The album, while being very melancholic, simultaneously puts you in such a state of relief. Kiss of Death certainly feels like a good sonic example of such — starts of hunting, terrifying, but when the presence of death finally catches up with you, it's no longer scary, it's not a stab in the back: it's a kiss. Reminiscent of how meaninglessness is being addressed in existential philosophy.
That's a nice note. Doing this album has been such an important journey for me, and Kiss of Death was really the final destination. I was coming to terms with feelings of grief and guilt and fully accepting, almost embracing, my own ceasing. I realized that I can’t change any of the things or traumas I’ve been through, however, I am fully capable of changing my perception and perspective of them.
I have this mark on me, now I choose to see it as something beautiful. I can choose the stance of having loved and having felt love for the people that are now gone. And me remembering them is also proof of love. It boils down to perception–possibly cultural values as well–and rethinking requires that we let go of our fear. We should aim to be brave enough to question what events should be attached to what emotions.
How did you let go of your fear?
Writing this album provided me with a tool, something to carve with. I think of it as poetry, and it’s been a healing process; a way to understand myself on a spectrum I haven’t quite dared to explore before. Until I wrote this album, that is.
On a non-conventional level? It takes some, several detours to realize that even language — what we use to understand our selves — are just generalizations, thus to go deep we need to go beyond words.
That goes for how we’re told to treat or react to death as well. I can only truly speak of the Western, Scandinavian perspective, where we really have furthered ourselves from the idea of death. That creates some tangled agonies, some of which probably won’t come back to haunt you until later in life, which seems fine, but later, once they do, we’re not sure what they are or how to deal with them. It’s weird. But that's what and why I want to talk about–what I would like this album to navigate through–emotions of grief, guilt.
That’s a therapeutic approach: the methods of sound. Sound transcends words, and therefore puts us in closer contact with truth, at least according to Nietzsche, or perhaps I’m just damaged by professor Dodd. But let’s talk about guilt for a second, I read that you felt guilty for being alive while others aren’t?
I did. But then I finally asked myself the right questions, even though they came at the wrong time. By writing these “constructed dialogues”, the lyrics, I was able to transcend into a place of being forgiven. It's very frightening to be vulnerable, but once you reach a certain point where you start dreaming about things, having nightmares, waking up to the feeling of being haunted, then you have to deal with what might have felt impossible at first.
I’m not trying to make it sound easy, I mean it's very frightening to be vulnerable, but once you reach a certain point where you start dreaming about things, having nightmares, waking up to the feeling of being haunted, then you have to deal with what might have felt impossible at first.
Looking outside of yourself can really help as well. I mean everybody has, or has had, experiences with “darker,” feelings, whatever that really implies. What I find interesting is how we so rarely touch upon them, it’s like we’re all so afraid that we’re going to bring up bad memories,
“Weigh down the mood?”
— exactly. And so we stop talking about them, pretending like they don’t exist, arguing that “the word is already so heavy,” without realizing that when we suppress these emotions we’re actually adding weight, as opposed to once we dare to talk about them, that's when weight is released. It's almost illogical. But I believe that it’s important to keep asking questions without finding a definite answer.
In short, it's been a very personal intimate journey, but at the same time, it's also been a very social, bonding, experience.
