Ursprung Interview with Andreas Skald Axelsson

RavenzCraft Arts Presents

URSPRUNG

Band Members


Andreas Skáld Axelsson


Mathias Nóttúlfr Larsson




Ursprung Is a unique old norse folk project made by Andreas Axelsson from Värmland, Sweden. The instruments used such as the tagelharpa, lyres, shamanic drums, jawharps etc is blended smoothly with ambient drone like sounds along with the greatest music there is; Mother nature.

1.First we just want to thank you for taking the time to participate in this interview project

it is an inspiration to myself and many others to have the opportunity to speak with and get to 

know you and your perspectives on life and creating music,.

Hello, and thank you too for this interview..



2.Can we first start off with a brief introduction about yourself for people who may not be familiar with you and your music.. Where are you from?, tell us about your home land, is there any historical places or interesting things about your area you enjoy? 



My name is Andreas from Värmland, Sweden. I am the creator of the band Ursprung. I grew up in a home surrounded by deep forests on the outskirts of Munkfors. So nature is important to me as it has always been in my life. 





Historical places, sure there are some. We have a couple of runestones close together around Karlstad hehe. I can't really write down everything I know, but I'll tell you the last folk legend I heard... 



In Ekshärad, a place not far from here we had a viking king that supposedly fought against the christianisation, if I remember correctly, this king has his grave on a mountaintop, which I plan to visit soon. 

Is there anyone in particular that had a big effect and influence on you as a young artist? anyone personally in your life that influenced you? ,,

I have no clue what drove my interest for playing music, as long as I remember I have always wanted to play music. As a child I wanted to play drums, so I built my own weird drumset of boxes and pots and stuff and just jammed away hehe.





I started practicing brutal death metal vocals at the age of 13-14 and I got kinda good at it. I was in my first band by 16 as a vocalist, but the band never really became anything else but an idea. 

Where I live no one really plays other music than country/blues, so I soon began teaching myself all instruments necessary for being a one man band. I wrote and released some black metal songs between a million failed projects with a thousand different people, and later on a full black metal album

I have almost given up on assembling people for a full band, but if against all odds someone were to cross my path and wanted to make music..id give it a try..

My taste in music varies alot, I can listen to everything that has that "thing" to it. I'm not sure why I'm drawn to the darker & depressive/melancholy themed music. 








Lately my inspiration has been old stories and a bit of history/religion. I am currently working on rune poems, inspired by: the elder futhark runes. And I'm pretty sure I will add them as lyrics to future albums with Ursprung. 

4.What about professionally, what artists or performers did you listen to or follow early on that inspired you?

 I noticed you like a range of different types of music , i can relate to this as well ...good music is just good music! there is no limits...

 and what about currently, who do you enjoy to listen to and follow as far as personal listening choice?




I swear I have no limit whatsoever to my musical taste. Dark folk ambient to folk music to pornogrind/brutal death metal a la waking the cadaver. 




To kind of sum up my music taste through the years: Job For a Cowboy, Circle Jerks Rise Against, Black Flag, GG Allin, Minor Threat, Fugazi, Shining, Lifelover, Eskapi, Burzum, Mayhem, Lil' Peep, Wardruna, Forndom, Nytt Land, Sigurbodi and Danheim. 




Currently I'm in a period of listening to :Of The Wand and The Moon: on repeat. I am also listening alot to Örnatorpet, dark swedish dungeonsynth. Lyrics are as important as the music to me. I don't write a song I'm happy with and just put some random lyrics onto it just to have something catchy or cool. It has to have a meaning or I won't have lyrics at all. I'm not really inspired by one person only, but the few bands that do it all on their own, the multi-instrumentalists,They are my kind of people.





5. So i noticed you have already had a few really cool collab projects with other artists in the folk ambient viking style genre scenes such as Anatoly of Nytt Land and Sigurbodi Gretersson ... this is amazing !

 if you had a dream collaboration opportunity who would you like to create a collab music project with?



Thank you, they are amazing artists and I'm very happy to have collaborated with them. Tough question to be honest, but for Ursprung I'd love to make a song with Maria Franz and Einar Selvik. 



6.On the topic of collaboration, one of our new projects this year is to influence the artists that participate in the RavenzCraft Arts interview project to connect and 

collaborate with each other to create small singles or short video projects..would you be open to doing something with another artist that fits your style to create something in the future with us?





Absolutely, if it feels 100% right for all parts I am open for collaborations.







7.So back to your creation of music,,,do you have any certain ways of influencing lyrics or songs? such as walks in nature, meditation or any other forms of creative process you go

 through to create your music? do you record outside near natural sounds and nature?



I write alot of things down, like keywords. I am a big thinker, I can write down certain words and just let them grow into sentences over long long periods of time. Same things with the musical part. Right now, I feel like I've hit a creative wall. But I have my way of countering this, by not creating anything at all and just shutting up and listening to music, stories, nature, videos, books, people. 



It takes some time but in the end I feel like I can get back in there are start creating again. Other than that, most of my ideas and lyrics come in the most unexpected ways and places. Some through dreams, some ideas have came at the very edge of me falling asleep at night and I just pick up my phone to write it down.

Usually when I get a "keyword" or a little piece of melody, just some simple note I just know what I'll be doing with it. It feels very natural yet unreal. And of course I am impacted by my surroundings.

I also have dropped all my cares for what other people think of the things I create. I don't care. Some people has told me I suck and some people has told me I'm very talented. I try not to care about neither. Sure, it's very fun to hear someone say they like my music. But I try not to let it disturb my creative perspective.






 8.Is their anything new on the rise for Ursprung you can mention or have ideas for in the future?




Yes, there is. I'm getting a new tagelharpa built for me, by the skilled musician and instrumentbuilder Per Runberg.

I made a tagelharpa myself a couple of months ago, but it did not end up the way I wanted. There is also another new instrument in the toolbox, a bukkehorn. I'll be making more albums in the style of Urminnen in the future. In fact, I have three albums planned. I have plans for a music video soon, nothing fancy but not all the way homemade crap quality either. We'll see. 





9.Is there any sort of goals you want to achieve with your life or with your career in music, do you create to inspire others?




 I don't really create to inspire other people but I suppose that's something inevitable. Its a fun thing if I do, but thats not my point through all this. I have this intense driving force of creating things, 


not just music but in everything. I do want to encourage people to create. My whole life changed when I learned to write and record music on my own. And thats just the beginning of my whole philosophical frame.








 
10.Can you tell us a bit about your spiritual practice and beliefs?


obviously you incorporate this into your music as well can you explain a bit more on how you do this and what it means to you?
do you have a personal favorite song you have recently created that means alot to you ? can you explain?



I wouldn't say I'm a religious person. I do want to picture the old folklore/stories/religion can be applied to todays society, in a metaphoric way. It speaks to me that way and I write these thoughts and ideas down and let them become an idea of a song. I would say my own favourite song is Hören mig alla, and those lyrics come from Völúspá. My own idea to that song is at first you get a soothing/mystic tagelharpa & throatsinging in 


"modern" swedish language. Once the swedish part is past, the part where the Allfather wants me to tell the old tales... You're going to get ripped into old norse verses about the ginnungagap. 



I wouldn't say I'm awesome at explaining hehe...











11.So what about other interests, do you have any all time favorite movies or shows/books or albums that are all time favorites that you will never forget? any favorite hobbies outside of music, hiking, driving fast cars, hunting...

Movies... One of the movies I for some reason wont forget is Trolljägaren (Trollhunter). No idea why. Other than that, I love Tolkiens Lord of the Ring movies & books. 

I love reading musicians biographies. I recently read My Damage, by the punkrock vocalist Keith Morris. I also LOVED Scar Tissue, with Anthony Kiedis. I have been getting into alot of serial killer books and documentaries lately.
I have been gathering stuff to go hike. I believe I have assembled all things needed for it to happen, me and my fiancee is pretty much just waiting for a warmer weather. Music albums... I would say I'm very inspired by the black metalband "Grift". I heard the song Svältorna and pretty much knew I had to buy that release and so I did. I do also like alot of old bands like The Doors, John Lee Hooker, Hendrix etc. The list could go on forever. 

As for shows I love the walking dead ( & fear the walking dead), breaking bad, etc. That kind of outlaw and otherwordly stuff is fantastic. I've always loved survivalism and survival shows hehe. I can't pick just one thing out of 
everything I've seen and heard. Impossible! 

12.Is their anything you would like to share or say to any of the followers and other musicians and creators out there? any words of advice or personal experiences you would like to share that you have been through yourself on your path as an artist?

Yes, I suggest you to be as independent as possible when you make music or other art. And to never give up or care about other peoples negativity they often throw around. 

Build up a immunity to bullshitting people, they are a disease to creativity!

13.well we want to personally thank you again for talking with us and if you have any parting words or words of wisdom to leave us all with feel free to do so ...

We look forward to seeing and hearing more from you,,,you are a great artist and we encourage you to continue to persue your path of creating awesome music!!

Thank you for taking your time to do this interview. Heil Óðinn!

Special Thank you to Andreas Axelsson 

and Mathias Nóttúlfr Larsson

for taking time to reach out to the world with their amazing music!

Follow and Support URSPRUNG  here at these links below:

Bandcamp

https://ursprung.bandcamp.com/

Youtube

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCajseV2Q-1ytpNKnB8ERRg

Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/UrsprungOfficial/?ref=br_rs

Watch the official RavenzCraft Arts music video introduction for Ursprung here at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGulDtrA1jA

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https://www.facebook.com/RavenzCraftArts/

We have exciting new interviews and music video projects 

for the 2019 season!

Stay tuned!