Das Interview mit James von Wheel zur The Path EP (English Version)

Artist: Wheel

Origin: Helsinki, Finnland

Genre: Progressive Rock, Metal

Label: Umbrella Artist Productions / Warner ADA

Link: https://www.facebook.com/wheelband/

Bandmember:

Vocals, Guitar – James Lascelles
Guitar – Saku Mattila
Bass – Mikko Määttä
Drums – Santeri Saksala

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

Hello Wheel

I´m glad that in the course of the release of your new EP „The Path“ you want to introduce yourself to our readers. At first I would like to know how you guys found each other to create your progressive sound.

Wheel / James:

Saku and I met while we were working on a TV show in Tampere at the end of 2014; we were chatting after the show and discovered that we were both big fans of modern progressive music. We met up again in early 2015 and decided to put a band together – Saku recruited Mikko and Santeri and we have been making music together ever since.

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

We could already listen to the EP, which was released by Umbrella Artist Productions / Warner ADA on 21st April. First thing that caught my attention was the modern way, which sometimes also switched into devout progressive parts. How do you create your songs respectively how do you proceed during your rehearsels and which themes are getting your attention?

Wheel / James:

This style of art/progressive music has always interested me as there are very few limitations for the composer; we can write bigger/longer songs with unusual structures and time signatures that bands would struggle to get away with in the pop world. The other side of our writing is that we don’t believe in complexity for it’s own sake – we are very mindful about keeping our songs cohesive and would rather use a logical, simple solution than going out of our way to overly complicate things.

For The Path EP, we spent a long time in the rehearsal room adjusting the arrangements, structures and our individual parts before looking for a suitable studio to record in. We were really happy with how it turned out, especially as we recorded everything in 2 days!

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

You already anounced your second studio album, which will be released at the end of 2017. What can your fans of the first compositions expect, and will there be similarities to your EP? How far is the developement of your second output?

Wheel / James:

Our second EP is going to come out towards the end of 2017; there are definitely stylistic similarities to the first EP although we don’t want to give too much away before it is released. What we CAN say is that the second EP is an improvement in every measurable way over the first; it is more ambitious in scope and like our first EP, will be mixed by the incredibly talented Jesse Vainio. In terms of development, it is nearly completely finished – we are making the finishing touches in the near future so it will be ready for an end of year release.

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Time For Metal / Rene W.:

During the last weeks you did a tour through Germany. What are your experiences from that tour? Did you enjoy the audiences, and were there any highlights or even bad moments?

Wheel / James:

The tour was a lot of fun; we got on very well with The Intersphere who are super nice guys and a great band. The audiences were incredibly receptive, especially considering most of the crowds had not heard us before, people were really into it. The shows were great and they were a lot of fun to play – we will definitely be coming back to Germany in the future to do it again.

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

Everything on Farewell, The Change and The Path fits together and appears like a concept. Do you want to create futures albums with this clear signature, too?

Wheel / James:

We are definitely open to the idea of a concept album, we just need to find an incredible concept to keep ourselves invested enough to make a whole album about a single subject or story. There are some amazing concept albums out there which have inspired me in the past, particularly The Shaming of the True by Kevin Gilbert and Frances the Mute by The Mars Volta; we will keep this in mind when we are writing new material and see if anything suitable comes up.

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

There are no short tracks on the EP The Path. Do you need enough space in your songs to unfold yourself, and what do you think about even longer tracks, which sometimes fill out a complete album?

Wheel / James:

All of our songs are long compared to industry standards, it is true and regarding writing something long enough to fill an entire album, it could happen. I have always felt that three to four minutes is a very short amount of time to develop a musical idea to it’s full potential; I have never been a fan of songs that are long for the sake of it but if interesting things happen for the duration of a long track, then it’s length is justified.

When you think about it, it’s pretty strange that so many songs that come out every year have nearly exactly the same length – there is definitely room for music that breaks the 3-4 minute length rule in 2017!

Time For Metal / Rene W.:

Thank you for this short interview and the possibility for our readers to get some insights into Wheel. We wish you a lot of success for the future, and the last words are yours!

Wheel / James:

Thanks for your interest in our music, The Path EP is available now on all platforms and we would love to hear what your readers think of it.