Please tell us a few words about the new release, about the music on it as a whole or a few words on each track in part. How are you happy with the final release?
The album is an amalgam of different metal subgenres. Everything from blasts to heavier grooves is utilized as required and vocals range between deeper growls and higher screams.

About the tracks in a "few words": 

WOE is about how fucking disgusting this world we live in is. All this war everywhere and uncontrolled invasions by young able men who abandoned their families in a war torn hellhole to seek a better life for themselves just to go around raping innocents at a whim and old rich fucks who are bombing mostly innocent people to shreds in a quest for more money with no regard for human life. Every side is wrong and every action taken just perpetuates the chaos. Musically the song is probably the heaviest song on the album. Double guitar lead as I love those.

THERE IS NO SHELTER spells out my view about the direction we are heading. Emotionless talking heads make us all look the same, act the same, see things the same, everything taste the same, all life die all the same. I fear for what the future has in store for us and I don't want to wake up one day in a world laid to waste because of shitty decisions by some dickhead with no touch of reality. I want my kids to have a clean and safe world to live and to play in, to grow up in and a planet to love and to cherish. The song has probably the most variation in styles within it all the way from blast stuff to Sentenced-style bits. I love Sentenced and they are one of my most important influences. And a double guitar solo!

INTO THE FORMLESS DAWN I wrote when I was reading about this one girl killed by two fuckwits and then these assholes even going as far as to taunt the family of the victim and defaming the victim publicly. The other shit even got away with it and tried to become a fucking celebrity running all sorts of Ask.fm type pages answering equally retarded kids' questions. I just started to really wonder how come the parents of a murder or rape victim rarely go all out medieval on the assailant's ass. I know myself well enough to guarantee I would do everything in my power to destroy anyone harming my family and not look back in remorse. This one is a bit more "progressive" concoction with all the movie soundtrack influenced parts and fast riffing that I don't even know where in the genre chart I would place them. A grim song. No double guitar solo.

SEVERANCE again vents the frustration towards the current events. I just don't get it how people are so stupid and ignorant that religion is still so dominant in world politics and basis for people's behavior. Are we really that dumb? I guess we are. No matter what you believe in, it always makes you see someone else as the enemy. Most reminiscent of my band Pain Confessor but lacks clean vocals that would have probably been there in the chorus if we had done the song with the guys. Thrashing melodic death metal or something... One guitar solo!

EMPTINESS came from a much more personal space as I have very close experiences of a muscle dystrophy and what hardship and struggle that brings to everyday life. I came up with the chorus melody and lyrics while watching the scene from the movie Dredd where a couple of guys get themselves skinned alive and thrown down a building with a puff of Slo-Mo slowing their experiences to feel like eternity. I could very well imagine the pain in the stressed muscles and waiting for the seizures to subside would feel similar. Music-wise this is the most modern style song with strange marriage of heavy riffing and a chorus that is more hopeful than hopeless, suitable for the song's theme of not yielding to hardship. Has sort of a guitar solo-ish interlude and outro.

IMMORTAL, ENTWINED then again is a story that has some basis in real life stuff but came up when I was looking at a couple of trees in a forest that were entwined together. I know this is quite old a story and basis of many poems that the embracing trees are dead and reborn lovers so I will not claim to have come up with something new there but I was just toying with possibilities of how and for what reason the two lovers could have become trees in their afterlife. Perhaps it wasn't just a whim of destiny but they had an affinity to the woods and nature and had a means to ensure their return as something they had always belonged among. Witchery? A way to transfer their essence into other living entities? Why not. The song is to me the most purely melodic death metal track. Again a double guitar solo!

FOR THOSE WHO SHALL FOLLOW I just wanted to say that we fucked up big time and cannot even act to correct our mistakes but instead fuck things up even more. I would not want this to be our last will and testament to our children and the following generations but it seems it is going to be our final "up yours", like our kids will inherit a massive debt and a jail sentence with no chance of parole. In hell. Hope not... Most thrash metal song on the album, I would say. Wait a minute! This has a double guitar solo as well!

WE WALKED IN THE SHADOWS is a farewell to past. At the time I wrote the lyrics I had been suffering from a frustrating long dry period of writer's block and seemed like I just lost all inspiration and desire to create anything. I had come to a point where I just didn't see anything worth fighting for as far as music was concerned. I gave up and bid farewell to my band Pain Confessor. Not sure if that is something to be ashamed of, as I don't like to be a quitter but this came to be something too much of a weight to bear at the time. I am glad and relieved if the others decide to keep going with the band. A behemoth of a melodic death metal song with a chorus that grows, and grows, and grows. Holy shit! This has a double guitar solo.

How would you describe/label the music on it? Does it sounds like anything we might have heard before?
I don't know anything else than "metal" but I guess it should be called melodic death metal or something. I think that is quite a generalization. It sounds like metal and it has double guitar solos and shit so I think it might sound like something. I can guarantee influences from Sentenced, Impaled Nazarene, Boney M and WASP.

Where was it recorded and how much time did it take you to record it? Any interesting stories from the recording/producing the material?
I recorded the whole thing at home by myself during 2014 / 2015. Most of the songs were quite complete when I started to re-record guitars and rearrange the songs etc but still it took quite some time as I didn't do it as a primary task but on the side of all the personal stuff like work, family and studies. I don't know about interesting but I can tell you that I aimed to record stuff in the "old school" vein with as live takes as possible with as little editing as possible to make the music sound live and like it would sound played live. Vocals are almost completely one or two takes, guitars and bass the same. I preserved some of the original guitar leads and worked in the other parts that were meant to be for the other guitarist of the band but as I was to do it all alone I just "channeled the spirit" of a second guitarist and played the other parts with different moods.

What can you tell us about the cover artwork? Is there a link between the artwork and the lyrics? What are the topics of your lyrics?
I took some pictures in a nearby nature reserve called Aulanko during the winter and thought about all this beauty around us that we ignore and willingly destroy for some transient personal gain so I just toned one of the pictures to reflect the ravaged nature and life. The link is there with the artwork and lyrics. Our reckless behavior, our cruelty and probably our demise by our own creations.

What do you expect to gain through this release? What are the band's aims at the moment?
I expect to gain nothing else than relief and I already gained that. I got the songs finished to my own liking and I also got them released in a way that isn't tying up myself and robbing me of my rights to anything I do. I have no real aims at the moment, just keep doing whatever I do and see what the future will bring. If there is ever the right moment and I find the right people to play the material live I will probably do that but in the current state of live music and the whole music business I will not hold my breath. I cannot do it for free or worse yet pay for playing a gig. It's not that important to me as I have seen that side of this path already and paid my share of gigs and releases. Now it's time to do stuff on my own terms.

Is there a special format the material is released in? Or is it released in multiple formats? How many copies were pressed?
I will release a physical version at a later date but the first release will be digital in all the major digital distribution services on Friday March 11th 2016. A pressing of the physical album will be quite limited unless something really strange and unexpected happens and there is actual demand for larger amounts. Doubtful.

Where and how will you promote this new release?
I have Mike from The Metal Detector Music Promotions doing promo for me all over the world and Finland is handled by Mega from Metal Asylum Promotions. No live events are planned so it will be only social media, press and word of mouth. Sort of old school even though the means are modern!

Where can we order it from?
Pre-order is available at www.asoulcalledperdition.com NOW and on the release date the digital version is available at Spotify, iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Shazam, Deezer and all the other places. If you can't find it on some specific site, check the others. It will be around the web.

February 2016