It’s very much the album we wanted to make. Faster, noisier and more out of control than "Harsh Realities", but still having the same type of recognisable songwriting. The oldest songs were written back in 2011 and have appeared on the split with Sete Star Sept and the rest at different points between that and 2016. Now we had a clearer vision of the album as a whole than with "Harsh Realities", so instead of just writing songs we were writing songs for this album. How we write really varies, sometimes a song feels ready the first time we play it together, sometimes it keeps changing from rehearsal to rehearsal. And considering how rarely we’re able to rehearse that can literally take years. Finding time was the most difficult thing about writing and recording the album, it was actually recorded at four or five different sessions in various places during a couple of months. Big thanks for how the record turned out goes to our friend Mikael who recorded and mixed the whole thing, and who really helped us achieve our vision.
Someone spoke about "Step Down“ as the "Chinese Democracy“ oft
the grindcore scene….in general, did you realise that a lot of people described
the "Harsh Realities“ -album as a real grindcore masterpiece ?!
Luckily it didn’t take as long, but it’s obvious that people have been waiting for the second LP for a long time. Still, we didn’t feel that we had to hurry in making the second one because we didn’t want to do a rushed record just for the sake of making a new record. "Harsh Realities" wasn’t really planned, we just went and recorded all the songs we had and then took time to arrange them into a working order. We also didn’t know how to achieve what we wanted in the studio, so the production is actually cleaner than what we had in mind. Big part of DT80k is making just the kind of grindcore we want to hear so it didn’t suprise us that people who already liked the same bands we did also liked the LP. Of course we didn’t expect it to happen on the scale it did. What has been a lot more suprising is how many people who are not that much into grindcore also really like it.
Let’s talk about the lyrics. I think they can be described as traditional
grindcore-lyrics concerning socio-political issues. The artworks oft your
records go torwards this direction as well. If I remember correctly, you
described yourself in a post on your facebook as „Social justice warriors“. In
„Cause/Avoid“ from the new album you write: „In the end it‘s really fucking
simple, you either cause or avoid suffering. The options are literally handes
on a plate.“ Generally, I agree, but is it really that simple ? Isn’t life more
complex and aren’t there more colors than just black or white ? Of course you
can’t write about that complexity in a 40-second grind eruption, that’s
obvious…In „Repeating failures“ you speak about futile attempts of the
government to stop enviromental pollution…
Especially in these times when everyone who is considered to be politically correct gets labeled as a SJW by the alt-right it only makes sense to fully embrace and carry that label with pride. So yeah, we are a political band and we’re definitely social justice warriors. The lyrics are intentionally very blunt, and they’re more about making a statement than having a discussion." Cause/Avoid" is about using animal products, and that is a topic that - in the end - is quite simple. If you are a healthy person living in a first world country there is no reason at all to keep eating meat and supporting factory farms as the alternative is so easy. "Repeating failures" deals with two specific projects that have taken place here in the last few years, the start of a mine at Talvivaara and the plans to build a nuclear power plant at Pyhäjoki. In those cases the government has actually done the opposite, supporting the failing mine with hundreds of millions euros while it keeps making losses and causing damage to the nearby lakes. At Pyhäjoki the state has allowed the project to proceed even though all the necessary plans are still not presented, and as a result the nature reserve in the area has been leveled to make room for the infrastucture even though they don’t have the permits to build the plant yet.
Jori has Sick World (hardcore), Tomi plays in Vallanhimo (hardcore punk),Rust(mincecore) and Profit (noisegrind), Oula is also in Rust and then he has
about a dozen different noisegrind/gorenoise/noisecore projects. Ville is the
busiest one and plays currently at least in Hard Action (rock) and the hardcore
punk bands Kohti Tuhoa, Perikato and Yleiset Syyt.
There are some really interesting active grindcore bands in Finland right
now. Houre from Tampere is a great band with lots of noisy blasting and good
riffage. From Joensuu comes the young band Happivaje who are full of energy and
improving on every gig. For friends of pitch shifter Tunkio is a must listen.
It’s a two-piece from Jyväskylä. Their guitarist has an awesome solo project
called Tolerance which is mincing madness with programmed drums. Unohdettu Tulevaisuus from Helsinki has released two 7”s and can be recommended for
anyone who likes it raw and fast.Romutus is also a highly recommended
noise/crust band.
You have now signed with Svart Records. What were the reasons that you did
not stay at FDA Records (which was called FDA Rekotz before) ?
No other reason than we just had talked with him about releasing
"Harsh Realities", everything worked really well with both FDA and
Rödel Records who did the vinyl version. Having Svart release the second one
came quite naturally as they had already released some other records by some of
us and our friends. FDA and Rödel are also going to repress "Harsh
Realities" again on both CD and LP some time next year as there still
seems to be demand for them.
One thing i always want to ask to: Do the finnish people really drink so
much alcohol, or is that just a stereotype ? I have read, that the finnish
people drink less than the european average, if you look at the sales of
alcohol. But maybe finnish people drink a lot of home-made brandy ? And what
can you tell us about your home town Lappeenranta-according to wikipedia, the
most prominent people were icehockey players. Is that (icehockey) still very
important in finland ?
It seems that the average consumption has been getting lower, but that is
also a thing that is getting more polarised. Most people are drinking less, but
the part of people who already are not doing that well keep drinking. Growing
up in Lappeenranta we pretty much didn’t have anything in common with those who
played hockey. Luckily back then there were other things also, like lots of all
ages - hardcore/punk shows and good libraries. Ice hockey draws the biggest
crowds of all the team sports in Finland but it’s still not much of an interest
for us. Some of us are really passionate about other team sports, while others don’t really care about them at all.
What about playing live in the nearer future ? Will you come to germany as
well ?
Right now there is nothing planned. We’re not a band that is able to tour
and play very often, so it will take a while before we’re going to play outside
Finland again. We’ve been to Germany a few times already, and while we’re
definitely going to play there again next time we tour Europe our next tours
will probably be to places where we haven’t been before.
The last words are yours…
Listen to "Step Down" as loud as possible while fighting things
that try to restrict our lives.
pictures: Jouni Parkku
