Information
Author: Mourning
Translation: Bosj
Line Up
Mattias Parkkila - Vocals
Anders Biazzi - Guitar
Gustav Myrin - Guitar
Mattias Söderlund - Bass
Mattias Borgh - Drums
From Sweden comes Blood Mortized, the band from Stockholm, which has assets a self-titled album and the EP "Bestial" (which you will find the review in the site), seems set to provide us more material, let's see what they are saying about it.
Welcome to our site, I just read on your facebook page that the second album "The Key To A Black Heart" is coming, right? How long to get it between our hands?
Hey Artistocrazia! Mattias Borgh, drummer and producer of Blood Mortized here! Yeah, the whole album is recorded and almoooost finished in the mix. I have some minor adjustments to do and then I´ll master the new album next week, it´s entitled "The Key To A Black Heart" and it will be shipped to FDA Rekotz for a CD release and to chaos Records for a vinyl and cassette release. Art work is taken care of by the amazing Thomas Kynst from Holland. I guess it will be out in March, so keep them eyes of yours open!
The album will be released again in collaboration with the Mexican Chaos Records and in Europe with the FDA Rekotz? How did you get in touch with these labels?
FDA Rekotz I got in touch with tahnks to Ralf Hauber from Mystical Music who recommended FDA Rekotz for Blood Mortized, cheers and thanks Ralf! FDA Rekotz is taking care of world wide distribution of the CD version and digital download. Chaos Records was recommended to our vocalist Parkkila from our Chaos Records label mates Turbocharged, so thanks to Ronnie from Turbocharged for that one! Chaos Records will do the world wide vinyl version.So far everything has worked out great with our new labels. Chaos Records release of the "Bestial" EP was really good. Support our small but hard working labels and order stuff from them!
Let's step back: since the band is still recent, we give a minimum of useful information to those who had not yet had the opportunity to meet you. Who are Blood Mortized?
We are five old tired men, but still ehhh quite hot and good looking? Haha! All of us have been playing in bands for a long time. Biazzi in Scum, Amon Amarth, Myrin in Pathalog and Apes IQ, Söderlund in Charta 77 and a bunch of other bands, Parkkila in Stigmata, Excruciate, Malfeitor (now active again with a new album coming out in a few months) and some more, I have been playing in Embryo, Crypt of Kerberos (new album coming in 2012 via Pulverised Records), Arcana, Sonic Venue, Calliphora and a bunch of jazz bands. All of us have grown up listening to and playing metal and we still love to play this type of music. From the beginning Blood Mortized was more of a studio project but now we have a solid and complete line-up and we rehearse and will play live from 2012 and on. In 2009 we released our debut album via Vrykoblast Productions. Then we recorded and released the "Bestial" EP (as a trio, because Moberg, the second guitar player left the band) via Chaos Records and now we are about to unleash "The Key To A Black Heart" via FDA Rekotz and Chaos Records.
The line-up in 2011 has added two items to the carrier trio, I'm talking about Gustav Myrin (Pathalog) on guitar and Mattias Söderlund on bass, how they were recruited? Did you already knew one another?
Myrin and Biazzi have been friends for a very long time, they talked about him joining when Moberg left and so far it works out great. He and Biazzi compliments each other in a really good way. Söderlund I found on a forum haha, he was laying there in a deep dark corner with a profound wish to tune down his four stringer and bash out some death metal haha... He is a great guy and a very good bass player, plus that when we play live he folds his bass into a suit case which is quite funny haha! (cheaper flight tickets you know hehe…)
You come from Stockholm and play death metal in the most natural way for Scandinavian people, the sound is one that has an unmistakable trademark, you were also members of nineties bands that have participated in writing pages of the underground history of those years, I'm talking about Embryo, Crypt of Kerberos, Pathalog, Egypt, Stigmata, Scum (previous Amon Amarth, Anders is present in both jewelry of their productions, the ep "Sorrow Throughout The Nine Worlds" and "Once Sent From The Golden Hall"). More than two decades have passed since the birth of that movement, what has changed? What are the most obvious differences you notice between those like you who has lived fully that time and who refers to it?
Well actually, me and Södelund don´t live in Sthlm. We come from a region called Södermanland... But anyway, we grew up both listening and playing this kind of music. I was really into the underground thing and wrote with bands like Masters Hammer, Rotting Christ, Nekromantia, Samael etc and all the hordes of fanzines and compilation tapes etc. I loved the underground thing! Very good times, which will never be the same. Everyday new letters in the mailbox, trading stuff with fans and bands. People had to make an effort to get a demo tape or a vinyl or CD. You could not download stuff and every guy and girl who was into these bands really supported the scene back then. Now a days we don´t get a penny in recording budget so we have to get by doing everything from our own budget, which is really hard. When we made the Crypt Of Kerberos debut album we had a budget, we could record in a good 24 track studio, now a days every one records in their rehearsal space haha.. But since we love this music we put up with it. The kids who listen to underground independent bands should buy the CD´s and listen to them on a real stereo, and NO your crappy sounding mobile phone is not a real stereo haha!
Talking about lyrics, the treated issues are now largely been eviscerated, how do you avoid falling into banality? In practice, as you avoid the same fate of Manowar with a "dictionary" reduced to a dozen words repeated endlessly?
Well, to write from your heart I guess is the solution. Me and Parkkila share writing duities, but I can only answer for myself... I like writing lyrics and I take my time writing them, but what others read into them or if they find them interesteing or not is not important to me. When it comes writing for a death metal band there are of course re-occuring themes such as death, destruction etc. It all fits with the sound of the band, if I write for another band I might write about birds and bees haha!
What are the key points that a death metal lover should never lose sight of?
Flow of the music and songs with riffs that get´s stuck in your head. It should feel energetic and crushing, it should feel organic, the listener should hear and feel that the music is performed by a bunch of human beings (zombies?) not a computer! Ohhh, I guess that disqualifies most modern bands then with their perfect production and time corrected drums and for guitars they don´t even use real amps arghhhhh... All tube amps is the only way to go if you ask me brummm, brummm, bang, crash!
How much is difficult to keep up a band having other companies to carry on and with whom you worked as Malfeitor, Birch Mountain, Arcana and Crypt Of Kerberos that involving the two Mattias? Any news regarding these formations?
Crypt of Kerberos is about to re-release the 1993 "World Of Myths" album via Pulverised and in 2012 a new album will be unleashed if all goes well. The new songs are massive and doomy like hell! Malfeitor is releasing their debut in a few months! Arcana is releasing a new EP and a new album in the spring plus doing some concerts during autumn. Not difficult to keep these bands apart, different styles of music and different people. For Crypt I am the drummer, I don´t produce or mix anything. Likewise for Arcana Peter Bjärgö takes care of that so I only play drums or percussion which is nice. Pakkila lays down vocals for his other bands but he is not doing any of the production, which saves a lot of time...
How was your music received on stage? There was a performance that you remember with most pleasure?
Well that remains to be seen haha! We will start play live with Blood Mortized in March this year and take it from there.
What are your listening outside of death metal?
Once again I can only answer for my old grumpy self... Right now I have been listening a lot to Bats For Lashes, the new Anna Ternheim, the new Ane Brun, Tori Amos. I like female singers haha... I also listen a lot to John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Bill Evans etc. Classic jazz be-bop, hard-bop, mainly from the 60´s. Rudy van Gelder made most of my favorite jazz albums one of the best producer ever!
Other passions and interests?
Not time for much else except for music I am afraid... If not writing or rehearsing music with various project I am always locked up in the studio with the mixing and production side...
What is your life outside the band size? Unfortunately we can hardly make a living only with metal, so what are your every day jobs?
Ufff, ain't that true? I am a music teacher and I teach drums, ensemble and sound engineering on a music college. Myrin builds some kind of weird things in a small factory (maybe he builds nuclear lawnmovers? Haha!) Biazzi is a carpenter (in Swedish we call it Professionell Svart-Byggare...) Söderlund works with ehhh humans in one way or another, Parkkila is working at some kind of a ware house... I guess it´s quite clear we don´t speak about work when we meet each other?
If you were to organize a festival of Swedish bands only and you were forced to narrow the field getting a bill of only ten bands, which bands to invite and why?
Bolt Thrower, Slayer, Bathory (one can wish, right?), Neurosis, King Diamond (Them and Conspiracy line-up), Kreator (Extreme Aggression line-up), Merciless (playing all songs from The Awakening), Paradise Lost (playing the whole Gothic album) and Morbid Angel (playing the best tracks from the four first albums) and Masters Hammer. We can just say I love these bands and it would be the best festival ever!
Anything else is brewing as well as the release of "The Key To A Black Heart"?
Right now that is a pretty massive thing for us so we focus on the album and of course our upcoming gigs in Germany!
We arrived at the end, I leave you one last time the word to complete the interview as you prefer.
Thanks for the support! Be sure to get your zombiefied hands on the new album!
