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BACK
 IMPALED
NAZARENE
Absence of Sobriety Does Not Mean Incompetence
By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley
NET-only
Impaled
Nazarene singer Mika Luttinen is a fan of love and war. Well, if
you consider porn to be real love, Luttinen would be the Fabio of
the porn world.
"I love porn. All of my royalty money goes to buying porn,"
starts Luttinen down the line from Finland. "You know what?
I think they should hand out a Nobel Prize to the first man who
put out the porno DVD with multiple camera angles."
We both laugh ecstatically.
"I’m serious. It is the greatest invention ever! When
we were touring Europe with Emperor a few years back the t-shirt
vendor for the band told me to buy a DVD player for porn. I still
hail that guy for making me get one. When I first bought a porn
DVD with the multiple angles, I said to myself, ‘Fuck! Look
what I have been missing.’"
As for his fascination with war and all things devastating, just
throw on the band’s new album Absence of War Does Not Mean
Peace on Osmose Productions and you will feel the power of their
own brand of nuclear metal.
About the new album, the Finnish frontman says, "This album
was a good experience for us because this was one of the first times
we had some ideas of what we wanted to get from the new album. When
we were at the Astia studio the producer Anssi Kippo [Children of
Bodom, Entwine] asked us if we liked the guitar sounds of the last
record [2000’s Nihil] and we told him yes, but we wanted to
improve them."
Continues Luttinen, "He [Kippo] looked over the notes and what
sounds we had with Nihil and just improved it. This worked out great,
but as usual it could have gone any way, really. We [the band is
rounded out by bassist Arc v 666, drummer Repe Misanthrope, guitarists
Onraj 9mm and Somnium] don’t plan too much ahead and sometimes
what we finish up with surprises us."
And much like the past few records, this one offers so much stuff
and really doesn’t short-change the music fans. It seems as
though all Impaled Nazarene albums are solid releases.
"If you ask me, I’d say that our first five records aren’t
very good, just really sloppy stuff," laughs Luttinen. "I
think our music has improved quite a bit and really started to get
good when we actually made an effort to produce good material. I
think a lot of people said that we wimped out with the Nihil record
because we were so professional with the recording. We used to be
the biggest bastards when we would go into the studio all drunk
and not give a shit. That was great and gave some charisma to those
records and you could hear the madness. With Nihil, unlike the previous
efforts that were all recorded live, it was done as most bands do
it: in stages. First the drum tracks, then the bass guitar and so
on. Nihil was indeed a learning process for us.
"Having had that experience with Nihil, working on Absence
of War Does Not Mean Peace was a pretty easy record for us to do,"
says the singer. "It was clear from the beginning that we were
going to do it the same—to keep the professionalism."
It must be great to be able to clean things up, but at the same
time still deliver the reckless drive, right? Because I remember
a time when I was at a Milwaukee Metal Fest one year and you were
passed out drunk, lying on the floor.
"That is heavy metal, Adrian. I’m sure you had been drinking
the weekend as well?"
Yes, I was.
"But to get back to your comments, I think a lot of what we
are doing right now is the right thing for Impaled Nazarene. Out
of all of our old records, I can only really listen to Ugra-Karma
[1993]. I just can’t listen to the others ’cause they
make me grind my teeth. When I listen to Suomi Finland Perkele [1994]
I can spot the mistakes. I wish I had done things different back
then, but I am glad that we were that way as it gave the band some
character. We never followed any rules back then, and we still don’t.
Even if we have cleaned up our sound, just look at the lyrics. It
is still the same insane lyrics, and things won’t change in
that area. This is our seventh album, and we would be stupid not
to want to change the production and improve what we do as a band.
I understand a band like Darkthrone being the way they are, but
that is them—very simple and cold, and they will never change.
We changed and I don’t see what the big deal is. Absence of
War Does Not Mean Peace is a great album. We are not black metal
or death metal. We are nuclear metal and no one knows what the fuck
that is, so we can do whatever we want. And that is what we are
doing."
Luttinen ends, "If old fans don’t like what we are doing
here or think it is too professional, I don’t care. Fuck them.
This is Impaled Nazarene right now and it will continue to evolve
as the years go on. Man, I sound like a real bastard. Good!"
So is it safe to say it is all about booze, porn and metal music
for Impaled Nazarene?
"Yeah…and don’t forget Satan," he laughs. "Never
forget Satan!"
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