"What he’s brought to The Eternal has been invaluable. He is definitely part of the sound change sonically rather than in the songwriting sense. He would actually sit there and produce, rather than just wishing the session would end or not give a crap about the music. He was really into it.
"It was amazing spending two weeks with him when I was recording the vocals. Obviously it takes me a bit of work. I’m not a pitch-perfect singer! [laughs] But he has a fantastic ear, and he got the best out of me. He was also always suggesting and encouraging the use of different guitars in order to get different textures and participated like a band member would. I think it’s good sometimes to have someone else’s input and perspective, and even better if it’s someone like Rivers, who produces a lot of good bands.
"At the same time, we were very wary of not letting Rivers overproduce us. For all the years that I’ve been making albums, I just wanted one really clean, tight-sounding album. To me, ‘Sleep Of Reason’ is the cleanest and the tightest album that we’ve done. It’s not necessarily clean in the commercial sense, just cleaner in the guitars, drums and the melodies. I like dirty stuff too, but I just wanted a nice, clean, smooth album this time. You see, Rivers is a European producer, and he understand the European sound. I’m not saying that we want to be a European band, but a lot of Australian productions tend to be a lot drier-sounding. A lot of the more affordable metal engineers don’t seem to use reverb. That’s cool, but we were after that Anathema sound, where everything sounds warmer and dream-like. We wanted textures, layers and tastes.
"For the next album, I already know some of the things I want to do in regards to the production to enhance and get things more natural-sounding. We don’t want to be one of those bands with what I like to call 'the Century Media production.' It has a very triggered drum sound and where everything is very digital-sounding to the max. It’s all too perfect. We played around with some of the triggers on the drums on ‘Sleep Of Reason,' but ultimately I still want to head for that more acoustic rock band sound where everything is real. To get the real good quality sound, it costs money, so you do the best you can within your budget. We showed Rivers our budget, and he gave us more than we could ask for. It’s fantastic. But you learn so much each time, and now I know have ideas of what I want to achieve in the future. There’s a very definite chance that we will be working with Rivers next time.”
Another interesting collaboration on ‘Sleep Of Reason’ was The Eternal’s decision to use renowned artist Travis Smith for the artwork.
“I did the cover artwork on the first album, but by the time we were making ‘Sleep Of Reason,' it was a timing issue this time around not to use more of my art. There was a shorter amount of time to pull ‘Sleep Of Reason’ together. We had years to dwell on ‘The Sombre Light Of Isolation.' The concept was really clear on what it was going to be, where as with ‘Sleep Of Reason,' it only came together while we recorded the album. In fact, we only had the track running order sorted out prior to going into the studio, so the preplanning of the concept wasn’t figured out. It was weird, because we had just got back from Europe and realized that we were going to go in to record an album within three months!" he laughs.
"So we started recording it, and we were really into it, and then we started talking about artwork. I really couldn’t motivate myself to come up with some artwork this time, so I suggested that we get someone else’s view on things. We thought that we would give Smith a shot and see what he would come up with. We came up with this idea of basing the artwork on Goya’s [1799] etching ‘The Sleep Of Reason Produces Monsters.’ It’s a picture of a person sleeping with the owls and bats all around him. So that was also how we came up with the album title too. We liked the concept, and we have always liked Smith’s work in the past, especially the whole Katatonia and the ongoing raven’s theme. That was always a pretty cool look. So we thought we would give that a try.
"We told him to lose the owls and go for a more sinister theme, and he came up with the ravens kind of coming in and out of the person sleeping. He kind of put a more sinister twist on the original etching. It was good to get Travis, because when a lot of people are doing reviews, they tend to latch onto that kind of stuff! [laughs] We’re thinking that direct marking isn’t such a bad juncture at this point of our career! [laughs again] And the cover artwork ended up fitting well with the instrumental title track too. It all just seemed to fit together thematically. I think it's pretty cool. We just got it all together just in time to hand it into the label.”
As The Eternal continues expanding their audience, I wondered if Firebox Records had anything to say in regards to their continued success and prospect for the future. I was surprised to find that if anything, no news happens to be good news.
“They’re Finnish, so they don’t say much at all!" Kelson laughs. "They’re pretty quiet. If you don’t get an e-mail from them, it usually means that things are pretty cool. They may not be the biggest record label out there, but they’re slowly growing. It was great to see some of their bands actually charting in the top 40 in Finland and getting as high as number four in the singles charts with a doom metal band. It’s pretty crazy.
"We’ve been with them for a while now, pretty much when they were only a couple of years old really. At this point, we’re technically out of our contract. We haven’t discussed the future as yet, but I would still like to work with them in one way or another. The one thing you get with Finnish people is that if they say they’re going to do something, they’ll do it. They pay the studio on time, release things on time and ship things on time. They do everything they say they will. There’s no bullshit with Firebox Records, and that’s the Finnish mentality. In Finland, when you meet someone who talks a lot, you tend to think they’re full of bullshit! [Laughs] You’re always questioning what they’re trying to sell you. It’s always 'yes' and 'no.'
"If they won’t give us more money, they won’t. But they’ve been pretty good to the degree that where we sometimes go over budget and past deadlines, they give us a little bit of leeway. We met one of the guys when we toured over there last year, and he was a really good support to us. The only real problem with Firebox Records in the past was with physical distribution. We had to intervene and help ourselves out with a label here in Australia. But that’s kind of good, because you get the feeling of being involved with the label. I definitely support them and respect what they do, and respect that they give me money to make records, and continue to do so. I wouldn’t say that we’re the top sellers on their roster or anything, but they still always feature us in ads when new albums come out. They’re really good with promotion. There’s been plenty of interviews, and in big magazines too. So in that respect, we get plenty of good reviews and interviews.
"The only thing they can’t help out much on is tour support. Firebox Records tour support is more like a bit of extra promotion, help on a few shows here and there and some extra CDs. There’s no 'get on the plane and come over.' Our touring doesn’t affect album sales enough for that yet. The same thing applies in regards to releasing a single. In Finland, they know a Finnish band will chart and sell more copies of a single than their album, because they play all the time. For us, we’re just not there to support the single, so there’s no point in releasing a single. So in the end, Firebox Records offer what they offer, but it’s still better than some other labels. I have friends on some bigger labels where they have to pay for their own recording budget and wait to get compensated from their label at a later date. We’re lucky that we don’t have to do that. We book the studio time, and they pay for it. I feel the relationship is good.
"We’re not selling through the roof by any means, but ‘Sleep Of Reason’ has sold more copies than our debut. If they see that we can keep growing, we’ll stick together. I’m pretty happy to stay where we are because they have a good work ethic and one that is similar to ours. We want to do this on a global scale, and so far Firebox Records’ help towards that has been invaluable.” [END]
