Interview with Pär Sundström, bassist with Swedish Power Metal Masters SABATON

Of the many bands who specialise in the epic sub-genre of power metal, there are few whose creative approach is as singular and specific as Sabaton.

For the lion’s share of their career, the Swedish band have eschewed the standard fantasy imagery in their lyrics in favour of a more hard-hitting approach – the real-life blood, sweat and tears of actual historical battles.

This has culminated in not only their superb upcoming new album The Great War, but also the launch earlier this year of their ambitious Sabaton History Channel project.

“We have been quite busy,” says Sabaton bassist Pär Sundström with typical understatement. “As well as making the new album, we’ve been working very hard on the Sabaton History Channel. We have not had any time to rest. We are also doing a quite intense PR tour for the new album and we will have done 400 interviews by the time that’s over.”

“It’s been fun to have played some shows (at the time of writing, they had recently played a gig in Malta). There’s been a few new songs in the set and the fans have been so excited to hear new stuff.”

The new stuff specifically is the 11 songs that comprise The Great War. As the title suggests, all of the songs on the record tell true stories of World War I.

“There were many things that inspired us to do an entire album dedicated to World War I,” Pär explains. “Last year there was the 100 year anniversary of the war coming to an end. We had covered World War I in a couple of songs, but the timing could not have been better to do a whole album about this conflict. It was a pretty intense, dark war so the themes of the songs are well suited to Sabaton.”

The album is also one of the few recordings not produced by their long-time collaborator Peter Tägtgren, this time being overseen by Jonas Kjellgren, who was also behind the desk for last year’s Manowar cover (in which Sabaton delivered a kick-ass version of Kingdom Come). In addition, this is the first Sabaton album to include Tommy Johannson on guitar and backing vocals.

“It’s been great to have Tommy on board, because he’s a guitarist, singer and songwriter. Everyone contributed a lot to this album and so we have a really good feeling about that,” Pär enthuses.

As history buffs, Sabaton had historian Indy Neidell on hand to give the songs authenticity.

“We were very lucky to have Indy helping out with research,” says Pär. “He also works with us on the Sabaton History Channel.”

Which neatly segues into the next topic of conversation. The Sabaton History Channel can be found on YouTube and goes into the history behind some of history’s most important wars and battles.

“It came about to inform Sabaton fans about the wars and battles which inspire our songs,” Pär explains. “It is an idea we had for a very long time and we felt it would give people a greater understanding of what the songs are about. The idea is to create documentaries about the battles in each and every Sabaton song, so we have so much to cover and it’s very exciting.”

The channel and the upcoming new album both continue the great Sabaton tradition of covering real life conflicts.

As Pär explains: “We didn’t really have that on the first (recorded) album and we all felt like something was missing. We wanted the songs to be about the real world, not fiction or fantasy. So writing about real life wars and battles is something that came naturally to myself and Joakim (Brodén, lead vocals and keyboards).”

And, yes, there’s a world tour to support the album as well – and Pär reckons the time has come for Australian audiences to get the full Sabaton experience.

“After 20 years, we would love to tour Australia as a headliner. We have done some festival spots there before, where we had been forced to do shorter sets – but you guys deserve a full show!”

We’ll keep our fingers crossed for that one, but in the meantime, we’ve got Sabaton History Channel to educate ourselves and the unleashing of The Great War album in July. Whichever way you look at it, 2019 is a big year for Sabaton and their fans.

Get THE GREAT WAR now: https://geni.us/SabatonAU

Interviewer/ Writer: Matt Thrower