Zürich's FUELED BY FEAR have released their reinterpretation of A-HA's 1985 classic hit song 'Take On Me', unveiling another emotional layer hidden beneath the surface. The track is taken from the band's new EP "Ordinary Evil" (released on January 31st 2026), produced by Oscar Nilsson (The Halo Effect, The Haunted), bringing the characteristic Gothenburg metal sound to perfection at Bohus Studio. His extremely broad and uncompromisingly hard production gives Fueled By Fear their final edge – like the missing puzzle piece of their sound.
Watch the official video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwQoz6jjRzQ
Daniel Zopfi (Guitar) on 'Take On Me':
"We grew up with “Take On Me” by A-HA. it’s one of those songs that everyone knows, but we always felt there was another emotional layer hidden beneath the surface. With our version, we wanted to bring out the darker side of that feeling . the tension, the urgency, and the sense of stepping into the unknown. The video reflects that idea: being pulled between worlds, between safety and risk. It’s not just nostalgia. it’s about what that song feels like today, through our lens. We didn’t want to copy the original we wanted to reinterpret it in a way that feels honest to who we are as a band!"
Mauro Galasso (Drums) adds:
"The idea to cover “Take On Me” came up about four years ago, and at first, I honestly thought: what the hell? Turning an 80s pop classic into a metalcore / melodic death metal track just didn’t seem to make sense. At least not to me. That changed the moment I actually heard it. Once the arrangement came together, everything clicked. For the video, we leaned into that contrast. We embraced the 80s aesthetic, added a bit of parody, and mixed it with our heavier sound. It’s a tribute, but definitely not a traditional one. We shot the entire video in a single day in a small location, keeping things raw and simple, focusing on vibe over perfection. What started as a random idea turned into something we didn’t see coming. And probably not what you expect when you hear “Take On Me."
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Stream, download and add to your playlists the "Ordinary Evil" EP: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1fI2HcU1Xn3qdXXiMGAu0g
Mauro Galasso (Drums) on "Ordinary Evil":
"The title Ordinary Evil is inspired by Hannah Arendt's book Eichmann in Jerusalem and her idea of the banality of evil. The realization that evil often doesn't appear as an obvious monster, but emerges through conformity, thoughtlessness, and the abdication of personal responsibility.
These thoughts feel disturbingly relevant today. Authoritarian tendencies, power figures, and oversimplification show how quickly history repeats itself when people stop thinking for themselves and find resistance too exhausting.
This confrontation also shaped our work on the EP. During the creative process, we completely questioned ourselves musically and personally. What defines us? Where do we want to go? It was a process that forced us to let go of the familiar and approach things differently. There were moments when it would have been easier to give up rather than face this confrontation. This is exactly where Ordinary Evil comes in: Don't give up. Keep going. Face the repetitions,
defend your own path, and don't let indifference win. It's worth staying committed. Creatively, humanly, defiantly. Ordinary Evil is our statement for that"
Manuel Elber (Guitar) continues:
"Imagine making a dough, only to discover that you don't like the texture. You put it back into the fridge. The next day you add a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and after processing, your dough still sucks, but not so much to scrap it. So you put it back in the fridge, thinking about what to change. Then you try to learn all the insights a baker learns in a crash course. You add your dangerous half-assed knowledge you gained and surprisingly it starts to feel better. You keep
going, learn, each time adding more to the dough and finally you have a bake-worthy consistency, so far from where you started, that it seems like magic.
For context: "Ordinary Evil" took about four years to come to life. Scrapped more times than I can count. Cost us blood, sweat and tears, caused literal breakdowns, frequent questioning of the reason why we do this. But it shaped us as musicians, as a family, as a team. The amount of things we learned, technical, recording-wise, in persistence, in constructive criticism, is something no one can take from us. And as for all endeavours this heap of maniacs is tackling: it's always evolving, always changing, following the heart with an open mind. This one, we're especially proud of!"
Daniel Zopfi (Guitar) adds:
"Ordinary Evil was written out of frustration, anger, and watching the same systems fail us over and over again. It's about how cruelty gets normalized, how power hides behind routine, and how people learn to live with injustice as long as it's quiet enough. This EP isn't subtle and it's not meant to be comfortable. It's confrontational by necessity. These songs come from a place of distrust toward empty promises, authority without accountability, and a world that keeps demanding silence and obedience. It's loud, raw, and uncompromising, fueled by everything we're done ignoring: the hypocrisy, the violence beneath the surface, and our own complicity in letting it happen. This is us calling it out, refusing to soften the message, and turning that anger into sound exactly as we feel it right now."
On the EP artwork Mauro Galasso shared:
"The cover of Ordinary Evil visually captures the central idea of the EP: Hannah Arendt's realization that evil often doesn't appear as an obvious monster, but hides behind an ordinary facade. The ancient bust, whose surface crumbles to reveal a demonic face, is deliberately chosen. Ancient busts are a core element of my visual language as an artist, but here an additional layer emerged: They represent history and human patterns that repeat themselves. The monumental
decays and releases what has been repressed.
We had various approaches that were either conceptually too complex or didn't properly convey the message. When I returned to my own visual language, it became clear: The rawness, the epic quality, and the bold impact of this visual language reflect exactly the musical identity we developed with this EP.
The series was planned from the beginning. With each release, the facade crumbles further until the true face is fully visible at the end. A visual evolution that runs parallel to the EP. That my own style represents the band best has confirmed me as a graphic designer and as the drummer of Fueled By Fear: We have taken the right creative path."
With their new EP, Fueled By Fear deliver their most mature and uncompromising work to date. The five tracks move between dark groove steamrollers and melodically dense anthems – harder, more powerful, and more forceful than all previous productions. The band has sharpened their sound: hardness meets groove, tempo meets aggression, while melodic passages merge with modern pressure. The result is songs with enormous chorus quality and real singalong potential – dark, but irresistibly catchy.
BIO:
FUELED BY FEAR from Zurich have been combining the intensity of metalcore with the melodic depth of melodic death metal since 2011. The band manages to merge melodic passages with grooving rhythms into a sound that can both strike brutally and touch emotionally. Support performances for In Flames, Sepultura, and even Pantera underscore their international relevance. Their debut "Two By Eight" reached #5 on the Swedish rock charts and #22 in Switzerland.
Fueled By Fear stands for authentic metal without filters!
For Fans Of: Heaven Shall Burn, In Flames, Caliban, Darkest Hour, At the Gates, The Haunted, Bleed From Within
Photo credit: Marcel Bruderer
Line-up:
Vocals: Marco Böhlen
Guitar: Manuel Elber
Guitar: Daniel Zopfi
Bass: Josh De Souza
Drums: Mauro Galasso
Social Media Links:
https://www.instagram.com/fueled_by_fear_official/
https://www.facebook.com/fueledbyfear/
https://www.youtube.com/@fueledbyfear2516
https://www.tiktok.com/@fueled_by_fear_official
Streaming Links:
https://open.spotify.com/intl-de/artist/6trMH3h5QEeV4RkGJUTKkH
https://music.apple.com/ch/artist/fueled-by-fear/1175459666
https://soundcloud.com/fueledbyfear
https://music.youtube.com/channel/UChy74syl4Mi2XG03J0qyWkw