Amidst the hailstorm of artistes/bands talking about how 2011 was one of the hardest working years in their collective histories, it’s very refreshing (in a strange way) to come across one band that actually took it easy for most of the year.
Enter Sweden’s Deathstars. “It’s been great, since we took one year off. We said ‘no’ to all tour offers, festivals and gigs and that was really nice, since everyone in the band could deal with whatever they wanted to — outside of the band,” says frontman Andreas Bergh, better known as Whiplasher Bernadotte, who adds, “That’s it, that was 2011 for us — a good and relaxed year for the band, you need to do that sometimes. We had been touring so much that it was great to take a break. We felt much more focused (after the break).”
“Focused” is something the band would have to be, as 2011 began winding up, when they embarked on the first leg of the Made in Germany 1995-2011 tour with the mighty Rammstein, who happened to be putting on some of their most elaborate and massive shows. Ever.
“The tour was great. It’s like 15,000 to 20,000 people every night and each venue was sold out, so we were pretty thankful. Deathstars and Rammstein have been talking about touring before, so when I heard that they were going on this tour, I just texted Till (Lindemann, Rammstein vocalist) and said that we would like to come with them,” says Whiplasher. How intimidating was it to support a band like that? “It wasn’t scary to support them at all. It’s just a good vibe and raw power,” he says matter-of-factly.
Deathstars, completed by Jonas “Skinny Disco” Kangur (bass), Emil “Nightmare Industries” Nödtveidt (rhythm guitar, keyboards), Ocar “Vice” Leander (drums) and Eric “Cat Casino” Bäckman (lead guitar), is a goth/industrial metal band from Sweden that began its life in 2000 and has released three albums since.
Looking at the band’s name, the Star Wars connection is one of the first to come to mind. But as Whiplasher firmly clarifies, the band’s name has nothing to do with Darth Vader’s space station. “No, it’s got nothing to do with that. I didn’t even think about it when I decided on the name. It is more a play of words and phenomena, like pornstars, childstars, popstars, rockstars, superstars… Well, then we are Deathstars,” he says, and let it never be claimed otherwise.
Prior to the inception of the band, Whiplasher and cohorts were part of a black metal band called Swordmaster. So why the change to this sneering, sarcastic, negative and ultimately, more accessible avatar? “We were just bored playing that sort of music; it wasn’t really working for us anymore. We did some great death/thrash/black metal albums but it felt like we just couldn’t settle with that — we wanted to something more dynamic, bigger, cooler and not chained to a specific genre, as is the case with all bands that play metal. We are a hybrid of different kinds of music nowadays, we have no limits,” he asserts. Sure enough, listening to Deathstars, traces of resemblance to Cradle of Filth, Type O Negative, Rammstein, Marilyn Manson, even David Bowie (in parts) and countless others emerge from time to time.
Inspiration to create the Deathstars brand of music comes from a variety of places — everything from black metal to pop and at the same time, nothing specifically, as the band’s frontman elaborates. “There’s a lot of black humour in what we do, but in the songs, it’s usually serious matters that we deal with in our f**ked up lives. Onstage, however, we are a straight forward rock band with a dark twist and sexual ooze,” he says.
Speaking of musical content, a notion that sadly seems to be losing importance by the day (in this correspondent’s humblest of humble opinions), it hardly seems like much of a surprise that Whiplasher doesn’t particularly care for much of what’s on offer today. “I mostly listen to KISS, MC5, Iggy Pop, Nico, The Ramones and old heavy metal, black metal and pop. I usually don’t care about new bands anymore,” he says and adds almost as an afterthought, “But if I find something good, of course, I’ll listen to it.” Playing the straight bat. The year 2012 will see Deathstars joining forces with Rammstein once again for the second leg of the latter’s Made in Germany tour followed by the follow-up to 2009’s critically acclaimed LP Night Electric Night. And how about throwing an India tour into that mix? Whiplasher replies, “We would love to. I really hope we can go there as soon as possible. We were talking about a tour to Asia just a few weeks ago, so we’ll see. It would be fantastic, of course.”
Of course it would. Just ask Metallica. Too soon?