With the "The Infernal Depths Of Hatred" opus; Anata from Sweden has released one of 1998’s best debut albums. Their potent mix of Death Metal and Black Metal are simply stunning. We caught up with their drummer Robert for an interview.
1. Congratulations with your brilliant debut album. When and where was Anata started ?? By whom ?
-Hi there! Thanks for your nice words about us. ANATA was born in -93. Back then we played more like death/thrash with a lot of new ideas, perhaps not that very good, but hey, who begins to play as a pro
immediately. From the beginning ANATA was me Robert Petersson (drums), Fredrik Schälin (guitar, vocals), Mattias Svensson (guitar) and Martin Sjöstrand (bass). Some years later, after our first demo was released (-95) Mattias quit and 6 months after that Martin did the same. Henrik Drake joined us on bass approx. July -96, and in late -97 Andreas Allenmark joined us on guitar.
2. Please tell us what you did before you started the band.
-All of us had other bands before ANATA but none of these are worth mentioning. In my case it just was a sort of hard rock’n roll band. Schälin was in a heavy metal band, and the other two were also in some
kind of unserious projects (sorry bandmates if I’m wrong here!).
3. Please tell us more about eventual demo tapes or ‘7 you have released.
-As I mentioned we recorded a demo in the summer of -95. The demo tape was called "Bury Forever the Garden of Lie", and the 300 copies are sold out (If anyone is interested we can make you a special copy, just send us a tape and include p&p). Demo number 2 ("Vast Lands of My Infernal Dominion") was recorded Easter -97, also with an extraordinary sound quality. We recorded one unreleased "demo" between these two, but it’s not available for anyone except for ourselves. The reason is that this was recorded due to that the German label Nuclear Blast showed interest in our music. They paid for it, but as you may figure out we never signed with them.
4. Please give us an insight into your debut album "The Infernal Depths Of Hatred" . For example the recording, the lyrics, the writing process, the concept and the featured tracks.
-The recording turned out extremely great. The quality is very high and you may search for years trying to find a better recording for the money we had for a budget. There isn’t very much we’re not satisfied with, but 100% perfect can a recording never be, you know.
The lyrics aren’t that easy to explain though I’m not the writer. On our CD many lyrics are of the anti-religious character. Schälin says he is kind of bored with that direction now. Concerning the new lyrics I think it’s going to be more blood topics and violence, but I really don’t know. This since we haven’t finished that many songs since we recorded "WAR Anata Vs. Bethzaida" (a split CD for Season Of Mist) a couple of months ago. Schälin doesn’t really involve us in the writing process, and often the lyrics become a surprise for us after the recording. Sometimes he translates them quickly in the rehearsal room but I’m not that interested, I just want to lash the hell out of my drums all the time, hehe.
Schälin and I create all music. The main part is Schälin’s, since he writes all guitar and bass lines. I make the drums sound intense and help Schälin with the song structures. Allenmark and Drake don’t really
have any good ideas at all, so the job is all Schälin’s.
5. Your CD is a blend of Swedish Death/Black Metal and American Death Metal. Is this a sound you wanted from the beginning or was it a coincidence ? Any influences ?
-It is a development that caused this. You can say that I was the one who got this band into death metal. I had listened to death metal longer than I played it, and I always wanted to play it. I love very fast US death and so did Svensson (perhaps not very fast death, but...). Schälin was not very much into playing it although he listened to some. In the beginning we weren’t that fast or good musicians so the music wasn’t exactly crushing the fans heads. Later Schälin became more like me and we both wanted to play intensive, fast technical death metal. So the music takes its form precisely the way we want death metal to sound
like!
My main influences are: Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Monstrosity, Vader, Cryptopsy, Malevolent Creation, Obituary, Morgoth, Pestilence and Death, and the list can be much longer... But before this I also
listened to stuff like old Carcass, Pungent Stench, Suicidal Tendencies and Anthrax (older releases).
Schälin’s influences are mostly like mine, but Drake is very odd. Drake’s influences don’t show up anywhere in our music. He’s more into Norwegian symphonic black and technical heavy metal, but of course also death metal: Blind Guardian, Emperor, Covenant, Death, Dimmu Borgir, In the Woods, Opeth....
Allenmark is a punk! No, he listened to bad black and punk groups earlier until we changed him.
6. To my surprise; you released your album on the Black/Goth Metal label Season Of Mist. How did you get in touch with them ?
-The usual thing, by sending our latest demo (in this case "Vast Lands..."). Mike, the owner thought we were awesome and signed us. He fought with a label called Blackend, but they lost. Season Of Mist gave
us better distribution, more money and signed us for less albums. Who wants to sign for 5 albums? We wouldn’t, and didn’t !
7. With all respect for the brilliant Season Of Mist; is this release a kind of a signal that it is acceptable for the more trendy underground labels to release Death Metal releases again ?
-Sort of, yes, but also no! It’s all about originality, and for example the black metal trend has now gone over the top… We are here to bring the brutality back and to the labels who are in the trendy mood: Find
something original or die !
8. You are about to release a split CD with label mates Betzhaida, who has said a lot of positive things about Anata somewhere else in this magazine. Please tell us more about this split CD and your contributions to this CD.
-Thanks Bethzaida! The split CD contains 8 songs, 4 each. The whole "WAR"-thing is a really funny thing actually, since the point is that the bands cover each other. The bands also do a cover each of their own
choice plus 2 unreleased songs each. Our contribution is Bethzaida’s "The Tranquillity of My Last Breath" from their first release "Nine Worlds". Our second cover is "Day Of Suffering" with the gods Morbid
Angel. Bethzaida’s part consists of our "Under Azure Skies" and the dead Swedish songwriter Carl Mikael Bellman’s "Drick Ur Ditt Glas". In English that would be "Empty Your Glass".
9. What is your political, religious and philosophical views ?
-Personally a hate all of it. I don’t understand politics and I’m an atheist, and I don’t give a damn about philosophy! I don’t know anything about Anata’s other aspects, and I don’t want to. It’s the best thing
actually, you can avoid conflicts that way.
10. Are any members of Anata involved in other bands/projects ?
-Not yet! I was asked if I wanted to play drums in a "US death-band" with Jonas the vocalist and guitarist in Taetre + a couple of other guys, and I am very interested, but there’s one problem; the distance. They live in Gothenburg 85-95 km from me. When you are unemployed as I am you cannot afford the costs back and forth. But we’ll make it out somehow. Allenmark studies an aesthetic musician program at school. He often
plays with all kinds of people and all kinds of music, so this doesn’t really count. I hope he won’t do the same for a living when he gets out of school, ANATA will always be top priority for him I hope, at least it
will be for me !!!
11. What are your plans for the coming months and year ?? Any tour plans ??
-It is very difficult to say what we really ought to do the next month, but we rehearse a lot and perhaps we will record album number 2 in the summer of -99. Tourdates will appear but we don’t know what countries we will enter yet.
12. Do you have a merchandise list ??? From what address can the band be contacted ?
- Of course our demos can be bought: Demo 1 (-95) "Bury Forever The Garden Of Lie" is sold out. Send us a blank tape + p&p and it will be yours. Demo 2 (-97) "Vast Lands Of My Infernal Dominion", costs 30 sek
or $5 + p&p (10 sek/2$). CD "The Infernal Depths of Hatred" costs 100 SEK or $12 + p&p. It can be bought from all of us. Shirts and other stuff will also appear in -99, but guess what! We don’t know anything about this yet. We have three available addresses:
Schälin answers only foreign letters, since he’s the best at English,
hehe.
Me, Robert Petersson answer only Swedish written mail, and foreign e-mails.
Henrik Drake is the "cyberking" and takes care of the e-mail from our website and stuff like that.
By the way, if anyone would be interested in our music, visit our website! We’ve got some really good mp3 from the album there.
The Official Website of ANATA
My address is:
ANATA
c/o Robert Petersson
Apelviksvägen 11
SE-432 53 Varberg
SWEDEN
E-mail addresses:
Robert Petersson:
fearless96@mailbox.euromail.se
Henrik Drake:
drake@varberg.se
Schälin:
po9418@ida.utb.hb.se
Season of Mist:
season@worldnet.fr