Metal Shock Finland (World Assault )

Based in Aarhus, Denmark, the progrock band BOIL plays an ambitious style of progressive rock and metal that balances on the delicate edge of melodic catchiness, intricacy and complexity. With the 5 members drawing from widely different influences, the unique mixture contains elements of both polyrhythmic modern metal, electronica, grunge and classic rock. Some days ago I asked the guys how they’re doing today, here’s what Jacob Loebner and Kristian Outinen told me…

Hi guys, welcome to Metal Shock Finland! how was your sunday?

Kristian Outinen: Mine was spent attending a concert with Toto. I’ve never seen them before and according to family members, I was into them when I was too young to remember. But don’t tell this to the hardcore metal fans. 🙂

BOIL was formed in 2004, tell me about the start and to what refers the band’s name?

Jacob Loebner: Yes the band was formed by the only remaining founding fathers Stig Nielsen (guitar) and Mikkel Ib (drums). For the first couple of years they were trying out different styles and band members until finally finding their way into the heart of the Boil universe. The name Boil was chosen partly to have a short and easy name but also in order to represent dualism in general, since Boil is a word with more than one meaning and can be understood to represent either the dynamics of reaching a boiling point or the repulsiveness of having a boil e.g. in your ass (oops, the interview has just started and we are already talking about ass, sorry for that, we’ll try to get back on track again..what was the question?).

Please present us the band members…

Jacob Loebner is our lead singer. He also sings in Malrun, another talented band from the Danish city Aarhus. Not to mention that he’s doing part of our booking and maintaining promotional contacts for us. So he definitely has his hands full. Stig Nielsen plays guitar and sings backing vocals, plus he’s the main songwriter in the band. Kenneth Avnsted plays guitar and does our web designs. He also edited our new youtube video for the single “Sleepwalker”. Kristian Outinen is the bass player and studies classical guitar at the conservatory in Aarhus. He holds a national record in swimming and has so far been a “bedroom
guitarist”. Boil is his first band. Mikkel Ib plays drums and percussion and handles the samples. He teaches music at various schools in the area and has tons of various musical projects in the kettle.

Each of you come from different musical influences, how you found the BOIL-sound, and how would you describe your genre?

JL: The two founding members of the band have an inert love for old school grunge and progressive music from the early 90s (Alice in Chains, Faith No More, Primus etc), while the other guys are much more inspired by more modern metal and progressive music (Gojira, Meshuggah, Lamb of God etc.). So when these two unlike worlds meet each other our music is created as a cross-breed of good old hard rock elements and modern styles and melodies.

KO: Mikkel and I are classically trained in percussion and guitar, respectively. Every now and then, some of those elements sneak their way into our music as well. It seems our goal is finding the right combination of catchy melodies and memorable songwriting with unpredictable arrangements and interesting technical elements. Walking the fine line of melodic yet sophisticated, progressive but not nerdy, epic but not cheesy.

In 2007 came out your debut album VESSEL, which was nominated as Debut Album of the year at Danish Metal Awards 2007. Tell me, how it changed your life back then?

JL: It didn’t change our lives enough, because if it had, we would be playing stadium concerts by now haha! But no, I guess it confirmed what we had known all along, namely that we were making music which people could actually relate to. But apart from that, it merely inspired us to work even harder and hack our way through this jungle that is the music industry.

Your second album A NEW DECAY was released last year. What can you tell me about its birth?

JL: It was a long labor, I’ll tell you that. There was a lot of screaming and kicking and at some point we had to do a C-section so the baby’s big head could come out. Whether it ended as a boy or a girl or something in between I’m still not quite sure, but it is a crafty one for sure and we all love it to death. The mother is doing well but the father took off like a thief in the night 😉

hahahahahah for sure it’s a birth that will not be forgotten…
What about the sound comparing it to your debut album, any differences?

JL: Well jokes aside. On A New Decay, we wanted to personalize our sound even more than we had done on the debut album. I think that succeeded really well. Also we didn’t use any line-in
recordings like we had on the debut album. So A New Decay has a bit more of that crunchy sound of cabinets in a live situation and that has a good feel to it.

How was its songwriting process and the choice for the song themes?

JL: Usually Stig came up with the general skeleton for the songs. And then we mutually dressed the skeleton with pieces of flesh, clothes and a nice curly mustache. The lyrical themes on the album focus on being able to question the information we are all bombarded with from the media, politicians etc. in order to see through the layer of spin and manipulation that a lot of information is colored with nowadays. We do not dictate a certain point of view but merely suggest that people think for themselves and base their personal opinions and decisions upon an informed and conscious choice.

It was produced and mastered by Tue Madsen, how was it to work with him?

JL: He did not produce the album, we actually recorded and mixed it ourselves in our own studio. But he did the mastering of the album. It is always great to work with him because he adds that crunchy metal edge on top of our music. This time however we nearly broke his leg in the process (guess it’s true what they say that men can’t multitask, at least Tue Madsen couldn’t walk down stairs and talk with us on the phone at the same time haha).

And how has the album been welcomed by your fans and critics?

JL: The album was released in most of Europe and received really good reviews with an average rating of 7 out of 10 so we can’t complain. Metal Hammer in Germany did a nice feature article about us and said that we will either be the next big Danish thing after Volbeat or an undetected gem for feinschmeckers, so let’s hope for the first option hah.

KO: Actually, we’re still promoting the album a year after its release as we shot a video for the song Sleepwalker (be sure to check it out on youtube) in April and right now the song is a “bullet” on the German Native 25 club list so it seems the interest is definitely there if the right promotion is added. We’re trying to increase awareness of our name and keep the interest up until the next album is ready in 2012. The most up-to-date stuff is on our page on facebook, so follow us there for updates.

What has been BOIL’s most memorable moment or show, so far?

JL: Probably when we won a Scandinavian talent competition and got to open the Sweden Rock Festival as an award. After playing we stayed the entire festival acting as teenagers again. There were more than a few memorable moments on that festival such as when our former guitarist shat his pants at McDonalds because he was too stubborn to leave the line before he had ordered, haha. Well…guess you should have been there to fully appreciate the nature of that moment 😉

I’ve read that you’re currently writing your 3rd album, how it’s proceeding? can you already reveal something about it, I mean will there be some changes coming up?

KO: We felt we needed to kick things up a notch. So the next album will be reaching into more extreme directions. Heavier when it’s heavy, more quiet and melodic at the other end. We actually tested some of the songs during our spring concerts in Denmark and the reception was good. We are about halfway in the writing process and new stuff keeps coming up regularly. The songs we played live are still being tweaked. We’re constantly finetuning.

JL: I guess you could say that we will be taking things to the edge instead of staying in our comfort zone, and so far we seem to create some really interesting music when we allow ourselves to take these “chances”. The album is probably ready by mid 2012 I guess. On the lyrical and graphical side we are working with a really interesting concept, but I won’t go into too much detail about that yet.

Kristian, this question I gotta ask you… you’re a finn among the danish… what’s your story?

KO: My mother’s side of the family is Finnish, but I was born and raised in Copenhagen. So I’m not a total foreigner. I frequently go to Finland, though. The official excuse is to visit family, but since I was a teenager, I was fascinated by how popular metal is up there, so I kept soaking up the atmosphere to the point where metal is now literally running through my veins. Yet I study classical guitar. Go figure…

I know that finns are quite fond of beer and alcohol… but I think the danish are even more… or not?

KO: Denmark currently holds some records on that front. They definitely have a love affair with intoxication!

What can you tell me about the danish metal scenes?

JL: There’s a lot of talented metal bands in Denmark. So far, however, it seems that most of them have problems getting their music heard internationally and of course it is never easy in such a small country. But I guess we have realized that our chances of making it lies outside of Denmark because the metal market in Denmark is simply too small for our kind of music to become really big. This is one of the reasons why we now have a German booking agency (Dragon Productions)

Besides you’re writing songs for your 3rd album, what are you gonna do this summer?

KO: Get back in shape. Joining the band in March this year was a big change in my life so I had to get used to some adjustments. I used to be a competitive swimmer, and my body doesn’t like sitting still.

Now the word is yours… how would you like to close this interview?

KO: Thanks for taking the time to interview us. I’m so pumped about the next album. It’s starting to take shape and I like what I hear. It’s always been a dream of mine to be in a creative environment and I feel so lucky to step out of the (competitive swimming) pool and right into such a talented band.

JL: Watch out for the album in mid 2012 or thereabout. It’s gonna be an experience for sure! And until then, go check out A New Decay on itunes or elsewhere or listen to selected songs on www.facebook.com/boilmusic or www.myspace.com/boilmusic

Interview by Tarja Virmakari

BOIL – Sleepwalker