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Interview by Greg Uhrlen |
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Lost Horizon may call Sweden home, but with their
latest release Awakening the World (KOCH) the band has invaded the United
States. Martin Furangen spoke to us not long after their debut live performance,
which had taken place in Paris, France playing along with DC Cooper's Silent
Force. While Furangen says he missed most of the show since the band had been
tied up doing interviews the greater part of the day, he was happy to report the
success of their own set.
“It went very well. The audience was really amazing. It was a full house, about
2,000, and were they really with us from the first note we played. It was quite
amazing, it was really a great evening for us,” said Furangen.
With funding from Music for Nations, a record label out of the United Kingdom,
the band’s expenses were covered and they were able to finally get the music
they’ve been sculpting for years to be heard. In fact, Martin says that some of
the material dates back to a previous band, Highlander, which he says in some
senses was the same band. Furangen says that Music for Nations has been treating
the band very well, and admits that he actually had not heard of KOCH, until he
read a review for their album a few weeks ago.
Since Wojtek Lisicki, their guitarist, is the one that writes all the music and
for the most part, all of the lyrics, the band’s line-up changes haven’t had a
huge impact, but he did point out that their music has evolved over the years.
“Since we’re not teenagers any more, we’ve been playing for quite a while and
we’ve been listening to metal for fifteen years or something like that. And,
when we grew up, when we were teenagers, we listened to all the classic heavy
metal of the eighties and we were brought up in this era and we got the spirit
for it. So, some of the material on this album is actually since the early
nineties, but, of course, it’s been rearranged and worked on a lot since then.”
While the band may have taken a few breaks along the way, including a jaunt to
Los Angeles for schooling at the Musician’s Institute. Their true love for the
music brought them to where they are today, and they are quite pleased with how
people are responding.
Martin says, “I think that the reason it sounds the way it does is because it’s
been evolving, ripening in a long process. We haven’t tried to sound like anyone
in particular. We always focused on making our music sound as we felt it sound.”
He added, “Wojtek and I started the band Highlander in 1990, he and I are the
only original members, who have always been in it. He’s always been there
writing the music and I’ve always been there building the band, and we had a lot
of other musicians in it throughout the years. But, it’s felt like we have been
playing with this band only for ten years. And finally, we were getting
somewhere, because in the early years, we had no plans at all trying to get
ourselves a record deal. We only played this music, because it was the kind of
music we wanted to play, we only did it for fun and for the pure love of the
music.”
While there has been an explosion of metal in Europe, almost to the point where
it is difficult to differentiate one from the other, mainstream video and radio
is still flooded with various types of pop music, leaving no room for metal. So,
when it comes to radio, Furangen says, “I pretty much never turn on the radio.
That’s pretty sad actually...”
But, Furangen and the rest of the band members have been very pleased with the
response amongst metal fans on the Web and elsewhere, and their initial album
sales in Europe. “It seems to be it’s either really great or it’s really the
opposite. We seem to be the kind of band that you either really like or really
hate.”
He says that the band does hope to come to the US, and as far as current tour
plans go, they are confirmed to play at the Wacken Open Air Festival the second
week of August in Germany and also intend to tour Europe in September.
Please visit Lost Horizon's Web site at:
www.oncelosthorizon.com |
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