(By our Norwegian correspondent Jan Ronald Stange)
On October 19^th Isak Rypdal and Alexander Bjørneboe of Electro Spectre returns with their 5th studio album titled ‘A Man-Made Sun’, a much anticipated album we are highly curious about after the preceding single and EP releases. I met up with the guys in Oslo to talk about the album & more.

Side-Line: What has the process behind the new album been like?

Alex: Well, we never want to repeat ourselves. The feeling of standing still will in many respects contradicts creativity. We play around with ideas, and some tracks grow in an interesting way, some are put on ice for later. We rarely have a plan for where we want to go creatively, so our new album is not the result of a fixed direction. To begin with, we didn’t even decide to make an album. It just sort of manifested itself after a while. We are always making music, and after a while you realise a new album is in the barrel. In the end everything came out really well.
Isak: This time Alex went to Vietnam on a two month journey to find time and inspiration to write new lyrics for the album. At the same time I went back in the studio to experimenting with a lot of new sounds and melodies for a new album.
We actually had no plan, except challenge our self to make an album we think is up there fighting with the major league of bands making modern electronic synth-pop. We also wanted a lot more punch and beat to the songs this time, as a contrast to the “quieter” album ‘Beautiful Lies’.

S-L: Do you want to reach a bigger audience with a more uptempo and pop oriented album?

Alex: We do. As a point of departure, I would like to point out that making music, and performing music, is for me not possible if I can’t truly relate to it. I mean, to be a vocalist is to me like being a storyteller. In music and words you try to bring something across. And it would not work if I don’t feel that it is of some importance, that it means something to me. At the same time; when you have been doing this for a while, you want your music to spread to new audiences, to try to reach new people. Music is communication after all. It would be difficult to continue to make music if there was no interest. That’s like having a conversation with someone who is not listening. I guess we have all experienced that, and it doesn’t make sense over time.
So yes, we always want to reach a bigger audience.

S-L: And is A Man-Made Sun an album you would expect to be able to win over more fans?

Alex: I certainly hope so. It is an album that has that core Electro Spectre sound, but at the same time contains a… Let’s call it a constructive variation. Some tracks are cool and punchy, some are more dwelling, some are playful, some are… well, beautiful. Whether you are at a party, or it’s the day after the party, there are tracks that will get you in the right mood, or reflect your feelings. At the same time I think the album works really well both as a collection of individual tracks and as a whole. People have different approaches to the album format. For some people a few of the songs will be a lot more played than others, for some people the album as a whole is an important part of the listening experience. Either way, I think most listeners will find something they really like, and hopefully will feel the need to have Electro Spectre as a musical reference in their lives.

S-L: What is the meaning of the title ‘A Man-Made Sun’? Are you at the center of the Solar System now?

Alex: Ha-ha! Hopefully, yes. Well, we have always had an interest in the futuristic visions of mankind, as seen in movies and literature, and heard in music. Not least during the 80s, where glammy optimism went hand in hand with dystopic scenarios related to cold war, and where an interest in outer space, in the machines of tomorrow, in robots and scientific progress played an important part in art and pop culture. It is no secret that Electro Spectre has a strong love for some of the music from the 80’s. Also, I guess the contradiction that a man-made sun both indicates a thing of beauty and an engineered monstrosity is mind-tickling. Since it is a concept that is hard to fully understand, it plays well as a title. We like to fuel the listeners imagination.

S-L: What do you think about the response for the remix contest you announced for the single ‘The Way You Love’ this summer? Among others we noticed that Zeromancer front man Alex Møklebust did a great SnifferGod remix for the song. What other remixes are worth mentioning?

Isak: It was great, borderline overwhelming! We received a lot of great remixes from a lot of talented remixers around the globe – one of my personal favorites is the Morganix remix by Morgan Lindstrøm, a man who is known from ‘Langsomt Mot Nord’ and other great projects here in Norway. The remixes by Technomancer and Mudman are two other remixes worth mentioning as some of the best. Although I want to add that the majority of nearly 30 remixes is holding a high standard and there’s a lot of interesting interpretations of the song all over.

S-L: Are you going to support the new album with a tour in the near future?

Isak: At the moment we are seeking for a new booking agency that could take care of that side of our plans. It would be lovely if any relevant booking agents reading this feel the need to contact us.

Get the album at iTunes, or listen to “A man made sun” right here!

Jan Ronald Stange

Sometimes – when I’m not cooking, biking, listening to music or attending concerts, I write stuff for Side-Line.com. Mostly about Norwegian bands, but it’s been some Swedish, English, American, Danish, German and others too… 😉

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(By our Norwegian correspondent Jan Ronald Stange)

Late this summer the Norwegian electro-pop band Electro Spectre announced a remix contest for their latest single “The way you love”, and the results are in! Isak Rypdal, producer and keyboardist of Electro Spectre, received tens of mixes, both domestic and from abroad. This resulted in an EP release with 7 winning remixes, and lots of the runners up are also available on a Bandcamp page.

‘The Way You Love REMIXES’ WP includes remixes from SnifferGod (Alex Møklebust / Zeromancer, Seigmen), Morganix (Morgan Lindstrøm / Langsomt Mot Nord, w/additional vocals by Kjersti Helene Larsen), Defiant Machines, Technomancer, Mudman, Watch Dogs and the Cologne based remixer Yves.
The “Morganix remix” will also have it’s radio debut on Norwegian broadcaster Radio Nova this Friday night (September 14th) – check out the synth related programme Midnight Magic around 23:00: https://radionova.no/programmer/midnightmagic

Buy/listen to the REMIXES @ iTunes, Spotify and Bandcamp. Do also check out the runners up at their own Bandcamp page!

Jan Ronald Stange

Sometimes – when I’m not cooking, biking, listening to music or attending concerts, I write stuff for Side-Line.com. Mostly about Norwegian bands, but it’s been some Swedish, English, American, Danish, German and others too… 😉

www.facebook.com/jrstange

(By our Norwegian correspondent Jan Ronald Stange)

Langsomt Mot Nord (Slowly Toward (the) North/Slowly Northward, LMN) was a Norwegian synth/folk project that released three albums between 1985 and 1991. The main force behind the project is Ola Snortheim, a seasoned drummer and musician who’s been a member of a dozen Norwegian bands over the last four decades, and also the only permanent member of LMN. For each of the three albums he’s been joined by a main collaborator and a wast amount of guest singers and musicians.

With the help of publisher Christer Falck they’re now crowdfunding a vinyl box set of all their three albums in remastered versions, and a bonus album called ‘Far’ (Father), containing original tracks from Ola’s father, the Norwegian folk musician and Olav Snortheim.

I met with Ola and Morgan Lindstrøm, main collaborator on ‘Westrveg’, the second album.

Side-Line: First, what initiated this project back in the 80’?

Ola: I had grown a bit tired being in the background as a drummer in various band, backing up a vocalist who’s getting all the attention. I’d also played in De Press, which was in borderline of the folk-rock genre, so I was already going somewhat in that direction. Playing “ordinary” folk-rock wasn’t interesting, many bands sounded alike and boring, but doing it in an unique way, more instrumental, was something I wanted to pursue.
We started with my father’s recordings from the 50-60’s, laying new instruments and orchestrations on top them, making something new and updated with traditional tunes, resulting in the first album ‘Langsomt Mot Nord’ (1985).

This album got the project in the national spotlight, and they went on doing several TV-appearances, like this from 1985 with Kjersti Bergersen on vocals.

S-L: Why a new collaborator for each album?

Ola: It was just the way it happened…
Morgan: Originally Jørn (Christensen, collaborator on the first album) was meant to make all albums with Ola, but he got busy with other projects and the universe pointed towards me.

Ola: And after ‘Westrweg’ (1988) I wasn’t sure I’d make another LMN album. Then I met Espen (Beranek Holm), he was eager to contribute, and we ended up making the third album together – ‘Hildring’ (1991). We sat on the master tape for the album for two years after finishing, thinking it wasn’t interesting enough to pitch to major labels.

Instead they did several live shows, and in 1991 they were approached by the record company Origo Sound who aimed for the instrumental market. With a master tape ready for publishing it was an easy decision to say yes.

S-L: 30 years after the first album, what trigged the remastering and box set idea?

Ola: My first reason for remastering was to get the album out on streaming services. But then Christer Falck called me, wanting to release a Circus Modern triple box, which was another project I also wanted to prepare for streaming.  I grabbed the chance and said I also wanted to remaster and release the LMN album, and this way several things fell into place!

Morgan: We’ve been trying to release ‘Westrveg’ digitally for years, but Sony Music wasn’t very cooperative until now, not wanting to pay for remastering.

Ola: When we’re doing this the crowdfunding way with the help of Christer, the remastering costs goes into the project.

Morgan: … but the remastering job is almost for free anyway, that’s how we can do it. A real Norwegian “dugnad” (voluntary work)!
The most satisfactory part of this remaster project is making it sound how we wanted in the first place. We didn’t have the people or technology at the time when we made the albums to produce the kind of electronic music we wanted, now we do!

Ola: We even added some new synths on some tracks, added some depth and bass etc.

Morgan: Ola and I spent about six month prepare all the music in Cubase at my studio, using advanced processing gear and virtual synths, and the finalizing of the mastering process was done by Hugo Alvarstein.

Ola: I also want to add some background to the bonus LP in the box, called ‘Far’: My father, Olav Snortheim (1911-1988) was a folk musician and artist, with a natural gift to acquire great skills on any instrument. He travelled a lot inland as well as abroad, with a self-made suitcase full of instruments  – langeleik, bukkehorn (ram’s horn), lur and flutes, in addition to his small harmonica in his pocket. He sang, played and told stories, on a practically eternal tour in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. He even joined us on stage for a TV show in 1985.

S-L: Any other plans in the future besides the vinyl box?

Ola: Maybe we’ll do a CD box too, and even if the crowdfunding doesn’t get completed we’ll get the albums streaming anyway.

Langsomt Mot Nord (1985) | Westrveg (1988) | Hildring (1991)

Check their YouTube channel for some of the remastered songs, and join the crowdfunding project here!
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/langsomt-mot-nord-samleboks#/

Jan Ronald Stange

Sometimes – when I’m not cooking, biking, listening to music or attending concerts, I write stuff for Side-Line.com. Mostly about Norwegian bands, but it’s been some Swedish, English, American, Danish, German and others too… 😉

www.facebook.com/jrstange