When Beardfish referred to as it a day in 2016, nobody – least of all of the band themselves – anticipated a reunion. Inside lower than a decade, although, they’re again with their long-awaited ninth album, Songs For Beating Hearts.
The seeds for the good Beardfish reunion had been sown in 2020. One in every of Sweden’s best-loved prog bands, they stumbled to an unsatisfying halt in 2016, lower than a yr after the discharge of acclaimed eighth album +4626-Comfortzone. Inner arguments had put paid to the chemistry that had propelled the quartet for 15 years, and the one conceivable choice was to name it a day.
However music has a behavior of hijacking the feelings. 4 years after going their separate methods, temperatures had cooled and friendships had been rekindled. It wasn’t lengthy earlier than the urge to make music once more overwhelmed them. In 2021, Beardfish had been again in a rehearsal area, checking if the previous magic was nonetheless there.
“We’d been hanging out slightly bit. Not all 4 of us in the identical room, however we’d been assembly up, listening to information or having a beer,” says frontman Rikard Sjöblom. “However this was the primary time all of us had been in a room, eager to make music collectively. That was actually cool. We began by taking part in an previous tune – With out Saying Something from Mammoth – and it was mainly a case of all of the hairs standing up in your arm, that form of feeling. I felt immediately that we had been again; it felt like no time had handed.”
Beardfish fashioned in Gävle, Sweden, in 2001. Over the following 15 years they launched a sequence of dazzling, creative and wildly melodic prog information. The road-up of Sjöblom on vocals and keys, guitarist David Zackrisson, bassist Robert Hansen and drummer Magnus Östgren was stable and creatively virile via that point, which made their abrupt cessation appear extra surprising than the typical band break-up.
“It felt actually bizarre, really,” Sjöblom says with a nod. “I had a variety of different stuff occurring, however it was virtually like part of me was lacking. Once you’re collectively for that lengthy it’s virtually like a relationship, or a household. We form of grew up collectively and we all know one another rather well. There’s a chemistry, even when speaking collectively, that’s very totally different with these guys than it’s with anybody else.
“We perceive one another very properly, all the good issues about one another, and all of the faults! However yeah, it grew to become not possible to proceed with all 4 of us within the band, and we didn’t wish to sack anybody. So we simply mentioned, ‘OK, if it’s not the 4 of us, it’s not going to work.’”
Within the aftermath, the ex-members every launched into their very own contemporary musical journeys. Not unreasonably, Sjöblom’s post-split efforts had been essentially the most excessive profile, as he revived Gungfly to develop into the brand new automobile for his songwriting. Three glorious albums adopted, with an invite to develop into a full-time member of Brit prog heroes Massive Massive Practice thrown in as a cheeky bonus.
Lots of new stuff began coming to me, and it felt very Beardfishy… there’s a particular sound to us simply hitting the devices
“The primary outlet for my writing grew to become Gungfly and I wrote some new stuff for Massive Massive Practice, too,” he says. “The opposite guys had been in a few totally different initiatives. Magnus performed drums with a few native bands. David performed with a form of indie/hardcore outfit for some time. Robert performed in all types of various blues bands, and he and I did a tribute factor to this Dutch man referred to as Cornelis Vreeswijk. He was like a Swedish troubadour and he was fairly funky within the 70s! We did a tribute to him that we performed for some time. So there was a variety of totally different stuff.”
Scuttling again to happier occasions, Beardfish have formally and unequivocally returned. Their brand-new album, Songs For Beating Hearts, is a wholehearted and very important comeback, with a number of the most attractive and ingenious songs Sjöblom has ever penned. Composed and organized in secret, because the world remained unaware that the reunion was occurring, the brand new materials quantities to a celebration of friendship and the unifying energy of music.
“We needed to see the way it went first; we stored this little valuable chicken secure in our grasp,” Sjöblom says. “We stored writing stuff, engaged on songs and having a pleasant time. After a sure level it grew to become fairly evident that we needed to document a brand new album, and we determined to interrupt the information as soon as we had the album completed.”
Did he have any preconceived concepts of what a brand new Beardfish album would sound like? “No, I didn’t. I had a few little issues that I appreciated, however nothing was set in stone, like, ‘These are the brand new songs!’ However as soon as we performed collectively a few occasions, a variety of new stuff began coming to me, and it felt very Beardfishy, all of it! It all the time does once we play collectively. There’s a particular sound to us simply hitting the devices, you already know?”
A simple case of unfinished enterprise, Beardfish’s return appears to have gone swimmingly. Songs For Beating Hearts is filled with all of the eclectic emblems and songwriting brilliance that made their earlier information so gratifying. However it’s additionally a showcase for a extra relaxed, considerate and liberated model of the band.
Songs like the bubbling and folk-fuelled In The Autumn – that includes a duet between Sjöblom and his companion, singer Amanda Örtenhag – and hazily melancholic opener Ecotone are as attractive as something he’s written, whereas towering 20-minute epic Out In The Open is a multipart, prog-to-the-bone pleasure.
We’ve grown up collectively, and a part of you disappears when a band ends, so it was very nice beginning up once more
“Out In The Open was a type of tracks that simply stored evolving,” he explains. “We by no means actually got down to document a extremely lengthy tune, but when the tune wants it, it will get to that time finally. I began out with simply that opening piano determine to start with. I used to be educating piano at that time. A number of the college students turned up, and a number of the college students didn’t, so after I had a 40-minute break, I’d play that factor again and again. I recorded it, despatched it to the fellows and so they thought it was actually cool, and it stored evolving.
“It’s virtually an ode to Magnus, David and Robert. It’s not outspoken within the lyrics, however we’ve grown up collectively, and a part of you disappears when a band ends, so it was very nice beginning up once more. One other a part of it I wrote for my youngsters. I’ve three now. It’s about them being your hopes and goals, mainly. It’s a tune of affection, in a approach.”
One other piece with love as its theme, not-quite-title-track Beating Hearts is among the most creative songs to bear the Beardfish identify. Considerably, this 11-minute colossus marks the primary time the Swedes have used actual strings within the studio – one thing that after appeared financially implausible.
“We used the Stockholm Strings. They’re nice gamers,” says Sjöblom. “I did some stuff for +4626-Comfortzone the place I programmed strings, or performed them on a keyboard, like in the beginning of The One Inside, however it wasn’t actual gamers. We all the time needed it however we may by no means afford it! We had been aiming for a 60s psychedelic factor, like The Beatles or The Fairly Issues’ SF Sorrow. I feel it turned out fairly cool.”
Whereas Songs For Beating Hearts is an album that exudes heat and mild positivity, and most of its music playfully mirrors that hopeful environment, its remaining observe takes a darker flip. Torrential Downpour is a gorgeously crestfallen finale, and an virtually unintentional tribute to Sjöblom’s late father.
“I didn’t know on the time of writing it, however a yr later, after I recorded it, I realised it’s about dropping my dad. It’s about what we as dad and mom do, and what your dad and mom did for you, and the entire thing we undergo in life. The entire album explores the theme of affection – not solely boy meets woman or boy meets boy – however on a elementary degree of affection between individuals.
Lyrics will be therapeutic and cathartic, and generally you are feeling like a weight is lifted from you
“It’s about my dad and dropping him, and the hopelessness you may really feel; however it’s additionally about life persevering with, and the heritage we go away to one another. Lyrics will be bizarre that approach. They are often therapeutic and cathartic, and generally you are feeling like a weight is lifted from you.”
Downbeat denouements however, Songs From Beating Hearts is buoyed by the enjoyment that Sjöblom and his lifelong associates skilled whereas making it. Maybe much more necessary is how a lot enjoyable the foursome are having when taking part in reside. Their first official reunion present was at Gasklockorna in Gävle on Might 4, 2024, and Sjöblom remembers how thrilling it was to be onstage along with his associates once more.
“Yeah, it feels actually good. I do know some individuals missed the band – none greater than us, I assume! We all know one another so properly as musicians in spite of everything this time, and taking part in collectively feels pure; it’s what we ought to be doing.”
Within the 9 years which have melted away since Beardfish final launched an album, the world has develop into a barely darker and extra demented place. However hidden throughout the grooves of Songs For Beating Hearts is the fantastically upbeat message that music, friendship and good occasions are nonetheless essentially the most dependable antidotes to life’s gnarly, difficult moments.
It’s a message, and a document, that Sjöblom hopes might be obtained with enthusiasm by followers and critics – if solely to make sure that Beardfish can preserve creating within the method to which they’ve develop into accustomed. But when it seems that no person cares and the reunion is a moist squib, the plan stays the identical: make music, be pleased, love conquers all.
“We adore it if individuals prefer it, however that’s not the rationale we do it,” Sjöblom says. “We wish to have the ability to journey and tour and issues like that; we’re actually having fun with taking part in reside proper now, however we’re equally pleased within the rehearsal area. If success may help us to have the ability to preserve making music, then that’s implausible. However I actually don’t care if individuals like us or not. I make music as a result of I must. All of us do.”