try to do all the time, and we’re some new song of releases coming up which might be some of the most interesting stuff we’ve done musically.
Hardrock Haven: The Night Flight Orchestra has been dubbed a “nostalgia act” by many reviewers, a term many musicians would see as derogatory or even an insult. What do you think about it?
David Andersson: I don’t get insulted by being called a “nostalgia act”. I mean, it’s pretty obvious that we’re using a lot of sounds and atmospheres from the late ‘70s and ‘80s. But I don’t think we’re a nostalgia act, I think we’re taking these very familiar components and try to create something new with them and put them together in a new and interesting way. If you listen to our music, it’s not like each song is a pastiche or a rip-off of one band or one artist. It’s more like we take all kinds of influences and try to create something new from those very familiar elements and I think the mix is what makes it interesting. For me, the “nostalgia act” is more like bands that had their peak in the ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s or whatever but they’re still touring, playing just their old hits with perhaps one original member left and they have nothing new and interesting to present. It’s the same with Soilwork. I became a member of the band in 2012, but they had a long story before that, starting back in ’96 and their first album coming out in ’98. But when we’re touring – I mean, when we were touring (laughs) and when we’re gonna tour again, whenever that may be – it’s not like we’ll be playing just old hits from the 2000s. We’ll always be focused on the new material, we’ll always try to develop as a band and create something new. The whole point of doing it for me is the creative part of it. Before the pandemic, we’ve been asked lots of times by the promoters to perform old albums with Soilwork in full, like doing Natural Born Chaos in full… The “nostalgia promoters” say it’s easier to promote a tour like, “Oh, Soilwork is playing that classic album from 2003 in its entirety”, but at the same time, we only have one member left who was on that album, so it’ll be like watching him with a cover band backing him up… and I don’t think that’s fair to the audience. Plus, I wanna feel comfortable with that ‘cause they [Soilwork] did great back stuff back then and we play some old songs, but… Well, personally I don’t wanna see my old heroes playing their old stuff with only one member left who was on that album that they’re playing. So we’re consistently refusing all those offers ‘cause what’s interesting is what we’re doing now and of course we’ll throw in the old songs but I would never want to base our live show around things that the band wrote eighteen years ago.
Hardrock Haven: Does it mean you’d actually suggest that those bands whose all current activity is based around what they did thirty or forty years ago call it a day?
David Andersson: Well, if people like it and the band is happy, it’s fine with me. It’s not like I have a strong opinion about what others do (laughs), but it’s just that I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing it myself. As a genuine music lover, I’m always actively trying to find new interesting stuff that gets released in all genres. It’s actually very depressing that these days you can start a cover band or a tribute band playing, like, Pink Floyd or Guns N’Roses or whatever and actually sell out stadiums… You have two different Pink Floyd cover bands selling out huge arenas but it’s not even Pink Floyd, it’s just a cover band!… There are very few people these days who are genuinely interested in music and are willing to actually seek out new things. And I think that’s inevitable, ‘cause music isn’t that important anymore. When I grew up in the ‘80s and ‘90s, music was such a big part of who you were, a part of your identity… whereas these days music is just something like another media among others. You can enjoy it of course, but it’s more like people find a good song here and there and put it on their playlist and that’s it. It’s not like when I grew up and I wanted to know everything about the record – who played on it, who produced it, who wrote the songs etc… Nowadays, if you’re lucky, you have a song on a streaming service that people like and it’s promoted and people add it to some playlists. As I said, it’s inevitable and you can’t do anything about the way the consumption of media mutates and evolves… So anyway, I’m just happy we’re still able to do what we want to do and that we still have an audience and even new people learning about us… I’m glad we’re still reaching new people – I mean, new fans. It’s not like we’re gonna be the next Metallica or U2 (laughs). But they are Rock superstars already and we won’t have any Rock/Pop superstars in the genres we are active in. So I’m still grateful that we can do this and as long as it’s interesting and people still like it, I think it’s worth to continue. For me, the creative process is very rewarding and having people enjoying what you do it’s just like a huge bonus.
Hardrock Haven: You’ve just mentioned of how much the consumption of music changed throughout the last decades. What do you think caused it? Was it about technological development of people changing their attitude?
David Andersson: I guess it’s due to how all kinds of media operate and that everything’s right here. I mean, if you’re looking for a song, you can just search for it on YouTube or whatever and it’s just there at your disposal. You don’t have to work very hard to find what you’re looking for, so people started to take music for granted. Also, having YouTube and all the streaming services like Netflix and HBO makes people not content with having to pay for stuff they way they did. The more entertainment you have at your disposal, the more bored you get. So it’s a natural development but at the same time we’ll always have nerds like me who enjoy listening to music and reading about music… of how other people create music, their thoughts about creativity… I read a lot of music biographies, reviews and interviews and I still find it fascinating. But you’re not like specifically interested in music, it’s much more comfortable to watch a movie on Netflix or play a specific streaming playlist if you have guests for dinner – you can just look for “relaxing dinner playlist” on Spotify and just press play (laughs).
Hardrock Haven: Just easy entertainment… So, back to The Night Flight Orchestra, was the idea of building the band around a certain visual theme, like the airline theme, was there from the very start?
David Andersson: I guess that the whole visual thing started later on. I mean, for the first two albums we just did a couple of local shows in Sweden ‘cause no one was really that interested and that’s always difficult to get a management and a booking agent if you’re on a small label and you don’t have any financial resources behind you. But once we got signed to Nuclear Blast, a lot more people became interested, and we had a publicist and some money… a budget for videos and stuff like that… once we started being able to play international European festivals and go on tour as a headline band, then we started thinking more about the visuals. And that’s mostly our singer Björn [Strid] but we always had visions of having this aesthetic concept based on airline travel, so if we’ve got money to do it, we will take it even further. I mean, we always try to create something special with our stage show and I like the idea of having both the lyrical and visual concept, like a bigger concept… a framework to work within ‘cause you get more creative if you have a few limitations. And at the same time, musically, you can do whatever you want ‘cause it’s still gonna sound like The Night Flight Orchestra. We’re all quite unique as musicians and it’s a very interesting band to be a part of. And it’s very liberating creatively to be able just to do whatever you want, whereas in Soilwork we still have to be at least a bit Metal (laughs).
Hardrock Haven: We’ve already discussed the process of combining all those retro elements into what The Night Flight Orchestra becomes, but do you incorporate any elements of more modern music too – especially being, as you’ve said, an artist who always searches for new ideas?
David Andersson: Oh yes, absolutely. I’m listening to lots of new music. My two daughters, who are ten and twelve, listen to lots of modern Pop like Taylor Swift and Katy Perry and Dua Lipa and stuff like that and I listen to that too. It’s great songwriting and interesting big-budget productions. I also listen to a lot of strange new independent releases. So, as a songwriter I get a lot of inspiration from that, but it’s not so much the sound, it’s more like any kind of good melody or good arrangement or nice harmony progression is something you can always rip off (laughs). Or at least take the elements of it and try to turn it into something new and interesting. So it’s not about the sound for me – referring back to what you’ve asked me about switching from Soilwork to The Night Flight Orchestra, for me it’s always about the song. It doesn’t seem to be that much of a difference to write for Soilwork or The Night Flight Orchestra when it comes to the actual nucleus of a song which is the melody and harmonies. But with Soilwork I have to base it more on guitars whereas in The Night Flight Orchestra you can base it on any instrument. You can write a song without any guitars on it and it’s still gonna be The Night Flight song. But the actual process of making music to me, it’s not like I divide music into genres. I kind of approach listening to any sort of music in the same way: listening for the melody and the harmonies of the performers and the musicians… So to me, music is all the same and I don’t think genres at all.
Hardrock Haven: Having released the fifth album since the band’s inception, do you see think Night Flight Orchestra evolves with each album or is rather more consistent in its style?
David Andersson: Personally I think so and that’s what we’re all trying to achieve. Of course, it’s always hard to be objective about your own music so it’s more like I should ask you what do you think (laughs).
Hardrock Haven: Definitely an evolution (laughs)
David Andersson: Yeah, ‘cause it’s always hard when you’re creating stuff to take a step back and see… You listen to your own music in such a different way, so what might seem like a revolutionary step forward to me, might sound like the same old crap to others (laughs). At least we’re always trying to do stuff by shaking things up a bit. But at the same time, we still want to retain our favorite elements… So it’s like using that platform and adding other stuff to it and taking perhaps a few turns here and there – and involving a few strange new influences. It’s trying to surprise people, but at the same time, trying to make them comfortable too.
Hardrock Haven: So with all kinds of feedback, from the reviewers as well as listeners, would a harsh opinion or one that is totally different than yours actually challenge your own perspective on your music?
David Andersson: No, not really ‘cause first of all, I only read the good reviews (laughs). You can always have opinions about everything and especially in this day and age, people are very opinionated and tend to make really strange comparisons. Taking a Soilwork album, like our last album, and comparing it to Soilwork’s first album Steelbath Suicide from 1998… whereas that album was actually done by bunch of eighteen- or nineteen-year-olds. Now we’re middle-aged men and of course we can’t do that album again (laughs). Even if we wanted to, we still wouldn’t be able to do it because when you’re nineteen, you have a different outlook on the world, you’re much more inexperienced as a musician and you have this young, naive energy that is quite hard to simulate when you’re forty-five. So if you start comparing stuff, you’ll always find faults within things. I don’t take that very seriously, but as long as I know that some people get what we’re doing, I’m happy with that. And I know that a lot of people appreciate what we do and also, our audience is getting older. Hopefully we’ll get some younger fans as well, but I don’t read comments’ sections or things like that. I don’t really care as long as I know that most people seem to appreciate what we do. Creative process is quite a fragile thing ‘cause you always put a bit of yourself in there and then reading a lot of criticism is not really good for your self-confidence. So, I’d rather concentrate on what I do. If people wanna have their opinions, that’s fine with me, but it’s not like I’m really interested.
Hardrock Haven: You’ve just mentioned the demographics of your audience. So, in relation to The Night Flight Orchestra, will all those retro elements that might be familiar to the older generation but not necessarily to the younger listeners, do you think this expansion of the band will stop at some point? Or can you imagine the band drawing the attention of teenage audience, for example?
David Andersson: That’s the beauty of the streaming era that people are not that prejudiced when it comes to what they’re listening to. I mean, on every tour with The Night Flight Orchestra we see more and more young people in the audience and more and more people that are obviously not from Metal background. Also, we have lots of bands doing just the same thing that are way younger than we are and they’re attracting a younger crowd. On the last tour we did this March – before we had to go because of the pandemic – our crowds were really mixed and there were quite a few young people as well. And they certainly were not metalheads – they looked just as if they listened to good Pop music and they just wanted to have a good time. It’d be fantastic to reach more of a mainstream audience ‘cause I think it’s not like we wanna be a hipster band doing music for record collectors and music nerds (laughs). We want everyone to listen to our music – the record collectors, the young, the old… any music fan ‘cause I think our music has this kind of universal appeal. Yes, we’re on a Metal label and most of us are from the Metal background, but at the same time, it’d be nice to reach out to more people. Hopefully, we’ll be able to do so and have even more diverse crowds.
Hardrock Haven: Let’s hope for that! And back to Aeromantic, The Night Flight Orchestra’s latest album, was the songwriting process behind it any different than before in terms of inspirations?
David Andersson: I think the lyrics are always romantic and melancholic and kind of… well, Swedish (laughs). Like the whole ABBA thing, when you have happy songs but with that Swedish outlook on life when you’re in the best part of your life but at the same time, you’re extremely painfully aware that it’s gonna end (laughs). So we always try to have this tragic, melancholic, bittersweet undertone in everything we do and we usually involve some escapism, some airline or space travel and overcoming impossible distances.
Hardrock Haven: You’ve mentioned a while ago that you’ve actually managed to tour a bit before the pandemic hit. What kind of experience was it?
David Andersson: It was really good, probably the best tour we’ve done so far. We’ve managed to play eleven shows and then the borders started shutting down so we had to go home but those eleven shows were fantastic. We played England, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, France and these were all really good and the crowds were bigger and more enthusiastic than even before… So it’s a shame it ended up like that ‘cause it was really promising.
Hardrock Haven: So is there a plan to reschedule the remaining dates?
David Andersson: Yeah, we do have touring plans next year, but at the same time I’m very unsure whether it’s gonna happen or not… We also plan to release new albums for both The Night Flight Orchestra and Soilwork and we actually have touring plans for the both bands next year. But as I’ve said, I think it’s way too soon to make any promise or expect things to work out. Of course, we’re gonna tour as soon as it’s possible but personally I think it’s gonna be a while longer before it’s actually possible. Even if you’re able to play clubs, it’s hard to keep all that social distancing in the small Rock club…
Hardrock Haven: Well, people try to organize gigs like that, so what do you actually think about it…?
David Andersson: I don’t see how you can do that if you play a venue with, say, 700 capacity and everyone is supposed to stay away from each other. You’ll end up having perhaps 150 people allowed in there and then it’s not gonna work financially. With stuff like tour bus and everything is kind of expensive to tour, so touring for crowds of 50 to 100 people you’d have to make the tickets super expensive. I don’t think people are willing to play that much to see a Rock show in a club. But we’ll see. I mean, I might be wrong, but with the way the things look now, it’s not looking really promising. When you look at how the things are in the whole Europe now… I mean, in Sweden it’s kind of promising, but too early to take away any restrictions and in many European countries it’s worse than ever. So, I don’t see how you could make any touring plans before next year and I think there’s gonna be a lot of restrictions even next year. But we can always hope for the best.
Hardrock Haven: Absolutely! So in general, what’s your best memory when it comes to touring, both with Soilwork and the Night Flight Orchestra?
David Andersson: There are so many memories and after a while, it all becomes a blur… It’s all a magical experience – doing the shows – and it doesn’t matter how big the crowd is. The enthusiasm of the audience and the way you feel that day is what matters… But of course, playing something like a big stage at Wacken [Open Air] for the very first time for the 50,000 people is fantastic. But we also had club shows for, like, 300 people and they were really enthusiastic and they love what you do, so you can always have those rare moments of magic, no matter what setting.
Hardrock Haven: The last question has to be about a new single “Impossibile”. Is it an outtake from an Aeromantic recording session shelved for whatever reason? Do you often happen to shelve songs that don’t fit the concept of the particular album?
David Andersson: No, the actual song was written a few years ago, but the production and everything is new. With The Night Flight Orchestra, we always write and record songs, so we have tons of stuff that is more or less finished. Most bands are like, “Okay, now let’s do a record” and then they enter the studio and record all things and then it’s finished. But with The Night Flight Orchestra and quite busy schedules of ours, we’ve been always booking short sessions, like being in a studio for a week and recording a couple songs; then we do other things for a while and again, get together to record a couple of songs… So yes, we have this archive of songs that we can pick and choose from. Some songs that are released are old, some are now and we probably have albums worth of songs that we could just release any day… But we’re gonna record some more stuff and hopefully, release an album sometime early next year. But we’d still have lots of songs laying around… “Impossible” is a great song and we wanted to release that as a nice end of the summer single. I think it works quite well just to cheer people up now that the summer’s gone (laughs).
Visit David Andersson online: https://www.soilwork.org/ | https://www.facebook.com/thenightflightorchestraofficial/
Photos appear courtesy of:
Soilwork: Stephansdotter Photography
The Night Flight Orchestra: Harald Nilsson
