I think that the only downside is that since it’s so far away from Finland, we’re more or less forced to play for at least six or seven weeks, which is a rather long tour. Since the continent is so big, there’s a lot of things changing as the tour progresses which of course is nice, to have that variety of cultures and weather and what have you. There’s always something to see and experience outside of the shows as well. There are a lot of great things when touring in North America. What are you most and least favorite things about touring in North America? I hope we get to play some more acoustic stuff at some point in the future. We decided to do something different and it worked out really well. I think doing the acoustic shows were a definite highlight. What were some of the highlights for you of the band’s summer festival season? I think that made the tracks better, as well. Other than that, I did 99 percent of the keys at the studio as opposed to working from home, so that was different. The basic tracks were recorded at a song per day pace which for us is really fast. I think the speed we worked at in the studio this time was really amazing. What will be your strongest memory of the recording of the album? A producer, however, can be a really good thing towards the end of the sessions when everybody starts to be too involved and too close to the music…so an extra pair of ears wouldn’t hurt at that point. Other than that, it’s also quite easy to make sure that the identity of the band stays intact. I think the advantage is that we can work quite fast and not spend too much time dwelling on things. What are the advantages and disadvantages of producing an album yourselves? We also succeeded in making this album less layered than the previous ones and thus I think the songs are easier to get into. But with this one, I think that apart from two songs we managed to make a rather compact album in that sense.

Henrik Klingenberg: Our albums have had a tendency to be a bit all over the place musically. I caught up with keyboardist Henrik Klingenberg, who fills us in about the new record, touring, the status of some of his other bands and more.Ĭhad Bowar: What makes The Ninth Hour unique in the Sonata Arctica canon? The band has a North American tour planned beginning in November. The latest album from Sonata Arctica is The Ninth Hour.

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