Seventh Wonder – Andreas Blomqvist
Milton: Fast forward a few years later, and you release Mercy Falls. That must have been the album that you got the most attention for, right?
Andreas: Yes, the best reviews and by far. It was just so much that we started to feel embarrassed or uncomfortable, you know? (laughter) With Waiting in the Wings, we scored a lot of eights, a couple of nines I guess… Then with
Mercy Falls we were contacted by so many media outlets by all over the world, saying “You know, I’m a grown man and I cried listening to this album! I don’t care what genre this is, this is one of the best things I’ve ever heard in life!” And I’m like, “No, it’s not.”
Milton: (laughter)
Andreas: It was outstanding. I remember having a really big concern before releasing it. I always dreamed about releasing a concept album, since Seventh Son of a Seventh Son was released by IRON MAIDEN, although that’s not a particularly good example. We were of course thinking about how cheesy is this, or is this crap, or are they going to ignore us… It was a really stressful period for us too. A lot of stuff was going on. I remember discussing the idea with Tommy when were still recording Waiting in the Wings and we were both thrilled about the idea. We came up with the backbone of the story right there and then.
Milton: Really? That quick?
Andreas: Well, let me rephrase that. We outlined the main concept there and then. Writing the actual plot, the script so to speak of the story was a much longer and more complicated process. The main idea was done, but the details of the story weren’t nailed down. Down the road, we’re looking at the story and we’re like “Wait, this doesn’t match!” (laughter) Then we have to go back and rethink this part and rewrite it… I really acquired the highest respect for movie writers, because it’s a lot of work to make things match and make ends meet. Me and Tommy would sit together with pen and paper and go over things, like how this or that would be, should we have a song about this, and things like that. It took a lot of time. It was very exciting, but I was very, very anxious before the release, and I think Tommy was too.
Milton: I see. Do you think the hard time paid off in the end?
Andreas: Yeah, I am pretty happy with the result, song-wise at least. It’s really difficult; I guess no one is ever entirely satisfied with what you do. I like a lot of the songs, and I’m not 100% pleased with the mix. I think we could’ve spent some more time with that. Had we had a larger budget and more time, I think we could’ve done it a lot better. But given the response, I couldn’t be happier with it. The response just makes you really humble and thankful for everything that we heard and the support we’ve had. Obviously it did what it was supposed to do and I’m just thankful for that.
Milton: Is there anything else you’d change with the album though? I find it hard to actually think of things that could be better in Mercy Falls.
Andreas: Well, thank you very much. I would’ve spent more time with artwork, to make sure that that better complemented the story. It was done in a haste. I would’ve spent more time with the mix too. The sound was crisp and we did like that, but we could’ve made it better like the lead guitar sound… I wasn’t particularly happy about the bass sound. I think I spent so much time project-managing the whole effort that I wish I had spent more time with the bass lines as I would’ve liked to. I think they were not as exciting as they could’ve been. A couple of songs also could’ve used a bit more work, we didn’t really have the chance to arrange them as a band. You know, the songs were just ready but the writing was done separately. Tommy did his songs, I did mine, Johan did his in pretty much separate chambers you know? There were a couple things that I would have liked to do differently, but as a whole, of course, you have to be pleased given the response.
Milton: Cool. For SEVENTH WONDER, when it came to writing a concept album, how did that work really? You come up with the concept and then what? Music, lyrics…?
Andreas: That’s a really relevant question, because it’s really a catch-22. You would want the lyrics to ride the music and you’d want the music to set the mood for the lyrics and all. It’s really a mess, so you just have to pick your point of entry and roll with it. You may have to backtrack a bit, there were a couple of ideas that we scratched too. In a sense, when we had the story line, we kind of did a timeline of the events in the story while we were in the studio. Once we had that timeline, we sat down and decided like “this we should cover in the booklet, while this here has to be a song. Ok, what kind of song? Well, this here needs to be kind of an up-tempo, happy thing, while this needs to be a heavy and gloomy thing.” So we kind of made a list of the songs and the styles we thought that we needed. Then we kind of handed out assignments, like “You get to write the Yngwie thing, while I write the happy song.” Once the songs would start getting done, Tommy would work on the vocal melodies and we divided up the work to get the lyrics down. That was the long process of things.
Milton: Wow.
Andreas: I have no idea if that’s a good way to do it, but that’s how it happened. (laughter)
Milton: (laughter) Now, back to the concept of Mercy Falls. I noticed how on the SEVENTH WONDER forum there was a lot of discussion about it, and I mean a lot…
Andreas: (laughter) Yeah…
Milton: It seems that a lot of people who dig concept albums sometimes take the concept and elaborate it so much. I mean, they go on and on and make it so much bigger than it really is! It must be quite fun for you guys in the band to read all of these theories and ideas about the concept…
Andreas: Oh yeah! (laughter) I guess that’s the cliché that’s every lyricist’s idea or goal so to speak, to get the listener to take your ideas and make something more of it using their lives, their values, points of view… That’s why it grows and becomes more of than just what’s written in the booklet of a CD, so I think it’s pretty cool. That’s also the reason why we kind of stayed away from the discussions and tried not to clarify things too much. I remember when DREAM THEATER made the Scenes From a Memory album and the DVD, where they sit down and explain the whole story. Of course it was cool to know it, and it gave you an immediate satisfaction for a short while, but then afterwards, in retrospect, wasn’t it a bit cooler when you weren’t 100% sure? You know, that’s kind of true! So I was ready to actually release something about it… I made a really nice thing explaining the whole thing because the other guys in the band didn’t really understand it either…
Milton: (laughter)
Andreas: So I was trying to explain it to them too, and believe me, we had many hours in the car driving around Europe talking about it (laughter). I put together a graphical explanation of it all and gave the guys a powerpoint presentation of Mercy Falls. (laughter)
Milton: Unbelievable. (laughter)
Andreas: So I was kind of thinking that we should get that out but then I changed my mind. You know, we cleared out a few things because, and this goes back to what I said about spending more time with the booklet, there were a few fundamental things that weren’t so clear. But for the most part, we figured we’d let the fans flip those pages over and over and let them talk about it. I think that is for the best.
Milton: “University of Stockholm presents “A Day in Mercy Falls,” a lecture by Professor Andreas Blomqvist…”
Andreas: (laughter) Seriously! I think it’s for the best that they made me not do it. (laughter)
