"IF YOUR HEART SAYS YOU JUST HAVE TO MAKE MUSIC: THEN DO IT!"
LFdM: Hey Jape thank you again for your time, it's always nice to talk to you.
The last time we talked about your "baby", but today I want to talk about CULT, TDF seventh album, released just over five months ago. How pregnancy and childbirth has been? Complicated or something?
Jape: Hello! Well, "CULT" album came out in Finland in the end of June, later somewhere else, I do not even know when and where exactly, but... anyway... It is out alive and this was easy and spontaneous birth! ;)
LFdM: Compared to all the albums released, you have given a deeper and broader meaning to the theme of love, you have not relegated it to a mere intimate relationship between two people. There are only few bands of the Gothic melancholy scene able to sing his own soul. , you had already these lyrics within you, or are the result of a process developed in recent years? Or do they come from your personal journey?
J: I just cannot write well stories of some other persons, and I do not get any kicks about writing some fantasy stories, like so many bands are doing. I always need something from my real life, my own real feelings and thoughts. I always have to drink from my own bottle and taste it first before telling people how it tastes.
LFdM: Lyrics, music… you went into the studio with ideas already clear in your head or ideas came as you started to work together in the same room?
J: I had only some parts to the songs, then we went to the studio and did not think that much what we should do, we just spitted out the picture of that time. No business thinking, not thinking if people would like it or not. I had some lyrics and some melodic parts but that is all. We recorded this album faster than ever before. We did not spend many days at the studio.
LFdM: How much the other members helped the process of implementation? Regarding this, I’d like to know Esa and Juppe’s points of view: To Esa I’d like to ask how he found himself in this new role that has stood out his abilities. Juppe, my congrats for the depth given to the sound with the guitar: great job, beautiful passages of the gloomy electric guitar with the melodic and acoustic ones.
Esa Viren: I´ve always been a guitarist, and playing guitar is my passion, so this change gave me a new flame that comes to make music with TDF. Now finally I can give 100% of me to TDF music. First I joined TDF as a bass player, It was fun too, but I felt like I could not give out all I really can.
Juppe Sutela: Thanks...well, that is something I am gonna continue :)
LFdM: I noticed that you have a predilection for Asian culture. What fascinates you the most about this culture? Have you ever thought about introducing these elements, these influences in your music to embark on a whole new evolution?
J: I love Asian life style, more than western lifestyle. I hate to feel busy, which I am not feeling anymore anyway... and I hate to see or hear about how busy and stressed people are here.I need more sunlight. Even I'm a melancholic man from cold and dark north. I do not say that local people in Asia are not busy or stressed to get their living from some stupid business, but at least I can go there, and live without stress, as a fucking tourist. We need to slow down our lifestyle, everyone of us, no matter is it in Asia or Europe etc.
LFdM: CULT is a very mature album, reminiscent of your best past but it is not a copy of it (singing the same things that were sung in twenty years would have been a bit ridiculous in my opinion). At what point in the discography of TDF do you put CULT? And why?
J: I put it as it is, our seventh album. Samsara was more like just testing some things,more weird stuff and not that TDF kind of album, so With CULT we wanted to do all things more straight and simple.
LFdM: When talking about a new album you cannot help but mention the so-called influences - I also fell into the trap. We confront, as in your case I have often mentioned (as well as other magazines) Sentenced, to lever immediate impact on the type of sound. I am aware that comparisons often trivialize the work. What kind of relationship do you have with the history of the bands you are compared with? Have you ever voluntarily drawn from what they have done and left?
J: I respect Sentenced and we were touring with them back in 2000 around Europe. Of course Sentenced left their mark to many Finnish rocker hearts ,and I think it's cool!
We do not try to copy anyone, but no one can say they have no influences from their favourite bands! That would be total bullshit! There is so much music done in the world, that our brain, mind and soul is filled with feelings and melodies, and those drops are the elements we all are using in our lives, so...Of course all that stuff will be mixed in you,and that is how you make it to be your own, and it comes out as YOU, not as a "Copy". You cannot draw a tree if you do not see it first,or, you cannot make your own sushi before you see and taste Sushi first. After that, just make your own version!
LFdM: Music, as well as literature or painting, has the ability to speak the most hidden part of ourselves, that we are afraid to get out except through a mask. "Unknown III" is a clear example in my view, beyond its sentimental and intimate meaning. Do you feel enriched or emptied when you finish to write a song?
J: I felt like it was my last promise, and last thing to do for our dear friend Tonmi Lillman.
BTW. this summer we played at one very small Finnish Festival, and when we played UNKNOWN III, and I sang a line "Heaven didn´t stop raining, Stars fell from the sky"...it started to RAIN AS HELL, at the same moment! I walked out from the stage, I wanted to feel that rain. This is a true story, and we felt like it was a magical moment.
We felt like Tonmi was there with us. That festival happened on the same place where we spent a lot of time in summer times with Tonmi and other friends.
LFdM: Yeah, I know what you mean..
We've seen in the history of music some vertiginous climbs and painful falls, often unfortunately with no return. Have you ever been ambitious? Eager for success or something?
J: many many years ago I desperately wanted to be a big rock star - but now I'm happy that I lost that stupid wish. Personally I feel very fine to be as I am now. We were more in the magazines, on TV, on Radio, more on tour over ten years ago, now we are smaller, and seems like real promoters do not even care about us, or many people forgot us, but hey!
We are still doing music, doing shows when possible, we can still smile and have fun, we are alive!....so, we have no problems with this :)
Of course it would be more easier to make shows, promotion and all, If we would have someone to help us, but the thing is that we do almost all by ourselves, we just have to live with it, and just enjoy making music... When comes a day we do not enjoy this anymore, then we´ll quit.
Too many bands have been there only because of "Want more money, girls and fame" and as you see, how many Gothic rock/metal bands are left? not many ahahah so, what was their main motivation? and many bands of that genre which are still there changed their music style...We have our thing, and we love it!
LFdM: You are talking about making a new album next year, now I wonder: why choosing to release an album with just 8 tracks including a cover? I mean, you already have the material I guess, CULT is wonderful but it was maybe better to wait? Or is it really a bet with yourself making a new album after one year only?
J: when CD´s came, people started to create longer albums, so this was not only a joke but anyway...that let´s do only eight songs and that´s it! And because we do not sell that much, we are not rich people, why should we spend more and more our own money at the studio just to give too many songs for free to the people? If we would live without money, we would not care about it, but hey! We have to buy food too, not only to be at the studio and pay about it and ask someone to push record button. Eat that.. and If we would have bigger label, as we had in the beginning, of course we would do longer albums too...
We would not have these economy fucking stupid problems. We are poor artists! but well...after this comment people goes to fucking Spotify and check if there are any TDF songs for free:) I HATE IT! taking music for free, is not as Respecting your idols, It is only a free thing to you! and then go to buy some crappy hamburger and poison yourselves ;)
LFdM: Regarding a possible tour in South America: South America as well as China and Japan is a very receptive country in terms of music, a bit less demanding than Europe but very fetish: there are still many people who go to the shops to buy an album. Will you take a long tour or you'd like to do it? Which tour do you remember with particular feeling?
J: About South America, I think it will NEVER happen. There are too many asshole promoters who are ONLY talking bullshit! So, we do not even think about Touring in South America anymore! and for GOOD/REAL promoters in South America,we are too small of a band still....but I guess there is a possibility that we would hit Asia in 2016, but let´s see how things are going.
We would like to tour in Europe, but it seems like there is no Promoters who would do it for us, feels like we are totally forgotten so, We will play here in Finland and that´s it, and we do not wait for anything to happen for us, still we are ok here, in our small messy cave by ourselves :) !
LFdM: No words.. the world is full of sharks who work not for music but for their affairs. What you said is real, is a matter of who is better at kissing people's ass.
I won’t ask if we'll ever see TDF in Italy because I already know the answer, and as I've said, I often renounce to many live events in Italy because I don't want to give nothing to certain people. Unfortunately the passion for music is succumbing to some strange trends dictated primarily by ignorance, a poor musical culture and a lot of self-centered bullshit. What kind of help should have a band to move forward in a concrete way without having to resort to the sponsorship of the coolest member? ;)
J: At the moment, rock world is NOT dead, but it is more like underground. Nowadays youngsters does not listen music just because of MUSIC, they more like want to have big parties only.
My advice is: DON´T MAKE ANY BAND IF YOU DO NOT LOVE MAKING MUSIC AS HELL! If you make a band just to try to get girls, money and fame, and thinking that stupid Sunset Strip golden years in eighties etc. You are on a wrong way man!
IF YOUR HEART SAYS YOU JUST HAVE TO MAKE MUSIC,THEN DO IT! IF YOU FEEL LIKE YOU ARE NOT "YOU" WITHOUT MAKING MUSIC,THEN DO IT!
Make it from the bottom of your heart, same thing if you try to make love without hard on, no one likes it, You need that hard on right? Same way you need a real passion to CREATE WHATEVER ART!
LFdM: Ok I’d say that for now I asked everything I wanted to know! Bye, thank you and see you soon.
n.b. Samuel Schildt (bass) left the band last sept. 2015
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