AVATAR - Johannes

\r\nAfter their 2006 noteworthy debut CD, Avatar, those amazing youngsters from Sweden are returning with their new album "Schlacht". Johannes, vocalist of the band is giving us information about their new effort, also speaking about their excellent relationship with their label Gain records, their recent tour with Obituary and Holy Moses while he explains why they think that Evergrey are fucking insane! And why The Beatles is his all time favorite band. Read in details below.
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\r\nMetalzone: Hello, Johannes, welcome to Metalzone.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Thank you very much, how are you?\r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Fine. First thing I would like you to give us a brief biography of the band.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Ok. Avatar was first founded in 2001 by John and the guitar player Jonas when they were like 14-15 years old but the real incarnation of Avatar was formed in the fall of 2003 with these members we have today which was when we were around only like 16-17 or 18 years old or something like that. And since then we’ve made, with this lineup we’ve made our first demo, our first self-financed EP and then two albums on the record label Gain. And I like to call us the hardest working band in business right now.\r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: In October 24 you released your new album "Schlacht". How are things so far with the feedback?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Well, it’s been great actually. We’ve got great reviews and we’ve been able to promote it very well in both Europe and here at home in Sweden and you know people have liked it. We’ve been on a European tour now with Obituary. We came home like three weeks ago and the new songs were received very well also in other countries so it’s been real cool. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: What do you think are the differences between the new album and your previous release?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Well, on this one, it’s more dynamic I’d say in a way that we’ve become maybe more extreme and faster. In one way but still we have way more acoustic stuff and a little, little bit of clean vocals and stuff like that and even slower songs that we have never done before but it is a very dynamic album and I feel that we’ve grown in every direction actually like the rings on water with this one. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Björn from In Flames contributed a guitar solo on the track "Letters From Neverend". How come you cooperated with him?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Well, Gothenburg is a small city so when you are in the same business you get to learn each other. You meet many people at least when you meet on shows and you go to some shows together, you know, play on the same shows and something like that and we got to know In Flames a little bit, meet them in shows, you know, they were friends with Evergrey, we toured with Evergrey, they showed up on shows in Gothenburg and so on and you get to know each other a bit and then it turned out to us being their opening band on a Scandinavian tour and of course doing that we got even closer and then it was, you know, a fun thing between friends actually. “Hey, do you wanna come and do the solo”, “Yes, sure that would be fun”. It was more like that. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: My next question, if I’m not mistaken Schlacht means slaughter, am I right? Was this the reason why you chose to shoot your video in a slaughterhouse?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Well, that goes to the song itself. That’s also the title track, the first song of the album "Schlacht" which like you said means slaughter but also battle actually in German. But main meaning is slaughter. That’s because, that song is dealing with maybe in a slightly political way how people are living their lives and how we treat each other as human beings. How we become, you know, every time we sent soldiers to war or whatever or press people you’re turning into animals really, as numbers something to be killed, something to be slaughtered. They were the meat and the body and not what’s inside their heads. And that can go with whatever like, you know, prostitution or like I said soldiers or whatever. When people turn to objects and their lives don’t mean anything. So it’s like that and slaughtering animals is also a quite ugly thing in my point of view so we also emphasize that, you know. It wasn’t the nicest place to be and it wasn’t a nice message either, you know. Those hanging hunt. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Was this your first video ever?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, the first real one. We did an amateur one way back for one song from our first album "My Shining Star" but actually we did that as a demo. We also did an amateur shooting video actually which was fun and very good experience back then but it doesn’t really cut it in modern in our eyes now. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: This was your first professional video.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Exactly. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: How was the whole experience?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Making the video?\r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Yeah, more professionally, you know.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Τhe professional part was still, you know, a small filming crew and some young dudes helping us up and stuff like that. It was really laid back in that way and my biggest memory from that was actually that first I haven’t slept during the whole night before the video shooting. I was with someone and I didn’t sleep and then as we gathered, it wasn’t really hot outside but it was freezing inside. You know the whole building was like a refrigerator for meat. So it was freezing and we were going around wearing as you can see in the video us in thin shirts and tight pants and nothing else. During all the scenes we were freezing our asses off. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Basically, we can see you and the meat behind you. Is there any possibility of doing another one from the new album?\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Yes, totally. As I said we are the hardest working band and its business, there are a lot of things ourselves try and shoot, you know, why should a manager do this and this and that that we can’t do ourselves and so on. But that also means definitely that we have plans for videos and discuss which the next song will be, it’s just that we need time to make it happen right now. We’ve been home for three weeks on the European tour but after that we’ve been opening for Megadeth, we’ve been on this metal cruise, boat cruise for a big Swedish night with Soilwork, Danko Jones, Backyard Babies and so on which means that we haven’t had much time off yet. And now we’re into rehearsing again because we’re going to America, to U.S.A now in March so you know we got a tight schedule. I guess probably when we’ll get home from that we’ll sit down and plan a new video because it was fun and it’s cool and it’s a great way to promote yourself, you know, and it gives a little extra entertainment value to the band so of course we’ll do it when we have the time. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Let’s talk about your contract with Gain records. I suppose things couldn’t have been better for a new band like you and I also guess that your relationship with your label must be pretty good.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: It’s great actually. The thing is that one of the two owners, Markus Tagaris, he’s got some Greek heritage actually but I think he’s been his whole life in Sweden, he got to know us as kids when the band started before we were all these five members, three of us and two other guys who came and left and he got to know us early on and you know Tagaris thinks about music business and how to develop and what we should do and not doing and passed us all the secrets early on when we were just kids and his office is like two meters away from our rehearsing room and it’s always been like that so he’s been hearing our development long before he signed a contract with us. Which meant that he had always told us the secrets so anybody wouldn’t trick us. And it’s been really cool after that the day on both, you know sometimes tagging along on shows and we can have a lot of fun with them and they are all very creative and productive and really as it is in my label we’re top priority which means that even we don’t get as much money as, you know, as other bands on the big labels where the cookies are bigger, the cake is bigger but more people want a part of it, you know, we’ve got a smaller cake but we get the whole cake. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Although when you first started there were many problems with the lineup mostly.\r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, I think, you know, I’ve been getting that question a lot but it is actually my fault because I wrote the biography on the home page and we actually changing it now partly because of that but because we wanted simply to have a new one, a better one. At first I had a lot of energy and I wrote about the first two years, you know, we were just kids having fun doing covers with friends and then some things like “Ah, I don’t want to come”, “ok, you are fired” but that was really before there was a real band but there was still a band but we were just kinds, that’s when all the lineup changes happened. And there wasn’t a real serious attempt with having us full five member, full time serious band before we became these five members. And as we became them we were just still 16-17 years old and we haven’t a lineup change since then. We have never recorded or anything with another lineup and we had just played two live shows before this lineup. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: Because it is also mentioned that even you at some point left the band and came back later again. \r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, like two or three months over the summer holidays. That was, yes, I was 16 years old and I was just slowly learning proper vocal techniques and, you know, going in music education and stuff like that and I was in a music high school and everything but I hadn’t really gotten, you know, into how to do just vocals really good and I felt that I fucked up my voice simply. It hurt real bad so I felt “Hey, I want to sing for the rest of my life and I wanted to do this, I wanted to do metal screaming but maybe I can’t. “ I had to stop, I had to save my voice. But then, you know, like a few weeks after, “Damn, I’m stupid! Why did I stop?” . I had to figure this out and then I started to practice and finding out I got to learn my body better as it was growing, you know, and then finally “Hey, this is the way to do it. This doesn’t hurt at all, this is cool and it seems stronger and rawer and you know I feel like a lion now and as I did that “I wanna come back” because they haven’t found anyone anyway just people who made sound by breathing in and how to throw up between the songs and really weird people in between. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: So, you just had to find the right way to do it. \r\n

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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, exactly. \r\n

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\r\nMetalzone: You were nominated for the best newcomers of 2007 at the Swedish Metal awards and it was a great thing in the first place but was this nomination something that you hoped for or was it completely out of the blue?
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\r\nJohannes: It was really out of the blue. You know, it was the first year they had this contest I mean I’ve been shaking it out the ceremony on the internet and it wasn’t really a big thing. Anyway it was a bit cool because it was all about people voting on their favorite bands and in that way it was a bit of an honor but still awards are not that important, you know, it’s important what people think when you go to live shows and you meet them in person. It’s all that matters, you know, if we are to talk about fans it’s the cool thing when we can be there with them and have fun together with them. And you know an award it’s not that important, I’m more interested because I can’t show a fan “Hey, look you should like me, I got this award.” I can’t keep this award to say to the people in magazines “Hey, I got an award I must be good write about me.” And that’s a good thing of course but it’s not that important.
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\r\nMetalzone: I think the most important in that is the fact that you are so young and you were nominated, do you understand what I’m saying?
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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, that’s cool and we had a lot of recognition now because we are young and stuff like that and it’s cool in one way to see that but the reason that we’ve got this far even though we are so young it’s simply because we found each other early, we are a great combination of people, we are a great unit together, everybody is doing their part and we can all work together, we can travel together, we have fun together, you know, we can survive the bad times together too. And that’s important part and I guess that’s why we’ve gone this far even though we are so young.
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\r\nMetalzone: You play melodic Death Metal but what do you think are the elements in your music that are new and refreshing to this genre?
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\r\nJohannes: We don’t think in genres ourselves like that, you know, for instance we have a strong old school death metal roots and we started as… sure we’ve played Gothenburg band covers when we were 15 bit we’ve also played Vader and Slayer and Cannibal Corpse and that’s all still a big part of us that we want to keep that in the music in us, real aggression and brutality and stuff like that as still the melody is always the main priority in one way, doesn’t matter what kind of melody it is, you know the groove, the rhythm, and everything we want a great mix of it, I think that’s what we are right now. We are young guys who when we were even younger, you know, grew up with loving metal music. Loving all of it, loving everything to Iron Maiden to Helloween to Vader to Cryptopsy to Nasum from Sweden, loving everything. And getting inspired from everything that is real true. And what we’re doing right now is trying , you know, getting at least with this latest album getting as many of these feelings and grooves that you get from the different branches of metal in together, under one roof and make it work. Like my vocals on "Schlacht" are very fast and it goes with drums and Strapping Young Lad guitars and still somewhere you get this melody course or stuff like that which I like to mix it up and grant all the things that have inspired us together to mold into one thing on our pursuit totally developing our own sound of course all the way.
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\r\nMetalzone: Speaking of it in your musical influences you mention The Beatles.
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\r\nJohannes: Oh, yes and I use ideas that I got them because I grew up listening to them but you know people would never tell “Oh, that’s so The Beatles” because it’s hidden but it’s there, yes. They are my all time favorite band. It was my first time I heard “Hey, playing guitar will make else scream, cool. And, you know, yeah what can you say about them, they are so brilliant, they started so much of what is going on today and without Beatles I wouldn’t start singing probably and I am a big, big, big fan so thank you Beatles for that. And it’s going on like that from generation to generation. Mostly everything that happened has been evolutionary but then sometimes something happens to music that is revolutionary. And people turn to, you know, when we look back in time say “hey, that was when everything changed” but I say “No, that is the thing that you remember” but, you know, it was part of a logical chain of ideas. But I think that Beatles really revolutionized stuff over and over on only eight years as an out record making band. I really love them.
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\r\nMetalzone: I just mentioned it because you are so young and it’s kind of odd, you know, you don’t hear many people in nowadays referring to Beatles anymore and it was quite a surprise to me when I read it.
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\r\nJohannes: That’s funny because I’d say I have a lot of friends in my age that really are, you know, big Beatles fans too. You know we got parents with all Beatles albums to say some you should listen to this and some go “Hey, dad, that’s old, that’s lame” but some people hear it and listen to it. And we are quite a few of those.
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\r\nMetalzone: So, let’s talk about your European tour with Obituary and Holy Moses. How things went out there for you?
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\r\nJohannes: That was, you know, the best start of 2008 I could ever dream of being on tour with them. First thing as they were both Holy Moses and Obituary and the crew were all amazing, fucking great people. Really, you know, they were generous, they were open to us. And we started of being, you know, a bit careful in the beginning about “Hey, let’s find out what these Americans and Germans like kind of people they are”. We were a little laid back to see how much fun do they want to have. So we were taking this in the beginning until they came to us “Hey, guys are you shy or don’t you like us, what’s the problem?” “No, we’re trying to see what kind of people you are.” “Then get the fuck over here, come with us and go to the bar, now! You know like that, they really invited us in, really helping us out, especially the crew when we had technical problems and the audiences, you know, it’s always a challenge for us. We’ve been on a few tours when we were it’s a challenge to us to convince people that our kind of music is something for them. For instance, you know, we were with Evergrey in the fall 2006 and they were only with clean vocals and stuff like that and maybe not as fast in the way that we are and not as extreme when we are extreme and this was the same now with Obituary since they are a really old school band. And, you know, an old band, they’ve been around for 20 years and the same with Holy Moses, they’ve been around I think for 27 years it’s something, you know, for really long time. And here we are, we’re 20 years old, not the band but the people in the band. It’s a big difference. It’s a big challenge but we had a lot of fun doing it because that motivated us. “Hey, we won’t get anything for free from this audience, we have to do our best.” And we did and we won a lot of new people over as fans on this tour thanks to that.
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\r\nMetalzone: You also played with many others, really big names like as you said before MEGADETH, ARCH ENEMY, DISMEMBER, IMPALED NAZARENE. I want you to tell me what is the most memorable moment that you can recall right now?
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\r\nJohannes: With many bands I can remember you know, they are all scattered the good times, for instance with Impaled Nazarene, the drummer was the one who took care of us, the drummer of Impaled Nazarene because it was like two years ago but it feels like a hundred years ago if we count the experience when we were on tour with them. But he was really, really cool with us and actually I remember the good times of drinking and staying up away too late until late turned to early with him and stuff like that. And with Evergrey it was a lot of fun because they were from Gothenburg too so, you know, really the same mentality to the bone. The same city, we happened to be in the same areas and stuff like that and they were… I have a specific memory of having a nude masted drunk like hell in the bus with their keyboard player and listening to Cryptopsy and Michael Jackson.
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\r\nMetalzone: At the same time?
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\r\nJohannes: No, after each another. And I think we broke to sleep. He had a problem walking straight the day after but that was very good times. We did a lot of things like that with them. They pranked us once actually, a big, big prank. They pretended to be, you know, having problems in the beginning with each other, you know, not being very good friends and we’ve “Hey, this band is weird” but then we kind of forgot about it and then in Spain, I think, after our show we were two of my band, the drummer John and the guitar player Simon was asleep and the rest of us sat downstairs with their sound guy, the tour manager and, you know, I think one more and then we heard this fight upstairs in the bus, big fight. And then, you know something “You fucking shut up and Avatar leaves”, “No”, “yes they do” “Shut up”. And I thought what the hell, what’s wrong now. And then you heard a bottle broke and their guitar technician rolled down the stairs with blood all over. And I was like ok, they are fucking insane! And, you know, they came out “Avatar is extreme” “What! They did this because of us?” “What have we done?” And then they started to yell at us about nothing, you know, you didn’t do this, you didn’t do that but it was like bullshit, like nothing. So I thought they are insane, you know. They are on some heavy shit drugs, you know they are crazy. And then they said “Hey, do you want a beer” and everybody started to laugh. So it was this prank but really because you hear the bottle break and the roll on the stairs blood in space “God, I’m in shock, you know”. So after that, you know one of the heaviest parties on the tour, of course. So, you know a lot of wild partnership with them.
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\r\nMetalzone: So I suppose you prefer to be on tour than in the studio.
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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, I really do. Because I write about the one third of the songs, music to one third of the songs by myself and, you know, Jonas and Simon, the guitar players, they write the other two thirds by themselves and they will bring it to the rehearse room and, you know, we play it, we rehearse it and we start to jam along and change and develop. And you know since I’m with some rates from the very beginning I’m not interested in the middle parts after a while, you know, we’re getting sitting there and listening to and John is doing his drums takes and stuff like that. I don’t feel I can be very creative in that part of the studio’s time anyway because as I said it’s never stop “Man, he’s gonna fuck up, he’s gonna fuck up. We’re gonna listen another half hour rehearse. Shit!” You know like that. So I try to avoid the studio and instead I’ve been, you know, working out and practicing my vocal parts by myself as being better as to record and then I go to meetings once a week and I show up and say my opinion, the stuff mostly is great anyway because they know what they are doing and we like the same things and, you know, 99% of the time we want the same stuff so I don’t really need to be there up until I do my vocals and that is fun of course, it’s like do it fast enough, it’s like I practiced hard enough that I don’t need to be there too long. And it’s fun and I’m creative again and then we produce the stuff to fuck things up, you know, and that’s really cool. And then I try to avoid everything until the end of the mixing part where I can say what I want and so it’s kind of like I like the studio time as I don’t get too much of it. But touring I can never get too much. I think I do but then I wake up the next day and “Hey, let’s go again, I’m ready.” It’s not healthy but it’s fun, you know, being on tour, it’s parties, it’s meeting new people, it’s having fun. It’s like, you know, you become this little circus riding around and it’s kind of like going to war together, you become so close with the people you do it with because you are out there in the big, big world with people and that makes you really, you connect very, very much after a while. So in the main part of it getting being able to perform in front of people, entertaining people, do our music which is the main reason we do this anyway, at least I do this to be able to play my songs and the other guys’ songs on stage, playing our songs on stage. You know that’s the main thing, that’s my main therapy.
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\r\nMetalzone: Speaking of the fans, your fan base has been growing very fast. Do you think that this has something to do with the fact that the Gothenburg sound is growing strong again after also the reunions of At The Gates and Carcass?
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\r\nJohannes: Well, I think we’ve been growing before the news came out about At The Gates, I have to say. We know, it’s obvious that we are growing because people like this kind of music, you know, that’s very logic, you can’t argue with that but, you know, our ambition has never been to be a typical Gothenburg metal band, Gothenburg sound band because we love those bands and be called that but, you know, in modern day what is the Gothenburg sound today? Because the studio that everyone was using, the studio Fredman here in Gothenburg, it doesn’t exist anymore, it’s the same house but they made their own studio there. And after a while they called everything from Gothenburg, the Gothenburg sound and I can respect since what I explained you I like brutal metal and melodic metal and if we can mix it so it’s bit fair to call us melodic death metal, I don’t have a problem with that but I have friends in hardcore bands or pure death metal bands or whatever and everyone it’s calling it Gothenburg sound because ten years ago the scene of Gothenburg was happening. And now, you know, it’s ten years later and all these are going in very different directions, it’s just a race by inventing this Gothenburg sound then I wouldn’t say that they hunt and made do it, this Gothenburg sound for instance.
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\r\nMetalzone: Is just that many people is calling you as the new generation of the Gothenburg sound.
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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, sure, as I said I can respect that and I think even our label has to mention that because in the beginning the whole thing about the Gothenburg sound was that it was so invented, it was so really new, fresh, cool and we are of course very inspired by that and we are definitely out to be the next generation of Gothenburg greatness, so to speak, you know what I mean. And yeah they say that we are one to take the Gothenburg sound to the next level and in one context, yeah that’s right, you know. That we are like all the music we love, you know, everything that’s fast and heavy. We love it, they wanna copy it, we wanna evolve and mold it into our own thing and take it to the next level. As every great band has done, you know, being loving music, playing music and evolving the music. And that’s what it is all about, you know, we are young and ambitious and we work in that direction all the time.
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\r\nMetalzone: For someone that hasn’t seen your band live, how would you describe your shows?
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\r\nJohannes: Very intense. We actually had to slow things down a bit. My talking and the pulses between songs and stuff like that because we are too intense. We go on stage with our whole hearts into it and you know we are not this band where I have to be the lead singer and stand in front and everybody else is standing behind me getting fat and bored over the years. You know we are five front figures in one way on stage. Everybody is moving, everybody is trying to connect with people and everybody is doing some crazy stuff on their instruments and we try to do this, to mold it into our playing together as tight as possible. Because first thing first is always the music, to make great music, to come alive in front of people eyes. And then we want to look awesome doing it. Which means that we are all very, very into the show. And into, you know, making people having a good time and making people feel the things we do when we play this music. So I hope that people will feel passion when they see us. That’s the ambition, you know, feel as passionate as we feel.
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\r\nMetalzone: Now a question for you. You are all very young, I think you are of the oldests, you are only 21 years old.
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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, I’m 22 this summer but actually I think our drummer is the oldest because he’s born in February. We are both born in ’86. But it’s not a big difference.
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\r\nMetalzone: If I were to ask you in like twenty years from now could you see yourself doing the same things, you know, playing music, touring, giving interviews what would you answer?
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\r\nJohannes: As long as the music stays good. As long as I keep on feeling that I got an idea that I really want to put on tape, you know, I got something to write about. If I feel that I got a good music to talk about. I can most definitely see myself keeping on doing this but you never know. You never know what happens in your life, as long as we all stay alive and keep on being able to have this much fun doing this, working very hard and still having fun even if we are working so hard and as long as we are able to do that I don’t see any reason to stop. As long as we can keep on building this dream.
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\r\nMetalzone: Alright. So, Johannes the last word is yours. Give a message to the readers of Metalzone.
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\r\nJohannes: So, dear Metalzone and the whole Greek nation I want to say that it breaks my heart that I haven’t been in your country even as a tourist so I look forward for you guys to check us out, help up building a fan base over there because I want to go there and play for you guys. I know people who said they had their best shows over in Greece. So I long to get there, I long to see you and I hope that you will pick up "Schlacht" and that you will like it as much as we do ourselves.
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\r\nMetalzone: Thank you very much for this interview.
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\r\nJohannes: Thank you.
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\r\nMetalzone: And we all hope that we will see you some time in Greece.
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\r\nJohannes: Yeah, me too, I really hope so. You’ve got to come to our show if we get there. And stay in touch. \r\n

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\r\nVaso Prassa \r\n

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