Rising star STORM has been flying high of late and creating waves with a genre-defying sound. A string of singles has given an intriguing taste of what’s to come from an artist who is carving out a promising future. Having just opened this year’s Download Festival, we took the opportunity of grabbing an interview as he stepped off stage.

So how has your Download experience been so far?

It has been amazing. It feels so crazy to be here. I’ve seen YouTube videos of this festival ever since I was a little kid, I saw lots of Bring Me The Horizon footage. So, it is a dream just being here after watching all these great bands and now playing here myself is amazing.

And now you are fresh off stage, how do you rate your performance?

It feels great. The sun was out, even though we thought it was going to be raining, all the band had a lot of fun and it went as planned.

Now you are here, will you take the opportunity to watch other bands?

I’m going to check out Escape The Fate. I’ve been listening to them for such a long time so I’m really looking forward to that one and also Slaughter To Prevail, they’ve got a crazy sound. So, those two are the top of my watch list.

So many great metal bands have come from Norway. Do you feel you have a lot to live up to?

You could say that [laughs]. Norway has a big history when it comes to black metal and stuff, we’re not in that black metal genre but a lot of those bands could be classed as “legendary”.

Growing up, what kind of music did you listen to?

My first favourite artist was Michael Jackson, when I was a kid I used to love dancing to his music. Then on my mother’s side of the family I was influenced by flamenco music. When I was about eight years old I started checking out the bands from a video game I was playing and I discovered a band called Black Tide, they introduced me to the metal genre and from there I got into bands like Escape The Fate.

What makes you sing in English as opposed to your native Norwegian?

When I started my first band I sang in Norwegian and I was comfortable doing that. When I signed with Indie Records and started this new project STORM they said I had to sing in English because we want to reach out to more people. At first I was dubious, I didn’t think I could sing in English, but I tried it out and it went well. It feels a little difficult at times, some words I can’t pronounce right, sometimes in the studio we need a hundred takes just to get one word right, so now we’re very strict on pronunciation.

As you said, you have a lot of different musical influences, so what made you decide to play metal as opposed to hardcore, punk or rap?

Because Falling In Reverse became my favourite band early on. They just inspired me so much, and when they started with the rap stuff in recent years, I also started listening to that, there’s so elements of hip hop in my songs, and it’s mainly because of them.

Do you view STORM as a band or a solo project?

STORM is an artist project, but I have a live band with me and they’re such amazing guys. It feels like they’re part of STORM, it’s bigger than only one person.

How did you put the band together?

I started with only just a guitarist and drummer. I knew the guitarist before I started this project and he knew the drummer and we rehearsed a lot, just us three, but then we found another guitar player and a keyboardist, which is who I mainly write the songs with. They’re all such amazing people and they know what they’re doing. They’re all a bit older than me; 25, 30 years old so they’re all grown up guys.

You’re still at school, so how do you juggle the band with your other commitments?

It’s not been that hard to be honest. Sometimes there’s a lot to do but music is my passion. My school has been very cool with me and given me days off.

What’s your songwriting process?

I usually write songs in my studio. I start with the chorus, because I think that’s the most important part, that has to be catchy, then with the keyboard player we write everything around it.

I feel like your lyrics are very confessional and you open your soul. Was that an easy thing to do?

It has not been that hard, it’s been the easiest way for me to speak out about what I’ve been feeling and it is easier to say it in a song that talking about it one to one. So, it’s not been a big problem, but it actually feels really good.

It’s common knowledge that men don’t really open up and talk about their feelings. By doing so, do you hope you will be an influence to other men?

It would be great if I could be the person that inspires people to do that. That’s really important, and also it is Mental Health Month now so this a very important subject. Definitely.

With the energy you expend during a gig, do you feel emotionally drained after a performance? How do you relax after a show?

It’s hard, all my bandmates have to calm me down!

You’ve recently released a new single titled ‘Die Young’. Is this indicative of where your sound will go next?

That’s a hard question because we’re working on an album now. The songs are similar, but at the same time they’re not the same at all. We have pop-punk songs, hip hop songs, we’ve recorded the heaviest song we’ve ever made, we’ve recorded a lot of different styles, so I wouldn’t say ‘Die Young’ is what to expect, but the overall sound of that single is what to expect.

So how to you bring all these different genres together and make them sound whole?

We just experiment and try different stuff and find out what works and what doesn’t, and that’s the most fun part.

Now that you’ve played the UK’s biggest rock festival, what’s next? How can you top this?

I don’t know. I’ll just have to wait and see because this is the biggest thing we’ve ever done, so we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

Finally, if I had a magic wand and could make any wish come true for STORM, what would it be?

Playing a gig with Falling In Reverse! They’re my number one, so that would be a big dream come true.

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