Morose - INTERVIEW

Morose prioritize feeling instead of reaching out.

It was a friday evening when I got the opportunity to meet with Moroes at a minimal thai food-shack in a thawing Stockholm. I found 4 cheerful guys squeezed in at a table enjoying surprisingly (thinking of the shack) well smelling food. William (drums), Pontus (guitar), Adam (song), Sebastian (bass) and Andreas (guitar) is all five elements of Morose. Andreas is unfortunately not attending during the interview.

Everybody played in Hero Rescue Squad before Morose right?

William: No, not seb.

Oh, Seb is in the band?

William: Yeah, He started about two months ago?
Pontus: As bass player
Sebastian: Three
Pontus: And I went over to play the guitar instead!
William: So Andreas herem well he's not here but..
Pontus: He's "sick", he's playing WOW.
William: yeh..
Pontus: The whole band is playing WOW. It's a big disadvantage for us as a band. It affects our rehearsal times.

What happened to Hero Rescue Squad? Why did you form Morose instead?

Pontus: Should I take this one?
William: Go ahead
Pontus: Haha okay *Almost awkward silence* We split up because of people having different interests and...
William: It was mostly because our guitarist Per quit because he didn't like the same kind of music as us and after that we couldn't keep going. So we just kept going on our own.
Pontus: And at the same time our singer, Olle quit too so..

How does your writing process work?

Pontus: We have a producer who writes everything for us..*harr harr*
*everybody laguhs*
Adam: Yeah, his name is Pontus La...

The same as Amy Diamond?

Everyone: Yeah, exactly.
Adam: Isn't it mostly you, Pontus, who write all the guitar riffs at home and then you bring them to rehearsal.
Pontus: Yeah.
William: Yeah, and then me and Pontus try to put it together with drums.
William: We finish it and then we "teach" seb and Andreas and after 20 minutes Adam puts on the song
All: And then we're done..hehe..
Pontus: Song doesn't have very much space is our writing... 

So it's not so much thought behind the lyrics?

Pontus: Well of course it's much thought behind them but..
Adam: I write the lyrics before I get to rehearsal.

What do write about? What inspires you?

Adam: It's mostly anger... and hate... haha.



What is your ambitions? How far do you wanna go?

Pontus: I think you said a good thing about that before *points at William*
William: Huh? What did I say?
Pontus: When someone voluntarily listen to our songs and thinks "this is pretty fucking good". Then we are satisfied.
All: Yep, that's it.
Sebastian: But we want to reach as far as possible without becoming a sellout.
All: Yes, of course.
Sebastian: We dont have like big ambitions to reach out and spread out music.
William: No we don't do any of that.
Pontus: We're not super productive but we're not a product either.

What is it that makes you want to keep writing?

William: Pontus. haha. 

The only one not playing WOW?

William: No he's the worst.
Pontus: Nah, we can't figure out something else to do.
William: It's a great pastime.
Pontus: No, but seriously. All of us live for music and it's a great way to express one self.

Yes. It feels like music for you guys is more than just being in a band. It's more like a life style?

All: Yes. It's a combination of many things.
Sebastian: It's a way to hang out.
Pontus: It's also a will to be creative and I want to do something that I feel is good.

I have listened some to the new songs on myspace and what I heard was that the songs tend to go up and down a bit in "feeling" and tempo. First kind of hard and much rage but in the middle of the songs it cools off a bit.

All: We work much with contrasts. We want to keep it that way to make different parts of the song more effectful.
Sebastian: I've noticed it gives good results on stage. The crowd notices it too.

 

Yeah. Hero Rescue Squad was more straight-forward compared to Morose.

William: We went from trying to make it as hard as possible to just write and play with feeling instead.
Pontus: Especially when me and wille put drums and guitar together we work much with how it feels.

What do you call your genre?

Pontus: It's hard to say but...
Sebastian: Emotional melodious hardcore
Pontus: Right now we're in a phase where we experiment much so it might switch. But right now we're mostly "emotional melodious hardcore".

What are you doing the last 10 minutes before walking on stage?

All: Taking a piss. Atleast six times.
Adam: Taking a dump. Last gig I really regret I didn't.
William: You don't want to wet yourself in front of the crowd!
Sebastian: I've always been so busy so I haven't really thought about it.
Pontus: No but it's mostly trying to focus and keeping calm.
Adam: And we've learned from our mistakes. We can't like pep up before going on stage because then we will play the songs 10 times faster than we should.
Pontus: Yeah, like our first gig. All songs were as long as one song usually is.
William: What was the question again?

What are you doing 10 minutes before walking on stage?

William: Oh right. I'm always so damn nervous. I hate to gig. The 10 minutes before going on stage is horrific.
Adam: Conclusion: We try to keep calm and visit the bathroom.
William: I also smoke two minutes before going on. But that's just me.
William: And we also decide setlist 10 minutes before! It's always so unclear. You can ask anyone in the band and they'll tell you a different order.
Adam: I never know the setlist because no one ever tells me anything.

 
When are you going to gig next?

William: We have a huge break now.. But in spring mabye.
Pontus: We're going to have a break to just write new songs.
Adam: And then we have a tour this summer.

Oh, Where?

Pontus: Sweden tour together with Medea ( http://www.myspace.com/medeasthlm ) and eventually Inherent Youth ( http://www.myspace.com/inherentyouthhc )

Where more exactly are you going to play?

William: Southern sweden, What is the city called way down south?
Sebastian: Lund.
William: Yes Lund! Some places between Lund and Falun.
Pontus: About ten gigs.

Sounds fun!

All: yes
William: But's it going to be a living hell.
Pontus: Ah, yes. By the way. We noticed that we're not going to be able to use the car roof box. So we can't even bring a tent.
William: Then we all have to sleep in the car then.
Pontus: Nine seats. Yeah. As you can see we have no budget.

It's going to be the summer vacation for you guys.

Pontus: So to you who reads the interview. We need somewhere to crash after each gig!
Sebastian: But aren't there these "couch-jumpers" in sweden? Couch buddys or whatever it's called. I think there is some kind of homepage where you can search for beds.

What are you influences?

Pontus: I'm mostly influenced by all the local bands there is in Stockholm. But also other bands too of course. For example More Than Life, Defeater and a little of everything.

What do you listen to? Like just for relaxing etc?

William: Everything. But it's not what influence me. I don't really listen to the kind of music we play.
Sebastian: Me neither. I kind of listen to Bon Iver, José González...
William: HAHA. You have to browse your phone to figure out what you listen to?
Sebastian: Mnjah. I just browse a little. Oh yeah I listen much to emo rock too.

What radio channel to you listen to?

Pontus: P3
William: P3
Adam: P3

So what are you going to work on tonight then?

All: We are going to play WOW.

I meant on the band practice...

All: Band practice?
Pontus: Hahah. No but we're going to rehearse a new song.
Sebastian: We are going to go through some of the new stuff we are working on.

http://www.myspace.com/morosesthlm
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Morose/129530487071486

Pictures from Facebook by Louise Clysén Lindgren

Viktor Gustafsson