It’s late on a quiet Thursday evening. I’m feeling a bit nervous, chatting with Andreas Bergh, better known as Whiplasher Bernadotte, lead singer of Swedish metal band Deathstars. Very calm and polite, he comes across as mild and down to earth. His serious tone is matched with a relaxed, comfortable sound in his voice. After getting through the formalities, we get straight into talking about Deathstars, the past year’s events and their upcoming Australian tour.
“Everything is going really well and I think the band is in good shape; and we look very good as well. It is an interesting period.”
Having released their third album, Night Electric Night in January, the band have been touring Europe all year to promote it. The album, like all of Deathstars previous works, draws greatly on personal experiences and the “dark play lands of Europe.”
“Of course, everything we write about is kind of about our lives. It is no fiction. But then, I think Night Electric Night is a bit more coloured by all the touring we did before it, a bit more outgoing I guess. It’s not as introverted as Termination Bliss but we always write about what happens in our lives, reflections on it, always from the dark aspect of it… chronicles almost. “
“On the other hand, it’s very straightforward glam rock, dark glam rock, making entertainment of our personal hell… so to speak (laughs). It’s a rock band with a lot of substance to it.”
The band has drawn their influences from a wide variety of music, including a lot of 80’s synth-pop, particularly Kylie Minogue. I throw out the idea of Kylie doing guest vocals on a future Deathstars track.
“Our bass player is the biggest Kylie fan there is. That is the only person he talks about almost so I bet he would love that. We are all big Kylie fans. Kylie is amazing. We are like satanic disco, which isn’t too far from Kylie Minogue.”
With their first Australian tour coming up at the end of this month, there certainly must be some excitement amongst the band.
“Our music is so much about our lives, and Europe, they get that pretty easy so it will be different in Australia. We’ll see how well those to cultures collide. I think it will trigger a bit more to play in a new country because we’ve been in Europe all the time so it feels important to do good shows in Australia.”
“I’m looking forward to doing a lot of things while I’m there. I would like to party, have intercourse and maybe learn to surf a bit… we will hang out and stay up during the night at least (laughs).”
As we begin to wrap things up, Bernadotte begins to show more and more excitement about the upcoming tour and meeting all their fans here. He assures me that they are ready for non-stop partying on their tour.
“We are going to try to do as much as possible while there. Right until they close up. Also, it would be nice if the girls could leave their boyfriends at home.”
Sweden’s Deathstars are coming to Australia the September for the first time.
