AN INTERVIEW WITH ENTOMBED
AN INTERVIEW WITH ENTOMBED
When I arranged the Napalm Death interview (found elsewhere on these pages), I thought I might just as well get an interview with Entombed, too, as they were supporting said semi-legendary band. Besides, Entombed is a great band with a few classic death metal tracks under its belt.
After having seen them play, I went backstage. I didn't want it to take too long, as I realised Napalm Death would probably already have started playing by the time this would be wrapped up anyway. I for one definitely didn't want to miss too much of it.
After waiting for the guys to regain their breath and freshen up a bit, Earache's Karen introduced us into the smaller of the two Tivoli dressing rooms. We sat down with Uffe Cederlund (guitar) and Nicke Andersson (drums), both topless and still panting slightly. Behind us, totally soaked T-shirts were hung out to dry.
The other band members were around as well, but seemed initially disinclined to talking.
OK. Let's get going with the usual band biography lark. What did you do before Entombed or, rather, Nihilist was started?
Uffe: (Seeming a bit surprised at the fact that I knew about this Nihilist thing) Before we were in Nihilist we were in a couple of different bands, some metal bands, hardcore, whatever.
Nicke: Nothing really happened with those bands. We were all really young.
Uffe: We grew up together and stuff.
Nicke: Yeah, we got together and then we changed the name to Entombed. There was another band called Nihilist, I think, and we liked Entombed better anyway. I realised this interview wasn't going to be quite as verbose as, for example, that with Napalm Death. There were painful silences when I was waiting for more to be said, with them waiting for the next question. Maybe this happened because of their lack of ability to speak English very well, or perhaps just because they had a low interest threshold. I continued.
Now we're at this biography stuff, could you tell us your places and dates of birth?
Uffe: Stockholm, 3rd of October '71.
Nicke: I was born in Stockholm also, on the 1st of August '72.
Alex (Hellid, guitar) walks in, sortof half-dressed. Nicke asks him his place and date of birth.
Alex: 23rd of May '73. In Stockholm yeah. Can I go now (laughs)?
I told him he was excused if he wanted, and proceeded to the next question: What were the first albums they ever bought?
Nicke: For me it was...I don't know which one I bought first...but the first album I got was "Rock and Roll Over" by Kiss. I was very young so you got money once a week and I saved that and bought another Kiss album. I don't remember which, because in two years I bought all of them.
Uffe: Probably Kiss or something as well.
Which of your songs do you like best?
Uffe: Everything.
Nicke: Maybe one day like...(thinks of a name, then, a bit disappointing)...one song and another day another song. I like "Out of Hand", but I don't really have any favourites.
Uffe: It's, like, different every day. "Out of Hand" was pretty cool today.
What did you think of tonight's crowd response, by the way?
Lars-Goran (who’d walked in a bit earlier: That was cool!
Uffe: They were, like, everybody was standing around and watching during the first song. But then when we got into the title song, "Wolverine Blues", they started going around. It was cool. It was perfect. On stage the divers didn't give us a hard time or anything. Usually the crowd comes on stage and jumps on our effect pedals, but it was great. Everything went really well.
Which item of your CD collection now left at home do you most sorely miss on tour now?
Uffe: Upset on Cross (don't quite know what this is or whether I got it correct, ED.). It's a really cool band from Massachusetts.
Nicke: I miss all my Kiss albums. I didn't bring them along because they are originals. They're rare and shit.
Alex: (Mimics Nicke, cajoling) "Rare and shit".
Nicke: I just want to look at them, not listen. Actually, I wish I had some Dismember with me now.
What is your favourite band?
Nicke: (Lying) That's a hard question. Kiss.
Lars-Goran: Piledriver.
Uffe: Upset on Cross.
Alex: (Thinks for a while, this really has him nonplussed, he thought he was safe from my questions so far) ZZ Top.
Who's your favourite drummer, Nicke?
Nicke: The Slayer Hippy from Poison Idea (again, not sure if I got this correct, their Swedish accent doesn't make things any easier for me to transcribe, ED.).
Who's your favourite guitarist, Uffe?
Uffe: Mascis, the guy in Dinosaur Junior.
And yours, Alex (I got him unawares)?
Alex: (Grins) Tony Iommi.
And (to Lars-Goran) your favourite singer?
Lars-Goran: Roy Dixner (I hope I got this correct, ED.) from Devastation, a band from Chicago. Nicke: You probably don't know them. They never released an album.
OK then, on to your favourite drinks.
Lars-Goran: Trocadero.
Nicke: Milkshake.
Uffe: Coffee. Nick: Beer sometimes.
Alex: Milk and milkshake drinks.
What's the worst food humankind has ever made or discovered?
Uffe: French fries. It's so fat and everywhere you go if you order something you get French fries and you think "Oh, fuck".
Nicke: Broccoli. Broccoli sucks.
Alex: Sellery. Sellery is the worst thing on earth.
Nicke: Any vegetable for me. I am a meat person.
A good thing you're not in Carcass because they're all vegetarians.
Uffe: They're fakes, they just say that.
Alex: (To us) Do you want a beer?
Nicke: Probably Slayer, Celtic Frost, Devastation from Chicago, Repulsion, Autopsy.
Beer is handed around. Grolsch, of course. It tastes so much better than the stuff you get at Tivoli's regular bar, which I strongly suspect is watered down. The conversation transforms into a discussion of the forthcoming Autopsy album.
Uffe: The new Autopsy album will be the best. It will be called "Shit Eater".
Nicke: On the cover there will be a picture of someone eating shit.
Lars-Goran: It's cool.
Now Entombed is getting more famous, you're becoming more and more part of the music business. Is there something you particularly dislike about it?
Nicke: Everything except playing. The music industry sucks, you know. The only thing that's good is playing, meeting other bands, getting free beer. The rest sucks.
Uffe: Too much business.
Nicke: Too much politics.
Uffe: It's not enough fun.
Nicke: The business has taken away the fun sometimes.
In the background, Napalm Death takes to the stage. They kick off with my favourite "Harmony Corruption" track, "Suffer the Children". Still some questions to go.
Would any of you like a Wolverine for a pet?
Uffe: I don't think it's possible, but it sounds cool.
Nick: It would eat me alive.
Someone burps in the background. It introduces me into the "words to react to" phase of the interview. It would turn out to be a really short part. These guys surely know how not to be verbose.
The Swedish death metal scene.
Uffe: What?
Nicke: What death metal scene?
Uffe: No death metal scene. There's no scene. There's just a lot of bands. Everyone is competing with everybody.
Olof Palme (the assassinated Swedish prime minister).
Nicke: Corpse.
Lars-Goran: He was cool.
Nicke: He was all right. That's why he got shot. It was the Swedish secret service that shot him. It's true. But they can't reveal it because it's the secret service. It's secret, you know.
Napalm Death.
Nick: Headliners.
Uffe: Cool.
Krabathor (a rather unknown band that supported them quite a while ago, touring Holland, too, at the time).
Uffe: Who? Crematory?
Nicke: Who?
Lars-Goran: (Looking up for a second, thinking) Er...cool band!
Roxette (fellow Swedes).
Lars-Goran: Shit.
Uffe: No favourite.
Hellraiser.
Nicke: Excellent.
Uffe: Good movie.
Satanism.
Nicke: Excellent.
Uffe: Good...good entertainment.
Jesus Christ (their song "Out of Hand" is about this dude).
Uffe: Good entertainment.
Johnny Dordevic (the guy who sang on "Clandestine", the 2nd album).
Nicke: (In a really droll way) Good entertainment. Well...I don't know where he is.
Uffe: Last thing I heard about him he's a dad. He got a baby or something.
Knäckebröd (something presumably Swedish).
Nicke: Excellent!
Uffe: The best.
Touring.
Lars-Goran: Good and bad, mostly good. Fun. Even sleeping in a tour bus is cool. It's boring between soundcheck and gigs when you have to wait. Eighty percent of touring is waiting. And for what? We don't know.
Death metallers burning churches.
Nicke: Cool.
Lars-Goran: Cool. You could build a rehearsal room instead of just sitting there mumbling each Sunday morning (mimics mumbling).
Yngwie Malmsteen (a fellow Swede, well, at least sortof).
Nicke: Fuckin' idiot.
Uffe: A faggot. He likes boys. He hangs around with the girls, but it's all a cover-up. We see right through him. We're faggots too.
Lars-Goran: Yeah (laughs). You can bend over right now if you want (he then mumbles something in which only the word "French" is audible, to considerable amusement of the rest of the band).
Have you already started on the new album, or are you thinking of ideas for it?
Uffe: We have a couple of songs ready. We haven't thought about it that much.
Nick: Five songs or something.
Uffe: When we get back from this tour we're probably gonna sit around and start writing. We'll be touring until the first of July. Only 48 gigs to go. You should have seen us last night. We were terrible. Today was great.
And that concluded this rather brief interview with a bunch of people who weren't all too good at giving long answers (but you could notice that yourself already). Again CD liners were taken out and pictures taken. Lars Rosenberg (bass) dropped in with a girl he seemed to have found he could get along with nicely. We didn't linger in their dressing room too much (after all they were self-proclaimed faggots and we don't have eyes in the back of our heads!). I got back into the concert hall, where Napalm Death was just about to start "The Kill", the fourth song or something of their concert. So I hadn't missed that much actually.
RK
Written May 1994
What band(s) is Entombed's music most influenced by?