Metal Contraband’s Chelsea recently spoke with Marco Aro of The Haunted, to discuss to discuss the band’s first new album in eight years, Songs of Last Resort, working with Björn Strid of Soilwork,  ⁨Ola Englund’s direction of the video for “Death to the Crown”, Marco’s favorite track off the new album, his punk and hardcore origins, what band he’s been listening to lately, and more. . Check it out below: 

Chelsea here, excited to be joined by Marco Aro from The Haunted. How are you doing today? 

I’m good. How are you? 

Doing great, thank you. So, congrats on the release of the new Haunted album, you’re absolutely killing it with Songs Of The Last Resort. It’s honestly just one amazing track after another.

Glad to hear it!

Definitely. I would really like to just dig into it, and start from the very beginning of how you guys got started working on this album, and what kind of ideas and inspirations you first went in with.

Well, it’s been eight years, so we figure it’s kind of good. 

About time, right? *laughs*

The thing is that we live in…we’re so scattered, like, geography. Because me and Ola live in Stockholm and Adrian lives in London. Jensen and Jonas live like three, four hour drive. So we  really don’t get to like, we don’t have a rehearsal room where we hang out, and we only get together when we’re doing shows. And for eight years, we’ve been talking about doing this album every time we get together. And we get all excited like a circus clown, but it always just ends up as nothing. This time around, last year, we got together to do a show in Sweden called the Sweden Rock Festival. And that’s when we decided, okay, enough with the bullshit. We need to do this now because people actually paid money for us to do it and we’re not doing it. So we decided to, okay, let’s do it. And we had like a Dropbox with like eight years worth of songs. And once we decided to make this album, we didn’t even touch one of those songs. We wrote the whole thing. So the whole album was written in, like, three or four months. And then we got to the demo stage where we did our various parts. Yeah, the only conscious thought that we had going into this album was that, okay, let’s take The Haunted sound and turn it up to 11. That’s what we did. And we just said, okay, let’s make it an aggressive one just for the hell of it, because the band throughout the years has been exploring all kinds of areas and musical genres and stuff. So we decided, okay, let’s get back to the roots. Back to where The Haunted Made Me Do It, One Kill Wonder. With the aggression that we had when we were 25. So the lyrical theme also was actually a bit of a coincidence because Ola was writing at home, and Jensen was writing, and I was writing at home. And once we presented the lyrics to each other, that’s when we realized that we were all writing about the same thing. So it wasn’t like a…theme that we’re supposed to write about. But it just turned out that way because it’s pretty hard to ignore the world that we’re living in right now. It’s an absolute shit show. That’s when we decided, okay, let’s keep this momentum up with the lyrics and everything. It’s not meant to be a theme album, and we’re not a political band, nor have we ever been, or will we ever be, but…as I said, it’s just hard to ignore. So that’s why it turned out that way. 

Yeah, that’s very funny that you guys all kind of synchronized, even though it was eight years without officially releasing an album, you still had, you were still on the same wavelength in terms of the stuff that you came up with. Yeah, I mean, definitely going back to what you were saying about everybody being in different places and everything like that, that can…it is very rare, I think, for musicians these days to just be in one band and just do one project on top of that. It’s like everyone’s always doing multiple things, juggling a couple different gigs and everything like that, so…  

We’re actually no exception because you have At The Gates, Halo Effect and you have The Resistance. There’s all these kinds of bands that’s been around, and I guess we gather some experience from that as well. Playing with other musicians and stuff, so yeah. But The Haunted has always been like the mothership, more or less. When you start writing music with other people that you haven’t been writing music with before, it’s like a learning curve where you realize that it’s a lot easier to write with these guys than the new guys. That’s why it was written so fast because when you make like a really good soup with all the ingredients, and then you try to make that soup over and over again, but there’s some ingredients missing, and you don’t really know what it is that’s missing, but it’s something missing. And we found the ingredients again and it just turns out it was there all the time, but we just didn’t really use it. So now this time around, we got back to the youthful playfulness, I believe. That we don’t, like, try to follow any trends or anything. We just do what comes out of the heart. So yeah, that’s what we did. 

Very cool. Now that’s a fun analogy with the soup thing because yeah, exactly, everyone has their hands in other projects, work with other musicians. And of course that can also be a good challenge for yourself, a good learning experience. You may discover something new in your writing style you didn’t do before, but then taking all that and coming back to your roots, I feel like is always the most important part.

Yeah, but that was the thing when I rejoined the band in 2013, it was like coming home  because I’ve been doing various other projects, my old band Facedown and we did The Resistance and there was always something missing. Even though there were like really old, good, dear friends in all those bands, but there was something missing. It was…something was off. 

You were missing your friends, The Haunted!

*laughs* Yeah!

Very cool, that’s great. Now, I mean, so with the new album, we’ve seen quite a few music videos so far for “Warhead”, “In Fire Reborn”, both done by Patric Ullaeus, but also for “Death to the Crown”, which Ola directed. So what has the video production side of things been like for this album? 

I guess that we decided to do a completely different approach to what we’ve done previously, because we did like one video or two videos and it barely got any views or any attention or anything. But this time around we hired a social media person and blah, blah, blah. Because we’re old farts that sit around and complain that it was a lot better back in the day. Oh yeah, but we…I guess we decided because Ola is also, he’s a big YouTuber and stuff. So he pretty much pointed us in the direction of social media because as I said, we’re old. We don’t really get that thing. We didn’t grow up with it. 

No, I mean, you seem to be doing all right with it though. Like I said, I mean, these videos are getting a lot of attention. Like you said, Ola definitely has a good YouTube fan base that kind of follows along with all of his projects, I think.  

Yeah. And he has an understanding for the thing that when us old people, we get lazy and, as I said, complain about the new stuff. We don’t like the new stuff. But it’s a powerful tool. 

So, also for the new record, you had a special appearance from Björn from Soilwork just on one track “To Bleed Out”. How did he get involved in the project? 

The thing is that he’s been an old friend of mine for like 20, 25 years, but we’ve never done anything professional together. I had a vocal producer from a band called, remember a band called Clawfinger? So Jocke, who is Clawfinger more or less, he’s been my vocal producer for like 15 plus years. Then he decided to move to the up, up north of Sweden, which is like a 12 hour drive from here. 

Oh, wow. Too cold up there.

Yeah. So we tried to make it work. He had like this really great idea that I should come up in December into the north of Sweden and live in his guest house. No, I’m not doing that. Walking knee deep in the snow.

Just going to say, you’ll get snowed in, you’ll never get to leave. Like a horror movie in the making.  

Yeah! So Björn…Jensen actually called me because we were struggling to find a new vocal producer and he said, why don’t you call Björn? And I called Björn and he was most definitely on board immediately. So he produced my vocals on this album. He’s like this, I know Jocke who did my vocals before, he’s strict, but Björn is strict in a more candid way. He, well, because when I get lazy and I decide that that take is a good take because I’m tired, and I don’t want to do it anymore, he’s just…”Man, we’re not even close”. So yeah, so he pushed me, but in a gentle way, which I really didn’t notice that he was pushing me. I was just…so I guess that secretly or subconsciously, I pretty much tried to impress him, I believe. Because everybody’s  raving about, yeah, “Marco’s vocals sound so good on this album”. And I just look at those comments and think, “I didn’t do anything different”. But, I guess it’s, when I started thinking about it, I probably just subconsciously tried to impress him.

Yeah, definitely. Plus you guys had that advantage of that friendship as well. So he knew how to push you a little further without being too overwhelming about it and everything. And like you said, you were probably pushing a little harder, because it was your buddy in there, it was your friend, and you wanted to do good for him, right? *laughs*

Yeah, of course! 

Now, aside from the main singles, of course, which we dug into a little bit for the video side of things, let’s talk about the rest of the album. What have been some tracks that you’ve really been looking forward to getting out there and having everyone hear? 

Ah, my personal favorite on this album is actually a song called “Unbound”, which has…because I come from a hardcore punk rock background, and it has that d-beat and everything, and I was really happy when Jonas wrote that song because I got really excited. And that’s the one song that I, when I turn…I don’t usually listen to songs or albums that we make because I really don’t like listening to myself.  

No one ever does. 

*laughs* No! But that song is actually the one that always, when I’m in my car and listening to music, and I just want to like rehearse songs or something, it’s usually “Unbound” that comes on because I really, really like that song.

It’s become kind of like a new go-to for you for rehearsing, warming up and stuff. Very cool. 

Yeah, that’s really, it’s a fantastic song, and it’s in the same theme as “In Fire Reborn”. It’s a song about the soldiers’ perspective, when they get dehumanized, and they stop viewing the enemy as human beings or just that’s…That’s a really scary thing, but I guess it’s inevitable when you are faced with that situation. 

It’s an intense topic, but a very real one too, I’m sure. 

Yeah, because as I said, it’s really hard to ignore the absolute shit show that we’re living in right now.

As you mentioned, I mean, you’ve definitely been well-established in the metal world at this point yourself, but like you mentioned, you do have those punk and hardcore origins, which is also a genre that’s not afraid talking about the world, the situation, everything. So do you feel like those punk hardcore roots still influence you in any way? 

Most definitely, most definitely. Because when I listen to music nowadays, I realize that the older you get, the further away from what you’re doing, you get. There’s very few new bands that really, really excite me because they pretty much sound the same in my opinion. But when I had a few beers on YouTube late at night, I usually go to the older bands and listen to old Black Flag and Dead Kennedys and stuff. But then there’s a few glimmers of light, like a band from Sweden called Throne. 

I feel like I’ve heard of them, yeah!

Yeah, they’re very intense. And they’re a Stockholm band and they’re really young and angry guys, but they took hardcore and sprinkled some special sauce on it. It’s fantastic. You should check them out. It’s really, really cool. 

Definitely. Yeah, I’ve definitely heard the name, I’m familiar with them for sure, but I’ll have to dig into their music a little more. 

They’re really making noise.

And also coming back to the album Songs Of Last Resort, Jens Bogren produced, mixed and mastered the album. Of course, he’s someone who’s also very well known in the metal world. So what do you personally feel he brought? What did his touch bring to you guys’ songs? 

The thing is that the format that we usually stuck with back in the day, was that we decided on a studio producer and a mixer all being the same guy, which, good or bad, it was the format that we used to do before. But this time around, we recorded the album in one studio and then we sent out one song to five different producers. And Jens was the one that came closest to us, because the versions were very, very different. That’s when we all decided, oh, like when somebody hears your song with different ears, and Jens was the one that really, really got close to what we were after. Because we tried some new producers, like young guys which, if it was the modern sound that we were after, but it turned out not to be and Jens, he’s got like a really nice pedigree, so when he presented his mix, we were all like, “Sold!”

Yeah, well, he does have a good background in both, you know, producing classic bands and a lot of that…death metal origins, but also a lot of newer bands as well. So it feels like he kind of put that balance to it. 

Yeah. And he’s geeky as well. He’s very geeky with the sounds and everything. And he’s not hung up on, “Yeah, this is my sound and this is what you get”. You can come in with pointers, and Jensen actually ended up being employed by him.

Sometimes things like that work out too, right? Now I’m also curious, Marco, since The Haunted is based in Sweden and you’re originally from Finland, but then also all of your music and everything you guys do is in English, are you trilingual then? 

I actually am. I speak Finnish, Swedish and English, yeah. 

Very cool. Does it come in handy in the day-to-day life that you do, you know, kind of traveling around Europe and touring and everything?

Yeah, it is. And the funny thing is that when we play Finland, I speak Finnish in between songs.  It’s funny because the guys don’t even know what I’m saying. So they’re pretty nervous until I yell out the song title, because they don’t really know anything. 

*laughs* That’s funny. 

The Finns are very, very patriotic because the Finns are actually the only people, except for a few minority people, that still speak this language. So they’re very, very keen on you to, if you’re a Finn, you talk Finnish, period. There’s a few bands that had Finnish members that tried to speak English, because it was cool back in the day to speak English to the crowd. They booed them. 

Wow! 

So that’s why I keep talking Finnish in between songs.

And confuse your band, they just stand there ready to play like, “what are we doing”? 

Yeah, but like, the first shows that we did because back in the early 2000s, they had no idea at all. But now we’re a bit more professional, we actually have a set list that we follow. *laughs* Back in the day, we didn’t. It was a surprise. 

*laughs* Well, it’s good that Finland has that attitude towards Finnish, I think, because Finnish is such a unique language. It’s very different. It’s not, you know, technically part of Scandinavian languages, despite where it’s located. It’s a totally different language family, it really is very unique, so it’s good that it’s being kept alive.

It’s definitely the odd one out. The Estonians speak a similar language. It’s like, the difference between Finnish and Estonian is like Swedish and Danish. I don’t know if you can make the  connection, but the Danes have a certain dialect of the Germanic language. But the Finns, they don’t even have a language close to it. It’s very, very different. 

That’s great though, like I said, mean, it’s good that you’re still, you know, kind of helping to keep it alive in the community, especially because it’s definitely unique. So coming back to the Haunted, you guys have a few European festival dates throughout the summer and you’re also going through a few unique and different destinations in the fall, like Greece and Japan. Don’t see those as often on the playlist before you head home to Sweden. So just give us an idea of your outlook for the near future of The Haunted. 

The outlook for the Haunted has actually been the same since 2013 when we put this lineup together. It’s going for quality before quantity. Things have to make sense. It’s not about the money, it’s about making sense. This year, given that the album was released in May, so we missed out on the whole festival season and everything. So that’s why we consider this year like a warm-up year for what’s to come, because the offers are coming in and we’re in that blessed place that we can actually pick and choose. Because our lives don’t depend on it anymore, because we all have jobs, and families, and bills to pay, because music scene nowadays, there’s no money left, there’s no money left. If the money is semi-good, but it makes sense, we’re going to do it. Because the whole thing about The Haunted is that it’s about having fun. As long as it’s fun, we’re going to do it. But once it becomes a must, that’s when we have to sit down and take stock and see what went wrong. We have a few, like the Japan show and then we’re going to go to, I guess we’re staying home for like two days, and then we’re going over to the Canary Islands to play Mallorca, a festival there. I’ve never heard of that festival, but it’s a lot of big names, so I guess it’s good *laughs*. Yeah, but Japan has always been like this place that we’ve been there on, pretty much every album. So they embraced us when we got there with In Flames back in 2001, I believe. And they’ve embraced The Haunted ever since.

Very nice, so that’ll be a good return for you guys.

Yeah, but the thing is that The Haunted has gone through so many changes with musical styles and everything, and they still stayed true and loyal. So yeah, very grateful about that. The U.S/ also, it’s hard to understand that we actually have a fan base over there. Throughout these years. And there’s so many bands, there’s so, so many bands. It’s easy to just get lost in the noise, but apparently we have a loyal fan base even in the U.S.

Definitely. Well, your fan base all over the world is definitely excited that you guys have this new album out. Like I said in the beginning, it is truly just one awesome track after another. So, Kiitos…

Thank you!

…thank you guys so much for putting out this awesome music. We’re definitely looking forward to seeing and hearing more from you, and good luck with everything. Thanks for your time today. 

Thank you for your time.