Fixation: No Longer Speaking In Tongues
“This EP is all about cults,” FIXATION vocalist Jonas W Hansen explains. “It’s also about the psychological effects cults have on people, and speaking in tongues is this phenomenon that is very strange and interesting. We had a demo for the last album called Speak In Tongues, which is what we ended up calling our EP.”
Speak In Tongues was supposed to be a four track EP that was put out in between the Norwegian metalcore band’s debut album, More Subtle Than Death, and their upcoming sophomore album. The band initially started off before they released any music as an alternative pop-rock band before they started listening to heavier music, which inspired them to create heavier music when they started releasing music in 2020. But it wasn’t until Speak In Tongues that the band embraced the really heavy music.
Hansen wanted the EP to be conceptual and he felt it would be more conceptual if there were interludes that connected the songs together. Whilst he was hesitant to tell the rest of the band due to the strict timeline that they were on, once he did, the band loved it and they added the interludes.
The interludes are the highlight of the EP, adding an intrinsic layer to the concept of the EP. They highlight the more experimental side of the band as the interludes are made up of intricate instrumentals. “We had talked about having an introduction song anyway, but I thought it’d be cooler if we did four interludes and four songs,” he explains.
The concept of the EP is about Hansen‘s fascination about cults. “ don’t to join one!” He jokes, “but they’ve fascinated me since I was a teenager. It’s such an interesting thing, and there are a lot of documentaries and articles that I’ve read about them and their disconnection from reality. I’ve always wondered how one can get to that point where people believe in what a false prophet claims or eventually come to the point where they believe that they themselves are a prophet.”
Speak In Tongues tells the story of someone who feels disconnected from society and wants to find meaning in life. They find a cult, but then quickly realise that the cult isn’t different from what the person was running from, so they decide after a while that they start their own cult. “The moral of the story is that you’ll never be truly happy if you are always searching for something new and at the end, it’s a feeling of ‘I regret making this thing that I made, and it’s too late now, the idea is still going to fester in the minds in generations to come’,” Hansen summarises.
In the 21st Century, it is easy to make the connection between social media and cults, as they both thrive on people being isolated and manipulating large groups of people to believe what the leader wants them to. Furthermore, a lot of cults which are not around anymore live on through internet forums and various other social media sites, proving that the idea of cults never truly die.
Some people might think that it’s strange to write an EP about cults, but ever since their formation, FIXATION have been about social criticism and touching on different topics about what goes on in the world today. Writing an EP about cults seemed like the obvious choice because they are their own thing. There is so much to pull inspiration from because there are so many different visual identities, which made it easier for Hansen to write about.
He didn’t just write the EP; he also designed the stunning cover for the EP as well. “We had hired a graphic designer to do it, but they dropped out of the project, so it ended up being me who made the art work. I’m not a graphic designer, so I had to learn a lot along the way, but I’m really happy with how it turned out.”
The band have also taken the cult elements into their live shows. Hansen wears a cloth over his head during live shows, which was inspired by a photo he saw when doing research. “It is to symbolise the different stages that the person in the story goes through. Red means the initiation, blue means being taken into the cult, and the orange cloth represents becoming the leader of the cult. We wanted to show those different phases of the story in some way. It makes it more interesting playing live, especially during the summer when we played festivals where people might not have heard of our band.”
Although the cult concept is only for this EP, that doesn’t mean that FIXATION have written off any more concept records. Speaking about the future releases for the band, Hansen explains, “I’ve already got a new concept in mind for what we’re writing next. I’ve still got to figure out the details and things like that, but I have a general concept for it. Sonically, now I feel like creating Speak In Tongues has allowed us to test out our sound even more. We’re probably going to go more into the heavier sound, but we’re not going to stray away from the softer side of things. We love the melodic part of it and we could even make something that’s more poppier.”
Regardless of where they go next sound-wise, it is clear that FIXATION are one of the most articulate, innovative and hardworking bands who are rising through the ranks of the music scene with their unique sound and a look that is ever evolving. The metalcore world is theirs for the taking.
Speak In Tongues is out now via Indie Recordings.
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