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 MNEMIC – Ready to go!
By Adrian ‘The Energizer' Bromley
The sophomore album is always such a big deal for young and upcoming acts. The whole notion of the "sophomore jinx” and pressure put on the band has been known to ruin bands at times, but all bands react differently to the "sophomore jinx,” case in point Denmark's quintet Mnemic, whose 2003 album Mechanical Spin Phenomena won fans and critics over worldwide and just put out their second album The Audio Injected Soul (Nuclear Blast) without a even flinching.
"It was a big deal for us to see success right out of the starting gate,” starts singer Michael Bøgballe about the success of their debut album for Nuclear Blast. "But we knew when we went into record the new album that we had to make the real impact. You spend your whole life on your debut because you don't have a label deal, you are still defining your sound and you just work hard to get it all right. You sign to a label, put out and album and tour and next thing you know you have to put out the sophomore disc in the next few months. It was a jolt to the system for us, but we were ready.”
There was quite a quick turn round for the new album.
"Yeah,” he chuckles. "We [guitarists Mircea Eftemie and Rune Stigart, bassist Tomas Kofoed and drummer/keyboardist Brian Rasmussen] just wanted to get into the studio and get these songs recorded. We were busting out ideas like madmen and it was obvious we couldn't sit on this creativity much longer.”
Listening to The Audio Injected Soul, the record sounds a bit more stripped down and not as flashy. Am I right or just hearing things?
"No you are correct,” Bøgballe points out. "Not that we hated the first record and how it was but we just felt things had to be changed in order to get the right feeling from the music. We knew we had the right ideas but didn't really feel attached as we do now to the music.”
"This record is a lot easier to listen to and not as complex as the first one and I think that some fans may not be pleased with how we have shifted things around but that's what we felt was needed to make this record work. I think it is a bit more melodic, faster and a bit more roc- n'-roll-ish. It's a very straightforward album if you ask me.”
Why do you think these changes came about?
"It was very deliberate for us to make songs that were just easy to play. Obviously they need to be played well and the technique is not gone, but we play a lot of shows live and we found that when songs are 7-minutes long and changing grooves all the time it really is hard for some to get into it. This is where we need to be now with the music of Mnemic, I can't vouch were we'll be next album,” he laughs
And I gotta ask, was this a joint decision by the band to bring about such a drastic shift in style cause some friction within the band?
"Um…well, not really,” he pauses somewhat. "I mean, I think we all knew what we wanted and we needed to be fair to all the members in the band and their role and we knew Brian was a great drummer and had some cool techniques that shouldn't be wasted. He helped guide us through some arrangements that would suit him and shift things at the same time. We also knew that we all wanted to have some cool, kickass songs live and change was needed for sure if we were to create songs that delivered the goods.”
"When this record was coming together and the changes were obvious, we didn't give a fuck what anyone but us in the band thought,” he continues. "But of course the second you are finished recording an album then that feeling of how people are going to react sets in and it sometimes sends you into a panic. Did we make the right album? How does that song sound? This was a record about us doing what we wanted and while we did wonder how this change would affect people who were into us from the last record, we couldn't put out the same record when these creative impulses were taking over.”
He ends off, "I'm sure down the road we are gonna hear some bad things from critics or fans about this album and how things have changed too much, but again, who cares? This is Mnemic and you either deal with it or throw something else on.”
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