First of all, I recently saw Soen live. How do you look back now at the tour with Dark Tranquillity?
Oh, it was very nice. I think it is a good match. We can do it again. We are going to the US with them. They are good friends and they are a good band, so…

Two years ago the previous album ‘Memorial’ came out and I have the impression that Soen tours a lot more since then, more than before. Is that right?
Yes, it is fun. We did like 180 gigs per year and I have been doing it for the last three years. We want to tour a lot, we like it.

Was there a certain moment in time when you focussed on the writing process of new material for ‘Reliance’?
No, I think it is more that we try to find a rhythm, that gives us the possibility to tour enough and then release an album every second year. So we are a hard working band, but everything is fun, so it is going well. It is not an effort.

I noticed that the bass player, Stefan Stenberg is back. He has been away for five years, but I don’t remember what happened then? Was it an agreement due to circumstances?
Yeah it is very hard to be on tour all the time. Life came between it. He’s got kids and wanted to be home a bit more, which we respected, but then, when he was able to go out and tour again, the door was open.

Not only the music cleans your soul, also the lyrics are important. What can you tell about ‘Draconian’? You sing: ‘save us from what we have become’…
(thinks) ‘Draconian’ is more questioning your belief in who you are and why you do the things you do, how your decisions affect this, basically. This is a feeling of guilt, that is a good emotion. A sympathetic emotion you are supposed to feel as human being. And asking for forgiveness which is central, something you need to do if you want to become a whole person. Then you must ask for forgiveness and say you are sorry.

The first single ‘Primal’ should have lyrics about the existential fight between the human spirit and our current world. Do you think that men are wise enough to handle such a digital world now?
No, I don’t think we have any ability to handle this digital world. I don’t think we are in control. We are basically out of control and I don’t think that anyone is in control anymore today. We are kind of lost in the algorithms. This is of course something that I think is just going to grow. It is going to show how big this program is one day or another and how much it affects us. It is going to be clearer in a few years. The consequences of the way we live today. These are things that we are slowly getting aware of, the damages it makes and I hope…. I like to be positive and optimistic. I hope we will find ways to deal with this situation, you know, to handle social media, to handle the digital challenges we have.

Although… IT companies are already replacing people by AI… that will be a social bloodbath in the end I think…
Yeah. Exactly. Of course we don’t have a clue what the consequences of that will be. It will be a challenge and it is wild. It doesn’t have to be just negative or pessimistic, but of course it is something that we need to be concerned of. Cautious indeed…

Like you said, a positive attitude is always important and I think the title of the album ‘Reliance’ says a lot in that respect. Reliance means that you trust in something… and you hope for the best… Is that the positive note you want to bring in this world?
The theme, the idea of reliance is to encourage reliance to people, to have the courage to depend on other people around you, to rely on other people around you and to have this understanding that you are not just strong on your own, that it is not just a one man show. It cannot be solved by one individual because it is a little bit of this calling to this individualistic society that we are living in now: come on guys, don’t just focus on your own success and your own achievements, try to see if you can do that together with other people. We are much stronger together as a community.