Episode 39: Lord Ahriman (Dark Funeral)

When Dark Funeral released their debut EP in 1994, it came as a bit of a surprise to the unsuspecting Swedish metal scene – and for good reason. Mikael Svanberg, better known as Lord Ahriman, and his bandmates kept the formation of Dark Funeral a secret for well over a year before arriving to Unisound to make their now legendary first recording with Dan Swanö.  Eschewing the idea of a traditional demo, the band elected to self-finance and self-release the four-song EP that propelled them to fame inside and outside of Sweden with a brand of true black metal built on speed, precision, and intricacy.  After saving money for months to produce a thousand copies of it, Lord Ahriman and co-founder Blackmoon worried that they would be in debt for quite some time after financing the whole production.   Those worries were thankfully misguided – the CDs sold out within a week and the band made all of its money back.Since that moment, Dark Funeral have continued to evolve and deliver high quality black metal during their thirty-plus years in existence largely through the strong, award-winning song writing of Lord Ahriman.  The group have put a strong emphasis on their live performances, evidenced by the numerous tours that have hit locations in 55 countries to date and countless headlining gigs at metal festivals around the world.  Their upcoming live release, A Beast to Praise due out August 21st through Century Media Records, is a testament to their technical acumen, as it showcases the band’s first show after the global pandemic in Stockholm that was broadcast globally in 2022 to coincide with the release of We Are the Apocalypse.  Ahead of the release of the new live album, I had a chance to speak with Lord Ahriman about that gig, plus a number of other topics, including:the significance of that particular show for Dark Funeral after the global pandemic, the importance of touring in this day and age for metal artists, how the recording showcases newer members of the band like vocalist Heljarmadr, and how the band’s live sound continues to get tighter with each and every year.the amount of rehearsal time necessary to be content with a show, the group’s setlist selection process, the upcoming run of shows in Europe with Behemoth and Dimmu Borgir, and a discussion of stage aesthetics and why the band continues to wear corpse paint.an update on the new Dark Funeral album tentatively set for release in 2027, Lord Ahriman’s recent appearance with Mantas and Abaddon from Venom on stage to commemorate Welcome to Hell, his reaction to a lack of media attention to those performances, and the widespread influence that Venom had on the extreme metal community.self-financing and self-releasing the Dark Funeral EP, his fears about being in debt after spending the money and making it all back within a week after moving a thousand copies, working with Dan Swanö, and what the Swedish black metal scene was like in the 1990s.reflections on what more he would like to accomplish, how he motivates himself to push into new territory, and what’s next for Dark Funeral.Lord Ahriman was great to speak with and more than gracious with his time and responses.  As he stated to me, he needs to have a purpose for doing certain things artistically and musically, which might explain why Dark Funeral have fewer studio albums that one might expect for a band active since the early 1990s.  The emphasis on quality over quality, with a dose of artistic integrity, seems to have gone a long way towards helping Dark Funeral reach their status not only as a pillar of Swedish black metal, but as a truly legendary band with fans around the globe.  The same attitude that led them to believe in their material enough to pay for and self-release it back in 1994 is still evident in Lord Ahriman’s approach to music today -and that artistic vision will continue to lead Dark Funeral onward and upwards in the future.