The Median Man spoke with Heidi from Dark Sarah.
The Median Man spoke with Heidi from Dark Sarah.
SAVE ME
What was the inspiration behind the formation of the band and your thematic approach?
Everything started from the first single “Save Me” when I started to work on its lyrics. In the story there’s a woman “Sarah” walking in the forest in her wedding dress and singing “save me”. The chorus “Save me” is in major but the overall feeling of the song is melancholic. It sounded a bit mad combination, the character started to seem mad. I felt I needed to tell more about her story, about the madness. And so I started to build up a story around her. The first trilogy “the Chronicles” tell about her and her evil alter ego Dark Sarah.
Could you talk us through the writing process of this new album? Where does the album stand in relation to previous releases?
This album starts a new story line and it builds up the scenery and introduces us the new protagonist called Luna. The trilogy ended on last album and now starts something totally new. I could say “Grim” is an introduction to a new phase of Dark Sarah, combining something old and new both musically and thematically. Since our last album ” The Golden Moth” was made to be very theatrical I wanted “Grim” to be a bit easier to approach. The theatrical elements are still there but showcased in a bit different way. You don´t find so many dialogues there. For this album I also wrote almost everything and the songs didn’t change much in the production phase either, so I could say this is a very personal album for me as a songwriter too.
NEW STORY
NEW STORY
Could you talk us through the writing process of this new album? Where does the album stand in relation to previous releases?
This album starts a new story line and it builds up the scenery and introduces us the new protagonist called Luna. The trilogy ended on last album and now starts something totally new. I could say “Grim” is an introduction to a new phase of Dark Sarah, combining something old and new both musically and thematically. Since our last album ” The Golden Moth” was made to be very theatrical I wanted “Grim” to be a bit easier to approach. The theatrical elements are still there but showcased in a bit different way. You don´t find so many dialogues there. For this album I also wrote almost everything and the songs didn’t change much in the production phase either, so I could say this is a very personal album for me as a songwriter too.
THEATRICAL
Which songs are the easiest to imagine performing live and why?
We always want to build our shows to be energetic but giving the audience also a good view of our style and repertoire. So normally we include also some theatrical and slow songs next to the bombastic ones to our set. From this album I could pick up at least: The Chosen One, Illuminate, Melancholia, La Folie Verte, The Hex.
How has coronavirus impacted the band, in the short and long term?
Long term impact is very hard to tell yet. Luckily we had recorded our album already and in that way the impact has been minimal for us. However the lockdown of Finnish borders made impossible to shoot our music videos in Estonia according to the plan. So I needed to quickly find a Finnish director. It was very uncertain we could shoot anything, since the southern Finland was locked too and we couldn’t travel in Finland either. Luckily the lockdown ended just a week before the scheduled music video session. Of course we needed to be extra careful with the safety and distance. Also we could only have 10 people at the scene. I think we managed quite well anyway with some creativity!
CREATIVITY
CREATIVITY
How has coronavirus impacted the band, in the short and long term?
Long term impact is very hard to tell yet. Luckily we had recorded our album already and in that way the impact has been minimal for us. However the lockdown of Finnish borders made impossible to shoot our music videos in Estonia according to the plan. So I needed to quickly find a Finnish director. It was very uncertain we could shoot anything, since the southern Finland was locked too and we couldn’t travel in Finland either. Luckily the lockdown ended just a week before the scheduled music video session. Of course we needed to be extra careful with the safety and distance. Also we could only have 10 people at the scene. I think we managed quite well anyway with some creativity!