In September 2025 Swedish guitarist and respected YouTuber Ola Englund shared a video of him and Wolfgang Van Halen doing their best to jam through classic Meshuggah riffs.
With Wolfgang behind the kit in his Meshuggah shirt and Ola riffing away on a black seven-string made by his company Solar Guitars, the clip of the pair caught a fair amount of traffic online.
After a short segment of them playing Bleed – one of the most rhythmically intricate and unrelenting tracks Meshuggah have ever written – the two musicians effectively gave up, with Wolfgang modestly laughing, “And that’s all us mortals can do because they’re fuckin’ insane!”
Bleed is a track so demanding that even Meshuggah drummer Tomas Haake himself admits how challenging it can be to perform live.
Speaking to MusicRadar, Wolfgang says of Meshuggah: “They’re the absolute pioneers. That first album, Contradictions Collapse, is like a mix of thrash metal and Allan Holdsworth. But it wasn’t until the one after, Destroy Erase Improve, where they really found their sound.”
He continues: “You can tell on songs like Future Breed Machine they were really creating something new.
"I especially love their Chaosphere album. I think it’s the peak of their thrashy sound, while Nothing is my favourite example of their sludgey groove sound.”
Would Wolfgang ever bring that kind of tech-metal heaviness to his own project Mammoth?
“I really don’t know,” he shrugs. “In terms of what I create, I guess I’d love to go heavier and chase that Meshuggah vibe. But I don’t think it would be as a Mammoth thing, it would probably be more of a fun experimentation outside of that. I’d love to create something super heavy with all those mathy Meshuggah polyrhythms.”
Having started out as a drummer at the age of nine under the guidance of his father Edward Van Halen, as well as playing bass in Van Halen with his uncle Alex behind the kit, Wolfgang’s rhythmic background has been key to shaping Mammoth’s musical identity.
“I think I attack stuff from a more rhythmic perspective,” he explains. “It helps me see the bigger picture, which is really beneficial for Mammoth. Especially given that I’m doing everything on the records. It allows this inherent lock-in for each instrument.”
Given how many might say it’s typical behaviour for guitarists to prioritise their own contributions, for Wolfgang the understanding and appreciation of the entire musical spectrum has ultimately led to him writing bigger and better songs.
“You have to remember that there needs to be a bedrock for all the fun guitar stuff,” he wisely points out. “There will be a really important groove keeping everything in place and helping it all build on top.”
He adds: “Even vocally, I find my rhythmic background has really helped. That aspect of my playing is so important for everything that happens around it.”
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