Eigentlich sollte der Erste Weltkrieg der Krieg sein, der so entsetzlich war, dass man das Kämpfen für immer einstellen und unentwegt friedliche Zeiten erleben wollte. Diese Einigkeit wurde jüngst von einem Krieg mitten in Europa empfindlich gestört. Doch wie passt nun eine schwedische Heavy-Metal-Band da herein? Genau in diese unruhige Zeit fällt das Release des mittlerweile zehnten Albums von Sabaton mit dem beschreibenden Titel „The War To End All Wars“. Erzählt werden typischerweise militärische Geschichten aus dem Ersten Weltkrieg, die heute aber aktueller nicht sein könnten. Schon bevor der Ukraine-Krieg entflammte, traf sich unsere Redakteurin Jacky anlässlich der Neuveröffentlichung mit Sänger Joakim Brodén online zum Interview. Dabei ging es nicht nur darum, wie Sabaton ihre inhaltliche Inspiration erlangen, sondern auch um das Phänomen der geeinigten Fanschaft durch Authentizität oder was für ein Mensch Joakim vor seinem ersten Kaffee ist. Weitere Details erfahrt ihr aus dem Interview. Normalerweise würden wir jetzt Happy Releaseday sagen, aber an dieser Stelle wünschen wir jede*m den Releaseday, der heute gebraucht wird.
Frontstage Magazine: What makes the album different from other, previous ones you recorded so far?
Joakim: Oh, I don’t know. That’s a good question. I should have expected that to come up sooner or later and I should have planned for an answer, but I don’t have one, so I’m gonna try it out on you. Sabaton it’s like more of an evolutionary band than a revolutionary band somehow. If we listen to any two Sabaton albums, who are been released next to each other, like “Carolus Rex” and “Heroes”, there are difference, but they aren’t huge. On the other hand, if you were to listen to “Fist For Fight” and then listen to “The War To End All Wars”, then there’s a huge difference because there’s been an evolution over time. What would be considered “Sabaton” and what Sabaton does is pretty narrow in “Fist For Fight” days. And as we’ve been doing different experiments on songs, for examples adding the “Cliffs of Gallipoli” with the piano, it became a part of what Sabbath on can do. Over the years, the scope of what Sabaton is, was widened. And I think in that sense this is a step in that evolution.
Frontstage Magazine: Like a slow and steady progress?
Joakim: Yeah, we don’t want to do too many different things, because 1., I don’t think our fans would like us changing on every album and doing different things too much, and 2. also for us. I mean, we’d love 80ies catchy hard rocking metal. So, why would we change too much? But that being said, it is nice to do things that are a little bit unexpected. Some things are a little bit harder, which could be “Hellfighters” on this album. Some things are a bit softer, but not really crazy revolutionary, like “Christmas Truce”. Yeah, we had pianos before, but this time we did it in a waltz, which is kind of new for example.
Frontstage Magazine: Oh, it’s nice that you mentioned “Christmas Truce” because I have actually a question regarding this topic: Why did you choose this song or event to be a single as well as an animated videos, which was released in December 2021?
Joakim: First of all, it’s like one of those things we felt we were missing on “The Great War”. I mean, we didn’t miss it, we knew about it. It was not something we didn’t know about, but we did not have the right music. And it felt so bad that we abandoned that topic. For me, I didn’t think we had any songs that would fit to that on “The Great War”. There were not right for it. Same with “Hellfighters” in that case, we wanted to do that too. That was one reason. Second is we think it’s one of the better songs on the album and third obviously that being one of the best stories, I think I’ve heard of military history. Maybe not the best and it’s not a surprise. We like to surprise our fans with shit they never heard about before. But in this case, there is a reason this is one of the most famous stories of war because it’s also one of the best stories, I think.
Frontstage Magazine: And what would the best story for you be?
Joakim: I don’t know, I hope I haven’t discovered it yet. Usually, it’s the ones where I go: “Wow, did that really happen? Oh, how impossible”. On this album, reading about Adrian Carton de Wiart, the guy we sing about in “The Unkillable Soldier”, that’s just a fucked-up story, like Monty Python decided to do a sketch about a crazy British officer and then going wild with all kinds of crazy shit that it’s totally unreal; that can’t happen. But this guy really existed. We like the feeling of getting overwhelmed and passionate when you’re discovering something, even though it’s a very, very sad story like the story of Witold Pilecki that we sing about in in the “Heroes” album, song “Inmate for 859”. He went to Auschwitz on purpose and was executed for treason by the new Soviet government.
Frontstage Magazine: What do you think will the people who think or feel after they listen to your new album?
Joakim: I hope they will be happy, that’s a good start. One thing I can say is that songs are highly subjective and personal. We all in the band have different favourites from this album and some song might be Pärs favourite and I might think it’s one of the weaker songs on the album and vice versa. What is objective about the songs is the production, good sound or bad sound. Of course, we all like different things but on some level there’s also a matter of objectivity there, like a really cracked recording from a hundred or 60 years ago isn’t gonna sound as good as a modern one, spoken from an audio quality perspective. On that level, I think our producer, shout out to him, who did by far, according to me the best sounding Sabaton album ever.
Frontstage Magazine: Did it made a difference for you as well?
Joakim: It made a huge difference but once again that’s an evolutionary step. He also did “The Great War”. When listening back to that, we reflected and learning from our past mistakes with the question in mind: “What can we improve upon?”. I was there with the opinion, he’s the one who made the magic happen.
Frontstage Magazine: How about your own expectations for the album? Is it hard to keep realistic outlooks for platin status awards, for example?
Joakim: From a business standpoint, that’s pretty stupid, but I really don’t care about those things. The biggest failure you could imagine is when somebody, who really likes Sabaton, wants to like the album, listens to it and doesn’t like it. If somebody doesn’t care about Sabaton and doesn’t like it, well, I don’t give a shit actually. If we can make new fans, even better, that’s good. But in a sense, it all comes down to what the fans think. We had stuff done before that had been great reviewed by the press but not liked by the fans. We done stuff that the press gave pretty much nothing, but the fans loved it. Playing so much life is also special for us, to be able to see that in people’s faces. So, yes, I’m a really excited in that sound. I just wish I could see people’s faces when they listen to the album the first time because that’s a nice experience for us. At the same time, it is a long time ago that we did this album. Most of these songs I wrote over a year ago. It was finished recording in March 2021 and now it has been a year since we finished the official recording. That’s a bit weird. I’m super excited about it but somewhat feels really old to me.
Frontstage Magazine: When you had so much time in between from March last year to now did you have the feeling to redo it?
Joakim: If it would have been 10 or 15 years ago, I would have redone it 15 times. But I come to the realization that once it’s ready how you want it these small tweaks that I am gonna make at a certain point are gonna be so minute nobody’s gonna hear a difference and I know I won’t even hear the difference three months later (laughs). You gotta abandon it sometimes. But it was also nice because we could do other things. I mean, if you’re a Sabaton fan, it’s a good time, maybe not from a pandemic perspective but I mean for music for us in general, because “The Great War” wasn’t released that long ago. If we weren’t sent home from touring, we wouldn’t have made this album at all. We wouldn’t have released any album this early ‘cause we would still be on tour. And not only that we also did “The Royal Guard” video, we did the “Defence of Moscow” and “Steal Commanders” and then now singles as well as a whole new album.
Frontstage Magazine: Yeah, lucky that we have a new album now! You are mentioning your fans quite often. I think it’s really special that your community is so attached to Sabaton. Do you have an explanation for it? When my friends who listen to your music heard that we have an interview with you they got very excited and said “This is the best thing which can ever happen in your whole life”.
Joakim: (laughing and shaking his head) No, it’s not. But I don’t know about the reasons for that. People are asking us what we are doing right, but I think it goes both ways. What are the facts doing right? It’s not thanks to us only; it would be impossible. I certainly think it helps that we don’t really take ourselves very seriously. I mean, we are very serious about the stories we tell, but we are pretty relaxed people. The people we are on stage that is pretty much us. Maybe my stage personalized is a caricature of myself, sort of, but there’s a lot of me in what I am presenting on stage, which I guess could help in that sense. I’m not saying there is anything wrong with presenting a whole different persona. That’s a cool thing. But I do think that will create a distance between you and the fanbase. ‘Cause they don’t really have a connection with the person, they have a connection with the persona. For me, it would just happen before I had my first coffee in the morning, which is different from the perceived image of me as a funny middle-aged Swedish guy jumping around in a fake six-pack.
Frontstage Magazine: Is there a special character trait about you being the morning person without coffee?
Joakim: I’m still a grumpy fucking old man who needs his caffeine. I’m still not asshole to that person and both voice wise and body language wise not living up to their expectation of how I normally act on stage. But actually, I am not the worst one in the band, that is Hannes by far. I mean, nobody speaks to him before he had his coffee. You say “morning” and nothing else until he starts talking. Before that, you leave him alone. I’m actually not that bad but sometimes I’m tired because of the lack of sleep.
Frontstage Magazine: Of course, you have been around a lot, and I am sure we are all looking forward to being live again. One of the only shows you played in 2021 was the Exit Festival in Serbia.
Joakim: That was the first post-pandemic one. Then we did one in Moravský Krumlov in Cheque Republic public and then we were at a couple of shows in the US with Judas Priest. I was sort of fucked up because I was so nervous before. We had two days of rehearsals before which I thought was short, but everybody in the band was afraid of that, but we couldn’t make the timing because traveling during pandemic time wasn’t easy. We needed to make sure to bring our sound engineer from America over. So, it was a bit of a mess to sort out, but we actually got there. And I remember coming into the hall and it was so good to see everybody again because I talked to a lot of these people, but we have never been in the same room for that year and a half. That was a really good feeling. Then we started rehearsing, and everybody was nervous about if we still have it. That’s why everybody had trained really well. So, we all started almost laughing, because we expected it to sound like shit, but it sounded fucking good already now. That is a contagious feeling. People are happy. We are happy. The crew is happy that we still have it and then we go out to dinner together. Only to do that feel like a luxury. Sometimes during certain parts of a year, we’ll see these people more often than our families, so they are like our second family to us.
Frontstage Magazine: But was it strange to play on a festival with mainly electronic music acts?
Joakim: It’s a lot of people and not everybody’s there for the same music. You don’t have the same gathering of everybody in front of the headliner stage. If you’re playing a metal festival, KISS might be the headliner and then most people have a relationship to KISS, even if they are not super fans, they gonna watch it, because they want to see KISS. Now you have it way more spread out. We played Exit Festival before and it’s a really nice festival and it felt weird for us up until we went on stage and the intros started running and then all of a sudden it felt absolutely natural like that what I’m supposed to be doing.
Frontstage Magazine: I like how you feel the passion for what you’re doing. Was there a special time when it felt more like work than the thing you love?
Joakim: Sometimes it can be like that, but it’s usually luckily enough, only in those cases connected with being overworked or overtoured. When it has been too much at the same time, which it can be for anyone doing anything. Maybe then it doesn’t feel as fun as it’s supposed to, but it doesn’t suck still. It’s still better than most things. I mean, going on stage with salmonella and 41 degrees of fever wondering, if you’re gonna shit myself, when I’m jumping on “Primo Victoria” that is not the best thing. But to be honest, it wouldn’t be the best thing to do anything on that point (laughs).
Frontstage Magazine: Understandable! Let’s talk a little bit more about the topics. Of course, you focus on the World Wars. I am interested if you could imagine doing some older wars like in medieval times, the Crusades for instance?
Joakim: Obviously we’ve been mostly on World War 2 when World War 1, especially more than warfare. There are exceptions. “Carolus Rex” is basically about a hundred years of the Swedish empire from the beginning of the 1600s to the beginning of the 1700s. Also, it depends on the situation and the theme of the album. “The Last Stand” obviously has modern things as well as the Samurai and stuff like that. The problem with too much ancient history is where’s the line between legend and history. We want to do facts, but at a certain point, we have to surrender to storytelling according to legends. Which is cool in a way as well. But it’s trickier because we really enjoy the human side of every conflict. I mean, not enjoy it. It’s sounds wrong to say that, but one of the most fascinating things is the human side. People make jokes about us, dreaming of tanks and stuff. Yeah, we love tanks. That’s not a secret, but that’s not our favourite part. The most fascinating part is what does this extreme circumstance as military conflict does to the human mind. What terms bring out the worst and the best in an individual? And sometimes it’s impossible to predict how this person is gonna react. But if we go back 300 years in history, the average soldier could not read or write. There are no recordings of them speaking, because obviously there was no film or audio being made. What we have is a lot of generals, commanders or monarchs even sometimes and their accounts of things and they want to make themselves look good. So, it’s harder but we loved to be there and do more about those times
Frontstage Magazine: How do you do your research about it? How do you write songs?
Joakim: It could be different for every song. There’s not like we have one formula. In one case, it could be everything is basically out of one book that I read that had everything I needed. Sometimes it’s everything from a YouTube documentary to the Wikipedia article to a book in a movie. The only thing is that we tend to keep looking until we find something we feel passionate about, like a different angle. A good example, which was a long time ago, but I still remember it, is clearly the song “Stalingrad” on “Primo Victoria”. I read Anthony Beavers famous book about Stalingrad. It’s a really good book, but there’s so much data like everything is covered on day by day almost. This happened with this, but I didn’t connect. I had all this data. I didn’t know where to start, how do I tell this story? But then I found a translation on the internet, which wasn’t as common to find things online back in 2004 when we recorded the album as it was today. I found a translation of a Russian soldier’s diary and with that I totally ignored that whole book with all the dates and information, and totally went with the soldier’s experience of that battle. If we didn’t do much research, it’s because we found what we wanted like the right angle for that song directly. And sometimes it feels like you’re just researching, researching and even though you love the story intellectually that you really want to write about it, it has happened sometimes that we just had to abandon it. We really wanted to write about it, but we don’t have the music, or we can’t tell it in in the right way that feels right for us.
Frontstage Magazine: Are there some stories left from the First or Second World War which you didn’t tell yet?
Joakim: Yeah, a lot of them like the Portuguese Soldier Millions or Albert Severin Roche, who we call French ramble internally, because he was a badass. There are many things we want to do intellectually.
Frontstage Magazine: And how do you know a music fits right for such a story?
Joakim: It’s about not only about the story, but also how it’s told and from which point of view, but certainly one of the major factors is, this might sound hippy, so sorry for that, that the story or the way you telling the story is matching the emotional response we get from the music itself. “Fields of Verdune” is a good example for this, where the music really works to the story of the whole battle and the madness in the trenches and the chaos of war.
Frontstage Magazine: While you were speaking, I wondered if you did military service?
Joakim: I’m past the drafting age by now. Chris did military service. I was supposed to, but I was waiting for surgery. I was supposed to be placed on a marine base that would have put me in to 15 months of military service. But they relocated me while I was waiting for surgery because that position was taken. I ended up in the reserves.
Frontstage Magazine: Another question, which just crossed my mind: Where do you see yourself and the band in five years? Do you have any goals or perspective plan?
Joakim: If we would have set a goal it would sound crazy. If someone had walked in 1999 and tell me one day, you’re gonna headline Wacken, I would have said: “You stupid motherfucker! This will never gonna happen”. We were dreaming of one day playing at Wacken. But if we set the goal oh headlining it could either disappoint us or there would be emptiness when we reached it. We didn’t start with a master plan of this. But in five years, I want Sabaton to be doing a little bit better albums, a little bit better live shows, being a little bit better in musician and more experienced; loose five corona kilos, being on tour again and being happy about it. We’re not the biggest or most successful band in the world, but we are very happy and proud of what we have achieved. If we can improve on that and become even better that probably means that all of these other things, like getting this big show or getting a lot of money, success, whatever, are going to be consequences of us achieving our goals.
Frontstage Magazine: I really appreciate your answer since it shows the right mindset and things that we should definitely keep more in mind to be happy. It is already time for our last question which is always a bit randomly connected to your person and not so much about the band: When was the last time you wrote a love letter?
Joakim: Whoa, the last time I wrote a physical love letter. Wow, I don’t know. I don’t even remember. I mean, telling my wife, I love her over text message would be yesterday evening. If we count that as a love letter… But I mean a proper love letter. Oh, I was probably early teenager and a girl I had a crush on while swimming competition in Finland or something like that. But weird question, I have not seen that coming (laughs).
Frontstage Magazine: That’s always the purpose of our last questions. Thank you very much for the possibility to talk with you and your time. It was fantastic! Stay healthy and all the best for your new record.
Joakim: Pleasure to talk with you, too. Hope to see you on tour!
Fotocredit: Tim Tronckoe
