The Gods of Thunder return with their triumphant new album "Sutur Rising" and by Thor's mighty hammer we just had to speak with Olavi Mikkonen on the eve of their imminent US tour.

They can expect another quality album from us. There are going to be some new elements such as orchestral arrangements and a little more of an ethnic feeling throughout the record. I think we’ve gone for real brutality in some songs and with others we have done some of the most melodic stuff we’ve ever done. There scope of the album for us is much wider than anything we’ve done in the past.

It fits where we are right now to be honest. Obviously there are some parts that relate to the old Amon Amarth but there are also a lot of parts that are very much were the band is now. It is a statement as to where we are today as a band,

I’m interested in the title, from my research Surtr is foretold as being a major figure during the events of Ragnarök; carrying his bright sword, he will go to battle against the Æsir, he will do battle with the major god Freyr. How did you settle on this character for the album title?

It all started very early on in the process as we were coming up with a concept for an album cover. We felt that “Twilight” was a very strong album cover and we wanted to have something that was as strong if not better that “Twilight”. So it all started with the idea for a cover, Surtr is a very cool character in Viking mythology, he is a giant surrounded by flames with a sword made of fire. We could picture that this would make a great cover so we nailed that idea down, then whenever we had music that would fit within that overall concept we’d keep it. Johan would then write lyrics for it that way. The last album we called the Thor album because he was the Thunder God and the one before that was an Odin album, so we wanted to keep that tradition and dedicate an album to one of the characters in Viking mythology. If you have a great cover the rest is easy (laughs).

On the topic of the Viking themed lyrics, these are now synonymous with Amon Amarth, does Johan solely come up with the themes or is it more of a collective effort, and from which sources do you draw your inspiration?

Johan writes all the lyrics and probably he has the most ideas also as he has the most knowledge about the topic. We always talk about new topics also, I mean if we’re on a break at rehearsals we’ll always talk about new concepts we have. Ideas also come up when we’re on tour as there are long periods where you are bored with nothing to do, and then you have time to think about these things. We all try to help and come up with ideas but Johan is very good at writing about things that happen to him every day and then translates them into this mythology vibe, Many of the stories are 1000’s of years old so there is lots of books to read through, and we try to pick out interesting parts which would make good songs.

No not really, as I said I was more worried we would need to come up with a great cover. We have been doing this as a band for so long we know what we can do and so we don’t need to worry too much. I know we are capable of doing great songs. There is always pressure, pressure you put on yourself when you enter into the writing room to come up with a song. If we felt the material we had wasn’t strong enough then we’d just wait, we’re never in a hurry but we felt we had ten great songs and it was time to hit the studio.

Did you approach the writing of the record any differently from previous albums? Is there a formula to writing a Amon Amarth song, how do they come together?

We created a formula when we wrote the “Twilight” album and we stick that formula, which means we write together as a band in the rehearsal room. The first riffs will always come from time spent on your own at home but then we take them into the rehearsal room to show everybody and then we’ll make loads of demos. That’s the formula as to how we work and if we have a blockage then we stop and get back together in a couple of weeks when we have new ideas. The main thing for us is to work as a band, one team.

You chose to record the drums at Park Studios, while bass and guitars were recorded at Fascination Street Studios. Why chose to move between different studios for the recording?

The band once again chose Jens Bogren to produce the album, what makes Jens such an integral part of the recording process for you guys?

I think this is the third album we’ve worked with Jens as he knows the band very and is a great listener. He understands what we need and before we started writing we had a meeting with him to confirm we wanted to continue to work with him and what we expected. We all agreed “Twilight” had a bit too much of a Power Metal production and while I love the album this time we wanted a rougher sounding record. Jens also helps with arrangements of the songs and makes us really perform. He is a very big part of the way we sound.

It’s kind of both really. You have to do it otherwise you don’t get the music on tape but me personally I can’t say I enjoy it too much. It’s like going to the dentist, you don’t want to but you have to. Of course I like to hear the progress of the material day after day but I most enjoy writing the material or playing live. I mean we started recording at the start of October 2010 and then we had 10 days off to go to Japan, and finished up at the beginning of December. We do take it easy, we’ll work for 3 or 4 days then have a couple of days off.

The extended cut of the album comes with not the most obvious cover versions, “War Machine” By Kiss and “Balls to the Wall” by Accept. Why these two songs and which of you is the Kiss and Accept fan?

At the end of the day we’re all fans of KISS and Accept. We’re all old guys, born in the early 70’s so we grew up with these bands. I totally adore the make up era of KISS and everything they did is brilliant to my ears. We just felt that “War Machine” is one of the heavier KISS songs and we could do a cool version of this song, so why not? Accept, well these guys were huge in Sweden in the 1980’s every Metal fan over here has an Accept album and “Balls to the Wall” is a real Metal anthem. It was really cool to destroy that song (laughs).

It is always a struggle. You always have those songs you have to play for the fans as they are the songs that makes them go nuts, and that is what it is all about really. Then for the rest of the set it’s about just figuring out what is working best, so we’ll try out all of the new 10 songs at some point then we’ll take it night to night. After a while you soon see what works and gets the best reception from the fans and which are more popular. We always try to mix up our set a throw a song in there that people won’t expect but it is always a struggle. If we’re playing the same city a couple of months after we last played there then we’ll try to change the set as much as possible so we aren’t predictable.

Back in January you played the 70,000 Tones Of Metal Cruise, this sounds and looks like the most bizarre live environment ever, what was it like to play this event?

It was actually an amazing experience; we were really scarred before hand as we had no information before the show, so we were expecting the worst. It was one of the best organised festivals we’ve ever played and really cool as we had 2 shows and 2 days off, so we could walk around with a beer in your had listening to bands and meeting fans.