Previously known as Congestion, Let Me Dream should be a fair example of a band who started playing (more or less) standard death metal and which evolution had brought them to the fields of atmospheric and gothic rock without forgetting their metal roots. Don't get me wrong, this band is not just another MDB or Gathering - no. Their music is far more atmospheric and is pretty personal and difficult to compare. Let's see what they said in this interview through the Net we gathered a few months ago....
Q It's not usual that a band changes their name just before editing their debut album....why that decision? Don't you think it could affect on the sales as some old fans did not
know about the change?
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A Yeah, the name change might have affected on the sales, but only little I think... In Finland most of U.G. followers did know about the name change when the album came out, but I don't know how the situation is in the other countries. Nowadays almost ever letter we get is written for LMD, only fc~~ people seem to think that we're still Congestion and they don't know that we have released an album.... Well anyway we're still the same band with the same sound, so the only change is the name.
Q Anyway it's pretty obvious that the new name fits better on your music than Congestion, a more death-ish name... A LMDis a good name for a band that plays music like we do. Congestion sounds more death-ish that's true. However, when we chose that name (congestion) we chose it to describe the very same sound that we have now. Congestion = overpopulation, atmosphere behind it is gloomy and even raw, just like I want our music to be... however, too many people understood the name in the wrong way. So we chose more unique and maybe "easier to understand" name... think there's also other bands with the name Congestion, after all it was just picked up from an English Dictionary.
Q Looking at the album, the first thing that grasps my attention is the cover, pretty unusual in sure youi liked it but I personally found it not too appealing to make one to buy the album if you don't know the band ...Has that cover any concrete meaning?
A Yeah the cover is quite unusual, I guess it'sd more gothic sty fish than most metal releases. ..At least it ain't "brutal" or "evil" and that's very positive 1 think. The artist had to hum with the cover, so it remained more or less "unfinished". Anyway I think it's quite OK cover and it's original cover for a metal band...
Q Another thing that grasps my attention are the goth-ish vocal passages... Will your music go more into this direction in the future? Is your music pretty open to different styles in reflection of your wide musical tastes?
A Yes, I think there will be more gothic type vocals in some songs, but we haven't forgot the metal type vocals either. Yes, we have wide musical tastes arid it shows in our music. The basic idea with LMD/Congestion have been to write atmospheric & emotional muisc and I don't see any reason to change it. We produce music that's natural for us, be it metal, goth. or something else.
Q One notices a lack of black metal influences on it. a style that seems to be the latest trend in metal.. what do you think of B.M. bands? Is really the BM movement so strng in Scandinavia as it seems from here?
A Hmmm... When we started to write music like this death metal was the trend and we sounded different compared to to that trend,..No black metal is the trend and we still sound original, I think... The black metal is strongest form of underground metal at the moment here in Scandinavia and I think it's the same all over the globe.l guess most new bands who start to write music, start with more or less black metallish music nowadays and some other bands change into same direction... In few ~'ears tis will turn out to be something else... A new trend shall come and people follow, that's how it always happens...What do 1 think of black metal? Well, it's just anotherform of music. I listen to B.M. bands who are musically interesting, like Morningstar from Finland. There's too man~ bands trying to sell their music with meaningless words. Who cares the wordswhcn it's all about the music! I hope...
Q I know you were recently checking out second guitarist... how'd did things go? This research for a second guitarist is mainly due to give a richer sound live or just to find new ideas and opinions in the band?
A Yes we had a second guitarist for a short while(4 months). He was really talented player but after all he didn't really fit into the group, so it was better for us to continue without him. 1 guess guitars sounded better on stage when there was two guitarist but meanwhile keyboards lost their power. So the live atmosphere is better with 4-piece line-up in my opinion...
Q A lot of bands are using keyboards to create atmospheres after bands like Gathering or My Dying Bride did appear on the scene... which are in your opinion the elements that make your keyboards being apart from the rest?
A I think it's the music as whole, which keep us different. On our new promo we used string performer instead of svnths so the sound is little bit more unique now... Nowadays we also use more sounds than before...Hmmm hard to say if our keys are different or not...I haven't been thinking any explanation s for that question... I guess we got the idea to use keys from early Paradise Lost and Nocturnus, not really from the bands that you mentioned. Also some Goth bands like The Fields of The Nephilim had a big influence on our instrument choices.
Q What do you think of syntb/keyboard oriented bands/projects like Mortiis?
A I like a lot of ambient/keyboard music like Klaus Shultze and some Brian Eno stuff; Mortiis is good as well. It's great that people make such music.
Q In your first demo, you included a Celtic Frost cover...do you feel LMD has been influenced by this band in any way? Which cover songs you currently play if any?
A Yes, at least for me Celtic Frost has been a great influence. I fucking love their energetic and primitive music, too bad that they changed it to glammy.... hopefully Warriors new band (Apyllyon's Sun) is something worth to check out, can't wait to hear it! At the moment we don't play cover songs at our gigs. Sometime ago we played Motorhead and before that Candlemass. Next time we might chose something totally different; dunno.
Q In your bio, you state that the band is looking for an avant-garde sound.What does this term mean to you? Whats your opinion about Misanthrope, one of the first bands to use term avant-garde (death) metal?
A Well, we are not afraid to try new ideas out. We're not calling our music avant-garde, but the music just has to be original to keep it interesting for us and for the people who listen to it. At least I'm always looking for something different. I've got some old Misanthrope demos, which I didn't like; anyway their song (dunno title) that I just heard was excellent, so I guess they're great.
Q Which has been the reaction from people and press to your debut? Any plans for a continuation? What about you relationship with Adipocere?
A The reaction has mostly been very positive. People hay liked the music I'm getting quite much letters, interviews, etc.. From all around the globe, so I guess Adipocere have promoted/distributed our album quite well. We don't know much about the second album yet...we've got quite much new and better material, but the label is still missing. Anyway we just recorded a new promo tape, which in my opinion sounds better than our previous stuff so I'm really looking forward to getting a new deal soon. Adipocere is one possibility, I think that they're still interested in us and they did quite OK work with the debut, so..
Q Are there any interesting bands that you'd like to recommend? What is your opinion in the current scene compared to early 90's?
A Well, I personally like such bands as Two Witches, Sad Parade, Sentenced, Morningstar, Barathrum, Decorysh... There's also interesting industrial/electro seen in Finland with such bands as Media Disease, The Insult, etc.. In early 90's there was some good bands like Demigod Funebre but like most old good bands they split up, due to several reasons.. . One reason might have been that Finnish (DM) scene was noticed a lot later by '~bigger" press and labels so Finnish bands never got attention that the Swedish scene did back then. Nowadays, there's again some good bands which luckily are getting also some deserved attention (like Sentenced, who were already in early 90's too, though....) I guess today's scene has good points, but if I look back to the past then gigs etc were a lot better, much more people got their asses on the gigs and arrangers did even get their money back, heh. . The underground scene was a lot stronger then...hopefully things get better.
Q Anything else to add?
A Thanks a lot for the interview and support! People can order our CD 'My Dear Succubus" for $19.00 (well hidden cash) from our contact address:
Jani Koskela, Leppasenojantic, 12100 Oitti, Finland. For info use the same address or send email to: gores@freenet.hut.fi. Finnish people can check us on our tour with Two Witches...
