|
THE ARCHIVES
|
Morrigan's Pit has closed down as of November 2006. The site and its articles will stay online as an archive until September at least, but probably longer.
The Archives
2002-2006
» CD REVIEWS
» INTERVIEWS
» LIVE REVIEWS
» SPECIALS
|
|
|
|
|
ANGEL BLAKE
|
Marko Tervonen
April 2006
http://www.angelblake.com
I'll make Marko's last words in this interview the first for this intro: "Angel Blake isn't a Crown Mark II, I'm not on a mission to convert old Crown fans. The music of Angel Blake is something different. So if you're up for a different sort of ride, try it, you just might like it ;-)". The talented musician used to be part of The Crown, who called it quits a while ago. Angel Blake is totally different - dark, melancholic but energetic, diverse and with clean vocals by Tony Jelencovich. For the debut album, Marko did everything (except the vocals) by himself, but he now has formed a band around him. Read what he had to say about Angel Blake's debut album, his plans and his motivations.
It must be great to have a come-back like this in the metal scene. Was it important for you to do something very different from the Crown and to start from scratch again? I can imagine it's very satisfying, esp. if it's all your own work.
Hi! Yes, my post-Crown life feels extremely good so far. Not only music wise, but also other things like family, and I finally got the time to start up my own recording studio, that has been a dream for a long time.
But yeah, it was very important for me to do it 100% from the heart. I knew that some poople would bitch that the music isn't "extreme" anymore, or death metal or whatever. During the years I have always loved midtempo melancholic metal bands like Paradise Lost, Sentenced to name a few. And I kind of felt lonely liking those bands in The Crown. There were some songs/riffs in that style that I tried to include in the Crown's sound. And it surely created some cool songs, but it wasn't exactly 
how I wanted them to be, of course for many reasons, like Johan's death metal vocals and the band's high energy performances etc. But now I really wanted to dive into the whole music with open arms and just make the music that came naturally out of me. When I started doing it, there was no stop to it. After the album was done. The songs kept on coming. I already have about 10 new song foundations written. And that's a really cool feeling. I guess there has been a lot of "old luggage" that has been waiting to be unleashed. I'm in a creative peak right now and I'm enjoying every minute of it.
Was it by choice that you played all instruments yourself instead of forming a band first?
It may sound strange, but at that point I felt that it was the easiest way to get the album done. I didn't want to stress and select the people, learn them the songs etc. I felt that it would be cool to kind of set the tone for Angel Blake by myself for the debut album. Whether the next album will be recorded as a band or just by myself, I don't know. But for the debut it felt right to do it the egoistic megalomaniac way...hahah. It was definitely a challenge!!!
Did the band name come from the Danzig song?
Yeah, I always liked that title. And it's also cool that the name originally comes from an old-school horror film called "Blood On Satans Claw". Sweet stuff! I also like the fact that it's a pretty "neutral" name, it doesn't lock the music into any specific genre.
Since the recording you did form a band. What can you tell me about these musicians? I only know that Janne Saarenpää was also in The Crown, and Christian Älvestam is also in Scar Symmetry, right? Will this be a live band only, or do you also plan to record a next album with the whole band?
As I said, I really don't know at this point. I haven't started thinking about the next album yet. But I'm really glad about the line-up, really cool and talented people. It's gonna be a blast doing some shows in the summer!
How did you get together with Tony Jelencovich and did you consciously look for a clean dark rock voice like his?
Yes, after I did a demo and listened to the songs 100000 times, I knew that the songs needed a vocalist in the style of James Hetfield vs. Nick Holmes. The songs needed a real singer. Tony has a voice that sounds very sincere. He's a real rock vocalist and I like the vibe that his voice contributes to the music.
What made you attract a contrabass player (Örjan Wressel) instead of a "normal" bass player for the band? On the album it's normal bass except on "... 'Til The End", right?
Yeah, only "…'Til The End" has a contrabass recorded. That's actually the only thing I regret about the album, I wish that every song would have been played with a contrabass. That's how it's gonna be on the next album. Both sound wise and visually the contrabass is cool as hell. I don't know if any other metal band has a contrabassist. I know that Type-O used to have it on the Black nr.1 video, but I think it's only on the video though… A contrabass with a nice touch of distortion is just mega heavy!!
"Autumnal" sounds very different from the rest, it sounds like some old recording and it's very very sad. Is there a specific story to it?
It just came out of me a few hours after we decided to bury the Crown. We were in the studio doing the re-recording of "Crowned Unholy". And there was this piano there, and I just sat there by the piano for 30 minutes and the song just came out of me. And I used to have this very poor dictaphone with me (you know those small tape recorders journalists have) to be able to record ideas whenever they popped up. So I put the dictaphone on rec-mode and played it. Just to immortalize the 
music for myself. After I got home I listened through the "idea tape" and really liked that piano theme. My original plan was to re-record it later on for the album. But then I realized that the original recording had a lot of atmosphere. Since the dictaphone is of poor quality, the tape varies in speed all the time. So everything sounds old, out of tune and of course mono I might add. So I used exactly that recording for the album, didn't even polish up the sound.
Why did you choose to cover "Paint It Black"? It seems (to me) to be one of those songs that's so unique that you can't really capture the same spirit in a cover...
I know that it's not the most original choice of a cover song. It's been done 100 times before. But I have wanted to cover this song for over 7 years. I just had this very simple version of it in my head and now when I got Angel Blake and a good singer, I just went for it. People seem to either love it or hate it, and that sort of reactions are always fun.
You have just recorded a video for "The Forsaken", can you tell us a little bit about it?
It's a pretty simple video with some 2D and 3D animations + the band. The original story to it was very cool. But unfortunately when I got the first edition I didn't like it at all, it was poorly done. The "side-story" to the video I mean. So in the end we concentrated on using a lot of the band footage instead. Feel free to request it on TV-stations and help spreading the Angel Blake word!!
How do you look back on the time with The Crown? How bad was it for you when the band disbanded - I could imagine being lost for a bit when something like that happens, but possibly you were already ready for a new direction in your musical life?
Janne said it the best on our webpage when we quit, that "I'm sure every member in the band can still come up with 10 reasons for continuing and 10 reasons for giving up, but after some heavy consideration we have decided to finally find out what life is like without playing in The Crown". There were a lot of issues that suffered from us having that band. We were in a situation where we did "impossible" things over and over again. The Crown demanded extremely much of our time, wich is all cool, but the downside was that the "normal" side of our lives just suffered too much. Jobs we couldn't keep, relationships that crashed, "impossible" tours with no money involved etc etc. There was never a problem within the band, it was just the whole situation that ate up our spirits. Some of us CAN tour 200 dates per year, and some of us simply can't. We are grown up people now (age of 30) and there are families to think about. When we started the band we were 15 years old, mommy paid our bills, no relationships or kids involved. It was a different situation 14 years later...
The album cover was done by Locus Constructions.. who are behind that name and what else have they done?
That's two guys running that thing. They did Crown's "Possessed 13", the DVD and the "Crowned Unholy" package. + several t-shirts + graphics. They are extremely talented and always come up with original ideas. Check out their website for more info, www.locustconstructions.com. They do webpages, textil and all kinds of graphics...
You have your own studio since last year, Studio-MT, how is that going?
It's all good. I really love having my own studio and I've been quite busy recording other bands. New offers and projects keeps on coming, so the future looks bright. Check www.studio-mt.com - I'm up for doing recordings, mixes and all kinds of work that involves sound.
Is there any news about a possible tour or festival gigs maybe?
Yeah, so far we're confirmed to do the Summerbreeze festival in August in Germany, that's gonna be cool. I'm hoping to book some more festivals for the summer...
I wish you guys luck and hope to see you live some day soon! Any last words for our readers?
Angel Blake isn't a Crown Mark II, I'm not on a mission to convert old Crown fans. The music of Angel Blake is something different. So if you're up for a different sort of ride, try it, you just might like it ;-)
submitted by Marlies 08.05.2006
|
|
|
|
|
