Answered by Jari Laine - rhythm guitars of Torture Killer.

UN: Torture Killer seems to have come out of nowhere. Can you go through a history for the band? I read that you guys started just out of a love for old school death metal and just to have fun, did you ever expect a record deal to come the way of the band?

Jari: "It all started out in early 2002 as a fun project like you said, we knew each other before from different death metal bands and since the death metallers in Finland and especially in our hometown are nearly extinct you pretty much know whose into it and whose not. We shared the same rehearsal room and all our bands at the time were not that active so we started to hung out during weekends playing our old favorites from SFU and Obituary while we were drinking. We enjoyed it a lot and pretty soon we gathered every weekend to do that, every time we learned a couple of new ones and pretty soon we were able to play most of our favorite SFU track and managed actually to make them sound pretty good. Then just by coincidence a friend of ours arranged some kind of metal event in our hometown and he knew we were doing those cover songs and asked if we wanted to play a cover gig in that event. So we did, and naturally we needed a name for the band and chose Torture Killer, it felt natural since we were only doing SFU songs on that gig and it sounded cool to us...haha...after the gig we started talking that maybe we should try to write a couple of songs of our own but with the same style. I think we did like 3-4 own songs which we all liked very much and it kinda just started rolling from there."

UN: The first thing I thought when I heard the disc was that you guys must be huge Six Feet Under fans. It’s easy to hear the similarities, yet with SFU constantly disappointing it’s nice to see a band picking up where “Haunted” left of! Would you consider Six Feet Under one of the bands main influences?

Jari: "Well we like SFU but were not obsessed by it...haha...I think it´s the picture you might easily get from us because of the style, name, past and stuff like that but were into all kinds of death metal really. This style just felt really good to play, I've always liked that riff based stuff a lot and since we have other bands doing the fast stuff already and especially since every death metal band nowadays are doing the fast stuff it felt like a good point not to do it ourselves. I like the fast stuff a lot but I grew up with bands like Obituary who weren't fast but were able to be more brutal than most of the high speed bands. I kinda agree that "haunted" is the best album together with "maximum violence"...as a whole albums those are the best but on every album they've had some killer tracks and they can definitely write some killer grooves."

UN: When a lot of bands form I’m guessing that being original is something that they may think about. Do you think in this day and age it’s hard to be truly original? I’m sure with Torture Killer you aren’t trying to reinvent the wheel, and are more so just playing the style of music you love.

Jari: "Yes it´s very hard and we don't care about that so much. I mean I seriously think we have like 0% originality...haha...but that hasn't been our goal at all. This is the style we love and want to play with Torture Killer. About the originality thing, we could try to be original but it would probably end up sounding total shit. I think the originality comes naturally, if you push it too hard just that you can say "we are original" it won't ever work. When I look the guys in the band or myself in the mirror I don't see the next NILE or Einstein's of death metal...haha...no fucking way, to be able to create something original I think you need more knowledge of scales, techniques and most of all creativity that we don't have. That's fine for me, but in all honesty I think we have managed to write some killer midtempo death metal tracks which are just made to play live on stage. It´s not original and it´s not technical but it's very catchy and brutal in other ways."

UN: I touched on this earlier, but Karmegeddon Media is the label that signed the band. Initially the album was going to be released by a label run by one of the members of the band correct? What prompted you guys to send the album around to labels? Just to test the water and see if anything came of it? Are you guys pleased with Karmegeddon?

Jari: "Yes it´s pretty much what happened. Everything around Torture Killer is a coincidal continuation of a coincidence...haha...when we had something like 3-4 own songs ready I suggested that we should write a full album straight away and I would release it with my very small ug-death metal label Severe Music. So we booked the studio, recorded the album in 30 hours and came out with this album. Obviously at the time we didn´t have a studio budget of any kind, so that´s why we had to do it so quickly. After a couple days listen at home we started talking that let´s see what a real label thinks of it since we all felt very good about the album. All of a sudden we´re signed with a label like Karmageddon Media which in Europe's standards is one of the most better ones and definitely a pro-label. Were very pleased with Karmageddon and hopefully we can continue with them in the future as well."

UN: Let’s talk about “For Maggots to Devour” for a bit. How has the response to the cd been so far? Do a lot of people seem to be getting into what the band is doing?

Jari: "It's been like what I expected. I'm very glad to see that a lot of people seem to enjoy it but of course we knew to expect the negative ones also. Some people have too much troubles with the obvious influences we have but overall it´s been very good and I think it gets the reviews it deserves. Overall this is a very good beginning for Torture Killer and I still like the album a lot and I see no reason why it shouldn't do well overseas as well."

UN: I think it stands out like a sore thumb right now. Death metal bands seem to be trying too hard to be overly technical or as sick and disgusting as possible. Not many bands right catchy riffs, but your debut album is chock full of them! Is it important to write catchy songs?

Jari: "Thanks a lot man, for Torture Killer it is the most important thing. It all comes down to the groovy, juicy and catchy death metal riffs. All You need is 3-4 riffs like that and you have a catchy song finished. I really don't have a problem with the fast and technical death metal since it´s the stuff I mostly listen to and I like it a lot, but you have a point that almost everybody does it, so it can´t be the end of the world if we do it otherwise...haha...both approaches have their advantages, the fast can be brutal the way we can't and the other way around."

UN: I have to say that I’m a big fan of the layout and it’s one of the most original death metal layouts I’ve seen in awhile. What influenced the idea to make the booklet like a death certificate? It’s such a simple idea, but it makes for a cool looking booklet. Also, I was curious to ask why you guys went the computer generated route instead of a painted cover. Do you think the cheesy poorly drawn gore cover thing is getting a bit old?

Jari: "A friend of ours is behind all the artwork and layout. He´s done logos and cover artwork for Finnish bands for years and he came up with the death certificate idea as well as the cover. He actually did some painted works as well, but he hasn´t done that for a while and quite honestly those were horrible...haha...but we knew he had some sick ideas in his head, and asked him to do something with the computer generated stuff. He did a poster for us for Severe Music Deathfest in which he used the same graphics which we all liked a lot, and we just wanted something similar. We didn't have a clear idea how we wanted the cover to look like so we just gave him the album title, track titles and said "do something brutal"...haha...and this is what came out. I like it a lot myself, the idea behind the cover artwork is pretty sick, but the graphics gives it a bit different vibe compared to the painted ones. Well those poorly drawn gore covers have something appealing still...haha...it´s what death metal covers should look like I guess...haha..."

UN: Was it intentional to keep the lyrics simple along the same lines as the music? There’s no doubt that they are gory, but they are straight to the point and don’t try too hard to be shocking. Would you say it’s important to have catchy vocal patterns, as opposed to just random grunting over the music?

Jari: "Listen man, this is the first interview where I feel someone is on exactly the same level of thinking that I am...haha...that´s exactly how it goes. We give a lot of thought how the vocals are arranged rhythmically with the backing riff and beat, first we try to come up with a striking pattern and then try to write some lines to match it so that it would make some sense. It´s not what you say, it´s how you say it. That's how we look at it. The vocal patterns are as important to us as the riffs and were not trying to make point in anything we say, we just try to make it sound cool."

UN: Would you say that Finland is a good place for an extreme band to call home? There seems to be quite a healthy scene with many bands being signed to some fairly big labels within the metal scene. You guys yourself are involved in some fairly well known bands.

Jari: "Metal in general is doing pretty well in here, I mean if bands like Children of Bodom end up no.1 in the national album charts leaving Eminem and 50 Cent behind - it can't be all that bad. But for more extreme side of metal like death metal is quite the opposite. I don't know why the kids seem to be more into the melodic side of metal. For instance it´s very hard to find players to do death metal. Our drummer plays in almost every death metal band there is in Finland: Demigod, Deepred, Torn and Torture Killer so it kinda gives you the big picture. The bands that get signed are mostly those melodic bands so it depends how you look at it. Is it good or not?"

UN: Because you guys are in other bands, would you consider Torture Killer a project band, or is it a full time band? Say for instance you guys were offered a tour, would you just drop the other bands and go on the tour? Is anything happening with the other bands at the moment?

Jari: "For me, I´ve left all my other bands because Torture Killer is what I want to do. Mostly the tours Finnish bands get into last for 2-3 weeks at the most so I don´t think the other bands would insist leaving them or us because of any tours. We're mostly good friends with all the bands so we understand if some band has a gig, recording or a tour coming up the other bands are not active. Torture Killer started out as a fun project but it has evolved to a stage where everybody in the band takes it seriously. I think Deepred is going on a tour at some point in April/May and then they have a recording coming up and Demigod is planning to go to the studio at some point in the autumn. Torn has no immediate plans and Funeral Feast has just released an album so I don't think those guys are doing anything in a while. You see touring is not as easy since we live in the far corner of Europe so we just can´t just jump in to a car and drive for 2 hours to get on a show. We have to travel 2 days for it even to make for a one gig in Germany so the location pretty much keeps us sitting on our asses with every band...haha..."

UN: Would you say that the lyrics in Torture Killer are horror influenced at all? I would sort of assume because of the samples that they are. While, on the subject of the samples, it’s nice to hear unique ones that aren’t used by every other band. Was it important to have samples that haven’t been used before? Just out of curiosity, what is the sample at the beginning of the cd from?

Jari: "It´s horror influenced, the lyrics are just plain gore/horror stuff but we don't spend hours watching for movies just to get influenced by them. It just needs a good imagination...haha...the samples we used pretty much tells the level of seriousness we had when we wrote/recorded this album. We have Sylvester Stallone, a sample from Predator...haha...it´s not meant to be a joke, they just fitted to the songs so that´s why we used them. A friend of ours gave us a cd full of samples that he had, and mostly I don´t have a clue where they are taken from. Sorry but I really don´t have slightest idea where the opening sample is from. Sounds like an old movie tough doesn't it? At the mixing stage we just listened to the samples and decided like in 30 seconds which samples we would use and in which song so once again there was no planning done for it. The idea was to use samples but not over-use them. Mortician for example has some cool samples in their songs but when they last for 1-2 minutes in every song it's a bit too much in my opinion."

UN: Let’s end with this one. Why do you guys chose death metal as your outlet of choice? What is it that drives you and motivated you to play such heavy music?

Jari: "It's the style I enjoy the most and the stuff I grew up with. I haven't been able to find the aggression or the power in any other forms of music to match it and of course we want to play the same kind of stuff we enjoy listening to."

"Thanks a lot for the interview man, was a real pleasure to do this one. All the best to your mag! Take care and stay brutal!"