METAL-ZEN

It’s a good thing Andromeda keyboardist Martin Hedin is a patient man with a great sense of humor. In my effort to coordinate the six-hour time difference between Eastern Standard Time and Sweden – plus do so using the 24-hour (military time) convention – I miscalculated by an hour. When I finally called Martin’s home, he was already gone. As Homer would say, “D’oh!”

Apologizing profusely, I rescheduled. And this time, I checked, double-checked, and triple-checked to make sure I had the time correct. Thankfully, I did.

I thoroughly enjoyed my wide-ranging interview with Martin Hedin, which took place on April 26, 2008.

In a subsequent e-mail, Martin included an attachment with this note, “These are pictures from Progpower scandinavia last autumn. Photo by Daniel Andersson. Hope you can use some of these!” Indeed I can. And did. Thanks, Martin!

Enjoy!

MH: Hello?

BM: Is this Martin?

MH: Yes, it is.

BM: Hi, this is Bill Murphy.

MH: Hey, Bill. [laughs] Finally.

BM: Yeah, I wasn’t going to blow it this time. [laughs]

MH: [laughs] Exactly.

BM: Thank you very much. I deeply apologize for yesterday.

MH: Well, that’s nothing. To be quite honest, I had forgotten it too. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Well yeah, to tell you the truth, I know that happens, because [another musician] forgot my interview when I called him the first time. [laughs] He just wasn’t there.

MH: Oh really? [laughs]

BM: [laughs] So I know it happens. I just hate it when it happens to me.

MH: [laughs]

BM: So thank you very much for your time today. I really appreciate it. It’s great to talk to you.

MH: Yeah, thanks.

BM: I don’t know if you read any of my previous ProgPower interviews, but I like to ask about entire careers, not just the most recent album. So for all of the people who haven’t heard of you before, this interview ought to be a good place to start. It’ll give them a chance to get to know you.

MH: Yeah.

BM: And get to know you as a musician, and not just the band.

MH: Yeah.

BM: This past week, a thought occurred to me. You said in an e-mail that you have a couple of little kids who always get colds every time they go out the door. [laughs]

MH: [laughs] That’s true.

BM: Are they old enough to appreciate the stuff you do? Do they listen to your music?

MH: [laughs] Well, my daughter is three, and she likes Andromeda. She mostly likes Thomas [Lejon] playing, she is always saying that “Thomas is playing a lot of drums.”

BM: [laughs]

MH: “Thomas plays a lot of drums.” And that’s true. [laughs]

BM: Is her name Aila? Is that it?

MH: Aila, yeah, that’s true.

BM: In your liner notes to Chimera, you wrote, “My little daughter Aila for proving this record works as a lullaby.”

MH: Yeah, well, that was when she was a baby. So we did Chimera, and I sat there and I mixed for hours and hours, and I was trying to make her sleep and she wouldn’t sleep. And when I started to mix all that metal music, she fell asleep somehow. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] That’s great.

MH: I don’t know if that’s a complement or I don’t know what, how to interpret that. [laughs]

BM: The bio for you on the Andromeda site seems to indicate that you are what we call a prodigy. I mean, if you exhibited musical interest at the age of two and you were composing your own or playing it at least, at four, do your kids, especially Aila, do you see the same kind of musical interest in them that you had as a kid?

MH: Yeah, I can’t stop it. We’ve said that many times, me and my wife, but we haven’t done anything to make her, like, be into music or anything, but it just comes naturally. I don’t know. She, right now she is singing all the songs from Sound of Music. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: I’m a bit fed up with it. [laughs] But still, she’s three and she loves it.

BM: Wow.

MH: Yeah. That’s pretty cool.

BM: So I guess that answers the question nature vs. nurture. I mean, somehow the music is innate in her, just like it was in you.

MH: Yeah, I think so. I mean, of course it’s probably inevitable that she would be interested in music because my wife is also into music. But still, so much comes naturally, that we are amazed.

BM: [laughs]

MH: [laughs] I don’t know about the prodigy stuff, though.

BM: Well, I don’t know too many other people that at the age of four are creating their own music. [laughs]

MH: Well, it certainly sounds good to say that, but if you would listen to the music I created… [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: I don’t know.

BM: According to a lot of the questions posted on forums and whatnot, it looks like fans are eager for Andromeda four. Are you guys pretty far along in that? Can they expect an album soon?

MH: Yeah, I know it. Actually, the album has been ready for a couple of months already, but we’re in between labels, and we’re trying to sort that out. [Andromeda just signed with Lance King’s Nightmare Records label and is scheduled to release The Immunity Zone on September 16, 2008]. We’re trying to be promoted as good as possible, and we also want it to be out before we play at ProgPower in Atlanta. And so it’s kind of nervous right now what will happen. [laughs]

BM: Yeah.

MH: Anyway, that’ll all change, I mean, when people read this interview, it will all be sorted out, hopefully, the album will be out. But right now, we actually don’t know which label we will be with.

BM: So you’re sort of shopping it around to different labels?

MH: Yeah, exactly.

BM: Have you gotten any bites?

MH: We are kind of shopping it around.

BM: Well, the good scenario would be if it does come out before ProgPower, but if it doesn’t, will you still play some of the new material at ProgPower?

MH: Yeah, that’s the question. We’ve been talking about that. We actually, we were playing in Moscow a few months ago, and we were discussing then to play some new material. But it somehow didn’t happen because we thought like, “Oh, they have never heard it.” And one song is like eight minutes of strange music they’ve never heard before. I don’t know.

BM: [laughs]

MH: [laughs] So we didn’t do it then, but we’re kind of anxious to kind of start to play it live also, because it’s a different thing than to just record the songs. And we have actually, we haven’t played any of the songs from the fourth album live yet. So I can’t make any promises, but I would really, personally, I would really like us to play even if the album is not out.

BM: Oh yeah. Well, it’s a great thing to have you part of ProgPower this year. Congratulations on being part of the lineup.

MH: Yeah, thanks. It’s going to be a lot of fun. [laughs]

BM: How did that come about? Did Glenn call you or email you, or how did you get to be a part of ProgPower? And what did you guys think when you found out you were?

MH: I don’t remember, because I wasn’t the one contacted. I don’t actually know the story behind it there, but of course, when we were confirmed there, it was a great feeling. I mean, we’ve never been over to the States, so yeah, it’s going to be very, very exciting. And we were talking about maybe planning some other gigs.

BM: In the States?

MH: Yeah, while we’re over there. But nothing is set yet.

BM: Well, for people who, let’s say, aren’t familiar with Andromeda, maybe haven’t seen your DVD [Playing Off the Board, what can audiences expect from you guys? And don’t say, like you did on the DVD answers, “A high energy, kick-ass show.” [laughs]

MH: [laughs] I’m not allowed to say that?

BM: No. That’s a given. [laughs]

MH: Ok. Yeah, then I don’t know what I would say. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Ok, well, we’ll skip that one.

MH: That’s pretty much what you can expect. No, you can expect a good variety of songs. We always tried to balance our shows, so yeah, little of this, little of that, a few songs from every album.

BM: Oh, that’d be good.

MH: Yeah. And yeah, I don’t know. We don’t actually perform them exactly as they are on the record, maybe. Johan [Reinholdz, guitarist] tends to improvise his solos, and we’ve rearranged some things, but yeah.

BM: Yeah. Are there other bands on the ProgPower lineup that you’re looking forward to seeing as well?

MH: Yeah, actually I haven’t, I’m not really aware of which bands are playing there yet. I haven’t looked into it yet. But are all the bands confirmed?

BM: Oh yeah. Right now, we’ve got Amorphis, Riverside, Iron Savior, Elvenking, Pathosray, Iced Earth, Jon Oliva’s Pain, Mustasch, Rob Rock, Spheric Universe Experience, and Saint Deamon.

MH: Yeah.

BM: Yeah.

MH: Actually, it might sound strange, I hope people don’t take this as an insult, but the only band I recognize there is Mustasch. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Is it really?

MH: Yeah, really. I’m not really…I don’t really listen to prog. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Well, two things about that: Mustasch is the one band in the lineup that most of us aren’t that familiar with, and it’s the one band in the lineup that you are.

MH: Yeah, it just happens that I’ve heard of them. What I listen to is mostly what, I just happened to hear them and some friend just happened to have an album. And I start to listen. It’s not like I am, like I actively search new people to listen to. It just happens.

BM: Well, the fact that you don’t listen to prog all the time really isn’t that different from other musicians like yourself. I think you draw more inspiration from other forms of music and then apply is to prog.

MH: Yeah, maybe. Of course I listen to prog, but not maybe the scene like, how do you say, I listen mostly to ‘70s prog like Genesis and Yes.

BM: Oh yeah, that’s great stuff.

MH: Yeah, it is. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: Otherwise I wouldn’t be listening to it. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] What do you think of Rick Wakeman, then?

MH: Yeah, he’s great.

BM: Yeah, yeah.

MH: I wish I could play like that. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Well, one of the things about prog in the ‘70s though, back then, all the critics said, “Oh, this is bombastic, flamboyant, purposeless, pointless.” They just hated it. But now, when you look at it, you think, “Wow, these guys were great musicians. And who cares if it was bombastic?”

MH: Yeah, well at the same time, I think they had a lot of fans back then too. But it is a little like you say, that they are appreciated afterwards.

BM: Well, when you guys are at ProgPower, or any concerts, really, do you like to sort of hang out and chat with the fans before or after your set?

MH: Yeah, we always do that. I mean, that’s the point.

BM: Yeah, cool.

MH: To meet the fans, and not just to perform and then, I don’t know, go to the hotel or something.

BM: [laughs]

MH: That would be boring. We always hang out afterwards, and well, Andromeda is quite a party band, actually. [laughs]

BM: Really. [laughs]

MH: I don’t know if you’ve seen the bonus material on the DVD?

BM: Yeah, yeah. [laughs]

MH: It’s kind of, [laughs] yeah, gives a little hint.

BM: Yeah. Well, one of the questions that I saw you guys, when I watched the interviews on the bonus material, is this question seems to irritate you guys. You’re compared a lot to Dream Theater.

MH: Ah.

BM: [laughs] And the look on your face.

MH: No, I’m not irritated, I think I handled that question pretty well on the DVD. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Yeah, I could tell. Both of you guys had faces that just said, “Uh, yeah, well Dream Theater.”

MH: They always come up, and I understand, I understand why people compare us with them. But I still, I respectfully disagree.

BM: Yeah, yeah.

MH: That we would have that much in common with them. Well, on the surface, maybe, at the first glance. If you just, if you listen a lot to Dream Theater and then you hear some Andromeda, “Oh, this is like they’re copying or something.” But I think anyone who gives us a listen will agree that we have our own stuff. I mean, we have our own approach to it. And it’s not that it’s, I mean, it’s flattering. They are great. But, it’s just a little bit tiresome that they always come up. It’s not that we’re irritated or anything. For instance, it would be great to do a gig with them or something, like support them or something, because it is kind of the same audience who listens to us. But we definitely have our own thing going.

BM: Oh yeah, I can definitely tell. On the one hand, like you said, is it somewhat flattering because Dream Theater’s held up as being such technical virtuosos. They’re speedy and they’re fast and they’re musically trained at Julliard or somewhere. But you guys—

MH: Yeah, they are. Of course, they are.

BM: But then, you guys are too. You’re music-academy trained, you’re very technical musicians. On the one hand, is it flattering to be compared to musicians who are considered some of the best in the world?

MH: Yeah, well of course it’s always flattering. But I think that the interesting thing is not who can play the fastest or anything like that, it’s more what you have to say. Like what is special about a band? What do you do with all that technical talent or whatever? If you just, I don’t know.

BM: Well, that’s a great question. It’s actually one of the things I was going to ask you. The style of playing you have on all these Andromeda CDs so far, you can play very fast, I can hear that and see it, like in the live DVD, but there’s some extremely beautiful piano pieces that I really enjoy a lot. You know, “Blink of an Eye” [from Chimera].

MH: Yeah.

BM: Yeah, do you find it more difficult to play all the speedy runs and be really lightening fast? Or is it more the emotional, what you have to say from the heart kind of stuff, that is more difficult to play?

MH: Yeah, I think that’s more difficult. I mean, when you reach a certain level of technical skill or whatever, it’s, that’s just a matter of time. Of course you can work a lot of time with technical stuff, but if you just put your mind to it, you can play, I’m not going to say anything, but you can play freely. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: But I think it’s definitely more of a challenge to make a feeling, yeah, a certain feeling come across, and to really do that while the record light is on. I mean, it’s not that easy to be emotional maybe when you’re in the studio and doing everything else. For me personally, anyway, it’s like that.

BM: Well, that’s actually some of my favorite songs that you do are yours. Like on “Castaway” or “Blink of an Eye” that’s some extremely beautiful piano playing.

MH: Thank you very much.

BM: Yeah, it’s moving. Tell me about the name of the band. One thing I find really interesting is, you guys are called Andromeda, which evokes images of vast reaches of outer space, and just eons way out there. And yet your songs are usually about inner stuff, very small spaces, within people’s ears, in fact. You know?

MH: Yeah, that’s true. I think that’s a good thing if you get that association with space. And that’s kind of the point. You’d really have to ask Johan about that, because he came up with it, the name I mean. But I think it’s just meant to make you feel exactly like that.

BM: And it’s an interesting juxtaposition with the vastness of the name but the feel of the songs.

MH: Yeah, well, I think the lyrics are, well, there are many about inner stuff. [laughs]

BM: Yeah.

MH: I know you haven’t heard the fourth album, but it’s kind of darker in both lyric-wise and music.

BM: Darker than this “Parasite” stuff? [laughs] I mean, some of your lyrics are kind of, you know what I mean? [laughs]

MH: [laughs]

BM: Well, I’ll ask you about that in a second. One of the things I love asking all the musicians is to tell me what was going on, what do you remember most about each album. Like if I say, “Extension of the Wish,” what comes to mind first? What do you think of when that album came together?

MH: Yeah, I think about the [laughs] boring fact that I was sick when I was supposed to record my keyboards.

BM: Really?

MH: I had to do it at home. Everybody else went away and they recorded it in another town in Sweden called Uppsala. And they had a lot of fun there, and I was at home like, [coughs] you know.

BM: [laughs]

MH: [laughs] And then they sent me the tapes and I had to record and send the tapes to them. And it was kind of boring in a way, but I also had the privilege to do whatever I wanted because nobody could stop me. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: So that’s what comes to mind with Extension.

BM: Another question is, what’s the deal with you guys standing waist-deep in water in that CD booklet photo?

MH: Oh, that’s just an idea. I don’t know whose idea that was.

BM: [laughs]

MH: It was bloody cold, I can tell you. We were there, I think we were there over an hour in that water. And it was, I think it was March or April.

BM: Really?

MH: In Sweden. And it’s bloody cold in the water. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Yeah, that doesn’t look fun.

MH: I remember it was like three or four hours later I started to feel my legs again.

BM: [laughs] Wow. Is there a song on that album — I understand that they were not, this came together before you had a whole lot of input, this was all written music and lyrics by Johan.

MH: Yeah, pretty much.

BM: Is there one of those songs on that album that was the most difficult to put together, that gave you the most trouble as a keyboardist or composer? Or were they all pretty much about the same?

MH: I think they were all pretty challenging technically. Especially if you write something on guitar, it can sometimes be hard to translate to keyboards, and vice versa. But, well, I managed.

BM: [laughs] Yeah, it came out great. I like the sound of it.

MH: Yeah, I really like that album also. Of course, I don’t listen to it that much anymore because it’s, it just happens like that, you just kind of forget. But I like to play it sometimes.

BM: Was, your first singer, Lawrence [Mackrory]. Was he always just going to be a session guy, or was he ever considered to be — ?

MH: He was never considered to be a band member, he was just helping us out.

BM: I see.

MH: Because we didn’t have a singer, and the label really wanted the record released, and that just happened, actually. It came out great. But then we were going to release the album in France. The label there wanted the band as we were there, and we already had David, so if we had found David like a few months before, you would never have heard the Lawrence version. I don’t know, I think it’s been a lot of conversation about that, when you change singers there’s always a lot of fuss about it. But I think it’s kind of interesting. You can listen to both albums and you hear different things. I think it’s definitely a different mood.

BM: Well, let’s talk about the second one, II = I. You really stepped up to the plate here, and there’s a lot of music and lyrics by you throughout this whole thing. Why? Did you just come to the table with a whole lot of creative ideas, or was there a gap that you stepped up to fill?

MH: I don’t know. It started like, when we had recorded Extension, and then we rehearsed pretty intensively before that. And then we liked it so much that we just continued to do that. We rehearsed maybe three times a week or something. We never do that anymore. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: And I don’t know, we just started to take fragments of different ideas like Johan had a riff, and I had some chord progression and some melodies and Thomas had some rhythms, and we just put it together. And the first half of the II = I album is, yeah, that’s what you hear. They are like band effort songs. And then I think, we worked individually at the same time at home. I think that it was just Johan wanted another instrumental, and he had written “Morphing.”

BM: Yeah, “Morphing into Nothing.” Yep.

MH: Yeah. And he worked with, I think it was a rehearsal, but nobody else showed up, just Johan and David [Fremberg, vocals] showed up, and I don’t know. And they wrote “Castaway.” Then we just needed some more songs, and I had the “Parasite Trilogy,” those last three songs, I had that pretty much ready already. I just had to write some of the “One in My Head,” instrumental parts. I had to do that, and I did that with Thomas. He did the ending of “One in My Head.” That’s one of the most progressive things we’ve ever done. [laughs]

BM: Yeah.

MH: We called that, when he came up with that, we called that little piece of music, “Thomas’ Brain.”

BM: “Thomas’ Brain.” [laughs]

MH: [laughs] Because he must have been on fire when he played that. But that’s just how it happened, and it made a very, I mean, the record is very broad or whatever you say. And that’s probably why, because we did half of the stuff together, and half of the stuff individually. And yeah.

BM: Well, your role really expanded. You’re credited as producer, engineer, mixer.

MH: Ah yeah, that just happened. We just thought, “Where are we going to record it?” And then I just said, “Well, maybe I can do it.” And I didn’t really know if I could do it, because it was my first album I produced.

BM: [laughs] Really?

MH: But yeah, it took, I think it took about 10 months of all my time. [laughs]

BM: Oh, I see.

MH: It was fun. Looking back, of course, I would have done some things differently, but I’m really pleased with that anyway. It’s probably the record I’m most pleased with personally.

BM: Really?

MH: Because it’s so, there is so much love gone into that. [laughs] Or whatever.

BM: Oh yeah. Well, where did you get the idea for the “Parasite Trilogy”? There’s pretty negative, interpersonal stuff there. [laughs]

MH: [laughs] Yeah, it’s not from real life. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: Well, I think that the original idea was from David Lynch, Twin Peaks or something.

BM: Oh yeah, yeah.

MH: With that alter-ego Bob and things like that. And it just kind of emerged. I don’t know. It’s my own take on it.

BM: [laughs]

MH: Yeah, I don’t know. I think that criminals, people that commit crimes, they tend to be, people look at them like they’re all bad or something like that. And it’s much more complicated than that. And that’s the message. That maybe it’s not—

BM: It’s not black and white.

MH: No, it’s not black and white. And it’s kind of told from a first person point of view, to be in that kind of schizophrenia, not knowing exactly what you’ve done, and things like that.

BM: Wow. Which song on there was there one that you just had the most difficult time putting together? Like, take after take, or there were nuances you just couldn’t quite capture?

MH: [laughs] Well, actually, when it comes to recording, as with your question about Extension also, which was the most challenging, I think that they were about the same all of them. Everything is kind of hard if you want to do it, if you have a thought and you really want to do it like this, and it can be hard even if it’s easy to play. So I think the one I was working most was “One in My Head,” to get that finished in time. Because that was the last piece of the album, and I really wanted it to be intense and strange. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] You succeeded.

MH: [laughs] Yeah, thanks.

BM: [laughs] Well, this, the artwork is cool too. How much input did you have working with Mattias Noren on how the cover looks?

MH: Yeah, I worked very closely with him. I think he was quite annoyed with me. [laughs]

BM: [laughs] Really?

MH: I don’t know. I called him every day and like, “Oh, can you do it like this? Like no eyelids on those molecules, just eyes.” I had all those kinds of ideas. And it was fun, but I don’t know.

BM: Too much input, huh?

MH: Maybe a little bit too much, yes. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: I wanted it to be different things from every lyric and like, it’s not a concept album, but I wanted it to have a concept feel, like both with the artwork and with some musical stuff like the piano soloing tucked away there. Different scenes from the four songs before. And the “Parasite Trilogy” is a concept within the album. So I just wanted that concept feel, even if it wasn’t really a concept album.

BM: Well, the cover kind of reminds me of a combination of the Twilight Zone TV show and Pink Floyd.

MH: Yeah?

BM: Yeah.

MH: That’s not bad.

BM: No, that’s good. It’s very cool.

MH: [laughs]

BM: In the liner notes, you mention how long it took. [laughs] You thank your friends for remembering you when you finally found your way out of the studio. [laughs]

MH: [laughs]

BM: Did it really feel like you were in there forever?

MH: Yeah, it did. Like I said, about 10 months of all my time. I just slept and then I did this album, I mean, that’s all. So well, it was a relief when it was finally over.

BM: You could do that then, because wasn’t that before you had kids?

MH: Yeah.

BM: Yeah, so you had a little more time. You probably couldn’t do that now, could you?

MH: Yeah. No, otherwise nobody would have ever heard that record. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: If I would have had kids then. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: And it was a little bit, that was, it was a little bit problems when we did Chimera, our third one, because I really didn’t have time to do it. And we still worked in the same way. We rehearsed much less, so that’s why there are much more individually written songs on the Chimera album, because we didn’t have time to rehearse. [laughs]

BM: [laughs]

MH: Well, I didn’t have time, anyway. I don’t remember what the other guys did, because I had so much to do then. And it was around the time when we got our first kid, and I had two jobs, and recording this album, and I recorded Acts of Silence, Thomas’ other band. And yeah, all in one year, and it was a little bit too much. [laughs]

- end part one

NOTE: The entire interview can be found in the ProgPower USA IX program given to all attendees at this year’s metal fest.

Tags: Interview //