Metal Shock Finland (World Assault )

Stright out of Italy, melodic metal band LAHMIA offer up their latest album ‘Into the Abyss’ on to the world, with bone crushing vocals and melodies to keep you on the seat of your chairs. After reviewing their album I took the chance to ask Flavio Gianello (lead guitar, main composer) about the band, the music and the life of it all.

1. Welcome to Metal Shock Finland, I’m Dylan Raine, Can you introduce yourselves?

Hi Dylan and thanks to you and to Metal Shock Finland for the space you are giving us. We are Lahmia and we are from Rome, Italy. We play a layered melodic death metal in which you can find various influences: Swedish and USA death metal doom, black metal but also more classic stuff.

2. How and where did the music start?

The band met its present identity in 2007. In that year we released our first demo titled “An Eternal Memory” which received e great feedback but we actually were still in search of more personal and unique sound. If I put that CD on now I can hear several nice ideas but also a lot of stuff poorly developed.
One year later we released our second EP (“Forget Every Sunrise”) and the goal was almost achieved. The feedback was even better than on the first release so we knew we were on the right way. With demo we found our sound that was finally optimized with “Into the Abyss”: a balance between extreme yet melodic genres.

3. Who does what in the band?

I’m the main composer of the band, since I’ve written all the tunes of the album and arranged most of the guitar parts. Francesco (our singer) is the man behind every lyric. Of course everybody arranges its instrument parts and contribute in the final structure of the songs. We are very comfortable with this situation and we have found a nice balance but that’s not something prearranged, it’s just something that went this way. In the future maybe other members will play a more active role in the song writing process. The only will for us is to compose and play the best music we can produce.

4. Having heard your album from start to finish (a few times) now, where would you say you find your real motivation from? And what keeps you focussed on producing this sound?

This is simple and I believe every band who chooses to play some kind of underground music can understand me. The engine is the passion: without it everything will be worthless. Passion means play what touches your deepest feelings, and live experiences that can give the meaning to your everyday work: play in front of a crowd that enjoys your music, share the stage with some of your favourite bands, meet people who have your same passion and sincerely supports you. These are outstanding goals that can really justify everything if you have the good fortune to achieve it.

5. Are you planning on touring?

We recently were the official support band of the outstanding Fleshgod Apocalypse Italian Agony tour and maybe that tour will have a second tranche in the near future. Beside this we are planning some gig in Italy and even Europe promoting our new album but things are still evolving and at this time unfortunately I can’t give you further details.

6. With so many bands losing their own style, how would you describe your own music and what you bring to the genre?

We simply play what we like, what touch us and try to do it in the most personal way. This is because we mix so many different influences. I don’t think every band should be innovative but every band has the duty to do its best to sound unique and diverse. Lahmia tries this from its beginning.

7. Do you as a band, or individually have a favourite track on the album? And if so, which one and why?

We really like each one of the songs: we worked very hard on every single tune. If I have to name one of them I’ll say “My Crown” the last track (if we don’t consider the outro): to me it is one of the best and most mature songs we ever wrote. It mostly mix our doom and black metal influences in a way I really like and that makes it sound fresh to my ears also after many times I listened to it. I know that some other guy from the band may prefer the title track, “Drag me to Hell” or some other tune: for this reason I invite everyone to listen to our album and choose their own favourite track!

8. Can we have some links to your music, website, or any other source you can think of?

Of course, just connect to our website www.lahmia.com or to our facebook profile (www.facebook.com/lahmiaofficial) to have all the news regarding our band. We also have other profiles (myspace, twitter, reverbnation and so on) all accessible through main website.

9. Is there anything you would like to share that I have not yet asked?

Just want to say hi to every reader of Metal Shock Finland and we hope to meet a lot of them on tour soon!

10. Thank you very much for your time and this brilliant album.

Thanks for your time and your nice words, Dylan.

Interview by Dylan Raine

To read MSFinland’s ‘Into the Abyss’ -review, please go HERE.