HÄLLAS – Oh, those seventies!

May 04, 2026   »   interview   »   U2604

text: Schmidt Péter

Hällas, from Jönköping/Sweden, and their new album Panorama has received positive acclaim worldwide among fans of old school progressive/hard rock music. We discussed the band's history, recent developments and future plans with singer-bassist Tommy Alexandersson. The band was formed in 2011 – you were all very young back then. Where did your interest in this old-fashioned, 70s-rooted kind of music come from? Maybe it was influenced by your parents or other older relatives? Of course, our parents grew up in the '50s and '60s, so they had some old records in their collections. But my parents actually listened to a lot of '80s pop music and many Swedish musicians and bands. I think when we grew up listening to the modern kind of rock music, it was all very polished and well-produced – there were so many bands sounding like that. Then in 2011, when Graveyard and all these bands came along and took the music back to its roots, that was during our 20s. We fell in love with that style and started digging through our parents' record collections. There's just something about that old music – it sounds like it should, somehow. Where and under what circumstances did you meet and form the band? From the beginning it was me and a guy called Jesper who started the band together with Kasper. We met Kasper at a bar, talked about rehearsing, and started playing as a rock trio – Deep Purple covers, Black Sabbath, some Jimi Hendrix, blues rock and hard rock. Then we met Alexander, our former guitar player, and started playing more twin-guitar stuff, more Thin Lizzy-inspired, Wishbone Ash kind of style. When we recorded our first EP, Marcus the guitar player joined – we parted ways with Jesper and Marcus came in. Nicklas was the producer of that record, and he added some keys to the tracks while we weren't there. We thought it sounded really good. Then we had a show with the American band Danava in Sweden and asked Nicklas if he could join us on stage. After that show we kept asking him, and eventually he was in the band. After our first North American tour we already knew – about six months in advance – that Alex was going to leave. So I called my friend Rickard, who I'd had a side project with a few years back. I knew he was a really good guitar player and that he liked all the same music we do. So Rickard joined in, and here we are. Your first three albums took shape as a trilogy, but Isle Of Wisdom and Panorama are separate from them. What do you think – will there be any more examples of lyrical concepts spanning over multiple albums? I like to write different things. When we did the trilogy, each upcoming album was part of that story, and after three records in that world we felt it was time to do something new. Panorama is more a combination of thoughts and philosophy – it has a story of course, but it stands alone. As for the future, we honestly don't know yet. We'll see what's to come. You use the term “adventure rock“ for your own music. Beyond that, do you have any declared band philosophy or set of rules that you create by? We don't really have rules – except one: the music should be fun when we're creating it. That's the only rule. I really like the organic and natural sound of your records. Is it difficult to create this kind of sound – so reminiscent of the early 70s – in the studio? What equipment do you use for it? We use a lot of pedals and effects, but the approach is: if we have a vintage Marshall or Fender amplifier, we try to make it sound as good as it naturally can. We don't do a lot of digital stuff. I think we've formed our own kind of sound, and of course it's inspired by the '70s – in our world, many productions from that era are timeless, and that's always what we're aiming for. As for the philosophy, it's something like: less is more, more is more. Sometimes less is more, sometimes more is more – but it should always sound good and natural. Many of the old bands that can be called your main musical influences were characterized by performing their songs live in a different, more free and more “jamming“ way than on their studio recordings. In this regard, what about Hällas in the live situation? Right now we're on tour – tonight we played in Utrecht in the Netherlands. We have a few more shows across Europe, going to Germany tomorrow and ending the tour in Prague. We've also played shows in Scandinavia, Central Europe, and France. After this tour the festival season starts – we have shows in the UK, Czech Republic, Spain, and Greece. We're aiming to do another tour this fall as well. We definitely want to go back to South America and North America. We want to play a lot behind this record, because we think it's great and we want to show it to people. Panorama is your first album that you are distributing through your own label, Äventyr Records. Doesn't this seem like a risky decision compared to the financial background of – for example – Napalm Records, with whom you were previously under contract? Of course, releasing a record on your own label is a financial risk. But at the same time, we have a sense of how much we can sell and how many fans we have in different territories. We pressed a good amount of records to start, saw that they sold, and then pressed more – we're building it up. We were actually at a Swedish label called RMV, and Napalm was a partner of theirs – RMV had distribution in Scandinavia and Napalm covered the rest of the world. It's good to have the big players behind you. But it's hard being a musician at our level. The dream is for all of us to eventually live completely from the music. Running our own label and selling our own records means we don't give away the rights to our music – and that means we might earn more, work less at our day jobs, and make more music. That was a big part of the decision. We're very happy with what the previous labels did for us, though. With its 21-and-a-half-minute playing time, “Above The Continuum“, which opens the album, is your most grandiose composition to date. Where did the inspiration come from to create such a monumental piece of music? We love all the old prog records – 2112 has that long track, and many Yes albums have extended pieces. We've always talked about writing a really long song, but we never had the time or the right conditions. With Panorama, since we were releasing it ourselves and could take our time, we decided to go for it. We also had a gap of about four years since the previous album – we released a live album between Isle of Wisdom and Panorama, but there was proper studio time where we weren't rushing anything. So we thought: a really long song, this time. It was very hard to write, but really fun. We had a lot of fun making it. Actually, the song was even longer than 21 minutes originally – but since a vinyl side holds around 21 or 22 minutes, we had to trim it down and work within those limits. This composition consists of seven parts – were these originally intended as separate songs, or not? No, they were never meant as separate songs. We don't usually build songs around a single riff – the parts grew out of each other, or from twists on ideas we had. I don't think they would have been that interesting as standalone songs. But together, as seven smaller parts within the whole, I think they work really well – they make each other better.

How did you find the guest musicians who played the wind and string instruments in the song, and organize them for this collaboration? They're musicians from the town where we live – we just asked around. I asked my sister's husband Jake, who is an upright bass player, and he came in for a session. We also had violin players, cello, a trumpet player, and some horns. It was all through personal connections – someone knew someone. All of them are professional musicians, and I hope they had fun recording it. Nicklas handled most of the sessions with them. All of your album covers are beautiful work – even your debut EP looked gorgeous. Did the same artist create them all? The first three album covers were made by Adam Burkey, an American illustrator – he's very talented. The two more recent records are by Branca Studio, and one was made by friends of ours in France, Emy and Gaspard. So it's been a few different people over the years, but I like them all – each one is really cool in its own way. A live album was released in 2023 – can we expect a Blu-ray/DVD release in the near future too? I'm not sure – maybe! If people want a Hällas show on Blu-ray with really great sound and everything, maybe we can do that. We've discussed the idea of a live DVD, but we've never actually done it. So we'll see what the future brings. Regarding the musical concept, I feel some kinship between Hällas, Phantom Spell from the UK, and Mausoleum Gate from Finland. Do you know these two contemporary bands? Mausoleum Gate from Finland I actually haven't heard yet – I'll have to check them out. But Phantom Spell I've listened to a lot, especially their recent record. I like it a lot – very cool and adventurous music. We're actually playing together at Desert Fest in London, I think. I don't know if we're on the same day, but if we are I'll definitely catch their set. You are currently on a European tour. Once that's done, will you be visiting some venues outside of Europe? I know our crew is working on it. I really hope we can play all over the world. How much were you able to do concerts and tours in support of your previous albums? We've toured on every album. In the early days with Excerpts we weren't doing long tours – more frequent small shows. But with Conundrum and Isle of Wisdom we did proper European tours, spring and fall, plus Scandinavia and the US. We had a break during the pandemic, just before Isle of Wisdom came out I think. But yes – we're a touring band. We love to tour. And we really hope to play in Hungary one day, we've never played there. If you're reading this interview, I hope you give Panorama a chance and listen to the music. Hope to see you soon!

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