On a cold December evening, me and my best friend descended on Manchester, England to attend a gig with a line up I couldn't believe when I first heard about it; SABATON, supported by TYR and KORPIKLAANI. And we had the honour to interview Gunnar "Guns" Thomsen (Bass) from TYR. We were booked to interview Heri Joensen (Vocals/Guitar), but we were told he was feeling a bit under the weather, but we got an interview none the less.

So, it was great having the opportunity to interview a member from a hardworking and very talented metal band. We also said a quick "hi" passing by the singer of KORPIKLAANI, sadly no chance to interview him either.

But we were looking forward to the show, and too right because it was a cracking show. TYR sounded excellent, they put on an amazing show and it surprised me how well they sang, since live sound can do a number on someone's voice, either the singer has been touring a lot and his voice is damaged and/or the sound hasn't been mixed very well, but well done to both the sound guys and TYR for an excellent show and I highly recommend seeing TYR whenever you get the chance, because they will not disappoint.
 

Setlist:

1. Blood of Heroes
2. Hold the Heathen Hammer High
3. Grindavísan
4. Tróndur Í Gøtu
5. Mare of My Night
6. By the Sword in My Hand
7. Sinklars Vísa
8. Lady of the Slain
9. Shadow of the Swastika

Now, I do wish I could give the same praise to KORPIKLAANI that I did for TYR but given I'm not really a fan of KORPIKLAANI I wasn't exactly looking forward to them. Don't get me wrong, they're a great band, with great stage presence but I honestly found their set very boring. It was mostly down to the fact the sound wasn't mixed well, which is odd given TYR had a great sound, but they're two different bands, so both have different sounds anyway. You could barely hear the vocals, the guitars were a little too quiet and they were a little too samey for my enjoyment, but given the crowd reactions, I'm pretty sure other people enjoyed them, so that's good at least.
 

Setlist:

1. Tuonelan tuvilla
2. Ruumiinmultaa
3. Juodaan viinaa (Hector cover)
4. Petoelaimen Kuola
5. Sumussa hämärän aamun
6. Sahti
7. Vodka
8. Ievan polkka
9. Rauta

And finally, the awesome SABATON! Boy was I looking forward to seeing these guys. It was my 3^rd time seeing them and they never disappoint and I was right. As expected, they put on an excellent show; they had great crowd interaction, as Joakim (Vocals) tends to do. He even got one of the crowd members to choose the next song, simply because that fan was following them around the UK, so hats off to him and hats off to Joakim, one of the best frontmen I've ever seen.
 

One thing I loved about seeing SABATON is they know how to get the crowd going, as they opened with a fan favourite, "Ghost Division" which got the crowd going immediately. Followed by "To Hell and Back" which both me and my mate assumed would be a fan favourite and we saw we were right as we watched the crowd jump up and down to the chorus along to that catchy, folky melody.
 

They also added some songs to the set list, like "Swedish Pagans" and they even let the crowd choose to hear the Swedish or English version of "The Carolean's Prayer" and that's one thing that will make SABATON bigger and bigger; they let the crowds choose the songs, plus the incredible song writing and hard work that goes into SABATON. We can foresee them becoming one of those default bands, like METALLICA, a band that newbie metalheads get into when they first listen to metal music, and damn do they deserve that level of recognition. My advice? Go see SABATON whenever you get the chance, they will not disappoint you.
 

Setlist:

Intro: The Final Countdown (Europe song), The March to War

1.         Ghost Division
2.         To Hell and Back
3.         Carolus Rex (English version)
4.         40:1
5.         Gott Mit Uns (Swedish version)
6.         Soldier of 3 Armies
7.         The Art of War
8.         7734
9.         Far from the Fame
10.       The Carolean's Prayer (Swedish Version)
11.       Swedish Pagans
12.       Attero Dominatus
13.       Resist and Bite
14.       White Death

Encore:

15.       Night Witches
16.       Primo Victoria
17.       Metal Crüe

Hello, I'm Luke from Metal Temple and today we'll be interviewing Guns from Tyr. So, thank you for taking the time to let us interview you and first off, we wanted to speak to you about the most recent album, "Valkyrja". What was the inspiration and story behind this album? Even the name why that name?

The whole name thing, that's something we already had, and we already had some songs that included that name and the whole theme [of the album] was based on that; we wanted to do an album based on women.

Well, we can tell by the album cover, given the woman on the front.

I was wondering if the whole Viking theme came naturally to you, given you're Scandinavian?

Yeh, that came totally by accident. That's a natural thing for us. We were kinda taught when we were kids to sing those old, traditional songs which had been carried from mouth to mouth. So, we just mixed it into the music, and there you go.

It makes for interesting listening.

Yeah, yeah it does. But it's also music. If you study it as music, it gets extremely complicated but doesn't sound complicated, but there's some really weird things in there.

So, with the whole Viking theme of the band, would you say you're a practicing Heathen? Or do you simply have an extensive knowledge on the subject?

Oh, not at all. We've been called Pagans and what not, but I can only speak for myself and I don't believe in anything really, I just leave it at that. I'm totally fine with whatever people believe, whatever makes them happy. Although, I should say we would probably be better off not believing in anything. It would be a more peaceful place, I think.

Believe in yourself is what I say. So, what were the early days like for the band? You said you were in it from the beginning, so was it a fast start; a slow start?

It was slow. We really have been doing all that work that has to be done to get to where we are now. We did some music and we basically went out and tried to play it as much as possible. We tried to evolve, to see what direction we wanted to go, what worked, what didn't work. We did a lot of those kinds of things. And we released our first album, and first single called "Ormurin Langi" which was the first traditional number we ever did and that became number 1 in Iceland, and it took us by surprise.

And that's very interesting for a starting out band as well.

Yeah, and if you listen to the album, and the sound was not happening at all. But whatever, it was the first album.

Yeah, it was early days.

So, we kind of went on from there, I guess. But we went to Iceland and did a lot of playing there and we kept on going there for a while.

Well its good see your hard work paying off.

Yeh, and we went to Germany and we got to know the best news and know more and more people you work with, and it kind of evolves from there. It's hard work, but believe me, it's a lot fun. It's hard but fun.

Well that's the kind of thing you want to look for in this kind of job, you've got to find it fun at least.

Yeah, or I don't see why you should do it.

I noticed the song "Hold the Heathen Hammer High" was huge years ago; did that open many doors for you?

Yeah, well actually that album did and that track was a hit from the first day. Everybody sang it when we played it live and even the bands we toured with did. It was kind of strange, it's a catchy track.

So, how long have you been in the UK so far?

We have 10 dates, I think we have here and we've already played most of it. And we did 2 shows in Ireland.

So, how has the UK treated you? How have you experienced it?

It's a little bit different from place to place, because we had some headlining, and co-headlining shows in between, when Sabaton actually have days off, we do shows. And we did a show in London and that was absolutely fantastic show. Now that was great but other places have a good reaction but a little bit heavy crowd. You have to work them up to that YEAH, but it comes there eventually, but it's also to be expected because we haven't done that much around here, especially the northern parts, so you have to work at it. The first time around it's gonna feel a little bit heavy, but that does not mean people don't like it. I know with our music that people tend to listen, instead of going YEAH!

I've heard that some people see you as more progressive metal in some way, obviously Viking themed, but Viking themed Progressive Metal. Would you agree with that? Because with Progressive metal, you kind of need to listen to it more than simply head bang to it.

I never thought of us as Progressive Metal anyway, but early days I guess. But now, we actually have simplified things, you could call it sell out, I don't know, I don't care but if you want to stay in this business, you need to get as a big an audience as possible and if you can do that and still remain Tyr, then have a go at that too, then you can go on and do whatever you wanna do.

Well, thank you very much for taking the time to let us interview you and we look forward to the show.

Anytime.