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INDEX
INTERVIEWS
GUESTBOOK
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1. Hello! What's up in the camp of GOD DISEASE? Could you make a little introduction or sum up the biography of the band?
Ilkka: God
Disease is Mika Elola - Drums, Henry Randström - Bass, Ville Yrttiaho
- Guitar, Jesse Könönen - Guitar and me, Ilkka Laaksonen - Vocals.
With this line up we have played since fall 2015.
All is well
in the puss infected gutters of camp God Disease. We are looking
forward to next year and releasing our first full-length album,
that will be coming out via FDA Rekotz. So keep a look out for the
next epidemic, spreading 2017.
2. What's the deeper meaning of the band name? Does it imply god is a disease for mankind, or rather god is subject to a strange divinity-exterminating sickness?
Ilkka: Well it was just a cool name for a band in my opinion. You can interpret that how you want to, but God is disease, God is destruction and God is the ultimate excuse for all the evil in the world.
Mika: Interpret that as you see fit, but for me god is a disease….
Ville: All religion-related matter is disease for mankind.
3. How do you define your music when someone isn't familiar? Perhaps the sentence "English doom metal heads who relocated to Finland" would correctly sum it up? Ah Ah
Ilkka: Is our music English? Well the fact is that bands like Paradise Lost, My Dying Bride and old Anathema are somewhat influences to us but I feel we have this built in melancholy in us, like almost all the Finns have. So maybe your sentence is not the worst way to describe our music. Of the Finnish bands whom we have taken influence, or at least I have, are Rippikoulu and Hooded Menace.
Ville: If i
need to explain someone what kind of music we play, i just say death
metal. I’m not really into this genre dropping or sub-genre stuff.
4. While many new old school death bands sound very necro or influenced by ENTOMBED, your music is more doomy and "melodic" in a darkened manner. Do you believe the "melodic" side is what some current Death metal bands miss? Do you believe it's easier to hook the listener with more "diversity" (Always remaining in the Death metal world).
Ilkka: This “necro” trend really pissed me off at one point. It felt like nobody cared about riffs anymore and everyone wanted to be the most evil motherfucker around. I feel that Corpsessed started it and they were so good at it that everyone wanted to mimic them. Still no one has reached the same level as Corpsessed. These Entombed spawns… Some of them are really great. Like the Argentinian band I found out just a few weeks ago, Morte. Really good Left Hand Path like stuff! On the other hand there are so many bands doing the same and some of them just don´t justify their existence… In general I´m happy that people are playing Death Metal even if they don´t reach unique level at it. The best possible hobby there is.
Ville: I am a huge fan of Entombed and whole swedish death metal scene and if your guitar tone is based and relying on buzzsaw BOSS HM-2 pedal you better have some killer riffs otherwise it is just another bad clone of the legends from the 90’s. And to answer your question concerning the melodic side, in my opinion not every band should have melodic side or “catchiness” in their music. Huge spectrum of variation in death metal and bands makes it interesting.
5. The French label SOUTH FROM HERE records re-released two of your demos on a CD entitled "Doom Howler / Abyss Cathedral". How did this opportunity happen and are you satisfied with the release? In a way we could even see it as a full-length album... In your opinion what would lack for it could be considered as an album?
Ilkka: It´s not a full-Length by any means. This is also the only physical format that has Doom Howler songs on it. Vincent from South From Here first contacted us about releasing Abyss Cathedral on CD, but we had some inner turmoil in the band at the moment and it was a bit later that I proposed him to release this compilation including both EPs and the rest is history.
6. If you were obliged to choose one of the elements of your music to define the style of GOD DISEASE, would it be the old Death metal parts, the doom parts, the most brutal or the more sorrowful moments? (I know it's not a so easy question AhAh)
Ilkka: Argh! It would be the brutally sorrowful parts that tear your soul apart…
7. I guess you are quite a lot into the old PARADISE LOST releases, I mean the records from the 90's... Since their beginnings each new album shew the music to contain fewer Death metal (Or better said death doom?) each time. Which album from theirs do you enjoy the most? Personally I stopped with "Draconian times"...
Ilkka: I actually think the latest album is the best.. Maybe someone played some God Disease songs to them and they saw the light haha! I have spent time with the later ones also, they have their moments even though I prefer the old ones. It would be another dream come true if we could play live with them at somepoint…
Ville: Latest one is a masterpiece and and i love first five albums (lost paradise to draconian times). Paradise Lost has made a huge impact on me personally.
8. I saw in another interview you were quite strongly into the first ANATHEMA records... I never got into their music, it always seemed strange since I enjoyed old MY DYING BRIDE and old PARADISE LOST, so I should have in theory enjoyed ANATHEMA as well... But it didn't happen.
Which release of the band would be the best for someone into old death doom/ traditional death metal? Could you explain what pleases you in the music of the band? (Perhaps you'd have words to underline what is good and emotional in their compositions)
Ilkka: Pentecost
III + The Crestfallen… Those riffs man… And the heaviness that MDB
or Paradise Lost just did not have! Anathema was more brutal than
the other two back then, which is a bit ironical today… The best
songs are Kingdom, They Die and And I Lust. Serenades is also a
good album, but I suggest to start from the Pentecost III and The
Crestfallen ep.
9. Just to keep a bit more with old doom bands... I also enjoy old MY DYING BRIDE, I perhaps prefer their first MCDs than the first album, it was the right mixture of doom and death metal... Which releases of theirs do you prefer? Do you dig all their discography or it stopped at a point in time?
Ilkka: The Angel And The Dark River. I always connect this album to a family tragedy, it was around the same time I found My Dying Bride and this album, so this one has a special place in my mind. As The Flower Withers is great too, but the ones that really got me into this kind of metal are albums like A Line Of Deathless Kings, Like Gods Of The Sun, The Angel And The Dark River and Turn Loose Swans, which must be the heaviest MDB album. It´s basically love at first sight for me and the love hasn´t died. Warming up to this band also would be an unforgettable moment.
10. From these 3 famous English death doom bands, the "top 3 from the 90's", which one would be the most influential for GOD DISEASE's music?
Ilkka: I think it´s Paradise Lost after all.
Ville: Anathema
or MDB did not play any major role in my musical background so for
me it is Paradise Lost also.
11. The last years we saw the most extreme forms of doom develop and more bands to embrace it, I'm thinking about the most obscure doom death, the deeper style that almost comes without melodies and has very deep vocals... What do you think of this style? Is it a bit too much as you'd prefer to hear more regular "Death doom/ Death metal"? Sometimes some of these bands are so drowning that it's not really "metal" anymore, it sounds closer to drone, or dark ambient/ industrial perhaps…
Ilkka: I think you mean bands like Encoffination, which I think is just wonderful stuff. I like the misery… Always great to see people pushing the boundaries of extreme music.
Ville: Those kind of music have their moments and places where to be heard and to be enjoyed.
12. To come back to God disease, Metal archives doesn't tell us a lot about the musicians' previous bands... Since I think you're rather closer to the 30's than the 20's, there should have been other metal formations before... Can you tell us about it?
Ilkka: This is my first band ever… I had some side project called November 1939, but it died away fast. This band has so far fulfilled my ambitions in music and just recently I started arranging a festival called Helsinki Death Fest, so.. I don´t need other “real bands” at the moment.
Ville: For me there isn’t much to tell. Some high school bands back then and couple of minor projects by myself and loyal friend called Mr. EzDrummer (drum machine). God Disease is my first “serious” band and I am putting all my effort for it.
13. I saw you had quite a lot of musician changes since the creation of the band. Does it mean old school death isn't very popular in Finland? Since these changes occurred partly for the guitarists, I wonder how you're able to keep the style of the band coherent... How does it remain GOD DISEASE?
Ilkka: By the time we started OSDM was not popular. Now it is. Back then Black Metal was the fashionable music and actually one of the guitarist left our band to join Barathrum… I guess we have just found the right people who understood what was the point of this band and we have carried on.
14. What's your opinion about tape releases and paper fanzines? Do they own a place in the underground in 2016 or i's only for nostalgic peoples? Are you rather for CDs, tapes or vinyl releases?
Ilkka: I think
they have their place in metal. I personally collect paper zines
and I have started to have some tapes in my collection also. Even
though I have no way to play them.
15. Which albums and demos are you listening to the most? Could you survive on a desert island if you had to take only newer Finnish bands, and if so which ones would you choose? (If the answer is too hard, you could also take releases from the 90's...)
Ilkka: Recently I have listened a lot to old classics, but I always keep my eye out to find new bands. Cryptic Brood is one that I have listened a lot recently and Chthe'ilist, Chapel Of Disease and Cruciamentum albums have been under heavy use too. On a desert island I would take Solothus, Galvanizer, Instant and Lantern releases! But I would kill myself fast without my whole record collection.
Ville: Can’t name any particular what i have listened the most recently but Krypts new album is sooo good and I think I take that to the desert island and die happily there.
16. What will be the next projects of GOD DISEASE? Something special to announce? Blessed be the sickness.
Ilkka: A process for debut album is up next. We will take a break from live shows until it´s done so we return in June to play with Funebrarum, Rippikoulu and Corpsessed in Helsinki. Blessed Be The Sickness.
Web
page:
https://goddiseasofficial.bandcamp.com
