Het tweede hoofdstuk van het tot op het bot gaande doomcollectief Colosseum is geschreven. ‘Chapter 2: Numquam’ zal de harten van illustere doom metal fans deze winter weer zeker verwarmen. Wat de band onder leiding van Juhani Palomäki (bekend van Yearning) ons op dit nieuwe album laat horen is een staaltje wanhopige droefenis die er mag wezen. Ik had dan ook al vlug inspiratie om de man een aantal vragen te stellen om ieders winterdepressie nog even te doen oplaaien. Met een kwinkslag en onderhoudend, dat wel.
Hello Juhani! We did an interview when the debut came out, and now with the sophomore record ‘Chapter 2: Numquam’ it is about time for the second chapter in Colosseum’s development. First of all can you give us some insight of what happened after the release of ‘Chapter 1: Delirium’. Was it received well? Did it come up to your expectations? Greetings. ‘Chapter 1: Delirium’ got mostly very positive response when we look at the reviews, ‘though the music is quite negative in spirit. Of course there were a few exceptions to this matter, but that can always be expected. Even the bigger metal magazines in Finland gave special attention to this release and that was kind of surprise considering that the style of music we play isn’t too mainstream. Luckily the people have noticed what’s the essence of this music: the atmosphere. We played a few live shows in Finland and Latvia and I was composing new material all the time. With ‘Delirium’ we succeeded in creating very heavy and dark atmosphere and the things that lacked something production-wise on the debut were fixed on the second album.
When we had contact late 2007 five songs for ‘Chapter 2: Numquam’ were already written. Can you tell about the further development and recordings this time? Yes, that was a productive period of time. I had no conscious direction where to go, but it was more like a very intuitive way of working. When you walk around day after day holding all the weight of the world on your shoulders it will show on your work also. All that milk you carry from the store everyday ain’t that light, you know... and so soon is a time for another funeral, day after day. Very often I wonder how this inspiration really works and I can more often understand those wackos who say they feel like they’re under some sort of outside force that works through them when they create music. I believe in hardly nothing overall, but the process of creation has something mystic and weird in itself. You get carried away and move along with the atmosphere and it feels like you’re going somewhere automatically guided by your instinct, sub-consciousness or whatever. Then there are some people who think you should use some drugs to create something more interesting. Why should you in the first place? You have to be out of your mind in some way already. Anyway, my mind was flowing with new ideas luckily and I made demos to all the other band members and we even rehearsed few times for the recordings. Some songs changed a bit during the time and it’s always wise to check out that everything is in its right place before entering the studio. I recorded the keyboards/orchestrations at home and sent them to our guitarist Olli who played with these files and also created some new elements in there. It took a few months to make all that work and then suddenly we had an idea to use real instruments instead of just synthesizers. We contacted some people we knew and sent them demos of what they should play. The idea came quite late, but luckily we succeeded in doing all the recordings in time. We used D-Studio again and this time we had a clear thought of how we wanted for example the guitars to sound like compared to the previous album. The sessions were very relaxed and we stayed on the schedule. We worked very long days naturally, but that’s just cool when you’re doing what you like to do.
It leaps to the eye that the album has an increase of orchestral arrangements, adding a highfaluting zest to the music. I think this had an impact on the recordings as well, isn’t it? Yes, that’s very important factor on this album. The other one is heavy guitar sound. From the beginning it was clear that we wanted to sound big and during the process it even came to our minds that we’re going too far with this. Now, when listening to the final result, one can be only satisfied. The atmosphere is strong and at times scary as hell. Anyway, the amount of tracks in the songs is at its best 300-400! That’s quite a lot compared to my old 4-tracker that was quite useful during the old times. We worked with classically trained musicians on cello, violin, trumpet and flute and ‘though the sample libraries nowadays are very useful nothing beats the real instrument in the hands of a skilful player. With a music that’s so full of details and many elements finding a right balance between these is quite a task. The new album is more orchestral and dense, but still we wanted guitars to have more room in the songs as it is still metal we’re playing. Olli spent many months in mixing the album, but as we can hear the guitars sound much better than on the debut.
Another important feature is the contribution of session musicians to your four-piece core. How did this come into being and can you tell something about your thoughts and your intentions on that level? (flute, trumpet, cello, violin) In fact the other guys in the band had this idea about using real instruments. I knew the cellist Aapo Romu as he went the same music school as I did back in the old days. He plays in Vanguard, a Helsinki placed metal outfit and has played also on the album of Let Me Dream. He liked our material and he was in. Cello as an instrument is fucking great sounding. Very soon I had an idea where I would like to hear that instrument and there were plenty of different tracks used with that instrument in the studio. I sent some demos and notes to Aapo and we fixed some things in the studio. All in all it went very smoothly. Risto Vuorensola is also a professional musician and he played straight from the note paper all the necessary parts. Cellos and trumpets work very effectively, for example at the finale of ‘Towards The Infinite’ and ‘Prosperity’. There are some choirs etc on the background as all the hell breaks loose. Our guitarist knew Elise Hujanen who played the flute parts and the drummer Sameli happened to know Heidi Savilakso who performs the violin parts. We had very busy schedule in the studio and there was not too much time for a session musicians to rehearse, but luckily all went very well. Their contribution on these songs means that there’s even more tracks on the songs to make it big and with real instruments this time the end result is even more effective. The flutist seemed to be quite emotional as she began to cry while hearing the material in the studio. We must have done something right this time.
I think the album is more accessible than its predecessor without loosing its heaviness, do you agree on that? The overall sound on ‘Chapter 2: Numquam’ is heavier, but there’s some shorter songs also compared to the debut and there’s a bit more variation between the songs. We’re still playing the same style of music, but this time with a more refined way and with a stronger and bigger production. The nuances and variations are small, but still noticeable. There’s plenty of ways to suffer and die. The opening track ‘Numquam’ for example offers the fastest beat in our history and I can still guarantee it’s not too fast. It’s like some old Katatonia song played on slow motion. On the other hand in eerie ‘Towards The Infinite’ and massive ‘Prosperity’ there’s slowest beats ever compared to debut. As paradoxical as it is, the fourth song on the album ‘The River’ (that’s about the red river flowing from your veins) is as catchy as a funeral doom song can get and you can simply not go further in that direction, ‘cause that would be a sacrilege. And yes, still it’s a very heavy song. Compared to the debut ‘Chapter 2’ may be a bit more accessible, but we still have to remember what music we’re talking about. It’s not too “nice” or “easy listening” stuff. It’s not party music. It’s the stuff you’d like to listen while being alone at night, dark stuff you know. Luckily there’s some people who are into this type of “cut your veins open with a cheese-slicer”-music, otherwise we wouldn’t have an audience. There has to be music for everyday funeral. But seriously speaking it’s great that we’ve got dark music in the world. That will always cheer you up. C’mon, I found a band called Comatose Vigil from Russia as someone said it’s in a same vein as us and I feel better than ever listening to that stuff. On the other hand I want to kill myself while listening to any other band, so my medication is not correct this time. Too bad.
But fewer guitar soloing starring, or am I wrong? The absence of fluttering guitar lines is partly replaced by the richness of keyboards and orchestration I would say… On the songs like ‘Towards The Infinite’ and ‘Demons Swarm By My Side’ the leads play a smaller role, but on the other songs there’s still plenty of them, but maybe they just were unnoticed by you. In the title track, ‘The River’,’Narcosis’ and ‘Prosperity’, the lead guitars play quite remarkable role. They might be a bit lower on the mix than on the debut as the rhythm guitars and orchestrations demand some space. It took from me a bit time before I got used to a final mix of the album, but now I notice that all the elements are in their right place. Sometimes you wonder how it would be like making a song with just one guitar, bass, drums and vocals. That would be something different. The basis to me in the song-writing is to find interesting chords in the first place, doesn’t matter if it’s from the guitar or keyboards, something I can lean on while creating these lead guitar parts. Some people worship riffs and I don’t blame them for that, but I just must worship chords. Different intervals form together different moods and that’s just always evocative to your guitar playing. In the basic death metal for instance you just have to come up with a killer riff and that’s it (old school death metal was better with this), but when you’re dealing with atmospheric suicidal music (“wine is fine, but whiskey’s quicker..”) you have to go from a different starting point. I’ve tried to combine influences from classical music to those influences from metal all my life and even succeeded few times. Next is the time to combine African Voodoo-music to NSBM. Anyone interested? Who shall cast the first stone?
What does ‘Numquam’ mean? What does it stand for? ‘Numquam’ is a Latin word that translates to ‘Never’. It has to do with thematics about the finality of death. This finality is what really makes death painful for a human being to conceive. To this pain human has created various explanations and fairytales that have brought comfort to some people and more suffering to others. Well, what are the thoughts of a dying atheist..? Not too cheerful I bet. I myself as an atheist look at death at all its cruelty and bareness and wrote a song about that. These are some facts we have to face in our lives and they are definitely not pleasant things. Well, the song itself isn’t too pleasant either and is not even supposed to be. People want some entertainment and behold here it is. Bollocks. ‘Numquam’ fits also as a title to a whole album, ’cause there’s this feeling of finality all over this album and death lurks around the corner in many of these songs. I will never write about death again… oops, I did it again.
And closely linked to this question: can you shine a (dim) light on the lyrical contents this time? Lyrics are not based on Lovecraftian writings anymore. There’s no clear literary influences or references and if there is that’s just purely coincidental. When I write lyrics I pay attention to aesthetics of the words in itself and try to avoid the most obvious choices, still often failing with this. Music can explain the unexplainable, but the words are more limited case. A friend of mine once said he has trouble with expressing himself through language. I was a bit perplexed. The words were not enough for him. Later he turned into a professional dancer. Maybe he now has more fun. Gosh, I hate dancing. Anyway, the lyrics are a desperate effort to illustrate the atmosphere of the music. As my life has been very dark, the music is very dark and so the lyrics cannot be about mystical gardening accidents (anyone seen Spinal Tap) no matter how tragic they might seem to be. I already explained enough about the title track on your previous question. Other tracks include paranoia, depression, surrealism, misanthropy, suicidal views, escapism and such. I’m not very eager to go into details as I think that would spoil it all from listeners/readers perspective. There has to be more questions than the answers and luckily there is. There has to be a room for personal interpretation.
The albums all are a chapter, which reminds me of literature. Can we see your works as a reflection of personal experiences, like a diary? A kind of catharsis? Colosseum’s songs are not autobiographical in a lyrical sense. Of course your own life affects to your works and so there might be some similarities and connections, but on the whole it’s not definitely a diary. If I’d write about my own life it would be so boring we should slow down even the remaining bits of the tempo. Chapters are a view of a band called Colosseum at a certain time. We haven’t decided how many chapters we’ll make. I believe it’s less than a hundred. About catharsis I’d say that it’s great to release your negative energy through something creative. And negative energy is definitely infinite resource. That’s ‘Prosperity Of Poverty’.
One would even discover a glimpse of hope in a title as ‘Prosperity’… but I guess it isn’t the case? Yes, exactly the opposite. One should first read the lyrics of ‘Prosperity’ and then watch a film of Aki Kaurismäki. The song itself offers a view where you turn the things upside down and view all the negative as a richness. Well, that’s when you’re wealthy. A millionaire, indeed. Congratulations! You’ve just won in the lottery: abundance of grief, prosperity of poverty and wealth of misery. Cheers.
By the way, this is an amazing composition. Can you tell a bit more about the writing and realization of ‘Prosperity’? In fact there was nothing special I guess. I just had an idea or two, started playing and liked what I heard. Lyrics are quite special in their view ‘though there’s the “necessary words for doom metal” included. It’s just some sort of inverted view point in there. This song is one of my absolute favourites on the album. This Doomy can you get. The finale of the song reminds a bit of Allegretto part of Beethoven’s seventh symphony, but not too much.
‘The River’ has been broadcasted on Finnish web radio. Well, that’s kind of remarkable… A friend of ours is a co-host of that show in the Radio Noise and they played that song. They’ve got a metal show where they play even the more extreme music. They had Skepticism interview also and stuff like that. It isn’t so usual that this kind of music gets airplay, but now we’ve witnessed that it’s possible.
You have filmed material for a videoclip of ‘Towards The Infinite’. What about that plans, because I cannot find the result on YouTube? Yes, we have filmed lots of material and have very clear idea of how we’d like it to be. Lately we’ve had some obstacles on the way, so the video isn’t ready yet. It will be someday anyway and it will not be nothing like a usual music videos.
When looking for your home place I stumble on places with names like Kanta Häme and Riihimäki. Where is it in Finland and can you tell a bit more about the environment you live in… We rehearse in a small town in the southern Finland called Riihimäki and this is where I’ve lived for ten years now. This is a small, quite ugly town, but there’s some forests and lakes nearby like almost everywhere in Finland. Our drummer Sameli lives quite far from here in Salo, that’s a small town in the west side of Finland. Our bass player Janne lives in the middle of a forest outside the conurbation with no neighbours nearby so it’s quite cosy. It’s a very small place called Topeno. Guitarist Olli just moved to a small village near Riihimäki called Renko. All the members live nearby Riihimäki with an exception of Sameli who has to drive few hours to come to rehearsals. Finland is everywhere the same, forests and lakes everywhere wherever you go. Well, if you go to northern part of Finland, Lapland, the forests are not so dense and there are some fells of course.
With ‘Outro’ it seems as if we are landed close to the experimental ‘Umma Gumma’ and middle part section of ‘Meddle’ of Pink Floyd. What do you think of this feel regarding to this spatial sounds? Well, I haven’t heard this Pink Floyd number, so I can’t compare these. It’s experimental music as the ending of the album. We tried out all the weird stuff we could get our hands on in the studio. All the weird gadgets were used. If we had used all the tracks we recorded the end result would have been terrible. Luckily Olli had a clever way of mixing the song. I remember hearing these sorts of sounds on some old King Crimson album if I have to compare it to something. We spent one whole day recording it and it was fun thing to do.
I see you only did five gigs until now. That is not much (of course Colosseum’s music is different from the stuff festivals book, I understand… There has been only few gigs and with doom metal being quite unpopular music it isn’t easy to book gigs and more impossible to get paid for it. We’re still looking forward to play some gigs in the future. Luckily there’s some doom happenings around the world and we’re interested in these kinds of things.
Are there any plans to play live again? There are some plans, but nothing’s confirmed yet.
When you are on stage, are there many people who know you from Yearning? At least here in Finland there is. There were some plans to bring Yearning to live-band format couple of years ago, but these plans dried up.
Now that this name has dropped, the future of Yearning was insecure when we spoke last time. What are the prospects for that band at the moment? At the moment there’s a couple of new songs ready, but nothing else to inform about.
And what are your hopes and wishes for the near future for Colosseum? We’re starting to rehearse for gigs, trying to book some gigs and I’ve written couple of new songs that are going to a more extreme direction.
Last words are for you… Check out ‘Chapter 2: Numquam’ and see you at the gigs hopefully soon! Doom and be Doomed!
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