Aspherium started out in 2007 with Marius and Torgeir. They found drummer Bjørn Tore and recorded a three song demo; "The Lingering Animosity". After a long search they found a second guitarist in Morten Nielsen. With the line up complete they started playing live and among other things reached second place in the Norwegian Wacken metal battle finals.
Now the Aspherium debut album is completed, and it is for sale at our homepage, and ITunes, Amazon, we are currently continuing to play live and working on more new material.
SPR (VIMH): Hi guys, congrats on your new album The Embers of Eternity!
Aspherium: Thank you! We are very proud of this new album! We worked super hard, and it turned out exactly as I wanted.
SPR (VIMH): What is the significance of the album title The Embers of Eternity?
Aspherium: Embers can be both good or bad. They can help us create heat or cool food, or they can start fires and kill us. The embers represents humanity. We have the ability to heal and destroy. As long as humanity is around there is some hope, there’s also the possibility that we will just destroy everything. But the embers most importantly to me signifies hope. Which is something we try to put into our music, because I think that’s really needed these days.
SPR (VIMH): What do the lyrics talk about? Which are your major lyrics’ influences?
Aspherium: This is a concept album about a future where humanity basically messed up the planet. Where humanity did nothing to prevent the world form getting destroyed. The album deals with a lot of what happened to the planet, and why humanity often is blind to the things that are right in front of us. We choose to look the other way and pretend that everything is ok. But we can’t do that forever.
SPR (VIMH): Which are those elements that separate your new album from your previous albums?
Aspherium: We worked really hard on putting the songs together, it all flows together very well. The whole album flows together with interludes. Every song has a section or more with really sad melodies that to me makes the songs very interesting and takes it to another level. I wanted every song to have something that really made me feel something, and these sad parts are some of what stands out the most to me. It happens both in guitar or vocal melodies. There’s also more variation on this album. Especially vocally. There is a lot of ear candy for the people who really listen deeply. And there’s a synth solo on the last song!!
SPR (VIMH): How would you characterize “The Embers of Eternity ” and what are your expectations from the new album?
Aspherium: I would call it a melodic death metal concept album probably. But we also have some prog, some black metal, groove and mellow stuff.... We hope to get our music out to more people with this album and continue to grow the band.
SPR (VIMH): How’s the fans’ reactions been to the new songs on your live shows so far?
Aspherium: It’s been very good so far! People seem to really like the new songs live, they still feel very new and fresh for us to play. Which keeps us on our toes for sure. We are doing more of the new songs that we haven’t played yet, when we’re playing more shows starting in April.
SPR (VIMH): Do you prefer to be on the road or on the studio writing and recording?
Aspherium: Right now I want to tour as much as possible, because that’s where I feel we can reach new people and grow the band that good old fashioned way. But I love both.
SPR (VIMH): How did you come up with the name Aspherium initially?
Aspherium: I was trying to combine different words to come up with something that wasn’t used. Somehow I ended up with Aspherium, and it just stuck.
SPR (VIMH): How would you describe your music style to someone that hasn’t heard of you before?
Aspherium: Progressive death metal seems to be what most people seem to call us, so that works. I want to just call us metal, though. We’re a metal band, and we incorporate a bunch of different styles of metal.
SPR (VIMH): Which do you consider to be the best male & female vocalist in metal history?
Aspherium: For male I think I’ll have to go with Devin Townsend. He’s got an insane range, and he can do both singing and screaming amazingly well. As for female, I don’t know about all time, but the one that comes to mind right now is Tatiana from Jinjer. She’s got a great singing voice, and she has a damn brutal growl as well.
SPR (VIMH): Which is the record you wish you had written and why?
Aspherium: Still Life by Opeth, because it’s almost a perfect album. Or the black album, because then I wouldn’t be broke all the time.
SPR (VIMH): Were you obliged to give just one album to extraterrestrials that would represent the whole human music, which album would it be and from which band/artist?
Aspherium: Empath by Devin Townsend. It shows off beautiful and varied music, brutal metal, choirs and some silly stuff as well. A good mix! The aliens would come back for more!
SPR (VIMH): If you had the chance to travel in time… where would you choose to go? To the past or the future and why?
Aspherium: I would go back and see Metallica with Cliff Burton. Or maybe just go back to the 60’s and stay in that time line to see all the amazing stuff that happened throughout the years.
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Marius Skarsem Pedersen: Guitars/Vocals, Bjørn Tore Erlandsen: Drums, Torgeir Lyby Pettersen: Bass, Morten Nielsen: Guitars
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