Utter Trash--Nasum

Welcome to Helvete

An interview with Anders of Nasum

By Mike Salamone (with Bob Ignizio)

While many grindcore bands today spin tales of zombies and gore, Nasum (Anders - drums and vocals, Mieszko - guitar and lead vocals, Jesper - bass, and Urban Skytt - guitar) prefer to follow the path of bands like Napalm Death with a more thoughtful, political approach to their lyrics. The Finnish band's latest release on Relapse Records, 'Helvete', cements their position as one of the top bands in their genre with a collection of brutal anthems intended to wake the listener up and get them to think about what's going on in the world.

Mike Salamone: How did the band come together? What was your first release and when did it come out?

Anders: Nasum was formed by me and a guy called Rickard Alriksson back in the fall of 1992. By spring 1993 Mieszko joined us and we did our first recording which was a split 7" EP with the legendary Agathocles. We kept on doing a couple of more recordings until Rickard left us. Mieszko and I kept on as a two piece doing some more recordings for compilations and split 7"'s until we got signed by Relapse and did our first album "Inhale/exhale". Following that we found Jesper who joined us on bass and we started to do shows and tours. Since then we've done two more albums ("Human 2.0" and "Helvete") and continued to do shows and tours.

MS: What are the circumstances regarding Jesper leaving the band? Have you found a replacement yet?

A: Jesper's reasons to leave the band is described in detail, and in his own words on our website. He's leaving the band in September and we haven't found a replacement yet, but that'll happen soon.

MS: Your lyrics tend to deal with social and political issues. How would you describe the band's political stance?

A: The band have no political stance as a group. We all have different ideas (they are of course in the same ballpark) which we explain in our lyrics. We write about situations and problems in the world. Our lyrics are mainly directed to the listener so that he or she can get some ideas and then take it from there. We don't write "change the system!", we write "change yourself!" to put it easy.

A: The Shane Embury appearance all started with a weird idea: "What if we could get Shane to come and play with us on the album?", and some how we made that weird idea a reality. Shane came to us and spent a couple of days with us in the studio. He's a really quick learner, so quick that we had to teach him two more songs than the one ("Whip") that we wanted him to play on! The Jörgen Sandström appearance was actually planned for "Human 2.0" when we were fooling around with an idea to record an old track with many guest vocalists. That didn't happen but this time we could feature Jörgen here and there on the album, which was great. And Petter Freed is a local friend who came up to the studio and did some guitar noises on one song.

A: We wanted to have a one word title that would sum up the whole album - the lyrics, the ideas, the sound and so on - and we found that "Helvete" was the best word. It refers to the state of the world, the personal hells of many people in today's society, but it also refers to the energy and power of the music.

MS: What is your songwriting process like? Do you write your music to fit the lyrics or vice versa?

A: We all write music and lyrics separately. The music and lyrics are equally important for us, but I guess that we spend the most time on the music because not all listeners read the lyrics. We also write our songs individually. I write my songs by myself at home and the others write their songs the same way. Of course we make some adjustments and such when we play them together but we never "jam" songs together.

A: Well, Jesper is leaving to put more effort in his "real" band Burst which is a really cool hardcore type of band. Me and Mieszko have a crust band called Krigshot that exists now and then. Mieszko is also in punkrock maniacs Genocide SuperStars and our new guitar player Urban is of course playing in Regurgitate. Check them all out - it's good stuff!

MS: What other styles of music do you listen to besides grind/death metal and are you influenced in your writing by styles different than your own?

A: We listen to all kinds of music, some stuff very very far away from grindcore or underground related stuff. We like whatever is good, and we get inspiration from everything that we listen to. It's such a waste not to pick up inspiration from all possible sources.

A: There will be shows in the U.S. but I think we'll have to play in Europe first. Eventually we'll return to the land of milk and honey...

Bob Ignizio: What are your views on the present political climate, specifically the Iraq war and Bush II in general?

BI: Unfortunately your style of music combined with the serious lyrical content means you're probably not going to be hugely successful from a commercial standpoint. What do you do when you're not playing in the band to help pay the bills?

A: Mieszko has his own recording studio called Soundlab studios. I work at the local newspaper as a web designer and freelance writer. Urban is a teacher without a job and Jesper is currently working as a reporter on another newspaper.