Tribulation

They bring their explosive live show to our shores for the first time this month for a whirlwind tour of gigs in Hobart, Sydney and Brisbane, and guitarist and co-founding member Adam Zaars has a very simple, confident message to Australian fans about what they can expect from the Tribulation live experience.

“Our everything!” he says. “As usual, we never do anything else. We of course can’t do as big a production as we would, say, here in Stockholm. But we always manage to get around that, so you can expect a really good show.”

It’s that level of confidence that has carried Tribulation forward for more than a decade, ever since the band formed in high school back in 2004. When Zaars is asked what he would say if someone had told them all those years ago that in 2016 they would be doing interviews with Aussie journos in the lead-up to their first tour Down Under, he has another simple, self-assured response: “I would have said, ‘Of course!’”

He laughs. “I think I probably would have thought it would happen sooner, maybe within a year or two.”

In fact, this will be the first trip to our nation in any capacity for any member of the band. “None of us have [been to Australia], so this is very cool for us,” Zaars says. “We’ve all heard about Australia, since it’s so very different from Sweden, where nothing is really dangerous, where no animals are dangerous to ourselves! So it’s going to be quite an experience, I think.”

Ultimately, Zaars’ expectations for the shows and the Aussie fans are quite high. “I have a few friends from Australia, and I imagine that it will be quite intense – at least I hope so! But it should be really good. We’re starting in Tasmania [for Dark Mofo], and that seems like a really cool festival, we’re very glad to be a part of that.”

It’s great for Aussie fans that Tribulation’s maiden tour of our nation is a headlining one, as the Swedes will get to spread their wings and cover their entire back catalogue over the course of a set.

“I’m not sure if we expected to headline the very first time we went to Australia, but that’s what we’re doing. I hope it works!” laughs Zaars again.

“We do [play a comprehensive set] when we can. When we get 30 minutes, we can’t, we can’t really do songs from all the albums. But when we get an hour, we can. It all depends on what show it is. When we go to new places, we always try to present as much as we can.”

Reflecting upon the fact his band has now been around for more than a decade, Zaars says those formative early years were vital in the development of Tribulation despite their youthful naivety. “Back then, we were very young. Obviously we were still at school, and of course we were not as actively touring as we are now. We’ve actually only been doing that actively for three or four years now.

“So in a way it seems like a long time ago, but the band has been so much more active in the recent years, so it’s almost like it’s a different band. But in a way I think it’s good that we had that initial time of building the band. Even though we recorded the first album [The Horror] nine years ago, and that’s still relevant to some extent, but we didn’t release it till 2009. So it’s not recent, but it’s not 12 years in the past at least.”

Zaars has very vivid and positive memories of those heady early days in school when Tribulation were getting things together, and he maintains great reverence for their early musical influences. “It’s all pretty much the same, to be honest – I guess our main influence back then was most likely Morbid Angel, but we always had the heavy metal basics. And we still do, I guess.

“I remember those days very fondly, because we were very passionate about what we were doing, and quite focused as well. Looking back, when we recorded and made the layout for the first album, we were very prepared. I remember that we really felt that we knew what we were doing, and I’m sure we did know. We were very confident and very passionate. In a way it was a very different band, but in other ways it is very similar.”

And that passion is one of the reasons why Zaars believes Tribulation have another ten years left in them at the very least.

“I think we do, yeah – I’d be surprised if we didn’t. We’re equally as passionate today, it hasn’t really been fading. I think we’re even more focused in a way today, because this is about the only thing we do now. So we take it very seriously – if we want to keep doing it, we have to. So I’m pretty confident that we’re going to continue for quite a while yet.”

[Tribulation photo by Linda Åkerberg]