Interview mit Jørgen Munkeby von Shining (Nor)

Your new album is entitled „Animal“. What was the idea behind that title?
“Animal” is the title of one of the songs on the album, and that song also turned out to be the lead single which is now doing amazingly well for us! In fact it’s single-handedly multiplied our monthly listeners on Spotify by 15 x, and is being streamed 20 to 30 times more than any of our older songs.
But when choosing the title of the album we felt we needed to choose which of the two dominant and contrasting sides of the album we wanted to highlight. Most of the songs on the album have pretty dark and serious lyrics, circling about death and loss and similar concepts. But the music itself is pretty uplifting and has a positive rock-vibe to them. So even though the majority of the record is on the darker side, especially the lyrics, I personally felt that I wanted to focus on the bright and life-loving side for the front cover artwork and for the album title. Then people could discover the darker side afterwards by proper and more focused listening. When we landed on that conclusion, then the title “Animal” was a great choice! It’s short, it sounds cool, it’s a good starting point for artwork, and it’s the name of the most popular song on the album.

With „Blackjazz“ you invented a whole new genre, so to say – now you quit doing black jazz and started something completely new with „Animal“. How would you call this new style of SHINING?
I’m not really sure what to call the new music. But I don’t think it needs a label, really. The name “Blackjazz” was a great thing to have for those albums, since it made the whole concept more manageable. But while “Blackjazz” was a very intellectual and academic concept, and you really needed to see the album in the context of musical history to be able to fully appreciate the importance of the album, the new album “Animal” is made to listen to. The songs are made to give you an emotional impact rather than to make you think about music history or theory.

What was your motivation for this style change?
I basically felt that three studio albums and one live album and DVD was enough documentation to make the Blackjazz genre complete. Now it’s documented and saved for the future, and anyone can study these albums and start making Blackjazz music themselves, provided they have the technical skills and genre understanding to do it.
And since that job was done, I really felt the need to find some new challenges in my musical life. I wanted to learn new things and I wanted to do some risky stuff again. I love feeling like I live on the edge, and making this “Animal” album really feels risky and exciting again to me. I love these periods more than any other periods in my life!

„Animal“ sounds like it was inspired more by 90s pop than jazz or black metal – is that the case and if yes, which bands have influenced you most?
The new album definitely has less jazz and black metal than any of our albums before! There are lots of bands that has been inspirations or just points of reference when making the “Animal” album. Some of them might be: Ghost, Gojira, Biffy Clyro, Muse, Halsey, Bring Me The Horizon, Linkin Park, Audioslave, Devin Townsend, Brad Paisley, Guns’n Roses, Pink, Metallica, Kent, The Killers, Phil Collins, Carpenter Brut, Disturbed and Five Finger Death Punch to name a few.

Also the artwork looks very much as if it were from the 90s – was that the intention?
I personally think it looks more like something from the late 80s, but I think we’re both really talking about the same period. And yes, it was definitely intentional! I love the new synthwave 80s revival, but I still didn’t want the album cover to look too similar to other covers, so we decided to take inspiration from the 80s and from synthwave, but then do our own version of this kinda of stuff.

It’s the first SHINING-release for years with no saxophone at all – why did you give up the saxophone this time?
I decided to write music without thinking about if the sax should be part of the song or not. And if the song called for a sax part, then I would put it in, but if the song never needed a sax part then I decided that I wasn’t going to cram it in just because it’s become our Blackjazz-trademark. And in the end none of the songs really felt like they needed some sax, so that’s why there’s no sax on the album. It’s as simple as that!

Instead of the saxophone, synthesizers are the most dominant instrument on this record. What do you like in this element most?
I’m glad you say that! First of all it’s an element that hasn’t been dominant in our music before, at least not the kind of 80s lush sounds we’re using on this record. So it brings our music a new color and a fresh starting point, which made the writing of the songs so much more fun!

In how far did the songwriting and recording of this album differ from the writing and recording process of, for example, “International Black Jazz Society”?
The process was very different in many aspects! First of all I involved a lot of people in the writing of the music and the lyrics, which is something I haven’t done before. This time our new bass player Ole Vistnes wrote almost all the music together with me. Also our producer, Sean Beavan, collaborated on both music and lyrics. On the lyrics side I had Astrid Williamson from London help me out on most of the songs, and I have the Danish, LA-based producer Frederik Thaae help out with both music and lyrics on “End” and “When I’m gone”.
Another difference is that we recorded all the band stuff live in the studio, with everyone playing together at the same time. The only thing that was recorded afterwards was the vocals. That contributes to a very organic groove and feeling that contrasts to the more produced and modern commercial mix, and I think it gave us the best of both worlds!

Aren’t you afraid about the fan’s reactions – the new style is quite different from everything you did before …?
It’s always exciting to release a new album, no matter if you’ve changed stuff or not. If you didn’t change much, then you can worry of the fans will think it’s boring that you didn’t change. If you change a lot, then you can worry if the fans will think it changed too much. So in the end all that matters is really what you think yourself, and for me this was absolutely the right thing to do! I had to do something that was exciting for me, and I loved to work on this record. I’m also super proud of the results!

On the last song “Hole In The Sky”, but also on “My Church” there is a female voice involved – who is she and why was she your choice for this contribution?
The female singer on “Hole In The Sky” is called Linnea Dale. She’s a Norwegian pop singer, but and although she has never sung with a heavier band before, she was totally into the idea! And I think it turned out just amazing!

How will you combine the songs live – do you think, it works for the Blackjazz-style-fans or also for new fans you attracted with „Animal“ to combine both types of songs in a live-set?
Yeah, we’ve already played close to 20 shows that combines new and old material, and I think they work perfectly together. The new songs finally give us the variation in our live sets that I’ve been missing for the last few years.

Thank you for your time! Please let us do a short brainstorming in the end of this interview:
Being on tour: Try not to become sick!
Jamal Khashoggi: Unfortunately haven’t had time to read up on the situation due to album release and touring.
Backstreet Boys: I loved their song “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)” when it came out in the 90s, and I’m happy to reference that song on our track “When The Lights Go Out”!
Your favorite animal: Wolf or black panther
Germany: Is currently on #2 of most Shining plays on Spotify! That’s awesome! Can’t wait to play in Germany again!
SHINING in 10 years: Have no idea! Absolutely no idea! But I’m going to work hard at making us an awesome and great band!

Once again thanks for your time. The last words are yours:
Please check out our new album “Animal” as soon as possible, and come see us at one of our upcoming shows in November!

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Publiziert am 16. November 2018 von Moritz Grütz