The Ghost Of A Future Dead

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The title of At The Gates’ eighth album is powerful on its own. Given the circumstances of its release, seven months after the untimely passing of the band’s vocalist and Swedish metal hero Tomas Lindberg, it’s downright chilling. “The working title was <i>The Dissonant Void</i>, after the second track,” At The Gates guitarist Anders Björler tells Apple Music from his home in Gothenburg. “But after his surgery in January [2025], Tomas started the radiation therapy and a lot of heavy med. During that time, he was having fever dream, telling us he was having a hard time with the concept of reality. He changed the title, so maybe he had some kind of inkling that it wouldn’t end so well.” Before Lindberg’s cancer diagnosi, things were looking up in the At The Gates camp. Björler was back in the band after a five-year absence, rejoining his twin brother Jonas (bass), Lindberg, drummer Adrian Erlandsson, and guitarist Martin Larsson in writing what they envisioned as a return to the melodic death metal masterclass of their landmark 1995 album <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i>. “Tomas was very happy I was back in the band, and he was very set on doing this <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i>-type record,” Björler say. “Not in the music itself, but in the hard-hitting songs and easy structure. Once he got the diagnosi, anything could have happened. I’m just glad we finished the album for his sake.” Even without its tragic backstory, <i>The Ghost of a Future Dead</i> might be At The Gates’ finest moment since <i>Slaughter</i>. Below, Björler comments on each track. <b>“The Fever Mask”</b> “It was one of the final songs we wrote, but it quickly stood out as the natural choice to open the album. It’s a very punchy, in-your-face kind of track. I think it captures the essence of At The Gates very well, along with the lyrics by Toma. We got Charlie Storm to do the intro, who also did the intro on ‘Blinded by Fear,’ the opening track from <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i>, so the history is there. For the solo, I was aiming for the feel of a King Diamond song from ’87, maybe, but I can’t play like Andy LaRocque.” <b>“The Dissonant Void”</b> “This was the proposed opener for a long time before we had ‘The Fever Mask,’ and, as I mentioned, the original album title as well. It’s classic At The Gates style, but maybe more dissonant. Jonas had some very cool, aggressive, dissonant chords for thi, and the vocal hooks work quite well. There will be an animated video for it by Costin [Chioreanu], who has worked with us since 2014.” <b>“Det oerhörda”</b> “Tomas already had the Swedish lyrics for this on a demo and wanted to change it to English, but the rest of us said no because it’s a perfect song in Swedish—the rhyme, the verse, the phrasing, everything work. The title is almost like ‘The Unfathomable,’ if you translate it, but that’s also the name of another track on the album. Lyrically, it’s inspired by the poet Pär Lagerkvist, who wrote this kind of God-fearing, working-cla, anxiety-driven poetry. His stuff was very special to Toma.” <b>“A Ritual of Waste”</b> “This is a thrash attack, very to the point. It’s very much <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i>, but I was also going back a little further to ’90s death metal like Morbid Angel, mixed with a little thrash metal. This was also one of Tomas’ favorite. It was one of the first songs I brought to the table when coming back. A lot of triplet action, Boss [distortion pedal] heavy, but very reminiscent of ’90s At The Gate. I think it works well.” <b>“In Dark Distortion”</b> “This is a very unusual track for At The Gate. I was thinking Tomas’ style of singing would fit perfectly with a Killing Joke, Motörhead, almost like post-punk, rock ’n’ roll type of song. And what he did with the recording is perfect. It matches exactly what I had imagined when I wrote it. But it’s very nontraditional for u, and Jonas did a Voivod-like middle part as well.” <b>“Of Interstellar Death”</b> “This was one of the earlier songs we wrote. It has the Gothenburg style with the harmonies and the fast verse. What you hear in the last choru, we actually had that idea for all the choruse, but then we scaled down the first couple to have this big release on the last one. Dynamically, I think we made a good choice there. And then there’s a very traditional-style solo part in the middle, which is untraditional for At The Gate. But maybe we did one like that on <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i> as well. I can’t remember.” <b>“Tomb of Heaven”</b> “I was aiming for almost like a lullaby, a simple mantra thing on the choru, so that’s why the intro and outro [are like that]. Like ‘Interstellar Death,’ it’s very Gothenburg death metal. I think you can also hear that me and Jonas are very influenced by Trouble on the dual harmony part that comes halfway through, and of course Metallica. We grew up on <i>Ride the Lightning</i> and <i>Master of Puppets</i>, combined with the melancholic harmonies on Trouble’s 1990 [self-titled] album—all that stuff is amazing guitar work.” <b>“Parasitical Hive”</b> “I was thinking about something almost like a train, a locomotive that never end, that just keeps going and going. We combined that with things we did on some of the songs from <i>At War with Reality</i>. The middle part is something that we never did before; it’s a little influenced by Meshuggah, maybe, but doesn’t sound like Meshuggah. And the outro piece is something mellow with synthesizers to symbolize the calm after the storm.” <b>“The Unfathomable”</b> “This song is not related to ‘Det oerhörda,’ but the easiest way to translate ‘Det oerhörda’ is ‘Unfathomable,’ so it’s funny in that way. When we first met Tomas in ’89 and stayed at his parents’ house, we were listening to Morbid Angel’s <i>Altars of Madness</i> and a lot of American death metal from that era. This song is kind of our take on that style, with some <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i> in the verse. The intro is in the style of Trouble, also a little bit Metallica. I think you can also hear some Thin Lizzy and Slayer in this one.” <b>“The Phantom Gospel”</b> “Arrangement-wise, this is very tricky because it’s not traditional verse-choru. It starts out as a very heavy death metal song and then transforms into almost like a Judas Priest heavy metal song with quadruple harmonie. But we like short songs and always have. Jonas did some elaborate songs on the last two album, but I would say <i>At War with Reality</i> and <i>Slaughter of the Soul</i>, that’s where we want to be: around three minute, like radio pop song. Seven-minute thrash songs are not really our style. That gets tediou. The point of a short song is that you can listen over and over.” <b>“Förgängligheten”</b> “The translation is maybe something like ‘the withering of,’ like the decay of the body or when something breaks down and ceases to exist. But it is also saying that all life end. We had our friend Gunnar Hjorth play guitar on this—he’s classically trained. What’s strange is that all the music and lyrics were written when Tomas was still healthy. When you go back and listen to it now, it’s just a sad song. It reflects what happened to Toma, and it’s so much gloomier than when we wrote it.” <b>“Black Hole Emission”</b> .

via Apple Music

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