The Return of Her Bright Skies

The Return of Her Bright Skies

Her Bright Skies has returned with a brand new single entitled Bored as well as re-working of a fan favorite entitled IB4U originally on their Rivals album.  Starting off as their very own version of Nordic emo/hardcore and then merging into more rock and roll territory, Her Bright Skies from Sweden would eventually make their way to the States on a pair of Bryan Stars tours.  In this interview with guitarist Petter Nilsson, we discuss the reawakening of Her Bright Skies, the new singles and possible additional recordings, touring the US with Bryan Stars, and other stratospheric topics of intrigue.  Read on…

Introduce yourself, tell me what you do in Her Bright Skies, and how long the band has been together.
Hi, I’m Petter and I’m one of the guitar players in the band, a band that’s been together since 2005 with a 5 year hiatus between 2015 and 2020.

Where is the band based out of and what is your local music scene like there?
Most of us grew up in the town of Jönköping. Right now we’re spread out all across the world. Growing up in Jönköping, the music scene was actually really good and varied a lot in style and genre. The most prominent genre was hardcore and metal though, which is where Her Bright Skies found the inspiration to start creating music.

What made you decide to re-record a new version of IB4U and how does it compare to the older version?
Fun fact; the “new” version was actually the original. When we went in to record Rivals, we kind of noticed how the pace of the songs never really slowed down. We needed a softer tune to give the listener some room to breathe. Since we had already played around with an acoustic version of IB4U, we knew it would sound good in both styles. The acoustic version ended up on the album, and the full band one was put on a cloud service, until now.

Is there any overall story or concept behind the lyrics of the Bored single?
Many of our songs are about escapism and Bored is no exception. Life can be tough for many of us and there are certain unhealthy ways people tend to deal with that. It’s just a part of my life that I chose to write about. It’s definitely not a tutorial of how to feel better about your situation, it was just my way of dealing with things in a particular moment in time.

How close are you to writing and a recording an all new EP or album?
We’re writing songs, but what it turns into we can’t really discuss yet. Simply because we don’t really know ourselves.

What has it been like to release new music right in the middle of a pandemic and so much social unrest in the world?
We had no real plans to tour anyways so it didn’t matter to us. Many people have said our music helped ease the boredom from being in quarantine so that was pretty cool and of course humbling. One of the songs was named Bored as well so that was pretty fitting. That was just a coincidence though.

It’s been five years since Prodigal Son. Did you guys think you would ever get back together to record new music and how did that decision come about?
We knew we wanted to continue writing music together in some shape or form. It’s always been such a huge part of our lives and writing together is definitely the most rewarding thing for us, artistically. Since we’ve been doing it for so long, it just comes naturally.  Members started reaching out to each other around the same time and everything just kind of fell into place. It was a good time for us to create something new in a familiar space.

When you look back on your first album A Sacrament; Ill City, what do you think of it now in retrospect?
It’s a cool album because you can definitely hear the progression we had made as a new band. In just a few years, as teenagers, we created our own sound and had a unique way of approaching lyrics, song structures and tried to paint a picture of how we saw the world and what we thought nordic emo/hardcore could sound like.  That album is just raw and inspired. It wasn’t influenced by anything other than our passion for making music.

Going back in time, how did the US Tour with Bryan Stars go and what were some of the highlights?
We did two tours with Bryan Stars and honestly it was probably the most rewarding time as a band. Definitely the craziest. We could see our fan base growing day by day as we toured NA and that was an amazing feeling. Like “We’re not at the top, but hey, we made it.”.  The highlight was the shows. We had a lot of supporters coming out to the shows but if we felt like most people hadn’t heard us before, we tried a little bit harder to win them over and usually, it worked.

You actually have a few songs about California. What did you think of this State when you finally got out there?
It’s one of my favorite places in the world. I try to visit Cali as much as possible. It’s just an inspiring place and as I said earlier, I write about things that happen and affect me in my life so yeah, it would be weird if California wasn’t in there.

Did anyone from Nine Inch Nail ever hear or comment on your cover of Hurt?
Radio silence from NIN. But, chances are they’ve heard it right? I wonder if Usher heard our cover of DJ Got Us Fallin’ in Love. That’s a long-shot.

What’s up next Her Bright Skies?
We’re writing, recording and that’s about it. If we feel it’s good enough, we’ll release it, 100%.

Any final words of wisdom?
Don’t microwave eggs. They’ll explode in your face. Talking from experience here.

(Interview by Ken Morton)

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