Bell from the capital of Swedish Metal, Gothenburg, were originally started by Manne Flood (drums, vocals) and Martin Welcel (guitar, vocals) during a late night drinking session. Both had been friends for many years and played together in different bands and projects before Bell came to be. To complete the line-up, well-known brother in arms and great bass player Jesper Ljung joined the band. Currently the band consists of four members, including a new second guitarist by the name of Max Aghall. Originally the band issued their debut album "Tidecaller" as a limited private pressing. The new High Roller edition is bound to make Bell popular outside their home country for sure. "We're not out to compete, we were absolutely thrilled when High Roller Records contacted us and wanted to work with us. There are many great bands from Sweden, so we don't think that's too surprising," comments Martin Welcel. "It's safe to say that you can hear when a band is from Sweden in general. It seems that there is a huge demand for Swedish bands, and Bell are hoping to ride that wave that was summoned with "Tidecaller"". It's always hard to describe the musical style of a new band but it should be safe to say that Bell feel quite at home playing traditional Doom Metal. Martin, however, thinks otherwise: "We don't consider ourselves a Doom band, though we appreciate the heaviness that comes with Doom. We don't wanna lock ourselves into one specific genre, we want to create something that's original. The heaviness from Doom, the groove from Stoner, the sound of heavy metal and high and powerful vocals. As mentioned, we appreciate the heaviness of Doom Metal but we are not hard core Doom Metal listeners ourselves. We are more into bands that experiment with Doom, such as Mastodon, The Sword, Entombed and Witchcraft." It's not a coincidence that the first Bell album bears the title "Tidecaller". Martin explains: "The song 'Tidecaller' is absolutely one of our own favorites, it shows a bit of technical finesse as well as vocal harmonies, catchy choruses and heavy riffs. We think that 'Tidecaller' is a hit song, as well as 'Secret Mountain'. We consider most of our songs pretty catchy, and we're trying to make the choruses easy to remember. For the more hard-core fans of the genre we try to write songs that are not 'easily listening', like 'Angels Blood' for example. Our lyrics are mostly about fantasy-themed worlds with beasts, wizards and the destruction of ancient battlefields, with deep hidden meanings."
