Pressure - Beaten But Not Dead w/Interview
Pressure is a melodic rock band based in Stockholm, Sweden. Featuring guitarist Simon Siirpo Forsell as the band leader with Olof Jönsson providing vocals and Emil Salling providing additional guitar work, the group aims to “lead everyday people around the world to overcome and embrace the pressures felt from everyday existence”, a noble mission that they accomplish with their music. Today we have the privilege of having an interview with Pressure and we also take a look at their new single, “Beaten But Not Dead”!
Like most of Pressure’s original music, “Beaten But Not Dead” is a song that was originally recorded in Pressure’s native Swedish - with the title “Nere Men Inte Död” - but was translated and features English vocals. Vocally, Jönsson provides an electric show of force and the song’s meaningful lyrics are presented in an electrifying and melodic way. This energetic uplifting message serves as a kick to refocus your efforts and dig yourself out of any negative situations you may be in. Instrumentally, the song is driven by its superb pulse-pounding guitar work, culminating in a 20-second long guitar solo starting at the three-minute mark. “Beaten But Not Dead” is a powerful song with a powerful message and illustrates the best pieces of Pressure’s electrifying sound.
Now let’s dive into the interview!
Thanks for being with Which Coast today!
What are some of your musical/artistic influences?
Well I do listen to a lot of different music and artists. I do think you will get different answers from me on different days but I love music that means something. Artists that plays and sing from their heart and soul. My influence come from the art of music itself. To show true emotions and feelings through music and to have a feeling/expression behind each and every note.
Do you feel like you can hear some of the sounds of your influences in the music you make?
I do hope so. I want to make more than cool and straight forward rock songs. I want them to touch people. As I do feel that we take influences from a lot of different bands you can always say that our music are unique or a full cocktail of influences.
The COVID-19 pandemic has really limited a lot of bands for the last several months. How has the COVID-19 pandemic changed the way that your band operates?
Yeah, this has been really tough for us. No shows and the whole business has been more slow. Pressure has taken this time to build our sound. Write, record and produce a lot of music. We have been working at our rehearsal studio, sometimes alone and sometimes all together. Always keeping safe and people around us safe.
You guys started by making metal covers of popular songs. When Olof Jönsson joined the band back in 2018, how did that change your musical direction?
We did search for a new lead singer because we were breaking out of the cover genre. Olof was a fantastic injection of energy and talent for us. It took us to a whole new level and inspired us to work even harder. Olof has a really unique voice and when he joined we got all the pieces to build our new songs.
What dynamics has he infused into your songwriting?
Olof has the voice and the appearance to deliver our songs and the meaning of them. As we wrote the songs we actually wrote them for his voice and for his style of singing.
This year, you’ve released quite a few singles, both in Swedish and English. Could you tell me about your songwriting process as a whole?
Me, Simon, writes the first drafts of our songs. Doing a "demo" version, with all instruments and vocals. But the song is just a draft. Then we start to work with the song. Olof takes it home to his rehearsal place, works it through, if the key needs to be adjusted I re-records the draft so Olof can work. After that Olof works through the lyrics and phrasings. We work really close with this because the lyric and the delivery is one of the most important of our music. When we are satisfied we take the song to the studio. Emil listens to our song, giving his artistic feedback and we agree on the song. After that, we start to record the song "for real" we do that ourselves with Simon as engineer and we all give feedback and critique so we get the best take on every part. When we have done this, we send our tracked version to our producer. We get some feedback, some redos and completes that. Then we send it for mix and mastering.
So there is quite much work behind each and every song we have. But we feel that we have to do this because of the message behind the songs. We have a lot of music already written that is in draft mode and we have not started working with yet.
What are some challenges you face when you’re translating your songs from Swedish to English (i.e. melodic changes/changing meaning of certain lines)?
The lyrics and the language is so important for us. We cannot just translate it we need to keep the same feeling and the same mood in the song as well. So one challenge is to keep the mood and the feeling even after translating. And also to find the rhythm in it. We rewrite some phrasing and melodies in the different versions just to keep the language and the mood intact. Another challenge is to keep a correct language, I mean we want the all the small details in the language that only a native speaking person can provide. So we have to consult for some parts of the lyrics.
We’ve taken a listen to your new single, “Beaten But Not Dead” and it’s very melodic and has a great meaning. Was the song written about a personal experience that you’ve gone through or is it more of a general message?
Yes, all our songs has personal connections has experiences. Beaten But Not Dead is no exception. There is people close to me that has been knocked down so many times, they have been mistreated, bullied, abused and they also struggle with problems of their own. Beaten But Not Dead is a message to them to keep fighting even if everything looks dark and even if it feels like no one understands you. You will battle your demons, sometimes they will beat you down, but they wont be able to kill you if you don’t let them. The song is a reminder to get back up, stronger and tell the demons that they can do whatever they want to you, but you will survive anyway.
What are you hoping fans get from this song?
I hope that our fans will get some hope and confidence from the song. I hope they listen to the lyrics and tell their demons to be quiet, and that they don’t want to hear the demons even breathing. There is so many pressures and demons around us. But let this song be a beacon to say that even if you win the battle you wont win the war.
Is there anything else you’d like our readers to know?
Pressure is soon to release our first album. It will be a story driven album with a lot of good songs about different kind of Pressures. We know you will find great rock to inspire you on it. I also want your readers to know that we get our fuel, or music and our passion from all of you out there. We want to tell the stories that we all can relate to.
Thank you for being with us today!
It was certainly a pleasure to learn more about Pressure as a band and how they operate together as a band. From the interview, it was nice to learn that the powerfully uplifting message “Beaten But Not Dead” was written directly for the purpose of uplifting people, something that the song succeeds in doing with its well-crafted ‘down but not out’ mentality. Overall, “Beaten But Not Dead” is an excellent song that encouraged me to keep an eye on Pressure as an excellent rising band. The way in which they write and record both in Swedish and in English will help them find a broader audience and helps make the group extraordinary. You can check out Pressure’s Spotify for more music and keep up with them on Facebook and Instagram for any updates about the band. We have “Beaten But Not Dead” embedded below, check it out!
