SPILL FEATURE: HILLS AND VALLEYS, THAT IS HOW WE ROLL – A CONVERSATION WITH MIC MICHAELI OF EUROPE

HILLS AND VALLEYS, THAT IS HOW WE ROLL

A CONVERSATION WITH MIC MICHAELI OF EUROPE

Since 1983, Europe has released 11 albums. The band formed in 1979, under the name Force, but by the time they signed their first record deal, in 1982, the name changed to Europe. It was a smart move. Europe became an ‘overnight’ success in their native Sweden and a couple of years later dominated the worldwide charts with The Final Countdown album and single. Europe is set to release their 12th album, Come This Madness, and I had the chance to speak with Mic Michaeli, their keyboardist about the new album and having a group that has not only endured but grown over the years.

“It feels great, it feels…we have been doing this for 40 some years, and it finally feels like we are getting the hang of it, how to do it right,” Michaeli laughs. He is being extremely modest. They have been doing it right for 40 years. But he adds, “we are really proud of this album, Come This Madness. Just very proud of what we have done with this latest album.”

It has been nine years since their last album, Walk the Earth, but that does not mean the band has not been busy. The album is a hard rock album, not so much a departure but a more defined sound. The band also throws in some prog rock to keep things interesting. “Yeah, it is harder,” agreed Michaeli. “But still, we have the melodies, and that is our brand. To have the heavy riffs combined with some nice melodies. The songs have their ups and downs, hills and valleys, that is how we roll.”

Europe approached the recording of Come This Madness differently than their last few albums. Michaeli explained that the band came to the studio with a definite different mindset. “We had been talking about making an album for a long long time, but we felt that we started having material that was really really good, embryos to songs. Maybe a riff, or a part of a song. So, we started working on it, and we got producer Tom Dalgety on board. He was just fantastic. He wanted to work really hard on the songs before we went into the studio. We basically had everything mapped out before started recording it. Unlike the last two or three previous albums, which were more of a spontaneous thing happening in the studio. We didn’t really work on demos before we went in, those albums were more spontaneous, which can be nice as well but working with Tom was a fantastic experience. We worked really well together and we were all on the same planet for the whole thing. I don’t think we have ever worked so hard on one album.”

That did not mean the band did not alter and change things once the recording button was pushed. “We made structures of the songs but then with sounds and arrangements, as we went along we added stuff and some arrangement changes in the studio. The band recorded in one studio, for the most part, but later we did overdubs.”

PURCHASE COME THIS MADNESS VIA NAPALM RECORDS

As for Michaeli it is interesting to discuss his keyboard playing and how it fits in the overall sound of Europe, especially on their new album, including some prog rock sounds. “I have never thought about it. One thing could be, it is a challenge to find your place in a very guitar driven music style. You have to work hard to find your spot in the musical picture. And I found a way to find that place or rather the place of keyboards in that big wall of guitars. We are all fans of prog, and I grew up and part of my youth was only listening to prog rock music, everyone loves Rush for example. Also Yes, Genesis, and anything that goes a little bit left, sinister, It can be a little bit cool.”

Along with the new album, the band has produced two very interesting and very different music videos for “One on One” and “The Cult of Ignorance”.

“The video for “One on One”, well Joey [Tempest, vocalist] and I worked on an idea that we don’t want the video of the band pretending to play and pretending to look cool and pretending to rock out. We wanted to do something completely different. And Peter Stormare, the actor in the video, is also a musician himself. He is a cool singer, more towards Americana music. We didn’t know him at the time. We got his number from a mutual friend. We called him up and asked if he wanted to be in our video. We told him, ‘it is just going to be you in a big warehouse.’ He said, ‘sorry, can’t do it because I hurt my foot really badly, and it won’t look good.’ We said, ‘ok, but that is even better, come over to Sweden.’ He had crushed his foot and was limping along, and he came over and we said, ‘we are going to fuck you up even more.’ He looks really beaten, bruised, black eyed, and we just made a thing out of him. We are just so happy that he said yes at all. It was a blast. He is the nicest guy.”

The video for “The Cult of Ignorance” could not be more different. The band took a very different approach for this video. “Joey and myself, still didn’t want to do a performance video and try to look cool. He said, ‘let’s bring in as many people as we can,’ and then we narrowed it down to people from Sweden being known internationally.”

The video includes Malin Åkerman, former World No. 1 and multiple Grand Slam champion tennis player Stefan Edberg, astronaut Christer Fuglesang, Howling Pelle (The Hives), Mikael Åkerfeldt and Fredrik Åkesson (Opeth) and E-Type, among others. “We spent a lot of time trying to get hold of all these people, and there were a lot of people who turned us down or didn’t answer us. But we are so thankful for all the people who said yes and wanted to be in it.  It was a lot of work to get everyone involved, but it is a good, fun video.”

“I hope that they walk away and that anything is possible. That is the short version. I really hope they walk away with the feeling…you always hope that you will touch people musically and lyrically and they can find hope in it and some comfort. Also, just an urge to just rock out.

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Main Photo Credit: Andy Ford | Background Photo Credit: revolver.se