Daniel Andersson, the bass player of Supreme Majesty, answered the questions of our editor Nathalie Mohr, refering on the current output "Elements of Creation".
But have a look by yourself...
Hi, thank you for taking time to answear some questions. Would you mind to introduce the band to the people who don`t know you?
Supreme Majesty was founded in 1999. We’ve released three albums and an MCD since then. Our music is Melodic Metal with lots of influences from the 80’s. Current line-up is Jocke Olsson, vocals, Chrille Andersson, keys, Tobias Wernersson, lead guitars, Rille Svensson, rythm guitars, Johan Rydberg, drums and me, Daniel Andersson on the bass.
Who came up with the idea of your bandname? Does it have a special meaning?
The first drummer Bartek Nalezinski came up with the idea. Originally it was meant to bet the title of an album with another band he, Chrille and Rikard had. But since that band split up and they liked the idea much they used it when they formed Supreme Majesty. It was not meant to have a special meaning but as with all things you can interpret things how you want to.
Who had the idea of the artwork of the albumcover? Why did you choose a female angel with the world in her hand? Which reference does it have to the title and the music of the album?
Chrille made the album cover and it was his idea I think.
The cover artwork is referring to the title of the album „Elements of creation“ which in turn is pointing to our feeling that we now are the band that will be able to really create the stuff we want to. We recently had the addition of two members Johan and Tobias, and Tobias our new guitarplayer, brought in lots of new ideas and stuff. The female angel is actually the one mentioned in the song “Dance of the elements” as the creator. So everything is kind of connected - the new line-up, our somewhat new sound, the cover, the title and that song.
If one watches the making-of on your CD he will think that you had much fun while recording the album. Was it so or are these only the nice pictures?
No, in reality we hate each other badly and all that you see is actually arranged. Just kidding, it was actually mostly fun doing the album. Lots of people in the band, including me, also has a tendency to not act seriously as soon as the camera is on, so most of the material was like this, which left us no choice, haha...
Of course, it was lots of hard work and tedious hours as well. But we really get along very well with each other and I can’t remember any serious fights during the recordings.
Would you like to do a conceptalbum once or would you say "Elements of Creation" is already one?
Elements of creation is not a concept album. There is as mentioned a concept behind the title, the cover and one of the tracks, but more uniformity is needed for a concept album in my opinion. We are actually discussing right now to make our next album a concept album. It would be a huge challenge but also something I really want to do. We need some kind of grasp of the story first, and if we can come up with something good, I wouldn’t be surprised if the next album really is a concept album. If so, I want it to be held together both in the lyrics and in the music as a unit and in this lies the true challenge.
How would you describe your music to an alien?
Providing the alien was familiar with earthly metal bands I would tell him our music is a mix of Europe meets Yngwie in a Nightwish song. If not, I think he better had to listen to it. I’m not that good at speaking Klingon anyway…
How do/did you handle the line-up changes in past?
The biggest problem we had with a line-up change was when our first vocalist Rikard Larsson left. We thought it would be nearly impossible to find another one in our region that wanted to do our kind of music. Then someone called Joakim called and left a demo-tape and he was as right for the band as it could get. Otherwise, we’ve had quite a few changes now, but it doesn’t feel like it, strangely enough. It has always worked smoothly to incorporate new members, guess we’re a bunch of extremely nice people, haha…
Are there any anecdotes out of tour- or studio-everyday life you would like to tell me?
We had a gig a few years ago where we were using pyro on stage. Everything was rigged and we were just getting up on stage. Then, Joakim see that someone is sitting on the stage edge near one of the explosives so he goes there and tells them to jump down. When backing again he of course steps on the detonator and everything go off! To add to the story, our current session keyboardist is just walking by one of the boomers and literally gets it up his ass… Everything ended well though, and we could continue the gig without the intro-pyros…
How do you approach the songwriting-process?
Nowadays we work separately and try to come up with stuff. Then we record it in our homestudios on the computer with drum machine. This way we can present the material to each other in a more finished form. It’s easier to see how it’s all going to be when it’s on the album as well.
Do you have special idols?
Not idols like you had when you were a kid. But I sure would like to meet Toni Iommi for instance and hopefully he would want to talk about the old days with Sabbath in the 70’s. Since I’m a sucker for Conan the barbarian and the Terminator movies and also admire his ability to go from living in a small village in Austria to governor and ridiculously well paid actor I also have to put forward Arnold as one of my so called “idols”.
Do you have special hobbys?
I like to watch movies and train at the gym. Just weight training though, I’m to lazy for the endurance part, haha…
What can one except of you on stage?
We always try to give the audience a good show. It’s boring to watch a band that just stands and play their music, you want some action on the stage, so we try to deliver that. When we have the opportunity we are big fans of pyro, 
but it has to be a stage that is suiting, plus there has to be some kind of budget for it, which isn’t always the case.
What`s your attitude towards internetmagazines?
I’m old enough to remember when there was no internet and all magazines where in paper. Sometimes I miss the thing about not getting all info at once whenever I would want to. There will never be bands that can build as much mystery around themselves like Kiss and WASP for instance. You could only read about them in select magazines so all kind of rumours were spread etc. Now it’s so easy to get information so some of the mystery is lost I think. Or perhaps it’s just me getting older… Of course I like the thing about internetmagazines that you can access the latest news, interviews reviews and so on quickly and not to mention for free. Given the vast amounts of internet magazines they’re also a great way for unknown bands to get some media coverage. But if I was to choose between paper and internet I would have to go with paper.
Finally some brainstorming:
dreams: Love to dream, unfortunately I almost never remember them.
interviews: Depends on the questions. When you feel that the interviewer has read up a little bit on the band (like this interview, wink, wink), they’re great, but when there are just standard questions that could apply to any band, it gets kind of boring in the end.
labels: A necessary part of getting the music out.
festivals: No soundcheck, practically no monitoring, no time schedules that are to trust, but still a great way to meet an audience you would never meet anywhere else and to have a good time in general!
Thank you! The last words belong to you!
Thanks a lot for this interview! All fans of melodic metal are encouraged to check out our latest album Elements of Creation which kicks ass in my humble opinion! Cheers, and rock on!
Interview: Nathalie Mohr
Pictures: Supreme Majesty, by Erik Karlsson
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