R A M – Z E T
Interview & live pictures by Luxi Lahtinen
The Norwegian ´Blackish Psychotic Power Metal heroes´ known also as
RAM-ZET
have seen the light of awesome greatness and are on their way into the
halls of success and fame (If I was the chosen one who could be able to
predict the future for them). Their new album, “Escape”, is out now and
should be available in the most European countries through many metal
specialists, so make sure to purchase your copy – each of you - ´coz
RAM-ZET definitely outdo the majority of today’s new metal acts by their
highly atmospherically original metallic freak circus.
I met Zet at Finnvox Studio in the beginning of this year when the final
mixing for “Escape“was in the works and give him my blessing about
another fabulous RAM-ZET album. A great man wanted to share some of his
feelings with me about the concept behind “Escape”; also about a
mind-wrecking song writing process, business side in metal music, beer,
metal, even more beer and even surprisingly, about ´the Finnish drinking
habits´ which seemed to become some sort of a concept known all around
the world by now – who knows why…?! Oh well…
Boys and girls… Zet from RAM-ZET lowers down the tune of his voice and
spits out his truthfully demonic conjurations at the cozy Finnvox
Studio…
First off, let’s have a couple of words about your forth-coming 2nd
album for SPIKEFARM RECORDS, titled “Escape”. Why such a title as
“Escape”? Are you personally escaping something or escaping from
somewhere...?
No, I’m not escaping anything or anywhere, he- he... But anyway,
“Escape” is kind of a concept album having a story about the ´escaping´
of two persons involved in this story. The whole story is about escaping
and the lyrics deal with one schizophrenic guy living in an institution
- and about one lady who works there, too. And this lady tries to rescue
this schizophrenic patient out from that ´hospital´ and eventually they
both managed to escape from there. The whole redline of the lyrics is
about those two persons trying to escape from that particular hospital
or institution in a nutshell.
How do you think this new album is going to differ from your debut
album called “Pure Therapy” musically? How much are you using the same
basic elements on this new record that already were on your debut as
well?
When we did “Pure Therapy”, I started the song writing for it by
myself and right after that our bassist Solem and drummer Kuth joined in
– and the rest of the musicians were hired to the recording a bit later
as guest musicians for “Pure Therapy”. Later we decided to recruit these
´guest musicians´ that we had on “Pure Therapy” already as the permanent
members of this band. As far as the song writing goes, it’s still like I
write all the songs and stuff, but we all arrange them together. On
“Escape” we have more female vocals. Now it’s like Sfinx did about 50%
of all the vocals and I did the rest, so in that sense this new album
differs pretty much from our debut. It’s a bit different, but at the
same time, I’m still influenced by the same stuff that influenced me
when I was writing down songs for “Pure Therapy”. All in all, “Escape”
is quite a schizophrenic album, I think – and maybe even more than our
debut was. We tried to take our music one step further and I guess we
succeed in doing so on “Escape”.
“Escape” has been recorded again at your own studio Space Valley
Studio. Do you think that to record your very own first album is always,
more or less, some sort of a learning process for the band how to use
all the equipments properly the right way that are available there, in
order to maintain the best possible sound for an album? In which areas
could you say you have progressed mostly if you take these two albums in
comparison?
Well, to be honest with you, to record our 1st album at Space
Valley, wasn’t that tough of a decision for us at all ´coz I have been
using the same studio for some years already, recording stuff there both
for myself and for other bands as well. So, I was used to that
environment beforehand, before our recordings took place there.
But of course it’s a little more special when you record all the stuff
in your own studio by yourself and for your own band. Sometimes it can
be pretty hard to get some distance from it and to try to get some other
people in for it. But that’s also why it’s such an interesting thing to
do; first record everything here at my studio and then bring it over to
Finnvox in the whole recording process. It’s kind of refreshing to do it
that way; to get away from those familiar routines for a while.
I’m overall more satisfied with the songs now, of course and it should
be that way naturally, too – and if it wasn’t that way, then something
would obviously be wrong ´coz the bottom line is that you kind of should
develop all the time. I also think that bringing some more female vocals
- some more melodic vocals into whole recording, makes it more complete
in its own way. Also, as the rest of the other guys are permanent
members of this band nowadays, it gives more of a band kind of feeling
over the whole thing than before. We have now 6 permanent members in the
band when on our 1st album, “Pure Therapy”, it was basically me,
Solem,
Kuth and a bunch of ´guest musicians´.
So, are you saying that you recorded this new album exactly with the
same line-up that you had on “Pure Therapy” already?
I did all the keyboards for “Pure Therapy” by myself and on this
new album, we had Magnus who did all the keyboards for it. The drums,
the bass and the guitars were done by the same guys who did them on
“Pure Therapy” already. Also, Sareeta played all the violins on
“Escape”. She did not play on our debut and joined in the band
afterwards.
What about guest musicians on this new album then? Did you use any of
them even for “Escape” as well?
Yeah, we indeed had 5 girls doing some choirs for two of the songs
on the album.
And that’s all as far as these guest musicians for “Escape” go this
time around…?!
Yes, I’m afraid…, he-he!!
I assume you have obviously written most of the songs for this new
album again – right? [Yes…]
But I also assume the other guys helped you out with the whole song
writing process for “Escape” a little bit at least – or how is it
Zet?
Yeah, they did some musical contribution for “Escape”, too, but all
the lyrics were co-written by me and one girl who is neither any member
of the band nor she’s a musician or anything like that. She’s just a
good friend of mine and that’s all. The way we write nowadays is like I
do some demos for songs first and give them to the rest of the guys and
they listen to them and come up with their own ideas for them. Then we
all just gather together at rehearsals and arrange all those songs
together. The whole song writing thing for RAM-ZET has been changing
quite drastically as a matter of speaking, knowing how it was when we
were working with the songs for our debut album. It’s really pretty
different nowadays as other guys put more of like their souls into this
band than they used to do earlier.
Speaking of your rehearsal situations a bit more; when you guys
gather together to practice your songs, is each of you entitled for
their own opinions if they don’t like something what some of you guys
may have come up with for some certain new songs and would like to throw
them away and replace some of those ´unpleasing´ ideas with their own
ideas instead?
Of course!! That happens every now and then. It’s only natural, I
think. We haven’t had any kind of problems with that at all. We all come
up with our own ideas for the songs and bring them to our rehearsals and
discuss ´bout them and try to find some solutions all together.
So, you could kind of consider RAM-ZET as a democratic band in that
sense…? Are you, -eh?! - aren't you (-laughs!!)?!
(-laughs!!) … I really don’t know about that. Maybe not if you go
and ask the same question from the other guys, too; then our band may
not be ´that democratic´, but when we arrange our songs together, THAT
at least has something to do with democracy in this band. But since I
still do write most of our songs, we come to the point where we need to
ask from ourselves what democracy’s all about after all?! In our band,
we
always discuss about everything as far as our songs are concerned – even
if like I said, I still write most of them. This has never been any
problem for any of us so far.
Hmmm… what indeed inspired you to write your songs the way you wrote
them for this particular album?
I think I was inspired pretty much by the same things when we did
“Pure Therapy”. As I still listen to different types of music, I always
kind of get a wide range of different kinds of inspirations from other
genres of music as well. I just cannot avoid being influenced by this or
that ´coz the music is always there for me in my life and I have not
limited myself to any certain style of music or genre.
Is there any particular style of music of which you’re mostly
inspired by? Namely when I just recently was going thru some
pre-listening to your new album - for me it sounded like you even might
have a bit more aggressive vibe going on towards your music on this new
record at least a bit more than what you had on “Pure Therapy” regarding
some of the guitar riffs and your vocal parts that sounded actually very
aggressive and intense – and tight as HELL!! Overall some of those songs
sounded, pretty damn intense and ´punishing´ all in all…
Yeah, I agree, it sounds pretty intense at times, but then we have
these ´soft´ vocals on some of these songs to give more contrast to the
wholeness. I really tried to create some contrasts to this album; that
was one of my main things when I was working with “Escape”. Besides, I
think each song clicks to each other more nicely as I was able to create
some contrast to them and make the songs overall a bit different to each
other, y´know. Contrasts in the song writing process have always been
important to me and there’s indeed a few of them on this album as well.
Did you feel any pressure when you started coming up with all this
new stuff for “Escape” as I think your debut was pretty well received by
at least all the Scandinavian countries? Besides, isn’t it just natural
that you kind of want to top everything you have done previously, so in
that sense do you believe that your own personal goals for this new
album have been received?
Yeah, I think it’s fair to say that I was feeling at least some
pressure from time to time, during both the song writing – and recording
process. When I started coming up with songs for “Escape”, I have to say
that after the first 4-5 songs I made for “Escape”, I kind of started to
be suspicious if they are good enough for this album or not. But then at
some point, you start to realize that it’s actually the pressure of your
own creative process that puts you in that kind of position really. In a
way it’s been caused by other people, too, who have already bought our
debut album and thought it’s good and stuff. But still, maybe the most
of this pressure comes from myself anyway as I’m always
driven by certain things to develop even a few of steps further
musically.
It also may have something to do with the fact that you kind of want
always to top something what you may have done in the past; develop and
write better and stronger riffs, more memorable chorus parts,
whatsoever! I bet that’s simply every musician’s personal, main goal,
too…
Yeah, it is - you’re very right about that. Also, I think one of
the most important things is that – well, I know it’s a ´cliché to say
that, but I have to say it anyway; namely you should avoid to do the
same record all over again ´coz if you do things a bit different way,
you ´re always developing into somewhere and it's always better that way
in my opinion. It would have not been any sense to do “Pure Therapy –
pt. 2.” with exactly the same music, but with different song titles , of
course.
Do you, however, think that you accomplished your own personal goals
with “Escape”?
Yeah, absolutely!!
Let’s talk about Mikko Karmila, who not only produced this new album,
but also your debut album, “Pure Therapy”. When you came to Finnvox
Studio for the very first time to mix your debut in 2000 with him –
about two years ago, what kind of impression did you get out of him both
as a guy behind the mixing desk and as a person in general?
For me that was like quite a new experience personally ´coz I’ve
been working so much in my own studio by myself and have been having a
control over things all the time. So when we came here and knew that he
was going to be the guy mainly responsible for the mixing process for
“Pure Therapy” and taking care of it all, it’s just natural that you
step aside a little bit and let him do his job that was indeed supposed
to be given to him to be done. And when some parts for “Pure Therapy”
kind of weren’t recorded the way I originally thought them in my mind,
and then we of course discussed them and let each of us express our own
views and opinions about them. But working with Mikko was never a
problem for us at that time. He’s an easy guy to work with, I think. For
me personally it was pretty much a refreshing experience to let him to
take care of the mixing because I’m always somewhat tied with other
products at my own studio for so long time. Therefore coming to mix our
debut at Finnvox Studio felt really good to me and provided me some
refreshing contrast to my own things I tend to work with at my own
studio. Also, I honestly have to tell you that when we first came here,
I thought we could
have been faced with some problems with this mixing process and stuff,
but there was simply none. Otherwise we wouldn’t be here now to mix our
new album “Escape” with Mikko.
As I believe you have been doing a plenty of final mixing with many
bands already and got a pretty clear idea what that process is pretty
all about, I was just thinking did Mikko show you some of his own
´secret recipes´ for some mixing methods and tricks how the mixing could
also be done in a proper and professional way in order to achieve this
so-called ´big sound´ for an album – to make it sound powerful and yet
still clear enough?
Yeah, like last time he introduced us a bunch of new things and
stuff and gave us some good advices that we partly tried out in the
mixing process of “Pure Therapy”. It was a good thing to me personally
to listen to him ´coz he’s without a doubt, a more experienced guy as
far as working in a studio is concerned.
Were you 100% happy with how the mixing was done for your first album
– or was there something in the final mix to argue about – or you would
do otherwise now if you got one more opportunity for that?
At least I try to think that I’ve always wanted to do things the
best possible way and the way what sounds best to me, of course. I have
rather strong opinions of what it should sound like and how things
should be like in general – and yeah, you could say that I’m very happy
with how the mixing turned out for it eventually. If someone is able to
show me some other way of thinking how some recording/mixing should be
done – and it’s even better than what I have in my mind, then I’m of
course all for it. I’m always trying to be open-minded for different
things and try them out within RAM-ZET´s music, if they are good enough
and fit in to the world of sounds of our band.
So you could also say that you understand him better now with how he
wants things to be done as the mixing for this new album will be
proceeding on and so on…?
Yeah, absolutely!! But also other ways around as well. I think
Mikko understands us better now than the last time of what kind of sound
we are after for this new album. I have to say that the first time when
we were here taking part of the mixing and Mikko was listening to some
parts of our songs on “Pure Therapy”, he was like: “What’s this; What’s
the meaning of this really? This sounds kind of… er!? weird…
(-laughs!!)”. He said that quite a few times indeed, so maybe he was
just quite ´unprepared´ to hear a band like us because obviously we
don’t have the most ear-friendliest sound in our music.
What kind of expectations are you running towards “Escape” then,
let’s say sales-wise or otherwise? Do you believe that you’ll gain some
new fans with this new product of yours ´coz I personally believe that
it’s gonna kick some metalheads´ royal asses by its utterly complex and
somewhat tricky compositions that it holds inside?
Since our first album sold about a thousand copies in Norway and a
couple of thousand copies everywhere else, I hope this new album could
sell a bit more than that at least. Also, if I’m remembering correctly,
4000 copies of our debut album was sold to Russia for some distributor
there both as cassettes as well as CDs. Maybe it’s fair to say that we
do have some of these expectations for this new record of ours that it
could sell more copies than what our debut did and we could possibly get
a bit better distribution for “Escape”, too. However, we don’t try to
think so much ´bout it because if you create great music in your own
opinion, you don’t think it like if we did this and that, would we be
more commercial and sell more records then? That’s not our way of
thinking at all and besides I’m not good at that myself at all – seeing
things from a commercial point of view, I mean. As long as we receive a
good feedback for what we do, it pleases us most
in the very end for sure and I’m always taking it as a bonus. We are
certainly not going to change musically into any commercial direction
just to get more albums sold and achieving these big sales?!
This is a type of music I have always wanted to do and like I just said,
we just don’t bother those sales too much. On the other hand, it’s no
denying that good sales also enables a continuum to do more albums and
tour and stuff like that. And speaking of touring, I also hope we could
do some touring for this album, too. That would also help us to get more
albums sold and give more people an opportunity to become familiar with
our band.
Like I mentioned in my last question, your new album isn’t that easy
to get into, but do you believe that this album could also offer
something really unique, progressive and worth trying out for those
musicians who are possibly so-called ´freaks´ into this type of, let’s
say, ´barriers-crushing-shit´ between different genres in music, but
especially in an extreme metal?
Hmm… that was a great question. But it’s hard for me to say really,
because I don’t think that way when I create music for this band. But I
believe there are always some people out there who are trying to achieve
something as complex yet progressive stuff as we do and this stuff might
be even exciting for them to listen to. But I have to say you need to
listen to our albums through at least a couple of times before you kind
of understand what’s really happening on our albums. We really aren’t
that easy of a band musically even if I also have to say we certainly
aren’t the trickiest band on the face of the Earth either. But whoever
likes our music, it’s of course nice; those who don’t, it’s ok with me
as well. I’m having no problem dealing with it at all. I know this isn’t
music for just everybody.
How would you say you’ve matured and kind of ´grown up´ as a musician
since the days of making of your debut up to this day? I happen to know
already by an experience this just is not one of those questions that
every musician loves to answer, he! he!!
(-laughs!!) …wo-hoo, what can I say, uh?! As the fact still remains
the same, all 6 of us have different musical backgrounds and I think,
even somewhat different faves of music, so we have been learning many
things from each other all the time. And working with the band, like I
have been doing for quite some time now, makes you grow up as a musician
because you need to hear what other members of the band have to say
about certain things in general and that makes you look at things with a
little bit more different perspective, I guess. You are kind of growing
up with the band constantly as a musician and that’s really something
you just cannot avoid.
Have you also noticed that somehow you demand more from yourself than
before and are probably more of a self-critical person than you have
possibly used to be before when coming up with some new stuff for this
band?
Yeah, I have to say so. Because, like we discussed earlier, when
you do your 2nd album, of course there will be expectations from others
and from yourself as well – and of course you always try to achieve
something better than what you may have done on your previous album – or
albums, whatever. And within this process, you automatically start
demanding more and more from both yourself and other members of the
band, too. That’s the only way of developing as a musician and as a
band, I think.
Since “Pure Therapy” came out, you’ve been doing some gigs at least
in your home country, Norway, and even one gig here in Finland, too. How
have people’s reactions been about those gigs you’ve done thus far?
Namely when I saw you playing at Tavastia club here in Helsinki in the
fall 2001, I have to say your live line-up looked pretty ´unusual´ for a
metal band. You had two girls in your line-up; Sareeta was playing an
electronic violin and Sfinx was taking care of the keyboards on that
particular gig who both are now the official members of RAM-ZET, too, as
it's been written…
The reactions towards us playing live have been immensely good so
far, I really have to admit that. People have overall liked the visual
side of us along with the music which is the most important thing, of
course!! What’s a bit strange maybe, but only a few people have come and
talk to us after the gigs and said how much they liked our live
performance and stuff. When that happens, that kind of response always
warms your heart naturally. Also, like you said, some of these people
may even like us because seeing us playing live is something different
than what they have probably used to see normally. We surely look
different, sound different and I have say honestly myself, I haven’t
seen any metal band that sounds or looks like us. So in that sense, I
guess we
are quite an original metal band after all.
Can you still remember how was your first ever gig like with this
band?
Zet: Oh my, oh my… my first gig?! It happened in February 2001 in
Norway…
So, how was it as a situation? Did you feel anything like: “SHIT…!! I
cannot go there and play to them. My stomach is way too full of
butterflies; I just cannot play a thing to them…”?
Maybe a bit like that, but since I’ve spent a lot of time onstage
and played in a lot of different bands before RAM-ZET, it wasn’t
anything new to me. But for that particular first ever gig with RAM-ZET,
I was somehow really nervous about it because I didn’t have any idea how
we would sound like to the audience. We had just played together at our
rehearsals, so playing live to people for the very first time, is always
a new experience. So I was really, really excited about it how
it would go and how would we be received by the audience. And as I play
the guitar and do the vocals, it gave me an extra shot of excitement to
be nervous about ´coz doing them at the same time, is pretty hard to do
in a live situation. You really need to concentrate on both things
physically really hard. And I still remember that in the middle of the
first song, I felt a bit dizzy and even started to see some stars and
was like:”…Jesus!”. But luckily that dizzy feeling went over quite soon
and I was able to play normally again like the rest of the guys in this
band. I guess that incident was caused by a huge tension that I had at
that particular moment. I was told afterwards that the crowd was really
pleased by our live performance which is cool, of course!!
Is there actually anything you can do before going to a stage in
order to ease up your tension a little bit? Just any kind of methods or
anything that you can do at a backstage before going to entertain your
audience?
Not really. You just try to concentrate on all that what you are
going to perform onstage and possibly warming up my voice at the
backstage a little before I start screaming there onstage.
As far as I know ´bout some methods of some (unnamed) Finnish metal
bands, they usually drink a beer or two (or twenty, he!) in order to
achieve a state of relaxation before going onstage and giving a blast to
their audience…
If I started to do that myself, too, in order to not be possibly
that nervous when preparing to go onstage, I bet I would become just an
alcoholic, he-he!! Seriously, if you got used to do that very often,
then I believe there’s no way how you can possibly be without those
“couple of mandatory beers” just before the show time. So, I rather stay
sober before the show starts and may have those beers after the gig.
That would make more sense in my case, I have to tell ya.
You have been sharing the same stage with Finnish ´Polka/Humppa´
metal heroes FINNTROLL for a couple of times, too. How do you like them
anyway?
I like them a lot as a band as well as persons, too. They sound
kind of special for me because when I was here for the 1st time, mixing
“Pure Therapy”, I went to Finnvox Studio all by myself and was about to
spend some time with many new faces whom I haven´t seen before. And I
only knew Sami (the label manager of SPIKEFARM RECORDS, that is) over
the phone; I hadn’t spoken to him face-to-face and stuff earlier. So
before I came to Finland, Sami called me and told that he’ll meet me at
the airport and the FINNTROLL –guys will be with him waiting for me
there, too. And Sami told me that they are going to take care of me and
help me out to survive in Helsinki. I have to say those guys were just
so GREAT and I spent a lot of time hanging around with them when I
wasn’t at Finnvox doing some mixing. They really made me feel
comfortable and it was fun to spend time with them all the way. I just
bought their 1st
album before coming here, but hadn’t too much time to listen to the
album, so I can’t unfortunately quite tell what I thought of it. But
regarding to their live shows, I have to say they are completely
different band both music – and concept-wise what I have seen thus far.
I think they are really great; I enjoy FINNTROLL – I really do. We were
also very happy to play with the guys in Norway ´coz a town where we
live nowadays, this was probably the first metal event there for several
years. FINNTROLL made it quite a happening and overall it was really
cool to get that gig organized there. It was just like I got to know
these guys even better when we visited to a bar called “Corner” there in
HELL-sinki for quite a few times actually and talked over many things
there with them. They are really nice guys; pretty much down-to-earth
and easy guys to talk to.
And these ´trolls´´ drinking habits didn’t scare you a bit – knowing
that they tend to be pretty damn heavy drinkers from time to time,
boozing like very…, -eh?! ´the Finnish way´?
No, because I was pretty drunk myself, too – almost every time when
we headed to that “Corner” bar, he- he!! I definitely partied a lot
with them and like you brought it up already, they indeed are able to
drink ´the usual Finnish way´ - there’s just no question ´bout that
(-laughs!!)!! But all in all, my experience with them was only positive;
I have nothing bad to say about them. Just a bunch of great guys!!
By the way, are there any other Finnish (metal) bands there you’d
like to do some gigs with?
I think… wow, that was a toughie one again; I mean, in a way that
was a tough one because being signed with SPIKEFARM, it also gives me a
nice opportunity to listen to some other bands on that label; bands that
I maybe would never listen to otherwise. And not many of those bands on
SPINE-/SPIKEFARM are known in Norway. But of course some of the bands
like NIGHTWISH and CHILDREN OF BODOM are known everywhere nowadays and
getting some good sales in Norway, too. And I like those bands myself.
As for the other Finnish metal bands, well, it’s hard to say really. I
like a lot of (metal) bands that I’d like to play with indeed.
Well, what could be those most ideal Finnish bands for RAM-ZET to
play with, then…?
It’s so hard to say because we could do gigs with bigger Finnish
metal bands such as NIGHTWISH, CHILDEN OF BODOM and the likes – and I
could not see any problems playing with smaller Finnish bands like
SILENTIUM, ENTWINE and those kinds of bands as well. But on the other
hand, I would mostly like to play with a band which is totally different
compared to the other bands in the metal scene, so I guess I probably
would stick to just FINNTROLL because they are so totally different
compared to us, for example.
Also I believe when RAM-ZET shares the same stage with FINNTROLL,
both of the bands in question are able to offer a pretty nice contrast
for everyone in the crowd both visually and musically, so no one should
get bored there?
Yeah, you’re completely right about that. That was the thing what
made our gigs in Norway quite a unique experience all in all; to play
with FINNTROLL was a really unique thing to do because like I told you
earlier, they are a very different sounding band indeed. And what I have
heard, they already have a respectable following both here in Norway,
but also in Sweden – not even to talk about Finland where they must be a
hugely popular band, I think.
Yeah, I guess you could say so. Still going back to your debut for a
passing while. Namely when “Pure Therapy” came out on your current
label, your press kit described RAM-ZET´s music as “Black Psychotic
Power Metal”. Do you think that definition fits perfectly to your new
album as well – or do you believe it needs to be changed a little bit
when it comes down to your new songs on “Escape”?
Well, to put it most understandable way for all of you: All those
influences are there: “Black Metal”, “Power Metal” and “Psychotic Metal”
in RAM-ZET music, I think. But there may be even more, I really can’t
tell. I had this discussion with Sami for some time ago and we were
pondering together how we should call our music and actually he was the
one who came up with that description for our music, so thanks to him
for that. I really think that definition fits to our music somewhat
perfectly. I also have to say that it’s not that easy to describe our
kind of music what we are doing nowadays because we
have so many elements inside our music. On the other hand, if we
are even more accurate with a fitting title - or category for describing
our music, then I have to say it’s kind hard to put all the elements
that we have in our music, under any specific category because our music
isn’t really limited to any certain thing, y´know? If you limit yourself
musically too much, it’s gonna be pretty tough for you to progress and
experiment within your own music and I surely don’t want to do that for
myself; I am always open for any good ideas as far as RAM-ZET´s music is
concerned. As for trying to fit that definition (“Black Psychotic Power
Metal”, that is) for “Escape”, I have to think of that later whether it
might fit to our new stuff or not, but right now it’s kind of way too
early to tell. But we’ll surely come up with something for giving people
an idea of what “Escape” will be all about. Maybe the latter mentioned
definition won’t fit to this album too well any longer, but like I said,
we are about to find out that later…
I don’t give up that easily, so can you already think of any
definition for “Escape”, how would you like it to be categorized then in
order to give people some sort of hunch of its content in advance…?
Well, all I can say that it’s going to be more atmospheric, so
let’s try this one out: “Psychotic, atmospheric Power Metal with some
Black Metal elements thrown in a well-balanced mixture… how’s that
(-laughs!!)?!
And it’s also up to a listener how he/she feels ´bout your music ,
right… ?!
Yeah, of course - but we also need to come up with something really
in order to promote “Escape” better ´coz that’s important, too, I think…
How do you feel ´bout all those strong contrasts in your music?
Namely listening to your songs you can easily hear that you’re using
those contrasts quite a lot actually; the aggressive parts of your songs
may turn, like all of a sudden, to really atmospheric yet so beautifully
arranged parts and I guess that’s one of the strongest points of your
music really…
Thank you for your kind words. I definitely agree with you that
many of our song arrangements are based on those strong contrasts like
you just spitted it out yourself. These rather strong contrasts that we
use in our music, are really that thing what make RAM-ZET so special and
unique band for many and I really want to keep it that way.
Ok then, let’s have a couple of words about your current employee and
the boss, SPIKEFARM RECORDS and Sami Tenetz. Are you happy with the way
how Sami has been supporting your band this far by trying to spread your
name out as much as possible – or is there anything at all he (or they)
could still do for you in order to get RAM-ZET´s name out even more over
the borders of different countries, metal genres and so on?
I think when we released our first album with Sami, SPIKEFARM has
just hired a new guy to do the promotion for SPIKEFARM –releases; and
because he was just learning things how to get all the promotion done a
proper way, maybe we didn´t get all that promotion for our debut it
could have been possible done for it. Quite hard to say anyway. But like
Sami has told us, the promotion for this new album of ours should be
done a slightly better because it wasn´t good enough for the debut. Also
license deals for this new album might help to get our name out even
more, but of course that´s all up to SPIKEFARM naturally. I wish,
however, that they could be able of license it to as many countries as
possible ´coz both the label and us could derive benefit from them, of
course!! We weren´t running too high expectations towards our debut,
tho,
but for this new album, we do. Thinking logically this issue, I think
our 2nd album just HAS to sell more albums than our debut. If it won´t
sell more copies than what “Pure Therapy” did, maybe there´s something
wrong in our music then, he! he!!
On the contrary, debut albums most often are kind of supposed to
open, more or less, the road for certain bands´ names; I mean, if you
have been in the scene for less than one year since the day you started
your own band, I suppose within that time it´s quite impossible to make
that huge impact on people (unless you are not Marilyn Manson or Rob
Zombie, he!) if a promotion for a band hasn´t been done determinedly and
devotedly enough and some real goals I your mind that this band could
BECOME something in the future if I did this and that in order to
achieve this and that, y´know?!
I couldn´t agree with you more on this. Of course all that what you
just said, is extremely important for any up´n´coming band…
Which countries has “Pure Therapy” been licensed for exactly…?
It was licensed to many countries. It was licensed to most of the
European countries like Germany, Holland, Belgium, etc. – and also to
Australia and Canada as well. But like I mentioned earlier, the
promotion for it could have been done a little better, I think.
One more question and then we are done, sir… I'm just curious to know
what kind of music do you listen to normally when you just want to relax
a little bit and spend some time alone at your home or somewhere else?
Hmmm… let´s say that when I create music which I have been doing
for the past 4-5 months now, I don´t listen so much any kind of music.
But when I do, I listen to DIMMU BORGIR; especially their last album –
then I listen to EUROPE, I listen to DESMOND´S CHILD and… what else;
Yeah, I listen to SOILWORK´s latest album ´coz it truly kicks some ass.
I actually listen to a lot of different stuff; also some kind of really
´weird´ stuff sometimes. I don´t have any so-called ´favorites´ right
now, tho.
But when you listen to something; some band or whatever, do you
constantly try to avoid somehow for being influenced yourself by that
stuff what you may listen to at a time?
To be honest with you again, when I listen to something, I don´t
bother at all if something may stick to my mind out of all that stuff
what I hear when I listen to something. And like I already said, when
I'm in the middle of my song writing process, I don't listen to any
music that much at all. It's already enough for me to hear what kind of
things I have done myself for this band, so I just don't spin many other
albums around during all that time.
And the final (cliché) words to end this interview, sir Zet…
Yeah, the time for those ´famous´ final words… I´d like to say
thanks for all those people who saw some quality in us and bought “Pure
Therapy”; not a bad choice at all ´coz we have got some really good and
nice feedback from them from all over the world actually. And I have to
say for the new listeners of our band that if you are going to listen to
“Escape”, you have to listen to it AT LEAST 3 times from beginning to
end before you make up your opinion out of it. It may be a bit harder
album to get into, but I guarantee all of you that it's gonna be worth
it – absolutely!!
Also, I want to thank you Luxi for coming up with another interview
with us for your excellent web magazine METAL-RULES.COM. It´s was a
pleasure to share a couple of words with you again, so thanks and c-ya…!!
Thank YOU Zet for your time and let the metal flow for RAM-ZET in the
future, too…
Contact information:
Spinefarm Records / Pete Eskelinen
Fredrikinkatu 71, 00100 Helsinki
Finland
email: pete@spinefarm.fi
http://www.spinefarm.fi
www.ram-zet.com