With the news that Music For Nations is officially back and will be reissuing four old Spiritual Beggars albums, we caught up with keyboardists Per to hear more. Check it out below.
Thanks for the interview. With the news that MFN is back, how did you feel when the news first broke?
I think it’s great, MFN used to be a classic rock and metal label with a huge back catalogue dating back to the early 80’s. Obviously as a music fan it would be cool to see as many reissues as possible of that catalogue, both our contemporaries and earlier stuff.
MFN is also going to be re-issuing four old Spiritual Beggars albums – how did that idea come about?
Honestly I wouldn’t know, we’re just happy that they’re being released since they haven’t been available for a while. Of course it’s even more fun that they’re gonna be put out on vinyl since that’s the format all of us in the band grew up with.
How will the reissues differ from the original versions?
The vinyl editions are different since only one of the albums was released in this format before. There will also be a cd containing the full album plus bonus tracks with each release. The artwork will be slightly different, not the front covers but some of it has to be adjusted to the vinyl size, meaning that they’re gonna look a bit different and contain some different details than the cd’s.
Which album is your favourite out of the four and why?
I’d say Mantra III because it was the first album I played on and those songs will always be a bit special to me. The touring that followed this album exposed the band to a lot more people and I think the general vibe was quite positive and we did play some excellent shows based on the material from Mantra III.
Were there any that were more of a challenge to get right?
We worked a lot on the On Fire album and it was recorded in sessions during a longer period of time. It was a bit of struggle to finish it, but I think the end result made up for any doubts we had along the way. It’s always difficult when you lose a member and continue with something that’s not road tested so to speak.
If you could go back and change anything about any of the albums, would you?
Yes and no, any member of band would always like to change something about their previous recorded work. It could be small things in the performances or something about the production one would like to change but I think it’s important to accept the old albums for what they are and how they sound. This is also a reason to continue to make albums as you learn along the way and hopefully get better at it so personally I’m quite happy with how these Beggars albums came out.
And are there any interesting stories/anecdotes from recording?
Nothing off the top of my head, it was such a long time ago. I hope we’ll have some amusing stories from upcoming Beggars albums instead.
