LANCER – Swedish Metal, With A Nod To Traditional Gods By Mark Gromen
No, not Thor and Odin, but rather
IRON MAIDEN, HELLOWEEN and even
relative newcomers/ countrymen,
HAMMERFALL: a blast from the past! Like
many of their young Swedish contemporaries,
LANCER possess an affinity
for '80s sounds, including the high pitched vocals of
Isak Stenvall (often favorably compared to classic
Michael Kiske). He introduces North
America to the band, their eponymous debut (via Doolittle Group) and
some worthwhile music. “Since
IRON MAIDEN is a major influence, we use
to say that our sound is somewhere between them,
Helloween and
HammerFall and that's pretty close. If you're more involved in the metal
scene, we could mention Gamma Ray, and Avantasia too. We used to refer
to Helloween, because they were the pioneers, but I can agree with you
that there’s some Edguy-feeling in our songs. The track ‘Seventh Angel’
is the most Edguy-ish track on the album, but since we don't have piano
ballads, orchestrations, synth figures and Hallelujah choirs, I think
that our sound is closer to the Keeper era than Edguy. HammerFall
guitarist Oscar Dronjak told our producer and friend Ronny Milianowicz
that he listens to our album in his car, which is awesome, cause
HammerFall is one of my favorite bands.”
The members began their journey as a cover band, called
KELEMEN’S
SALVATION ORCHESTRA, “We met at a music academy and our mission was to
spread the word of Power Metal. Every week you could hear songs by
Helloween, HammerFall, MASTERPLAN and
NOCTURNAL RITES echo through the
academy’s corridors.” Once they played live, it was on to original
music, as the singer explains, “After the debut gig at our local pub we
decided to start writing our own material: Power Metal with a lot of
inspiration from the 80's NWOBHM era. The first two songs we wrote were
‘Don't Go Changing’ and ‘Young and Alive’ (both on the current CD), so
we almost immediately found our sound.”
As often happens, in the transition to original material, line-up
changes were necessary.
“Everyone wasn't ready to go all in,” says the
Swede, his understanding of English euphemisms impeccable. “So we
recruited Sebastian (Pedernera), on drums and just before recording of
the album, we recruited Emil (Öberg) on bass. The solid formation of
Lancer was born and we felt ready to take over the world with our
music.” But what to call this new entity?
“Everyone in the band had
their homework,” begins ‘Stenvall, “to think about a band name. On my
way home, I saw
“Lancer” on a parked Mitsubishi car outside of my
apartment. It was like a revelation. Lancer, sounded fast, heavy and
really powerful and when I Googled the word, it meant some kind of
horsemen with a lance.” Bingo!
While
Lancer is something of a metallic moniker, the album artwork
is rather unconventional, sporting what the band describe as a
“battle
ostrich’ (lanky bird with studded collar, spiked knee pads and laser
vision). Those familiar with the 80s arcade game Joust, might see some
similarity. “None of us were aware of Joust,” contends Isak. “Our newly
recruited bass player Emil (who is studying to be a psychology teacher),
is a real video game nerd, said ‘Hey guys, we need to have a Joust
arcade game in the rehearsal room.’ We looked at him and said, ‘What is
Joust?’ He answered, ‘Don't you know what Joust is, our whole image is
built on Joust.’ He showed us pictures of warriors riding battle
ostriches, but the whole thing is a really strange and funny
coincidence.” In fact, it was the singer, who painted the original
concept. “When we had recorded our Reaching Higher demo, we needed a
cover, so I painted a metal mistress, with a lance, riding some kind of
dragonbird. My band mates said: ‘Well, it's cool, but what the fuck is
she riding? It looks like a blind ostrich.’ Everyone laughed and then
there was silence. We looked at each other and thought the same thing:
we must have an ostrich as a mascot. It's so weird that it's genius.
When we later on met with our record label, the boss said, ‘I love this
crazy ostrich. No one will forget Lancer, the band with a battle ostrich
mascot.” The crazy bird appears in their ‘Young And Alive’ video.
Speaking of promotional clips, the young Swedes already have a pair
under their belts, including the 8-bit computer game inspired ‘Purple
Sky’, a rather expensive proposition for a fledgling band. “We shot the
‘Purple Sky’ video when the EP (of the same name) was out,” explains the
vocalist. “It was the first song that I didn't write the music for, the
song was written by our guitarist, Fredrik Kelemen. I added the vocal
melodies. I really like the NWOBHM feeling over the song, a great
opening track. It has a catchy chorus and great guitar melodies. The
tempo and harmony appeal to both power metal and traditional metal fans,
but Lancer is so much more than our music. The whole theatrical and
visualizing aura of the band is really important so we wanted to show
the listeners what we’re about. When the debut was released, our record
label wanted a new video to promote the album. Both the record label and
the producers voted for ‘Young and Alive.”
After sneaking a listen, via YouTube, or the band’s website:
www.Lancermetal.com , hopefully you’re intrigued enough to check out the
remainder of the
Lancer CD. Stenvall hopes so, elaborating on a couple
of the standout tracks. “The best thing about power metal is that it can
be heavy, fast, evil and funny at the same time. The dynamic between
those elements are important for me, but it need to be balanced.
Helloween and
Edguy are masterminds of handling those things. An Edguy
show is always filled with a great amount of humor and supreme heavy
metal music. ‘Dreamchasers’ was that kind of song that wrote itself. I
started to sing the chorus a cappella, ‘Here we are still,’ and
everything fell into place. I sat down with the guitar and came up with
the pre-chorus on the first attempt. I think I wrote the whole song in a
single afternoon. It is very simple in the harmony and form, and I
think that's why it's so good, a really nice naive heavy metal spirit.”
He continues,
“Mr Starlight’ is a
Helloween/KAI HANSEN tribute. It
has typical ‘Somewhere Out In Space’ lyrics and the whole song is built
as a Helloween song: cheerful chorus, the down tempo bridge with
charging guitars, drum and bass solos and of course, the insane speed!
The lyrics of the song are told by a stoned dude who sees aliens,
watchers and spaceships on his street. He’s convinced that they are
coming to take him away and the only one who could save him is his
made-up friends: Mr. Starlight and his companion Mrs. Moonshine. It's
always a blast to play that song live, the crowd loves it.”
Lots to love, and the rest of the world is already crowing
(ostriching?) about
Lancer. “Here in Sweden the album has got really
good reviews, but we’ve received great responses in the rest of Europe
too. The reviews have been nothing but positive. We were featured in the
latest issue of the legendary Metal Hammer Greece, with an interview
and a high score review. Greece has even showed the ‘Purple Sky’ video
on national television! In Japan, we got a great review Burrn! We got in
contact with a guy from Osaka who owns a metal shop. He wanted to get
our first demo, Reaching Higher, and the Purple Sky EP. We sent him a
package that sold out overnight. That's awesome!” The greatest metal
loving nations on the globe are rarely wrong. Find out for yourself!
Mar 26 Mar - 17:45
