Behind The Artworks: Dreamslain - Forge Of Rebellion (2024)

In an era, where AI-generated “art” is a thing, and artists protest against the scams of AI-powered “arentists”, for us it is all the more important to work with, and showcase the art of real, human artists, who deserve to be seen, respected and very importantly, paid for the hours and hours of work they pour into their art - with the same passion that we pour into our music.

 

While not all aspects of our music are produced locally - the songs are mixed and mastered in the UK, the CDs pressed in Ireland, the t-shirts produced in Bangladesh and screen printed in the UK; but composition and recording are fully home-grown in our basement rehearsal space in Tromsø - for the artwork we asked the local Tromsø artist Tonje-Mari Clausen to work with us. We had been talking quite a bit about our music, and she liked it, so even though she had never before done album artwork for a metal album, she wanted to do it for our album, with a result we are most impressed and happy with!

 

The story of the artwork is a bit like the story of what bands inspired our songs. When initially discussing our song lyrics with Tonje-Mari Clausen, the theme of water and ships seemed to be something to focus on. We wanted then to incorporate some elements from each of the songs in the artwork, but that was a bit hard to make coherent. As Tonje-Mari Clausen described it “it becomes too close to a wizard collage sprayed on the side of a van”

 

We therefore decided to focus on 3 elements: post-apocalyptic landscape, ghosts, and a swordsmith, abandoning the nautical aspects.

 

The final cover thus contains the first and the last song: the post-apocalyptic landscape in the background from Humankind’s Fall and the swordsmith forging swords for a rebellion against this fate.