ANATHEMA: Interview with Danny Cavanagh

Anathema, the former Doom Metal act now considered to be one of Progressive Rock’s most revered bands, has returned with “Distant Satellites”, the more laid back follow-up to 2012’s “Weather Systems”, which is sure to make them reach even further heights in their already very successful career. Against Magazine had the pleasure to talk with guitarist Danny Cavanagh and got to know more about the new album, the possibility of playing old material live, his inspirations as a musician and his work with Anneke van Giersbergen among other topics, as follows…

So, starting off, anyone who has listened to all of your work, so far knows you are always in constant evolution, so having that in mind, what makes “Distant Satellites” unique for you in the midst of Anathema’s discography, especially in comparison with “Weather Systems”, your previous record?
Well, it’s for people to listen for themselves, to discover really. I would say it’s more stripped back, it has less layers, there’s some intensely personal songs on there, perhaps even more personal than on “Were Here Because We’re Here”, and there’s also the advance of the laptop, meaning the rhythm programming is becoming [present] in there a little bit you know, so that the laptop is becoming another equal instrument alongside the piano and the guitar and so on, so all of these things together really.

About this change of sound with the incorporation of electronic elements, it seems that the album sounds a little bit darker at times, and it’s really not that elaborated as some of your past works. Was this a deliberate decision, or was this something that just came on as you were writing the record?
It actually just happened, I didn’t even thought about how dark the record might appear to people until it was finished and then people told me it was dark, this might be because all of the songs are in a minor key apart from the final one, and we’ve been known on “Weather Systems” and “We’re Here Because We’re Here” to make songs also in major keys, and that really didn’t happen this time but that wasn’t Intentional, I just didn’t realize. We just picked the songs we thought were right and we did them in the way we thought would be right for them, but everything that happened afterwards in terms of the interpretation, like it being a dark record or this or that, that all happened afterwards, we didn’t really think about it too much…We just made the record that we wanted to make and then other people told us it was this or it was that or it was the other you know? But for us it was just the next album on the list.


So what does “Distant Satellites” refer to? What’s the meaning behind the title and how does it connect with the songs in general?
Well if you can imagine a metaphor of a satellite, a satellite orbiting, some of them are going a little bit far away, some of them go out of orbit, some of them come back, and it’s gravity that keeps satellites close to each other. Well if you imagine the metaphor being people, I love being the gravitational force that keeps people together. And there you have the meaning of the song.

So, going a little bit back to the electronic beats and programming, that are prevalent in songs like “Distant Satellites” and “You’re not Alone”. What inspired you to incorporate these kind of elements into your sound, which are clearly more noticeable on the second half of the record?
Well, to be honest with you, those ideas have been going for a long time. In actual fact, the song “Distant Satellites”, that’s the oldest song in the album, the idea, the beginning of that song is sixteen years old, and that song could have been done on “A Natural Disaster”, it could have been done on “We’re Here Because We’re Here” or on “Weather Systems”, but now was the right time, because we had different songs for “Weather Systems” that I wanted to play with, but this time, “Distant Satellites” or “Voodoo” as it was known, it was the right time for that song. I’m glad it was done now, because that musical approach, that production really did come from Vincent’s and the lyrics came from John really on the last days of the recording, so if we had done that song in previous years it would not sound like it does, and I’m glad it sounds like it does now. But yeah, it’s an important song for us really, it’s what I was going for, what I spoke to the band about allowing the laptop into the recipe, into the mix. It’s absolutely fun to do, providing that you’ve got good songwriting. You understand what I mean Luís? If the songwriting is good, you can do it in five different ways. Acoustic, piano, guitar, rock band, laptop, it’s always going to be a good song, you know. So what I said to the guys was if you want to merge electronica with a live rock band that’s fine, Radiohead did it , Atoms for Peace did it, and I’m all behind you on that. Let’s just make sure that we have undeniable songwriting to go with it. Otherwise there is no point, and that’s what John achieved with the writing of that song and that’s what Vincent has achieved in helping him to produce it. And Christer too.

Talking about “The Lost Song”, I was curious about something. It’s divided into three different sections throughout the album and it’s essentially about you trying to recapture a lost piece of music, isn’t it correct?
That’s exactly correct, yeah. It disappeared off a little Boss recorder that I had and I just never remembered it. I guess it was because I was really quite distracted that time and didn’t remember the piece, and tried, tried, tried, couldn’t remember it, but in trying to consciously remember something that was gone from my conscious mind, those rhythms and those melodies, and particularly the chord progressions all started to come, and then I just kind of wrote new songs together based on the original thought. New stuff came, so in fact maybe it’s either a good thing that the song was lost, I’d love to find it again, but I can never remember it. But if you hear me playing the piano at the beginning of the piano riff of “The Lost Song Pt. 1″, the piano riff is my attempt to remember that lost riff.

Well, it ended up being good you know, because you’ve created three great pieces instead of just one, while still trying to find that lost riff. You’ve worked with producer Christer-André Cedenberg for the second time right?
Yeah, that’s right, yeah. Actually it’s for the third time, you see, because he also mixed “Universal”. We worked for a month on that record, so that’s actually the third full album that we’ve made with him.

So, was his production work in “Weather Systems” that made you decide to collaborate again with him?
Yeah, it was. To be honest, he’s very safe hands, he’s very strung, a very good producer with a very strong work ethic I think, and he is a very special producer particularly in terms of a few different things, but mainly he’s a great mixer and he’s a really great kind of team builder and man manager, he’s pretty good at that and he’s got a very even, balanced mind. Also he’s a positive person obviously and he’s great with the vocals, with vocalists, he’s really, really good, he works so hard, he works such long hours to make these records. He works so much harder than the people in the band, it’s unbelievable. He’s got an amazing work ethic and I mean, obviously the band could work with other producers and it would still be Anathema, but he does make us into something a little extra I think. It’s better the devil that you know, you know what I mean? It’s like…we could go to another producer, but I’m not sure we would do that, because we know Christer and so far it’s working quite well unless we altogether piss him off… (laughs)

He actually plays bass in the record, right? In which songs?
Yeah, actually most of the songs to be honest with you.

I thought he only did a few so it’s really surprising to know that. He also did the mixing but I heard that Steven Wilson was involved in mixing two songs, which were “You’re Not Alone” and “Take Shelter” when Christer was unavailable due to illness. What was the experience of working again with Steven, and would you consider having him produce or probably even participate in one of your next records?
I would consider it, except that I really don’t think Steven’s got the time to fully produce an Anathema record, you know. In terms of going through all of the notes and going through everyday recording processes, that is not something Steven wants to do. But if we give him good files, he will do a good job in mixing them and that’s exactly what he did. And I’m glad that you’ve done your research and this is a nice interview. You have done your research and you know that it was due to illness that Steven was asked to mix the songs. He actually mixed four in total, including two B-sides, and two album tracks. And it was actually a very nice pleasure to work with him again and I particularly was impressed the first time he came back with “You’re Not Alone”, and what I liked about it was the clarity in his sounds, he gets a very clear sound. I noticed that on “We’re Here Because We’re Here” it was not as well recorded as this album was, but he was able to get a very clear sound. It’s still powerful, he doesn’t make it a mushy mix, he doesn’t make it too dark, he’s good you know, and he did that in six hours, that song.

Six hours?
Yeah. He just had six hours, he received the files in the morning and I had the track by the evening and all I asked him to do really, I seem to recall, was to make the guitars sound heavy and to turn it up, to make it sound more like a rock song, but other than that I think that is exactly as he mixed it. I just like the clarity, I mean, he’s very very good at that job, you know, he’s a great mixer and the musical decisions that he made were, I thought were the right ones. He did the same thing on “Take Shelter”, that mix isn’t perfect, because we were really in a rush to finish the album, and to be honest we probably needed another week… we were really rushed to finish this record, we had to finish the record by a particular date. And to be honest with you, I probably need a week of reservation time to go over and correct any mistakes, and I haven’t had that time on “Weather Systems”, and I haven’t had that time on this album and there is one song on “Distant Satellites” that I would fix the mix a little bit. Nevertheless Steven’s musical decisions were really good and he made a good judgment call on things like the drum beat. In fact it was only me and him and we agreed that was the right beat to go for, and it was a great choice and…it’s kind of complicated to make records when you have a lot of people who want the songs to go in certain directions and ultimately, if it’s my song then I have to make the final choice on the song, That doesn’t mean to say other people can’t be right, but I have to choose that they are right, you understand?

Yeah, perfectly.
Yeah, and that’s what happened with the beats for example, the beats that were chosen for “Take Shelter”, you know, Steven just had the right beat, and it was played by Wetle [Holte] in Norway, and I also judged it to be the right beat. But these are the kind of things that can be, I won’t say controversial, but there can be disagreements in the studio about this kind of thing, and it’s not easy to keep a balance when you have two or three or four people saying to do songs in a certain direction. What I like about it is that everybody gets an opinion, within the creative part of the band, the creative part is myself and John Douglas and Vincent Cavanaugh, that’s the creative heart, it always has been the creative heart since 1990. The only two people that really added to that were Darren White and Duncan Patterson. But the three remaining members of the original lineup are the creative heart of the band. What I like about it [songwriting process] is that everybody gets a say or an opinion on where a song might go, but the songwriter makes the final choice on the song, even if the songwriter decides “yeah, you were right all along, do it your way”, you know?

I think it’s always been a great equilibrium between you guys, it always worked out pretty well.
It’s not always easy, but we get there in the end, you know.

Yeah, and it shows, really. So, talking a little bit about your career, it seems like Anathema is now getting more recognition than ever, after all these years. I think that happened specially after “Weather Systems” and that success pretty much made “Distant Satellites” a very much-anticipated album. So what do you think was the turning point for the band, you know, for this kind of explosion now?
I would say Kscope and Steven Wilson were the two turning points for the band. Yeah, I would say it’s that. But I think mainly the turning point could even be my kind of expansion of mind and therapeutic process that I did in 2005 and 6, and then the sounds that followed that expansion, songs like “Dreaming Light” which came out in 2008, and a kind of really high quality melody started to come through more and more, and I think that was the turning point maybe, more than anything.

Okay. So, I have this curiosity – do you guys ever imagine writing new material in the future more in the vein of what you did in the early days?
I don’t think so, no. There is always the chance that we could revisit the early days for, you know, for a special occasion, but to write material in that style would be not appropriate. But listen, that doesn’t mean to say that we won’t write guitar songs, you know what I mean? But we don’t want to be tied down to a style, we don’t want to be tied down to a genre, we just want do what we can and be happy doing it, though of course we could revisit the old days for special occasions and concerts, but it wouldn’t be appropriate to write music like that, because the appropriate thing to do is to follow the heart, follow your heart in music, and to be brave and to follow the melodies and to follow the chords that are coming through. If we are lucky enough the songs keep coming, because what you have to remember is that we don’t sit there writing, thinking about the kind of songs that we should write, that never really happens. What happens is the chords come through, the melodies come through, the ideas come through. We follow the idea, we don’t follow a preconceived idea or a perception.

Personally, as a fan, I like both eras, and I can easily see that you guys needed to expand your sound, it needed to evolve into something different, which is what you have become today. But you know, there are still a lot of the old Anathema fans out there who would probably like to see you guys playing these songs again…
Well, that’s a possibility, that’s a possibility and it’s something that’s being talked about, but there’s no decision on that yet. In terms of writing new music, we refuse to write music in a style that is popular. You know what I mean? It’s like, we have to follow the songs, we have to follow the heart, we have to follow our instincts, that’s what we have to do.

About those concerts…Would you consider asking Darren White to do some vocals?
I don’t think… I should probably stop talking about this right now, because I don’t want to give away any secrets!

Sure. So…now talking about other live performances that you did with Anneke who has sung in The Gathering, those are quite amazing, you know? How did you two get to know each other? Will we ever hear something in the studio context from both of you?
It’s difficult to say. We met, the first time we met was 1997, and I was sitting at the piano trying to write the introduction to “One Last Goodbye”, coming up with that melody and Anneke came over and said “Hello” and I didn’t know who she was and then there was a festival and The Gathering were playing at that festival and I saw who she was that night and “okay, that’s the girl from this afternoon”, and she was obviously a very good singer. Then me and Duncan started to talk about them and I researched them and got to know them, plus she was beautiful and a great singer, I listened to those albums you know, “Mandylion” and “Nighttime Birds”, and that’s kind of where it stayed, it kind of stayed there, I always knew who she was and I always thought she was, you know, a great singer and good girl, and all of that, but we didn’t really become friends until about 2008, after she’d left The Gathering, and I think we met on one of her last shows with The Gathering and when we started talking I realized she was kind of a spiritual person and I was into spiritual ideas, so we started talking about that and we realized that we had quite a lot in common, and then I was playing an acoustic show in Holland and just asked her if she’d like to come along and join me on stage and play a double acoustic show, and she said yes and that went really really well, in fact there was two nights of that. That was great, and there’s always been kind of a good synergy between us, especially on the stage, I mean, there where it really happens. You know, she’s great on stage, she’s such a kind of a perfect singer really, and so that’s kind of the story as it goes. In terms of making a record, it’s difficult to do, we’re both very busy you know, and I’m kind of like a little bit out of side projects at the moment. The Leafblade thing has finished for me now and I’m not really thinking about side projects at this point in time. I might make a solo album, but I’m not so sure. And certainly, Anneke is always a friend I could call upon, but I’m not really into side projects to be honest with you, not right now. I wanna give all my very very best material to the band, I mean, my music belongs to Vincent and John, and if I have ten songs that they don’t want to do, and I still think that the songs are okay, then I could talk about a record then with somebody, or just do it alone.

Another question Dan. It’s hard to imagine that all of your sound would be rooted in musical influences only. So what other forms of art have always inspired you in your writing from the beginning up until now? What drives you?
Well I think life drives me to be honest with you. Life itself, nature, you know…the experience of being, the experience of living, the past, all of these non-musical influences are a big impact on my work you know, whether it’s the past regarding my mother and my family or whether it’s spiritual inspirations. Lots of different things, you know…but I would say nature is a perfect art. That’s my opinion. It feels to me like art is just a human interpretation of something that’s already perfect and all true art comes from a special deep place inside the human being that is connected to and part of all life. And that deeper place is really what inspires me, and that deeper sense of being and of knowing and of gratitude inspires me a lot. To be honest with you, the last couple of years have been pretty dark, pretty difficult for me, and in that respect I think I need a little nudge to reconnect with it again, I need a little bit of help to reconnect with it again. I know I haven’t lost it, because you can’t really lose something like your connections, your spirit, it’s lastly like if you can imagine a sun behind the clouds, you know? Just because there’s heavy clouds the sun is always shining above them. And the sun is always shining no matter where on earth you are, it’s always shining somewhere. Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there. And the spirit and the inspirational qualities of the soul, for want of a better word – there are no words to describe it, are to me a lot like that. So I feel like I need to reconnect to it, but I know it’s not lost, I just need to open my mind and connect to it again. And that is what happened in 2006, which is one of the reasons that the songs like “Dreaming Light” and “Untouchable” took a higher turn in terms of quality and writing and melody, it’s because of that.

So do you think “Distant Satellites” was kind of a cathartic process to you? Did it help you to get over this phase, to vent out your emotions?
No, no it didn’t. But I have started to make things a lot better, but it wasn’t the album that did it. I think that being busy helps and being creative does help. It certainly does help, but alone it is not enough, you know. But there are other influences that have happened in my life which are helping me too, and certain choices I’ve made in terms of how I spend my day, have improved things. But to be honest with you, making an album is always fun for me, I enjoy that process. I like being in the studio because it means that I don’t have to travel. Touring is great, but travelling every day, it’s kind of hard work, it displaces you mentally. What I like about the studio is it’s a creative home, it’s a home from home and I like that.

Would you be entirely happy only working in studio and giving up touring?
I don’t think so. There’s nothing quite like playing on stage, it is a unique thing and it is a very cool thing to do. I think a lot of travelling is a bit hard work to be honest with you.

So you wanted the opportunity to give some special shows and then to always have more time…
No, I’m not saying that either, I’m not saying that. Basically I’ve made the choice to do what it takes and to work with a manager who’s kind of strung and strict but able to listen and do what it takes to make things okay for everybody.

About “Distant Satellites”, what tracks would you say that are your personal favorites?
Track six, I think track six is the best one. It’s called “Anathema”.

Ah, yes, and you’ve written a title track for the first time in your career, why was that?
I can’t say why, but I will say that it’s the only song that could have been called that and it is appropriate for that song, and for the subject of that song, but as for the exact reasons or the exact subject of the song, it’s… I’ll never tell anybody. Nothing in public. But it’s very very very personal.

Okay, sure, I respect that man.
Cheers, man.

So what are your plans for the future now in terms of touring and what are you going to be doing next year?
Years, actually. We have a two year kind of scheduling ahead and it’s looking good to be honest with you, but I can’t really say what most plans are because they’re ideas and they might not happen and I don’t want to disappoint the fans, you know? But I’m having some pretty strong ideas and I hope that they’ll happen, and if they do then it’s looking like a very distinctive year next year and then 2016 will be onwards and upwards and new music and a new album and taking things to that next level.

Great man, and we’ll be waiting for it. Any last words for the Anathema fans?
Just thank you very much, and please always remember that no matter what style we have ever played or don’t play, the music is 100% honest, genuine and sincere and for that reason you cannot say it is anything else.

Originally published on Against Magazine on June 30, 2014.