Hi Rickard, how are you?
"I hate that question...if you say "ah, it's shit" most people just laugh or look at you weird. You are supposed to say "It's good" or something like that! Well it's mostly shit."
When did you start playing guitar and what prompted you to start?
"I started playing guitar in early 2005. I am not sure how long I have been growling but I think it was 2003 or 2004 when I started singing along to ‘Slaughter of the Soul’ and such."
Oh yeah, you are singing on the new releases!
"Yes. I’ll be the vocalist for now and we’ll see what happens down the road."
Okay, I see! How about your releases last year, 'Embers' and 'Phoenix', which elements are you particularly pleased with?
"I am just happy that they finally got recorded! And they sound quite nice too."
How did you come up with the artwork?
"I know this guy, John Kullman, who is a really good artist. I pitched some ideas to him and he just ran with it. He has already painted the cover for the upcoming album and we have ideas for the one after that. He works really fast when he gets going! There is a story to the covers starting with Embers leading into Phoenix and then...yeah, you'll see."
So there is some symbolism to the covers?
"Yes. The embers we talk about are the songs we recorded back in 2010! We really wanted to get them re-recorded but some of us needed time to get excited about that. You can see the shape of our mascot, burned into the trees, watching over the fire and that is just us keeping it in the back of our minds, not letting it die out."
And on ‘Phoenix’ the fire is burning bright again.
"Yes, Phoenix sees the fire reignite, indicating that we are back and ready to put out some new music. You can see the stick figure in the fire is looking kind of like our mascot and that is the embodiement of the Embers EP fuling the flames. So now the fire burns and I promise that it will spread and evolve!"
What is your strongest memory from the time in Omnispawn?
"Rocking out in the practice space."
Being one of the founders of this band, what is your earliest "Omnispawn memory"?
"Writing really "good" songs upstairs in Markus parents house."
You had two releases this year, what are your next goals? What are you looking forward to in 2018?
"T-Shirts and Album."
What are the top 5 albums that you listen to right now?
"At The Gates - Slaughter of the Soul (always)
Hypocrisy - A Taste of Extreme Divinity
Naglfar - Harvest
At The Gates - At War With Reality
Allegaeon - Proponent for Sentience"
Feel free to send a message to the readers in order to end the interview.
"You won't have to wait 8 years, or however long it has been, to hear new music from us."
- Rickard Wahlberg, Omnispawn- vocalist