Actually...
A short look back at making the new CD by Roine Stolt:
After being involved with the production and release of "Meet The Flowerkings"
DVD that came out in October last year(2003) it was quite a difficult task to come up
with a new and fresh idea for a new studio album concept, so I think I just said to
myself "let's start by writing songs" and then see where it takes us.
After all, the songs have always been the foundation of all Flower Kings music
recordings or performances, even if we lately have had the chance of working with
some fine musicians that can certainly groove and improvise as well.
To make a slight change I decided to mainly work with just an old nylon stringed
acoustic guitar and a pocket memory mp3 recorder. This provided some real scaled
down writing, I mean there were no big fat synth chords to impress or no electric guitar
or drum loop to hide behind. Just me, my voice and the guitar.
Still I found this "simple" way of working out songs very rewarding
and I came up with more music than I've done in a long time, some of it you
can find on the new CD "Adam & Eve" and some more will surely
see the day on possible solo projects of mine.
It is always hard, or I'd say impossible, to come up with totally fresh
and different sounding music.
Well it is still me writing and I guess I have, by now sort of, defined
my writing style and standards, regardless if it is for the FlowerKings,
Transatlantic or Kaipa.
I know what I like and what I want to achieve and I know my standards
are set high and I know my self criticism is sometimes
painful, but I get the job done.
I started writing for the new CD in October and after finishing a
FlowerKings European tour supporting the DVD release
I just did continue writing music and words in the same simplistic
manner, I did a few rough demos of the songs in a slightly more developed
fashion and sent it out to the other guys and then left for Costa Rica
with my family for 3 weeks.
In January we did meet in Jonas Reingold's Studio to hammer out a few
background tracks, the songs we picked should match the profile we have
decided on for the album, meaning they should be clearly recognizable as
FlowerKings tunes, but still contain new elements, if possible.
Well, you always try to come up with sensational things, don't you ?
But I've come to realize that for me the sensation lies more in the feeling
or the "soul" of the songs, than the complexity of odd meters or
the impossible or possibly "fiddly bits" or the production tricks.
Music is a strange bird isn't it ? We cannot exactly put the finger on what
it is that makes us go "wow" or what makes our hearts beat faster.
It's almost like love....!
I do trust that feeling and can only hope other people feel the same as I do.
Of course a minimal dose of speculation or constructual guidance is needed
to keep away from doing the same music over and over. I hope we don't ?
At least it seems that the strenght of Flowerkings is that we always try
to re-invent ourselves in a way so that the fans can get a feeling that we
or on our way to something new, unexpected and we wanna take you there, but
still keep enough of the great old Flower Kings vibe so it feels familiar.
We kept it very much open so that any tune we felt was a good tune could find
it's place on this CD, however specificly we looked for symphonic pieces with
strong melody as for the core material.
We felt no need to dive deeper into the jazz fusion thing we've been doing on
and off previously, because we're not really that type of band as a whole,
some of us dig jazz, blues and fusion but rather put it into our side projects,
instead wanted to concentrate on good symphonic and melodic stuff, where
every aspect of the band could shine.
I had this great epic tune "Love Supreme" that I've been working
with and was very pleased with and I had a few very cool vocal harmony ideas
for Hasse, Daniel andmyself for that one, the lyrics was also important
for that song and I was very pleased with that whole concept.
Starting to work on that one and a few other classic prog ideas felt
very good and I could see the other bandmembers gradually getting more
enthusiastic about the bulk of material and we got to the point where
everyone was feeling "we are making a good record here ".
"Vampires View" is a sort of bolero style dramatic song that felt
like a new approach, almost like from a musical, I'm sure it's gonna be
great live, a bit depressing but also very romantic.
"Adam & Eve" was another song that stood out as a somewhat
heavier song but still with a FK twist, built on riffs and an attitude.
"Cosmic Circus" has a late jingle jangle 60's feel to it and has
echoes of both Beatles and the San Francisco flowerpower movement.
We worked on one of Jonas songs that had a trashy metallic intro that
went into a vocal Lennon like section that didn't quite work out 100%
satisfactory, so I later re-wrote the whole vocal section and added new
lyrics and melody, but still over Zoltans old drumtrack, quite funny and
a bit strange, it ended up being "Timelines".
We worked for a week tracking drums mostly, now all in 24 bit digital for
Emagic Logic Audio on macinosh as usual and then I went back home to write
some more. I then wrote "Drivers Seat", another one of the epic
songs, a song that has both a sort of Swedish folk music theme and also a
classic prog theme.
Also "The blade of Cain" is a powerful thing that was from the
beginning a ending instrumental piece of the Adam & Eve song the we
lifted out, but now it worked perfect as a album closer instead, very
majestic.
Lyricwise I did work quite fast and most of the lyrics were written way
before we even started recording, some of it was actually written in Costa
Rica at the otherworldly beach or strolling around with the kid notebook.
"Love Supreme" is a song about the search for the ultimate love,
meaning a love that trancend, goes far beyond woman or man or family members,
or even the human race. If you search and learn enough about the complexities
of our environment and how all elements, plants, animals and humans work, or
should work, in harmony with each other, you can begin to see the perfection
and the unity, it's all very beautiful and a delicate balance to behold.
Some call it "God", by different names in different regions, and
some call it "the great spirit" or "the great mother"
or whatever, It is likely to all mean the same.
"Cosmic Circus" is also a song about the wonders and mysteries of
life, but also the confusion as it is not always easy to understand what is
going on and why bad and good things happen or fall on our plate.
We question the right or wrong and how to find one's specific role in
this cosmic circus. Much of what surface in the world politics and the global
schemes tend to be nonsence but the next minute it suddenly fall into it's
right place, mysteriously. History can teach us great lessons, but some refuse
to see it. Sometimes we watch, sometimes we go with the flow, sometimes we
wrestle to get out and sometimes we just stand still stare in awe.
"A Vampires View" is obviousy a song about the world, seen from a
Vampire point of view, a bit inspired by Anne Rice's "Confession of a
Vampire". It is telling a gloomy story of a very sad and isolated soul
that is forced live in the darkness, feeding on the blood, flesh or soul of
others and hate every minute of it, but can't get out and cannot see an end
to the grind either. A Smeagol or Gollum if you want or a Zombie too.
At the same time, in parallel, it is a song about a possible "bloodsucker",
a successful businessman or an entire empire or political system that have to walk
over dead bodies to increace his/it's profits or power, finding himself loved
and missed by no one in the end, isolated in a sinister world of profit and
corruption only. It is indeed lonely at the top.
"Adam & Eve" is a song about the complexity and difference of
male and female sexuality and views of how the society, now more than ever,
exploit sexuality in all shape and form, on daily basis, in magazines or TV
or on the internet, in books or in shops. You can almost sell everything if
you do it with a sex twist, big or small. It occupies our brains heavily, or
at least at some point, day or night, on and off. No one goes free of lust,
not priests, nor presidents. When lust dies mankind dies. It is the spark of
life but also a shameful thing for the moralists.
Adam & Eve is just fictious figures in this song, it has nothing to do
with the Bible's Adam & Eve. They cannot live together and they cannot
live apart, as God had put an incurably urge to bread in Adams brain to secure
the existence of the human race for all generations to come. Adam loves sex and
need it badly to feel alive, but Eve want to be loved for different reason, they
do not understand each other, they play a tiresome game that leave a lot to be
desired for both of them.
"Starlight Man" is about love, friendship, holding out a helping hand
and the ultimate power of kindness, the great boomerang of LOVE. But also about
enlightenment. The "starlight man" can be our parents offering us
protection or our teacher opening our eyes to hidden knowledge or a spiritual
leader or even someone who create great music or art that makes us feel alive
and in that way helping opening up our senses.
"Timelines" is a song that deal with time and to come to terms with
time passing and how time, bit by bit, change us outside and inside and all
that surround us. Nothing is constant, everything is changing and everything
is in development.
We get hurt, we learn, we suffer and "no facelift will cover the scars"
but even the wrinkles or scars can be beautiful if we accept changes as a part of
life. We get older, our kids grow older, our parents will pass away some day,
so will we. It is all a journey & we cannot stop time, all we can do is sit
back and relax or hopefully we can fill our time with some significant substance.
What we call a "meaning of Life". We can make some noise. We can send
out good vibes and get a few back.
"Drivers Seat" is a song that is about the need, or the option to take
control over our own lives and shaping it carefully to our own liking, if possible
instead of being faithful to all the companies or corporations that try to sell
us a "lifestyle complete". We are normally so manipulated by the great
flow of influences that the media shower us in every day life and there is always
someone out there who want us to subscribe to a new lifestyle or to wear some new
clothes or to eat a certain brand of food or try a new better toothpaste or such.
Some people simply follow the rest, or go with the flow, because it is a path of
less resistance. Some others go deeper into themselves and ask what can be done
and what their heart tell them would be the right thing. So in a way we can, to
some degree, create and maintain our own little universes without causing any,
or little, damage to our surroundings.
I often get the question if my lyrics are religious, I'd be tempted to say
"yes" to that, because there lies a religious experience hiding in
how we can create magic in real life. Religion is probably the science we long
to subscribe to as of learning of a higher existance where the universal machinery
reach a point of outermost harmony....puh.
In short a religion is a handbook of well being, so it's not really that mysterious.
When we see ourselves as participants of the big schemes or "links in the chain
reaction" or dominoes or whatever, we then realise we can make a change and
we can get rewarded with joy and peace or further enlightenment, it IS a reality
IF we want it to be.
My lyrics deal with all that and it is a religion in a way, all that you'll find
in the 10 commandments resonate very fine with all that I believe and proclaim.
The title of the CD was initially meant to be named after the opening song
"Love Supreme" but we altered it to Adam & Eve because it did
better fit our ideas of artwork and our plans for all stage shows and all of
the total art and package idea.
Adam&Eve was more suitable as a concept, as all lyrics could relate to the
Man/Woman, Light/Darkness, Hot/Cold, Day/Night, Love/Hate, Apathy/Devotion etc.
No one entity can exist without the other.
As for the music, we've tried to work with even more dynamics for this recoding.
There is however nothing groundbreaking on this CD but we wouldn't like it to be
"groundbreaking" just for the sake of being"groundbreaking".
Many others try to do more extreme music, but for us in this time of life we only
try to make music that create a feeling of well being or something that is powerful
enough to lift you up, fuel your spirit and get ready for the day or make you groove
to the beat with lyrics that will hopefully make your head spin with good thoughts.
If music put you in a good mood & you feel good you will most certainly do us
a BIG, BIG favour, namely ; you will treat your fellow humans good! That's again
the great boomerang of LOVE!!
I thought that listening to a new Flowerkings record should feel like coming home,
but the furniture has been changed just a bit, or the walls repainted or fitted
with new wallpaper. Strange and exciting wallpaper that is !!!
We feel no need to show the fans or other musicians that we can do something
exceptionally difficult or to play a thousand notes or rock real hard or be weird
for weird's sake just to show off or impress the fans.
I think that, by now, we have established a good devoted and faithful fanbase that
will follow us for a long time to come and now we only hope to see many new fans
discovering the band, hopefully outside of the progressive rock circles too.
We know we can do it, with so much talent within the band and so much love from
you fans. It sometimes feels like there is some kind of otherworldly force outside
of all the band that drag this project along and fuel it with new powers constantly,
I'm amazed how things happen the way they do and how so much great music energy
seem to surround The Flower Kings, just look at sideprojects.....wow!!
I wouldn't be surprised to find out, after I'm dead and gone, that I wasn't the
"real" boss of this band. Being a messenger isn't bad after all.
It's great being here and I'm still amazed how much we've achieved lately in terms
of quality music and good vibes and great memories. Just going back to the Swedish
tour a few weeks ago it was a great uplifting experience after working so hard with
the album.
Future plans include a new European tour in October where we will use a customized
light design and screen projections for the first time. We're gonna play a lot from
the new album and the rest will be ONLY songs we never played before. I'm very excited
about this.
We will then start working on a new DVD that will include a live recording of our
most popular shorter songs that didn't make it on to "Meet The Flowerkings".
We'll try to do: There is More To this World, Church of your Heart, The Flower King,
Last Minute on Earth, Retropolis, Train To Nowhere, I Am The Sun, Road To Sanctuary,
My Cosmic Lover, Compassion and maybe some medley of other songs. We have so many
songs to pick from. It will also contain interviews in english, biographies,
photo galleries.
Later we will start working on next studio album, we have a bit of a new work approach
to this CD, but I can't reveal details yet. In the meantime different bandmembers will
be releasing a diversity of solo albums or side projects, like The Tangent 2, Kaipa, Tomas
Bodins -Swedish Family, Daniel Gildenlow (Pain Of Salvation) the orchestral CD "BE"
and myself will try doing a few things as solo recordings with different cast.
We also hope to come to USA and Central America on tour beginning of next year and we
really would love to come back to Japan for a few shows. It sure is a busy time for all
of us and I guess we are blessed to actually have all these fantastic visions and projects
to be realized in our liftime.
Roine Stolt
July 3rd 2004.
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