Withem, a band hailing from Norway are trying their top to be most beautiful progressive band ever to be established in the global metal scene.
Will they? Well, this answer is upto you!
Never the less, here is something interesting about them. They have awesome vocalist who can pull out clean vocals ! They have crazy guitarists who can give the riffs like a river gushing to join the sea. Then they have a freaky drummer who can pump up the beats to the level of progressive to the unexpected. What more do you need from a band!
Since all the notions given above, I tried to see what they are! They are brilliant and terrific that they exceeded the level of unexpected. So anxious that I got an oppurtunity to interview their vocalist
"OLE A.W"
And this is how it went !
1.So tell me.. Withem being a progressive band hailing from norway, how is norway receiving you guys?
The feedback has been overwhelming so far. We've been doing a loads of promotion during the recording of our debut album, “The point of view”, and we've managed to get a group of followers, that has been very important and supportive for us during the whole recording process. The time after the release, have been awesome.
The biggest metal magazine in Norway, “Scream magazine” gave us 6/6 on their review. This means of course a lot to us, since this is our most important market.
As a conclusion, we have a interesting thing going on.
2. Influences of the band?
As a Norwegian prog metal act, it’s natural for us to get influenced by bands such as “Pagan’s mind” and “Circus maximus” . After all we are five individuals, who have their own bunch of influences. Just to mention a couple of artist that have been important to me: Nils K. Rue (Pagan’s Mind), Jorn Lande (Masterplan, Ark, Jorn), Pavarotti and Jan Werner Danielsen.
3.Concept behind artwork and lyrics?
The artwork reflects our lyrics in a perfect way actually. The song “Phrenesis”, is probably the song that shows out most on the album cover and the artwork. “Phrenesis” is a short word for anger, jealousy and madness. Possible those three words that can describe human failure the most. The dude in the centre of the cover artwork, is our main character, he basically, sort of live through the entire album, having different roles that shows us different issues through a human life and perspective.
4.Did you support any bands lately, how was the experience?
We recently came back from a mini-tour together with Circus Maximus in Sweden. Two sold out venues, one in the capitol of Sweden, Stockholm, and one in a smaller town called Alingsas. Everything about the whole trip was awesome. From the long bus trip- to the actual shows. We gained more fans and friend, and we got great feedback after both venues.
We have also been supporting Pagan’s Mind before the album release. Great feedback there as well.
5. Heard that you auditioned for Kamelot! How did it go?
I received a email from Kamelot’s manager, he asked If I was interested in a audition round for the new vocal spot in the band. They were almost at the end of the selection process, but wanted me to try aswell after hearing a demo with Withem on Youtube. It was a breathtaking moment, when I opened this email, since Kamelot have meant a lot to me as one of the greatest metal bands. I started out whit a demo recording of the songs “Ghost opera” and “Abandoned”, and it worked quiet well. They listened to my versions, and asked to do a few more. I actually did a writing session on some new material, and recorded them as well. After some months whit singing, recording and emailing with them, they ended up hiring the amazing singer Tommy Karevik of Seventh wonder. He ended up doing the vocals on “Silverthorn”, and he did a amazing job, so loads of congrats and my best wishes to Tommy and Kamelot.
6. Whats the future you looking forward to?
This year will be a totally new experience for us. We've done this minitour with Circus Maximus and we also did “Progpower metalfestival Oslo”. We are also working on some touring this year but for now, we are really looking forward to “Progpower Atlanta, USA” in September. It will naturally be a real “biggie” for us.
7.Message to convey to fans out there!!!
We are looking forward to meet all the beautiful people out there, all our fans, supporters, followers and friends to share our music with(em) hehe.
To all of you out there
Take care and stay safe.
All the best;
OLE A. W (Withem)
Interviewer: Shwetha Kamath
Interviewer: Shwetha Kamath
