Backstage at Sojus 7 in Monheim, the atmosphere is stylish and unusually polished — all moody lighting and sleek edges. It feels oddly perfect for an occult-themed rock band prepping their evening ritual. On this particular night, Year of the Goat delivered a blazing performance, (Read our review here but before taking the stage, keyboardist Mikael Popovic (Pope) and guitarist Jonas Mattsson took time to sit down and talk mythology, melody, and the music that keeps them moving.
Their latest album ‘Trivia Goddess’ marks a shift: a full-bodied celebration — and critique — of power, religion, and the feminine archetypes long buried or demonized. With stories that pull from biblical mythology, horror cinema, and esoteric history, the band leans into the grand and the personal with equal weight.
“We’re getting into it now — when it’s about time to go home”
On tour life, mishaps, and songs that grow on you
The current tour is the band’s longest stretch on the road in years — and the wear is beginning to show, if only in the tight logistics and lack of sleep.
Pope: “We haven’t toured in a while. So we kind of forgot what it’s like. We don’t have the routines we might have had at some point.”
Jonas: “The schedule’s been very busy. Not enough sleep. And many, many hours of driving.”
The shows themselves, though, are clearly paying off.
Pope: “Meeting the audience — it’s a whole different ballgame. People are singing along, even dancing. That hasn’t happened as much before. The songs grow on me. I’m starting to see them in a different light.”
Jonas: “Even if you play them well in rehearsal, it takes a while before they sit in the body — that muscle memory. But we’re slowly getting there.”
A true Spinal Tap moment was (almost) avoided when one of the opening acts had their drummer disappear.
Jonas: “So our bass player filled in. He learned five songs in 30 minutes.”
Pope: “He was walking around with headphones. Pretty impressive.
“It still feels empty”
On performing without Elin Gårdfalk
A defining element of ‘Trivia Goddess’ is the female vocal presence — especially the voice of Elin Gårdfalk, who handles lead or harmony lines on several key tracks. Live, however, she’s notably absent — something that’s felt on and off stage.
Pope: “We wish she could have joined. But we’re not a big band, and the economic side of things is very slim. It’s tough. We’d need a bigger bus and an extra hotel room.”
Jonas: “She really wanted to go. When we do gigs closer to home — Sweden, Norway, Poland — she’s there. She’ll be with us in Hamburg in December.”
Pope: “And every night… it still feels empty. People come up and say, ‘I really wish Elin was here.’ And I say: Me too.”
They haven’t changed the setlist, but it does mean Pope and Thomas have to stretch their voices more than usual.
Pope: “We just have to yell our lungs out. And I sometimes find myself asking, ‘Wait, who’s covering that line now?’”
“She went nuts — in the best way”
Female vocals and a wider sonic palette
‘Trivia Goddess’ features not just Elin but also Maria, who delivers one of the album’s most haunting moments — the voice solo in The Witch of the Woods.
Jonas: “Maria doesn’t get mentioned much, but she did the solo voice at the end. I had this idea like The Great Gig in the Sky — just a voice solo that grows into chaos. And she nailed it.”
Pope: “Tom Dalgety, who mixed the album, sent us a video from his studio. He was mixing only her parts and said: ‘My wife is wondering what I’m doing in here.’ It was pure chaos.”
The addition of female vocals added more than sound — it added dimension.
Pope: “It widened the spectrum. Especially now when I hear it — I feel we’ve been missing that before.”
“She trusted the only one who told the truth”
The video trilogy and Eve’s defiance
The album’s concept is echoed through three distinctive music videos — starting with Alucarda (a loose nod to the 1977 horror film), followed by The Power of Eve, and finally Trivia Goddess.
Pope: “The first is about religious oppression. The second, emancipation. And the third — revenge. A fun horror thing we made ourselves.”
In The Power of Eve, the central figure transforms from confusion to ecstatic defiance.
Pope: “Eve is the first woman. She defies God by trusting the serpent — and the serpent is the only one telling the truth. That’s her power. Not to blindly trust.”
The third video plays more ambiguously — women, a man in the trunk, a ritual in the woods.
Pope: “It’s both. The classic fear-fantasy of women killing men — and a symbolic dismantling of the patriarchy. At one point we thought of showing what the guy did. But Thomas said: leave something to the beholder. You can tell he looks sleazy though. He deserved it.”
“Dragging stomp, smoke machine, red light…”
Mét Agwe and the album’s conceptual detour
If ‘Trivia Goddess’ has a turning point, it’s Mét Agwe — the fourth track, and one that dips into an entirely different spiritual world. Musically, it’s slow, heavy, and deliberate — a dragging stomp that feels made for live shows, where it pairs perfectly with smoke and a red wash of light.
In the interview, Pope shared how the track came together outside the initial concept.
Pope: “Thomas had wanted to do something voodoo-related for a while. At first, we didn’t have a strict concept. We just wanted to be free — we had just finished the Heavier Trip soundtrack and needed some air.”
The theme of Mét Agwe — with its imagery of drowning, spirit possession, and zombification — eventually folded back into the larger arc of the album.
Pope: “That idea of being buried alive, coming back as a zombie — that’s a metaphor too, for how people go through life. Numb. Disconnected. And the melody… if we’d added backward guitars, it could’ve been a reggae song.”
“When you’re the new God… what now?”
A trilogy in progress
While ‘Trivia Goddess’ stands alone thematically, the band’s previous albums (Angels’ Necropolis and Novis Orbis Terrarum Ordinis) form parts one and two of a conceptual trilogy — with a third planned.
Pope: “The first album was inspired by Paradise Lost (John Milton), but inverted. The second pulled imagery from Dante and the seven deadly sins. In our story, Yeshua is killed, offered a throne in hell, and ends up frozen in the ninth circle after falling for every sin.”
Pope: “Now the next part — the third — will ask: What do you do when you become the new god? Will you be different, or the same?”
They’re hoping to release it in 2027 — which will be the actual “Year of the Goat” according to the Chinese calendar.
Pope: “We have to be done by then. We’re not very fast… but that deadline helps.”
“Beautiful and horrible at the same time”
On the artwork
The cover of ‘Trivia Goddess’ is surreal and striking — a green-eyed goddess surrounded by symbols and animals. It’s one of the few pieces not made in-house.
Pope: “We talked to [artist] Matias Frisk, who did the last album too. We gave him her attributes. The glowing green eyes were important — they’re in the lyrics too.”
The design took inspiration from retro aesthetics and classic horror.
Jonas: “It kind of became an 80s poster. We didn’t plan it that way, but it worked. One of our influences was Suspiria. The first witch is very ugly. In the new version, she’s beautiful. We wanted to mix that — make her horrible and beautiful.”
Religion, rebellion, and personal evolution
The band often describes themselves as “prophets with visions from Satan” — with a wink — but their critique of religion is deeply rooted.
Pope: “I grew up with the Bible taught as truth. And I believed there must be something to it, because the whole adult world talked about it that way. But then I read the whole book — and it’s insane. It cannot in any way be real.”
“Some Christians — not all — will defend the strangest things. Like William Lane Craig, this apologist who justified the slaughter of Canaanite children. ‘Now they’re in heaven,’ he said. They sacrificed children to Moloch — so we kill them to stop them from being killed?”
Pope is a member of the Satanic Temple, primarily for its social justice platform.
Pope: “Their issues are more important than ever. Thomas, though — he’s more spiritual. He’d say ‘esoteric.’ We all have our own ways.”
“If we convince someone — we’re happy”
What stays behind after the show
So what’s the one thing they hope fans walk away with?
Jonas: “If we convince someone — of the music, or the message — we’re happy. For me, the music comes first. If they like what they hear, I’m satisfied.”
Pope: “And the ones who like it… they really like it. They push it on their friends. The audience is growing. More people are singing along. And maybe one day we’ll be able to afford to bring Elin all the time.”
A few hours after our talk in Sojus 7’s atmospheric backstage lounge, Year of the Goat took the stage — and absolutely slayed. With a heavier live sound, commanding vocals, and an audience fully under their spell, the band proved that Trivia Goddess resonates just as powerfully in person.
