Twilight Force: A New Dawn Rising

Deep in the mystical forests, the heroes of mighty magic TWILIGHT FORCE have been climbing the power metal ladder, growing from strength to strength over the recent years. One of the trio of founding members still within the band,Daniel Beckman aka by his stage name Blackwald, lifted the lid on their brand new record Dawn of the Dragonstar when he recently sat down with Distorted Sound.

“We didn’t have to reinvent the wheel, so to speak, as with Heroes Of Mighty Magic we had a foundation of the soundscape and the musical landscape that we wanted. That made this whole process a little bit easier, because we could just tweak, and we knew more of what we wanted to do. With these three albums, when we made the first one we had a very clear goal about what we wanted to create with simpler arrangements and more straight to business songs that revived the late 90s power metal. Then with Heroes, we took a pretty big step further to incorporate the more intricate orchestral arrangements and all that, and then with Dawn Of The Dragonstar, we tried to create some sort of synergy, like an amalgamation of these two previous works that we had and create more in your face songs, but still maintain the orchestrations and all that we did previously. It’s been a very interesting and rewarding period and journey to work on this album and I’m happy with the outcome – we’ll see what people think!”

One of the biggest changes that has occurred for TWILIGHT FORCE in between their second and third album is the introduction of a new frontman Allyon, who steps in for Chrileon. As Blackwald explains though, the lineup switch hasn’t affected the band’s dynamic.

“We have Allyon as a new vocalist, and that was exciting – I wouldn’t say challenging because when we were writing songs we had to take into account his range and his abilities and also the fact that we could experiment a little bit more with the operatic parts and the skills that he has and so forth. In terms of progression, I would say we’re older and therefore wiser now! We streamlined our workflow a little bit more, and we knew pretty much what we were looking for when we started working on this album, so we had a very clear goal.”

 

“We didn’t have to change our writing style in any way. Most of the songs were written with Allyon’s vocals in mind, so it opened up a couple of new doors in terms of the storytelling. He’s operatically trained so we gently incorporated a little bit of that which was exciting to us. Besides that it was business as usual – no matter who the singer is you always have to adapt the song, the key of the song and all that to fit and hit that perfect spot  which we had to take into account, but it didn’t affect our songwriting, everything was already built with him in mind.”

Hailing from Falun, TWILIGHT FORCE are just one of a number of bands from the town who have risen in prominence over the past few years, and one band Blackwald gives a lot of credit to is arguably one of the biggest bands to come from the town; SABATON.

“SABATON have been like a local musical beacon of hope! They have put in so much hard work, and ever since they started, I remember the first time I heard their first demo that they recorded and I was of blown away thinking ‘wow, can a local band sound like this? That’s amazing!’ They’ve been really busting their asses every day since then so all their success is just so well earned. I’m really impressed by how far they have gotten and they really achieved a big part of what they wanted to achieve. They can be an influence as a local metal band to open up that realm of possibilities that you can reach out farther than you would have imagined and bring your music out to the world! They have of course been an inspiration in that way, and I don’t know if it’s known I actually played keyboards with SABATON in the first two years! In Falun and the neighbouring town everyone knows everyone and everyone helps each other in a way that you take inspiration and influence!”

How do you feel TWILIGHT FORCE have grown since your formation back in 2011?

Blackwald: Any kind of growth or success is a very welcome addition to our lives, and when you see that you’re affecting people’s lives in a positive way, that’s one of the greatest rewards you can experience. Some of the bonus material on this record is really crappy versions of two of the first songs we ever wrote from 2007, so that was years before we even released our first album but that was the seed, we didn’t even have vocals at the time! We knew that what we wanted to create, and even back then there was no telling that this was going to become this whole thing that we’re doing right now, it’s really rewarding and a lot of fun.

How do you feel the metal scene has evolved in Sweden?

Blackwald: Sweden is a pretty big stronghold for metal in general. First of all it’s very cold here so we have a lot of time during the dark months of the year just sit inside and be inspired by not sweating our asses off! I have to give credit to the music education system that we have here and that we’re very blessed to have basically free music training for 18 years –  you have to pay a small fee but you will have instruments available and you can try whatever you want, you will get the good training and the classical instruments or rock instruments, whatever you want to play.

What are the main differences from a festival and playing your own shows?

Blackwald: The obvious and the short answer is stress levels! The positive thing about festivals is that it’s generally well organized and you don’t have to think about much in terms of itineraries, and audiences are always amazing, because at big open air festivals, there’s always a lot of people and there’s always a lot of bands to hang out with and talk to and meet new people and that’s so amazing. But then often you don’t have 100% control over technical details and schedules and stuff so it gets a lot more stressful and you don’t get a real soundcheck. You have to just rely on things to work and out of the box.

You played Wacken in 2017, what was it like for you to play at one of the biggest metal festivals?

Blackwald: That was literally a dream come true! I visited Wacken as a civilian visitor the first time in 2000 and then 2001. That was an amazing experience, but then to actually play there almost 20 years later was out of this world!

What does the future hold in store for TWILIGHT FORCE?

Blackwald: Well we are going on some sort of tour, when exactly this is gonna happen and under what circumstances, I can’t really say – nothing is written in stone yet. We’re looking into a couple of options, and we’ll see what comes out of it. I’m actually excited to start working on new material!

Dawn of the Dragonstar is set for release on August 16th via Nuclear Blast Records.

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