Often times when a band changes direction or members, the desired effect is not achieved. In the case of the Finnish band Amoral, my opinion is that a change in both direction and members was a great choice. Still as technical and precise as a machine, the band chose to leave behind their Death Metal roots and emerge as a Power Metal heavyweight. Changing vocalists in 2008 was a questionable decision for fans of the band. Questionable that is, until they heard the first single titled, Year Of The Suckerpunch. With the addition of new vocalist Ari Koivunen, the band was dubbed as the Finnish ambassadors of Classic Rock to the 21st Century.

With a renewed fire, the band now has 2 albums under their belt with Ari Koivunen. The first album was Show Your Colors and the newest release is Beneath. Beneath and the first single titled Same Difference, has earned the band a coveted spot on the 2012 edition of the SXSW (South By Southwest) Festival in Austin, Texas on March 15th. Beneath is scheduled for a US release on Valentine’s Day, February 14th.

We are very pleased to have with us today, a founding member of the band; Ben Varon, lead guitarist for Amoral. Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us. We welcome you to the Rock. Nothing But…Family. We’ve got a few questions for ya today, let’s get right to it. Let’s talk about about the new album, Beneath. Tell us a bit about the upcoming release.

Beneath is by far the most ambitious project we’ve taken on so far. We entered the studio with the intention of recording pretty much two albums’ worth of material, about 70 minutes of music. And this was after the pre-production and losing the b-quality ideas, meaning all 14 tracks sounded killer to us and we put 100% into each one, not knowing exactly which would make it to the album. The rest would be used as bonus tracks.

The idea was to make a big, classic-sounding album that flows through many different moods, styles, genres… like many of our favorite albums from the early 90′s, and of course from the heydays of classic rock and prog rock. So on Beneath, you have big, epic-y long tracks at the beginning and end of the album, a few hard rock-oriented catchy tunes, some acoustic stuff etc. We’d like to think that as a whole it still makes sense, but that is of course for the listener to decide.

The first US single is titled Same Difference. In your own words; what is this song about?

The song is about ignorance, arrogance and inherited stupidity. Like everyone, we’ve seen our share of close-minded people. Especially touring, you end up at the weirdest bars, truck stops and little towns where you meet all sorts of folks. I’ve actually entertained myself sometimes by listening to some crazy racists preaching about their beliefs at clubs, and trying to see where it all comes from. And it sure didn’t help making me understand it any better. So Same Difference is my way of telling these that I’m sure they’d have better things to do with their lives and energy.

A video was recorded for the song Silhouette, will that be the 2nd single here?

Yes, as it was in Europe as well. Same Difference was kinda like a teaser from the album, with Silhouette being the “proper” single release, with a video to accompany it.

Beneath is being released by The End Records here in the US. What was the selling point for you guys to sign on with them?

The guys at The End just seemed to got it. That was a very important thing for us: we financed and produced the album ourselves, so that we’d have complete freedom to cherry pick the right people and labels to work with in different territories. It’s not a great feeling when you know that the label working your album is not really even that into it, so we wanted to make sure this would not happen again.

Besides The End being on the same wavelength, they had an impressive roster of artists and all the right contacts, which of course is important. And they made us an offer we couldn’t refuse, haha.

You guys will make your live debut in the US at SXSW. Are you guys excited to finally be playing the States?

Oh yes. It’s been a long time coming, I’ll tell you that. You gotta remember, all the bands we were into as kids, and the bands who we covered when we were like 14 years old, we’re from the States. For us, the US was THE country for rock music. So of course it’s always been one of the big goals for the band to get over there to play.

We keep hearing great things about SXSW, so we think Austin is the perfect place to start our project “US Domination” !

Amoral was a pretty successful Death Metal band. What prompted the change in direction for the band? Was it simply time for new beginnings?

The biggest push came from our previous singer. When he informed us out of the blue that he would be leaving, we quickly realized that this was our chance to expand our horizons even more than we thought would be possible in this band. We had already taken the music to a more melodic direction with every album, and the 4th one was gonna be even more so even without the lineup changes, but of course getting Ari to front the band took this to a whole different level.

I have to say, as surprised as we were of our singer leaving, it was a blessing in disguise. Some of us in the group – not the least myself – were getting bored of the growling vocals, and desperately wanted to work with vocal melodies. The fact that Ari can do both well is more than a songwriter could ask for.

Masi Hukari officially joined the band about a year ago. What has he brought to the band since his joining?

Besides good looks and an impressive stamp collection? Masi brought more than we dared to wish for when we begun looking for a new guitar player. The goal was to find someone talented enough to be capable of doing these and the old songs justice once we’d start playing live again. Masi came in just before the studio, and still had time to bring too song ideas so good that we had to finish them and put them on the album. Also, with his playing level, there was no way he was gonna be “just” a rhythm guitarist in the group, so we split the lead duties and the guys shreds all over this album, making me sound slow and tired! And just his attitude and outlook on life is inspiring. He’s made this band more fun, for sure.

I’ve heard a few tracks from Beneath and I have to say I love your tone on this record. Can you tell us a bit about your setup that you used on this record?

Thanks, cool to hear! We didn’t want a modern metal guitar sound for this album at all, so we tried to steer away from your Rectifiers, Diezels and the likes. The core of the tone is all Marshall. The white 1959RR head can be heard on every song. We recorded everything with two amps on all the time, and that was the one amp we didn’t change. For the second tone, we used the Perfect Connection GP-1000 preamp and my VHT power amp a lot. The GP-1000 has a really cool, dry tone, which was great for the faster, tighter riffs. Sometimes we’d switch that for a Mesa Triaxis preamp. And I’m pretty sure there’s a Marshall JCM800 in there somewhere also, on some tracks…

Guitar-wise, we had a bunch with us in the studio. Most of my stuff is on my trusted Jackson Warriors, and Masi did his parts mostly on his Washburn Nuno models. But there’ s a lot of Les Paul in there too, as well as an Ibanez 1991 Universe for the 7string parts, strats and teles for some of the cleans and Guild 6 and 12strings acoustics.

You guys being from Finland, I am curious what American artists have influenced you and the band. Who has helped shape Amoral?

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Well like I said, most of our favorite bands when we were starting were from the States. Me and our drummer Juhana started by practicing Metallica songs together. Then we moved to Pantera, Sepultura, Rage Against the Machine… Mid 90′s stuff. Once we got some chops up we added Dream Theater to the roster, which really helped us with our technique a lot.

A lot of the death metal stuff that we got into later was also from the States, bands like Death and Morbid Angel. Though by this time we figured out that there’s great music coming from other countries too, like Finland, for example, haha.

I like to end on a random question, so here goes; What would be your dream guitar and why?

That’s a tough one! To be honest, the USA custom Jackson Warriors I have are already my dream guitars, as I got to design them to be just like I wanted them. But I sure wouldn’t mind a mint 1958 Les Paul with a nice burst, or a Steve Vai Universe with that crazy swirl color they had in the early 90′s…

Is there anything else you’d like to discuss or a would you like to get a message out to your fans?

Those of you who are coming to SXSW or live anywhere near Austin, please try to come to our show at the “The End Showcase” on thursday. And if you appreciate versatility, big choruses, quality guitar riffs and mind-blowing singing, give Beneath a few spins, you just might fall in love with it!

I appreciate you taking the time to speak with us and we wish you and the band nothing but the best. As always, stay focused, humble and thankful. Many doors will open for ya. Keep on keeping on!

Amoral Members:
Ben Varon – Guitars
Juhana Karlsson – Drums
Pekka Johansson – Bass
Ari Koivunen – Vocals
Masi Hukari- Guitars

Keep up with Amoral below:
Amoralweb
Facebook
Youtube
Twitter

Check out the video for the song Silhouette below:

See the video below of Year Of The Suckerpunch: