For the first time since 1995's Slaughter of the Soul, At the Gates is going to hit up the studio in exactly one month's time according to guitarist Anders Björler in an interview with Noisey. Björler said the album, titled At War With Reality, started to take shape during summer 2013 and the concept, title and lyrics for the record fell into place fall of the same year. Anders' brother and bassist for the group Jonas Björler added the album is complete and just needs some final arrangements before they press "record" on the whole affair.
Vocalist Tomas Lindberg explained the band's approach toward writing the album.
"Especially with this album there was really two ways we could go into it. We could be really calculating and go, 'Oh shit, this is really important. People are gonna really expect a lot. This is the most important album we’ve done.' We could go into that way and overthink everything, and we’re still very meticulous about all the details, of course, but the other way would be just to go wherever the thing takes us. It sounds very cosmic or philosophical, but the music is out there. You just need the fucking medium to get it out to the people."
Jonas added there was an air of doubt regarding the record as well…
"We weren’t really sure if we would do another album, but we started and tried writing songs, and it happened. You shouldn’t be writing music if you are forced to write. Nothing good comes from that. When you have writer's block, you’d better wait for a couple of days until you feel more inspired."
…with Lindberg firing right back.
"We really just fed off each other during the whole process. I mean, this album has been in all our heads the whole time since we first started working on it. There was always an idea the whole time. A small part, and then we’d say, 'Oh yeah, that’s the whole song. Let’s do that!' We’re all in the process, and we’re all focused, so when I’d get an idea, it might be too crazy, but these two guys can put in the right place."
So we'll see soon! In the meantime, there are very, very brief trailers floating around you can check out for the record.
