Having already firmly established a huge following throughout
Europe with the release of four full length albums (1997's 'Greatest
Lovesongs Vol.666', 1999's 'Razorblade Romance', 2001's 'Deep Shadows
And Brilliant Highlights' and 2003's 'Love Metal'), a greatest hits
set (2004's 'And Love Said No - The Greatest Hits 1997 - 2004') and
a countless number of singles along the way, Finnish melodic gothic
rock act HIM (who are vocalist/songwriter/founder Ville Hermanni Valo,
guitarist Mikko Viljami 'Linde' Lindstrom, bassist Mikko 'Migè
Amour' Paananen, keyboardist Jani 'Burton Emerson' Purttinen and drummer
Mikka 'Gas Lipstick' Karppinen) have finally set their sites further,
and at the tail end of September 2005, offered themselves up to a wider
international audience for the first time with their internationally
released fifth album 'Dark Light'.
While on tour with The Rasmus and Negative, I caught up
with a freshly woken up and very tired (and admittedly verbally challenged)
Ville Valo in Milan (Spain), who was more than happy to talk about the
band's recently completed North American tour, their upcoming tour of
Australia, speculation surrounding reports of a new album due sometime
before the end of 2006 and the success of 'Dark Light' outside of their
core European fan base.
"'Dark Light' has been doing really well. We're very
happy with the album. It's shipped nearly four hundred thousand copies
in the US alone, which is great for us because it's our first official
release over there. England has also done well too, so it's been really
good. It's selling more than 'Love Metal', but then that's not hard
considering that with that album, we never did any real promotion or
tour behind it in the US, and it was only available as an import only.
And for a band such as ourselves, we have to tour so that people know
that we exist and know that we are around. We have the tendency to kick
peoples asses in a good way when we're having a good show, which has
helped us build up such a big fan base. I think we finally managed to
do that with 'Dark Light' in the US. We really haven't had the chance
to sit down and relax and enjoy the fruits of our labour because we've
been touring all the time, but it's not something that worries us. We're
just happy to tour."
Although knowing full well that 'Dark Light' was going
to be HIM's first official release internationally, Valo insists that
the album wasn't shaped or influenced to cater to a certain market.
"(After a lot of thought) I think we all felt like
kids in a candy store. Of course it gave us high hopes knowing we were
getting the album officially released outside of Europe, and giving
us the opportunity to find better promoters in countries such as Australia,
Canada and South America. Basically it gave us half of the world to
explore. I think that was as far as those influences came into the equation,
because musically, 'Dark Light' is still very much a HIM album as anything
else we've done in the past, only a little different."
Wasting little time since the release of 'Dark Light',
HIM has constantly been on the road to support its release, and most
notably in the US.
"We started touring in North America at the start
of October last year, and continued right through to the end of November.
So we did forty gigs over that period, without so much as a day off
in that time. The tour was everything we hoped it would be. It was really
good. Most of the gigs were sold out, and the new songs seemed to strike
a chord in a very positive way, so we were pretty happy with the tour.
It wasn't our first time touring North America, but it was by far the
most extensive tour we had ever done there. When we toured in the past,
it was nothing more than a string of dates that stretched out to a total
of fifteen shows at a time. Normally we did the west coast, and then
the east coast. This time around, we played some of the places in the
middle as well. It was all pretty exciting, especially being in Texas
for the first time. We managed to visit The Alamo, and that was really
cool."
While the historic significance about The Alamo (otherwise
known as Mission San Antonio De Valero) is an important part of American
history, Valo's reasons behind seeing the monument first hand wasn't
for cultural reasons exclusively.
"Oh it wasn't because of the Texan Revolution! We
just wanted to see where Ozzy Osbourne pissed, and then got arrested
for soon afterwards. It's a Mecca for us! (Laughs) If anyone in the
band was interested in its history, that would have to be Purttinen
(Burton). He's always waking up early in the morning so that he can
have a walk around the cities we're in. The only thing I care for is
bookshops and bars. I'm very simple. Give me a good book, and eight
pints and I'll be happy."
A little known fact in regards to HIM tours is that the
band has always played as a headlining act, and never a support.
"You're right, we always headline. We never play
a support slot. That's an unspoken rule that we have had within the
band since day one. The reason for that is that a lot of bands that
tend to start out as a support act tend to stay a support act throughout
their whole career. If you're not careful, it's so easy to become a
constant support and sustain that title without moving up. There's a
lot of bands that just stay as a support, and that's something that
we've never wanted. We would rather play in front of twenty people,
and still headline than play a supporting role to another band. We never
consciously decided to do this from the start, but we've always felt
that it's something that we have to do. It's purely based around word
of mouth and having fans spread the word for us. We recently had Finch
and Skindred supporting us here in the US, and they went down pretty
well. But I would have to say that so far, the best package we've had
to date was the Monster Magnet and Melissa Auf Der Maur back in November
2004. Auf Der Maur was really cool, and I am a huge f**king fan of Monster
Magnet. They're one of the great inspirations for HIM. 1995's 'Dopes
To Infinity' is one of my favourite rock albums of all time. So it felt
really weird to actually headline over one of my favourite bands. So,
in a case like that, I always like to call them co-headliners. It's
not simply because they've been around longer than us, but also because
you have to be really nice to the other bands because you never know
what is going to happen tomorrow. It could very well be the case that
we have to support them one day! (Laughs)"
As mentioned earlier, HIM are finally making their way
down to Australia for the very first time, which Valo hopes will live
up to both his and fans expectations.
"That's super exciting. We have a couple of friends
down there, and we're hoping to meet up with them. We've heard a lot
of great stories about Australia, and because we've never been down
there before, we're all really looking forward to this tour. I can only
hope that we have some time off. I think we're doing a promotional day
in Sydney, and another in Melbourne as well, so there's the possibility
of having a bit of time off to walk around, buy myself a great didgeridoo
and go to a pub to try out a few beers."
Another thing Valo is hoping before hitting Australian shores is for
is his band to actually feel well enough to comfortably play on stage
without having to duck off stage due to sickness.
"Paananen (Migè) has been really suffering
from a stomach flu in recent times, so he's been having the shits and
vomiting the whole time. We're supposed to be playing a show tonight,
so we're hoping that he's feeling a little better by then. When you
have a proper stomach flu, it means that you can't do shit. Well actually,
having said that, it means you literally can! (Laughs) The shit really
does literally hit the fan when you have a sick member of the band with
you out on tour, but we're hoping that he feels better soon."
Apart from the six track live DVD that accompanied the
limited edition version of their greatest hits package 'And Love Said
No - The Greatest Hits 1997 - 2004' and their full length DVD 'Love
Metal Archives Vol.1' (released in 2005), few in Australia have an idea
of what to expect when HIM take to the stage. But as Valo points out,
HIM sound nothing like their polished studio output.
"Image wise, we have a great lighting technician
and chandeliers on the stage. So it's sort of moody, yet funny on the
stage at the same time. But live, we're really loud, and a lot more
gritty sounding than what we're like on our albums. There's a fair bit
of improvisation happening too, so we tend to move about a bit too.
We tend to look like little tiny monkeys in a cage, but sound like gorillas
having the shits! (Laughs) That's the only way I can put it right now.
I'll let you know when I have a better answer to your question. We're
a very live band, and I think that we're simply a lot more energetic
live than what we sound like on our albums. That's actually what we're
hoping to catch for our next album. We want to go a little more in the
direction of how we sound live on stage, which is a bit more adrenaline
fuelled, and a little more up-tempo sounding. We don't necessarily want
to sound any sexier, but definitely hotter."
As talk turns towards their next album, I questioned Valo
about reports that HIM still had quite a few songs left over from the
'Dark Light' sessions, and their plans to release them as another album
before the end of the year.
"I haven't heard about that. Wow. To be brutally
frank, we didn't have any left over songs from the last recording sessions.
All the fillers and killers are on the album. We never record any more
than what we need for the album. There are a lot of bands that do that
though. They will go into the studio and record forty tracks and pick
out the best dozen and compile them together, but we never do that.
We would rather work on the stuff that we like, rather than spend a
lot of time on the stuff that we hate, or think is sub-standard. I've
been working on some new material in recent times, but because we've
been constantly on tour, we've haven't really had the time to sit down,
go to the rehearsal studio and demo that shit out. So it's going to
be a while before we have a new album ready to be released. It's still
going to take a while because I'm still waiting for the concept, that
one song, that one idea that will determine the feel or the theme for
the next album. I have some ideas and bits and pieces, but we're not
that desperate to get into the studio just yet! (Laughs) In the past,
I believe the band was more than happy with me having written all the
stuff before heading into the studio, but I don't f**king like that
anymore. Our next album will be more of a group effort, and the only
way we can make that happen is when we have finished touring and head
into the rehearsal room. It tends to re-energise everybody and bring
out ideas. So any prospect of a new album is still some way off really."
And a long way off it is too, as HIM plan to continue
hitting the road for at least the rest of 2006.
"F**king hell, it's never ending. After our Australian
tour, we're flying over to New Zealand, followed by a trip to LA, where
we'll at least have a week and a half off. In mid April, we're heading
off to the UK and Ireland to do about ten shows, followed by a couple
of extra shows in North America. We then plan to spend the summer in
Europe doing the festivals, with plans to return to the US and play
our first shows in South America. So basically it's going to be constant
touring until the end of the year. We don't have a great deal of time
off planned for 2006, but at least we managed to get most of December
2005 off. All I did was write some new songs and just try to get back
to a normal life with my fiancée (Jonna Nygren). Doing normal
things like washing the dishes and shopping for toilet paper is hard
to do when you've been out on the road for a long time, so it was quite
an adjustment to make for about a month. But then all hell broke loose
once again, and we we're back out on the road. I guess the only way
I can only describe my way of life is that it's very Dali-esque. Being
a musician is a very Dali-esque existence."
I would personally like to thank Ville Valo for his
generous time, and Chris O'Brien at Solitaire Management for making
the interview possible.
For more information on HIM, check out - http://www.heartagram.com
© Justin Donnelly - justindonnelly@ozemail.com.au
