FEATURES

Having conquered Canada, the DIMMU BORGIR cavalcade headed south, first stop the Trocadero, a century old burlesque house in downtown Philadelphia. Mid-afternoon and the Norwegians have already succumbed to the Eastern time zone, asleep right up until our scheduled 2 pm interview. Sporting a black eye and double loop nose ring, both recent additions (although not all of his own choosing), guitarist Silenoz is thrilled to be on the road in North America again. “To be honest, it’s more exciting to tour here than Europe. Not because it’s less atmospheric in Europe, but it’s always cool to try to break new ground. You see the differences more here. There are strong pockets and less strong pockets, whereas Europe is pretty consistent. It’s a challenge. You want to see what has happened since the last time. In Europe, you can only do so much, unless you get a big support slot, like for SLAYER or something. Then you can break more new ground.”

A year ago, BEHEMOTH joined Dimmu for a one-off date in Philadelphia. Was that the impetus for having the Poles become part of the current tour? “We’ve been wanting to tour with Behemoth for a long time,” states Silenoz, “even before that. This tour was supposed to happen in February, but for various reasons, we postponed it. There was a time we thought, ‘Oh, maybe Behemoth can’t do it now,’ but they turned down other offers to make it happen. I’m happy they still wanted to do it. It’s a great package. In the past, we’ve done a four band bill. With these three bands (including, opener, KEEP OF KALESSIN), it’s intense enough. By the time we’re off stage, people’s ears are shot. It’s cool to have some fellow Norwegians, even though (KOK) are from Trondheim,” he jests. “They get their guitars and amps today. They’re been using ours. Different shapes, different tunings, it’s like a completely different instrument.”

Despite their stature, might the Dimmu guys be worried about getting upstaged, going on after two such volatile acts? “Of course,” comes the refreshingly honest answer from the guitarist. “Both are really good live bands, especially Behemoth, with the routine and experience they have. It helps us get a kick in the ass too. It’s healthy to have…, not competition, but someone who’s good at what they do, because you can feed off that energy too.”

In Sorte Diaboli was issued almost a year ago. Since then, has Silenoz, as one of the chief architects, been happy with the reaction/acceptance of said disc? “We’re very happy with everything that happened since it came out. We still believe it’s a strong record. It’s too early to say if it’s one of the better ones, but that’s really not for us to decide. We can’t judge objectively. When we play those songs live, we can feel the power transcend to the people. We’re still proud of it.” That may be true, but I get the distinct impression that the high brow concept flew over many fans’ heads. “That might be true,” contends Silenoz. “Every album is important. For the fans, they have one more album to compare against the back catalog. To us, it’s a new step.”

“We try to see what we did on the last tour,” he says, beginning a discussion on the preparations for the current trek, “and not repeat too much of the same setlist. About half the set sells itself, but on this tour, six of the songs are different than last year. It’s important to keep it varied, a good mix between old and new, as well as the hard and more laid-back stuff. We’ve actually added two more from the new album. Our last American tour, it was probably too close to the release of (In Sorte Diaboli). Maybe we played one (new) song too many on that tour. This time, people have been able to listen to the album for a year, they know the songs better. That’s why we added two. There are like five or six songs (off Diaboli) in 80 plus minutes.”

OK, so there’s plenty of the current platter in the live show. What about new material? “It’s always in the back of our heads,” contends the songsmith. “I’m always writing lyrical ideas down. Musical ideas we only work on separately. We’re not really a band that can write on the road. We can, but we’re not comfortable writing songs while we’re on tour. We have to concentrate 100% on touring. When the touring cycle is completed, in the summer, we’ll have some barbecues and start jamming on ideas. That worked really well on the last album, jamming together, the old school way.”

Having lived with In Sorte Diaboli for a while, is there anything that has become stronger with age, or gained a new-found appreciation in the guitarist’s eyes? Something that only the passage of time has allowed him to uncover? “That’s a tough question,” he thinks it over before continuing. “When we were done with the album, I didn’t listen to it for weeks. When I listen to it now, there are some songs, ‘How did we do that? Why did we do that?’ I’m too critical.” Far enough, then what about a particular track that has begun to wane in Silenoz’ eyes, be it from perpetual performance, or just some quirk of recording drudgery? “Yeah, there are some songs,” he admits. “I don’t want to say any titles, but parts of songs that we could have improved. ‘Shit, we should have done a little extra.’ On this album, all the songs are pretty much the same (dynamic) level, while on Death Cult Armageddon ‘Progenies (Of The Great Apocalypse)’ was sticking out.”

No timetable yet, but there are definitive plans for another DVD. “We’re working on it. We’ve got a lot of cool material. We’re going to base the DVD around the Wacken set, last year. It was one of the better shows we’ve played in recent years. It was one that happened in front of 75,000 people! Usually, we’re unlucky in stuff like that/ That show was really good and the atmosphere was awesome. Hopefully we’ll have it out by October/November sometime. There’s so much stuff to go through. When this tour is over, in May, I fly straight to Vienna for editing. I sort of have an overview of most of the footage, but maybe I’ll take one of the other (guys) with me.”

The band shows no signs of stopping and while the corpse-paint has morphed over the years, from pure black metal, to more of a horror-inspired make-up, Silenoz contends it’s still a major part of Dimmu Borgir. “We HAVE played a couple of shows without (make-up), but those were unusual circumstances. We’ll do it as long as it feels right and honest. Image doesn’t make or break the band, but it has to do with the whole package. If we’d go onstage tonight in Bermuda shorts, it wouldn’t translate the right feeling. It’s theatrics. I don’t see it as a concert. It’s a performance. We jump into these characters we want to portray. It’s not like we change into that stage persona, we just prolong our own personality. So to speak.”

Dimmu Borgir, along with Behemoth and Keep Of Kalessin are on tour together until early May.