THE PRESS RELEASE: “Swedish hard rockers Dead Lord were clearly born too late. Formed in 2012 in Stockholm, Sweden, members Hakim Krim (vocals/guitars), Olle Hedenström (guitars), Martin Nordin (bass) and Adam Lindmark (drums) are clearly more at home with 1976 (the year Thin Lizzy’s Jailbreak hit stores) than they are with 2017. Just don’t call their brand of rock retro.
“It’s timeless, not retro,” Krim asserts. “Instead, it is pretty much all the modern rock bands that sound dated. I guess something happened during the ‘80s and onward. People had all sorts of recording tricks at hand, which led much music to sound very dated. Different effects and tricks are usually a lot of fun when they’re new, but tend to sound very dated after a decade or two. Not applying any of the modern mega compressors, expanders or other macky mack, make things sound more — I hate to use the word but here we go — true. More honest, I would say. Not retro. It just sounds more like the way it actually sounds live. The modern way of glazing everything in stupidity is not really what we’re after. Same way man buns are stupid, so is the modern rock sound.”
As with man buns and murses so too with ultra-slick studio tricks and obscenely-expensive mastering jobs. They’re just not in the cards for Dead Lord. The Swedes prefer to rock hard the honest way, where riffs hook, vocal lines stick, and steady rhythms pound the floor. There is no pretense in Dead Lord’s denim ’n’ leather swagger. There are no parlor tricks to Dead Lord’s sound. Like Zeppelin, Metallica and, of course, ABBA — all influences to the Swedes — the music does the talking. It’s raw, unbridled, and ready for action. No wonder Krim had little trouble describing Dead Lord’s sound: It’s a “mind-blowing, face-melting, awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping, twin-guitar infused smart-rock extravaganza,” laughs the frontman.
Dead Lord’s fourth record Surrender is a one-stop shop of everything from sweet licks and stylish solos, to simply remarkable catchy songs that hit you in the feels and fill the gas tank to the brim. Stellar guitar rock, fresh and unleashed, as Dead Lord reinvigorates and rewires a long-lost style, rocketing it into a new era with stone-cold future studio classics. Surrender conveys the sense, palpable at the shows, of the magnetic chemistry and rolling thunder the Dead Lord live extravaganza always floors you with. You can hear the fun and fever, feel the crackle and burn of the reels as they capture a rare rock and roll lightning strike, as if you were standing in the wings with the drug-dealers and crazed leather rebels of days gone by.
Humbucking their way into the mixing desk of Robert Pehrsson’s Studio Humbucker in Stockholm, Dead Lord couldn’t have found a more fitting sparring partner for their live burst of untamed rawk. Pehrsson has helped hone Dead Lord’s classy riffs and king kong energy into a diamond-cut crystal of top-drawer rhythm and blues.”
