Interview with Finnish deathrock band MASQUERADE: There's a city called Kaunas. It sounds exactly as the same as "bitch" in French

According to Facebook profile (facebook.com/masqueradepunk) and band webpages (masquerade.fi, masqueraded.bandcamp.com, twitter.com/masqueradepunk), MASQUERADE, started in late 2012 in Helsinki, plays post-punk psychosis with female vocals or deathrock, post-punk, dark rock, theatrical, psychedelic, experimental punk music. The band is: Suzi Sabotage, vocals, Jacques Saph, bass, William Freyermuth, drums and Anton Välimaa, guitar.

Before the end of 2012, Masquerade was quite a long time a more vague post-punk project with no specific name, riddled with temporary musicians who changed frequently. The first shows were set up under these circumstances, which included playing at Finland’s most long-running goth festival, Lumous, the next summer which the band was accepted in already on basis of a seedy rehearsal room recording of “Play Dead” (first song Masquerade ever made), featuring a drum machine. The first solid line-up consisted of Markus in drums and Joel in guitar in the beginning of 2013, which both were part of creating Masquerade’s distinct sound. The band started to evolve as a whole followed by such early songs as “Needle Through a Bug”, “Cuts”, “All Things Hurt” and “Predatory Man”. Group soon gathered interest in Finland and even abroad despite having no recorded music or video, ending up on national television in August and conjuring up new shows. Helsinki’s most significant punk venue Lepakkomies held their first official gig, and the event was sold out. Their first release was a promotional demo on internet consisting of three songs. They were praised and widespread over all expectations and brought Masquerade a lot of additional attention, i.e. being listed in Cvlt Nation’s six best releases of 2013. The first music video was one hundred percent self-made clip for “Needle Through a Bug”, in which they already had a new bassist. Early in 2014 they got a proposal from Fight Records for a maxi-EP, which they went to record to a studio in Kouvola, Finland for three feverish days in February. After that Masquerade was set for March tour in their home country, England and Sweden. A music video for “All Things Hurt”, second song on the upcoming record, was released in spring. The lineup changed rapidly with departure of Markus and Joel and substitutes were taken at their place. Late May 2014 they played one and only gig with this setup in Prague, and on the way to Leipzig, Germany the then version of the group split with scandalous consequences. The performance was not made as only Suzi was present in the city, but according to the singer that was just “good riddance”, although unfortunate for the unplayed show. It didn’t take as long as a week to recruit new members for the existing gigs. In less than a month this lineup rehearsed a set for two gigs in early July, and even conjured up a new song called “With Razorblades”. That month also a new song “Cry Like Birds” was published to promote the record. October 2014 held finally the day when the maxi-EP “Blood is the New Black” was released, and also got a distributor in the USA, Mass Media Records. That was followed by tours in France and England which were well received. In January 2015 our current bassist Jacques Saph joined in. On March 8th the band was seen on MTV3 channel as guests in a programme called “Tähdet, tähdet”. In April the band took William Freyermuth in drums and Anton Välimaa in guitar. June 2015 saw the band’s first Russian gigs and in August they embarked upon their first journey outside of Europe: U.S.A. and Mexico. Shortly after that they started to record and mix the upcoming album (due in Spring-Summer 2016), releasing a new digi-single “Panic Paranoia”.

Influences and band interests: Psychedelic rock of 1960's, punk (almost all subgenres) of 1970-2010's, opera, classical, chanson, cabaret, dark alternative; Virgin in Veil, Secular Plague, Sleeping Children, Gay Worms Invasion.

Interview (2016 01 20).

Could You please tell about Your band's beginning and deathrock scene in the world and Suomi (Finland)? This genre is rather forgotten, or maybe not? Maybe it's rebirth of deathrock now? Why did You choose it?

Jacques Saph: I'm kind of an old fart in the deathrock scene haha, as I created Sleeping Children when I was still living in France, back in 2003; and performed in around 10 European countries with that band. Virgin in Veil was founded in January 2015.

Suzi Sabotage: Our band began exactly a year ago and I joined it in May. My first gig with Virgin in Veil was in Moscow, Russia, after just a few days of experience in operating a synth. In fact, I was first meant to play bass but struggled to learn it well enough so I moved onto synth, since I had positive experience playing it when I was 13. Before joining officially I contributed backing vocals on the demo. What comes to the deathrock scene in Finland, it's quite marginal, there's much more hardcore punks. Virgin in Veil and Masquerade have been received very well by both of the "scenes" so there is indeed some demand for post-punk/deathrock. My first band happened to be hardcore, but since the beginning of my interest in punk I've ardently wanted to play post-punk as well.

Can You tell me, in short the main ideas are behind Your music? Could You name Your favorite Your compositions / albums / collaborations? What about the new album?

Jacques Saph: Virgin in Veil is everything conservatives hate. It's dark, catchy, debauched, but also political.

Suzi: We make a stand but can also be very tongue-in-cheek, having the element of passion and chaos is more important than making very complicated music or being too much about politics. My favorite songs of VIV are Decay and Drown in Flesh. The new EP is fun to play, very sexual. It's great music to get wasted to.

Jacques: Oh yeah. Or to get laid to, as well.

Suzi: Indeed!

Death, punk, rock, gothic. What do those things have in common?

Suzi: At least the roots - gothic rock and deathrock sprouted from punk and glam, as everybody knows. For me post-punk, hardcore punk, '77 and grind (just to mention a few) have always been interchangeable, I love them all equally. Nevertheless, I don't really feel being part of any of those scenes - I don't trust people in general, however they're dressed like. I'm sort of a tribe of my own since I refuse to succumb to rules of any clique.

Jacques: Same here. I love deathrock, I love punk, I love hardcore, but I'm myself, not a fucking label. If something sounds good I listen to it. If someone's cool and hang out with. Simple as that.

What is and what is not a Sound Art?

Suzi: There's no limits to any art, except if it's something that may have the form of art but it's sole purpose is to make money. It becomes a product, non-art. It can be enjoyed by people and I don't scorn them themselves for it (myself I like to listen to some t.A.T.u. now and then, for instance), but I scorn the ones making it for cash flow.

What do You think about relations between the old art and computer art? Are they compatible?

Jacques: Totally. Computer and internet make it way easier for bands than it used to be. Nowadays, a band can record their album, design the cover, create a website, sell the shit online. The best side of computers in music is that now musicians are more independent than ever. The bad side is that because it's easier than before, even talentless bands can find gigs using the internet and so on. But oh well.

Suzi: Computers make things easier these days, for example recording music by yourself, no studio needed. It's very liberating. But as well it's fucking boring if it's too much used, like many bands with mainly sample background music, no real instruments, just operating a computer on stage. What did we come here to look at?

What do You think about thousands of neofolk/industrial/ambient/tribal/electroacoustic/avangarde/deathrock, post-punk etc. bands/projects? Is it a kind of trend, o just a tendency forwards better music?

Jacques Saph: As I said before, thanks to computers and internet, now basically everyone can record and distribute music. So there's some good shit, some excellent stuff but of course, the majority is crap.

Suzi: I love avantgarde music, like Nico's albums. Folk is shit in my books, but I like some industrial, not too much.

What do You know about Lithuania? How and when did You come to it? What Lithuanian and foreign musicians do You value most?

Jacques: I know that there's a city called Kaunas. It sounds exactly as the same as "bitch" in French. I also played in a band Gays Worms Invasion around ten years ago who sang a song called "Lithuanian Mansonite". It was about a fucking cliché Manson fan from Lithuania. More seriously, I've never been there yet but hopefully I will soon. I heard Vilnius is beautiful.

Suzi: We would like to play in Lithuania! I don't know a lot about the country, but I would like to.

What inspires You?

Suzi: I'm inspired by all kinds of art and music, different experiences in my life and stories of others. Even as insignificant thing as some thrown away item on the sidewalk can inspire me - Helsinki is ugly, cold and dark so there's not many majestic things to see, I'm used to it. I can be artistically motivated by both industrial and grey as well as marble and beautiful sculptures. I'm creatively like on acid all the time, an eternal myriad of things can make my imagination bloom, I have constant visions about what I'm going to do next.

Jacques Saph: Life. Suffering. Urban decay. Deviant sexuality. Religion. Spirituality. Substance abuse. Rebellion.

What are You working on right now?

Suzi: We're working on the new Masquerade album, it's going to be very diverse, a powerful and disturbed piece of music. I've even recorded guitar myself on one track and another is in Russian, there's also at least one instrument that has never been previously used in our material. We just took the cover photos and I have yet to record my vocals on two tracks that are brand new and never even played live.

Jacques Saph: And as for Virgin in Veil, we just released a new music video, and we are looking forward for the release of our last ep "The Glory Hole" on 7" vinyl by Finnish label Fairy Dust Records. This year we're going to write new songs and play as much as we can, and maybe release some new stuff, we'll see.

What does the name of Your band mean to You?

Jacques Saph: The name of the band pretty much illustrates many of our songs themes, or artworks. It's about the sacred, which is about to get defiled.

Kiitos.