NATTEN is a Stockholm-based band that make instrumental music only. In my opinion, it's perfect for night time listening, which probably isn't a coincidence considering that natten means 'the night' in Swedish. They're releasing their EP Omen tomorrow, but we got hold of it before everyone else and it's embedded below. You should listen to it because it has a vibe that is pretty different from anything else you've heard before. NATTEN is the kind of band that don't like to discuss music techniques, so before I got in touch with Arvid who plays the trumpet, I was told that none of the guys in NATTEN have learned to play their instruments in a traditional way. They "just play". So I decided we'd talk about something else.
Noisey: Hi Arvid. How are you? Arvid Lärksäter: This is fun. I'm tip top.
Great. What are you up to?
I just got to Erik's place. It's the flat of chaos.
Tell me about the flat.
I'd actually want to send you a photo. He's refurbishing so everything's up side down.
Send me a photo.
I will. It's awesome. Erik can I do that?
Who's Erik anyway?
Erik's my childhood friend. He's from the old skateboard crew. He's awesome.
How come you're there?
I've just been rehearsing and we do that close to Erik's in Midsommarkransen. And some times when I'm on my way home I drop by and hang around here. It's been this messy since December. Calculated refurbishing time is two years.
Why?
You'll get it when you see the photos. Erik's building a kitchen in the bedroom. It's crazy.
Annons
Erik in his flat. Photo by Arvid Lärksäter.Are you crazy too?
No, not when it comes down to this kind of stuff. I couldn't care less about how it looks at home. Refurbishing isn't my thing anyway.
So what's your thing?
Well… I think I have to say music. We play pretty much every day so that has to be my thing, you know. That's the way it is. What's your thing then?
My job is my thing.
What?
It has to be since it's what I do every day.
Well I go to work every day but that ain't my thing.
What do you work with?
I work as an electrician at Huddinge Hospital.
Wow. That sounds pretty exciting actually.
Yeah it's pretty awesome. I'd snap some photos in the morgue if it wasn't forbidden.
One of my initial questions – before we got into all this Erik's flat business – was actually if you've ever experienced anything paranormal considering the dark themes in your music.
Yeah, it should count to have been locked inside the fridges in the morgue.
What?
Yeah, or where they keep all dead bodies. Some times it can be more than 50 dead bodies at the same time in those fridges.
God. What kind of paranormal stuff is going on in there?
A dead person is a dead person – that's something I totally get. But the awesome stuff is that they some times are cut open. I mean I get turned on in many ways because it's pretty damn cool.
Right. Is that where you get inspiration from?
Probably subconsciously. I try to be there as much as possible. We work all over the hospital but some places are my favourites. The morgue is definitely one of them.
So do you believe in ghosts?
No, no, I don't. I believe in evil maybe, but not ghosts. The evil inside the human, but not in the dead human.
Do you believe humans can be born evil?
No, I don't. I believe life makes people evil.
This is starting to get pretty deep now.
But what do you think? What is it that make some people evil?
I think people can be born evil.
Like the Omen kid?
Maybe not that extreme. Anyway, NATTEN seem to be into pretty dark stuff.
Yeah that's something we have in common.
What's not to like about light?
It's not honest, it's only what it looks like.
But you can't see much when it's dark.
But that's where everything is so exciting. It's where you can move. That's how it's always been for us, it's how we communicate.
It sounds like you think that what you see with the help of light is what actually makes you blind, in a way.
That's nicely put. Yes, there's nothing that can hold you back so much – your thoughts – like pictures that are too distinct.
True. I've heard that you're pretty popular in the Baltics.
Yeah, they're so cool.
Tell me a story from one of your trips there.
We were pretty tired at one of our first gigs over there. We'd been drinking beer at some random bar in a small suburb somewhere. There were plenty of people around and one of the guys from the band had managed to blast a toilet with shit so they had to close the bar when the gig was over. So we went to another bar across the street. When we arrived, we met two bartenders who had been to our gig. They brought us out to this empty parking lot. Literally nothing was there. One person had died there the weekend before. They had found a head in a local park. And then suddenly one of the bartenders shows us a homemade bong. He gives it to us and says, "light up, smoke up, kill someone and kill yourself." When you hear that… I mean, they have a way of living in the Baltics that you can't find anywhere else.
In what country was this?
Lithuania. They have these amazing concrete suburbs. I've never been in contact with such warm mentality. They were awesome when they listened to our music. I mean they listen to it in a completely different way, and they want to talk about the music. One guy had a gun and we got to hold his gun, and yeah… It's so overwhelming. We're going there soon again. I dream a lot about the Baltics, especially Lithuania.
So what happened with the bong?
It was alive at that parking lot. I mean, when in Rome, right? That's the way it is.
So how long will you stay in the Baltics this time?
We're only doing two gigs. But we're supposed to be there all the time. That's where we should play.
Explain the creative process behind your EP with four words.
Ambivalent, terse resistance, duel.
Pre-listen to NATTEN's EP Omen above. It's officially released tomorrow. NATTEN will be playing in Stockholm, Sweden on the 5th of April, and in Vilnius, Lithuania on the 11th of April. Find the details on their Facebook page.
