Arctora Interview

 

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?

Arctora started with me creating a solo-album as a side-project. I just wanted to write and record songs and practice mixing on them for fun basically.

For a long time I had no plans on forming a band around it, because getting a band together is usually such a pain with not only having to find good musicians, but good people you want to hang out and create music with.

But I ended up trying my luck anyway after the album was mostly finished, and I found all the members in a span of a week. I would have never believed that to happen!

2.Recently you have released a new album, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical style that you went for on the recording?

When I started the project, I had the intention of writing a “real” black metal album, but I quickly realized that’s not what I actually wanted to do.

After that I stopped worrying about musical style and just started writing whatever felt right.

There’s a ton of blast-beats, tremolo picking and nordic melodies, but also some progressive elements and technical riffing.

I’d say the albums genre is blackened melodic death metal, but everyone can decide for themselves.

3.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band has explored so far with the music?

The lyrics are mostly introspection about stuff I’ve been dealing with wrapped in a theme or a story.

For example, in the song “Arbiter of Fate” I tell about personal feelings, how sometimes the pressure of wanting to achieve and succeed is the only thing driving you forward, even though you might feel exhausted and close to burning out. 

And I combined those feelings with inspiration and themes from Berserk to tell the story.

Every song on the album has its own topic, some are more fantasized and some more grounded in reality.

4.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Arctora'?

I came up with the name around a decade ago, when I was 15 or 16.

It was supposed to be the name of my first band, but we decided on a different one back then.

Simply put, it’s just a combination of “Arctic” and finnish word “Tora” or “Torahammas” which mean “altercation” or “fang” respectively.

No deeper meaning than that, just something that sounded cool for my teenage-self back then and for some reason stuck in the back of my mind for all these years.

5.Can you tell us a little bit more about the artwork that is presented on the new album cover?

I wanted the album art to portray what I see in my head when I think of the songs and albums feel overall.

In my mind the album feels lonely, cold and barren, but also beautiful and vast in a way.

The art was made by Heino Brand, you can find more of his work here: https://www.heinobrand.com/

He was great to work with and he nailed what I was going for!

6.What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?

We have only played three shows so far, and all of them were an absolute blast to play, even the first show which was a bit of a nightmare scenario. Our gear had some weird technical issues all night, like in-ear monitors acting strange and even my guitar jack lost input connection as soon as I stepped on stage. 

But we made it through and had an awesome time!

I’d say we are quite energetic live, with two guys doing the vocals and everyone constantly moving and moshing around!  Not a lot of standing still and looking at your feet.

7.Do you have any touring or show plans for the new album?

We plan on gigging as much as we can in Finland at first and hopefully extending out abroad next year!

8.The new album was released on 'WormholeDeath' Records, are you happy with the support they have given you so far?

We’ve been very happy!

Communication between us and them is always quick and professional. If we have any questions or suggestions, they always answer real fast.

And they’ve been doing an awesome job getting us seen and heard globally.

9.On a worldwide level, how has the reaction been to your music by fans of black and death metal?

I have been surprised by the amount and how positive the feedback has been.

I’ve mostly just seen people praising the album.

I originally thought the feedback would be more lukewarm, since it is a home-produced album, but no. It has been great!

10.Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?

This is a question for which I do not know the answer, since we now have five people involved in making the music instead of just me.

I know we will have real drums on the next record at least!

11.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

I have to mention Jari Mäenpää and Alexi Laiho as the biggest influences for sure!

They are the reason I ever picked the guitar.

Amon Amarth and Insomnium are the two bands I really fell in love with also, and inspired me to start practicing vocals and writing songs of my own!

These days I listen to pretty much all metal genres and a ton of different bands, but a finnish band called Stam1na and the giant Mastodon have really grown on me the most these last few years.

Also, nowadays I listen to a lot of orchestral music and soundtracks.

12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?

We just released a music video for the track “I Am Human”, you can find it here:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ETrMDZreds

Thank you for the interview and the review!

And thank you reader for reading and listening to the music.

Hope to see you all live someday!

Arctora/The Storm Is Over/WormHoleDeath Records/2022 Full length Review

 

  Arctora  are  a  band  from  Finland  that  plays  a  very  melodic  form  of  blackened  death  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2022  album  "The  Storm  Is  Over"  which  will  be  released  on  September  30th  by  WormHoleDeath  Records.

  Classical  guitars  start  off  the  album  before  going  into  a  faster  black  metal  direction  which  also  utilizes  a  great  amount  of  tremolo  picking  and  blast  beats.  The  riffs  also  add  in  a  lot  of  melody  along  with  some  of  the  tracks  also  being  very  long  and  epic  in  length  and  the  solos  and  leads  are  also  done  in  a  very  melodic  style.

  Throughout  the  recording  you  can  also  hear  a  decent  mixture  of  slow,  mid  paced  and  fast  parts  while  the  vocals are  mostly  death  metal  growls.  Spoken  word  parts  can  also  be  heard  in certain  sections  of  the  recording  along  with  a  small  amount  of  operatic  female  vocals  also  being  utilized  briefly  and  some  songs  also  add  in  a  small  amount  of  synths.   

  All  of  the  musical  instruments  on  the  album  also  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to  them  along  with  a  couple  of  tracks  also  adding  in  a  small  amount  of  acoustic  guitars  as  well  as  some  high  pitched  black  metal  screams  also  being  utilized  at  times,  clear  male  vocals  are  also  added  on  one  song.  The  production  sounds  very  professional  while  the  lyrics  cover  nature  and  melancholy  themes. 

  In  my  opinion  Arctora  are  a  very  great  sounding  melodic  blackened  death  metal  band  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  musical  genre,  you  should  check  out  this  album.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Hearts  Ever  Restless"  "I  Am  Human"  and  "Haarksi".  8 out  of  10.

  YT: www.youtube.com/Arctora

IG: www.instagram.com/arctoraband
FB: www.facebook.com/Arctoraband