This interview was conducted via Email with Henrik of By Night. They play good Swedish metal, so make sure you check them out.

Introduce yourself.

My name is Henrik, bassist of By Night. We recently released our first full-length on Lifeforce records called Burn the flags. We are from Falkenberg, Sweden and play extreme metal.

Is there anything in particular that inspires you to write a song?

Music is pretty much like therapy for us. When I pick up the guitar and play it’s mostly because I have a very strong feeling inside me. Whether it is sadness, fury or happiness really doesn’t matter. I express my feelings through music. The fact that we’re more or less addicted to music contributes to constant and frequent writing of music.

Whats the best thing about the Swedish metal scene?

Probably that we are very helpful and supportive. We wish our fellow metalheads the best at all times. (As long as they have nice attitude towards others). Everybody (almost anyway) are pretty down to earth and we just try to have a blast when meeting other bands and all. It’s a good spirit around here.

Is it difficult being in two bands at once or sharing members with other bands? Does this ever become a huge conflict?

I don’t think it is difficult at all. It’s important to have an outlet in different regions within music.

For instance, I might want to write a nice ballad and have good tunes to it, then it feels stupid to bring that to By Night. It’s important to let people express themselves in different ways.

Is the success of your album or band in general something that you worry about or do you just take everything as it comes?

We take everything as it comes. The fact that we’ve got a deal with a records company is just a huge bonus! We don’t expect anything from others, we don’t expect the audience to like what we do or people to pay us for what we do. Of course we have goals to tour and all that. Put we don’t expect anything from any other than ourselves.

Whats your view of the United States (be honest: can mention anything you want-good or bad or both)

I haven’t been to the US just yet. But one thing that is good is that everything is so much bigger. The greatness of USA is something really cool, but could also be a bad thing at times.

The thing that everything is so extreme at points either one way or the other is something good while it is also bad.

Whats one place people should check out if they ever go to Sweden?

A difficult question. I, who live here am probably kind of blind to what is worth visiting here. Here’s nothing of greatness in Sweden except for maybe the unspoiled nature. If you pay a visit in the most north part of Sweden. You can watch the midnight sun at summer.

If you’re interested in Swedish metal, then you should probably visit Gothenburg where it is a lot of metal gigs and new cool bands rising up.

Whats a little known fact about Falkenberg?

Probably none. We have a brewery here called Falcon who makes great beer! Carlsberg bought it a couple of years ago and it is now their main brewery in Scandinavia. Interesting? Not really..

9. Name one album, besides your own, that you think all kids should have in their collection.

Meshuggah Destroy Erase Improve

Final comments.

Please listen to our songs from I on our website. And support us by buying it if you enjoy what you hear! Take care! // Henke – By Night

Interview by: RF

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