The latest "Show No Mercy" column at Pitchfork features interview content with Finnish artists Children of Bodom and Azaghal: https://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/feature/50073-column-show-no-mercy

Stereo Subversion interviews The Bell: https://www.stereosubversion.com/interviews-features/the-bell/

Swedesplease talks to Those Dancing Days in anticipation of seeing them at Hultsfred and gets a bit of news about the group's forthcoming single + album: https://www.swedesplease.net/?p=1084

Antenna talks to Anders Nyström of Katatonia: https://www.antenna.nu/?p=159

MP3: Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words - This room seems empty without you

I was just about to check out of my hotel room and head to the airport when the answers to this week's Göteborg feature showed up in my inbox. This week's guest: Matthias Andersson from Release the Bats, one of Sweden's preeminent underground labels.

How long have you lived in Gbg? What brought you there and what keeps you hanging around?

I moved here in summer 2003 so I have been living in GBG for close to 5 years now. I used to live in a small village in middle of the dark forests of the region Småland, later moved on to the nearest city and then spent one year in Jönköping. I guess I was longing for something more, something else, and eventually decided to go for GBG. In many ways there are only 3 options for young people in Sweden that want to escape the small town boredom: GBG, Stockholm and Malmö. Stockholm was never really an option for me for various reasons and Malmö always seemed a bit too small and boring. Since I already had friends and so on in GBG there wasn't really anywhere else to go at that point. 5 years later I have no intentions on leaving anytime soon, I love this city and for the moment I wouldn't trade it for anything.

I know you work with a lot of int'l acts, but you also seem to always have something going on w/the local scene. Do you see yourself as a regional label at all? How important do you think regional labels are in this day and age?

I actually really didn't release anything GBG-based until last year with the The Skull Defekts album ["Skkull"]. Ok, Tar... Feathers was kind of based in GBG for a while, but has to me always been more of a Stockholm-thing. I never really had the need to cover the music in this town before since other local labels like iDEAL and Kning Disk already did a very good job with that. But recently there has been sooo many amazing things happening here that it has been kind of impossible to not participate in one way or another! So yeah, RTB will definitely be exploring the current activities here a little bit more in the future than in the past with upcoming releases from Tsukimono, Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words, The Skull Defekts etc. Is it important with regional labels? Honestly I don't think labels are that important at all nowdays. Still I can see a purpose with regional labels, acting like some kind of centre of the scene with lots of things going on besides just releasing local acts (iDEAL being a way better example than RTB on that with club nights, festivals and so on).

Do you think there's a particular Gbg sound or attitude? Also, how do Gbg artists differ from those in other cities within Sweden?

GBG is known for having a very distinct sound when it comes to both Death Metal and Pop music for an example, but when it comes to the kind of music that RTB is releasing (whatever you want to call it, it's not like I even have a "typical" sound for the label...) I would say no. In that sense that I don't think anyone would be able to "hear" that a certain artist is from GBG when listening to it, just based on the actual sound. Attitude... I don't think this city differs from other Swedish towns really, but I know that outsiders tends to think that people in GBG are very open minded and easy to be around for some reason? If you should compare GBG to other Swedish towns when it comes to music and related activities, I think it's safe to say that no other town is even close to what's currently happening here! So many shows, new projects, new awesome releases and so on all the time! I also think musicians in GBG are usually a bit ahead of other places in Sweden, it seems like new impressions and ways to do things hits GBG first most of the time.

How's the health of the Gbg scene right now? Any particular artists that you're exciting about? What releases do you have planned? Also, anyone else you want to work with/wish you had signed?

Truly amazing things are happening here right now, I haven't been this excited about the local scene since I moved here, that's for sure. I don't know where to start... One of the best and most promising new acts is definitely the 3-piece Leafes. I put out a tape with them in December 2006 when they still lived in Jönköping and only had been a band for a few weeks. Then they put out a CD-R last year which is really, really good, moved to GBG and now they have just finished their debut album "Seedland" which will be put out on tape only! Kind of folky pretty song-based free jams for most of the time, usually arranged around acoustic instruments with a sparse use of electronics... In the vein of Sunburned Hand Of The Man and the likes, but with more melancholy. I really recommend everyone to check them out, and you will be hearing way more about them in the future for sure! Everything Dan of Sewer Election is doing is golden. Put out a Sewer Election/Altar Of Flies LP on RTB a few months ago. Another amazing project from Dan is White. Filthy lo-fi basement dwellings, disturbing shit. Modorra is great underground metal with my neighbour Jon on drums, haven't heard that much yet but it sure seems promising! Prostitute Finger is another new project, members from a few "famous" GBG acts. Rough feedback-mayhem, beautiful stuff. Relic was probably the most promising new band this town had seen in years but unfortunately it seems like they've just broke up? A damn shame if you ask me, the rehearsal tapes was some scary out there stuff and I could only imagine what this beast would have become in the future. Then there is the more well-known acts that is always doing brilliant stuff no matter what: Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words, Tsukimono, Viktor Sjöberg, Gloomy Sunday, The Skull Defekts and so on. Plus the whole DJ/club-scene with Studio, Tiedye etc. Current favorite local labels: Harsh Head Rituals and Pillowscars. Upcoming GBG-related releases on RTB this year: Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words - Lost in reflections LP + 7" (split release with iDEAL, Fang Bomb and When Skies Are Grey, a minor masterpiece!), The Skull Defekts - The drone drug CD (natural follow up to last years "Skkull", minamalistic and nasty drone-filth with an industrial edge, grim sounding stuff!) and the vinyl version of Tsukimono's stunning "Time Canvas" (originally released as a limited CD-R on Kning Disk last year). All these 3 releases will hopefully be ready early summer. Kind of happy with the current RTB release schedule I must say, but it would definitely be fun to do something more with Leafes in the future. While I'm at it, the label Fang Bomb is putting out a Gothenburg 2008 compilation soon with the The Skull Defekts, Anders Dahl, Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words, Sewer Election, Viktor Sjöberg, Jasper TX etc...

Got a song to share to rep Gbg? Tell us about it.

It has to be "This room seems empty without you", the opening track from "Lost in reflections", the upcoming Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words album! A bit different from the rest of the album, and also a bit different from the previous DLSODW sound. Still one of the most underrated GBG-acts in my opinion, why last year's amazing "Fall, fall, falling" (Kalligrammofon) didn't get more attention is a mystery to me.

It's a mystery to me too, especially since I count it as one of my favorite albums of 2007. And now, listening to this, it looks like there's a strong chance of a repeat. Amazing stuff, to be sure...

Dead Letters Spell Out Dead Words - This room seems empty without you

Check out a Digfi session (interview + 2 songs) featuring Umeå-based artist Cocoanut Groove: https://www.digfi.com/default.aspx?id=11745

You should be reading Thomas Denver Jonsson's "friend" blog without me needing to remind you, regardless- here's a new interview he did with IAT.MP3 artist/good friend/all-around good guy Björn Kleinhenz: https://vanbloggen.blogspot.com/2008/04/original-topeka-twin-bjrn-kleinhenz-on.html
In semi-related news, the itinerary for TDJ's upcoming UK tour in May has been confirmed: https://www.thomasdenver.com/e-gig.htm

MP3: Djembefitta - Lars Ulrich

When Djembefitta first wrote to me and outlined their treatise of hate with regards to "typical" Göteborg indierock, I knew I had to follow up with them and learn more. This week's entry in our ongoing Gbg-spotlight series does just that.

You guys have declared war on Gbg indiepop. What is it about that stereotypical sound that makes you so angry? What do you have to offer instead? What do you hope to accomplish?

Well, me (Ronny) and Sonny were talking the other day about older Swedish women going to Gambia in Africa to find their toy boys, and we figured out it's the exact same women who enroll into Djembe drum classes. It's probably lost on an American like yourself, but anyone from here would understand what we're talking about. Gross women who take advantage of young guys.

Now that we have a really lousy singer, like all big bands from Gothenburg, we are just waiting for the fucking money to roll right in! People are so stupid!

While your distaste for the sound of Håkan Hellström/BCQ/Broder Daniel/Jens Lekman/etc. is clear, are there any Gbg bands that you actually like? Is there another local scene there worth investigating, either now or in the past?

There's no scene worth investigating really. And when we are done there will be no other scene to talk about except for the new thrash/punk scene! You should investigate older swedish women going to Gambia though. They are really nasty! Is it even legal?

Actually the only scene worth checking out in retrospect is the bay area thrash scene from 1981-1986. We fucking love the big 4. Except for Anthrax with Joey Primadonna. Plus they were really from NY.

So who are you guys exactly? Have you lived in Gbg for a long time or did you move there from somewhere else? What keeps you there? What makes Gbg better or worse than other big cities in Sweden?

If we told you who we are we would have the fucking cops and kronofogden on our asses in a split second! Plus Siewert Öholm would accuse us of being satanists.

Gothenburg is really rainy and windy and it makes us pissed off. It's a good feeling!

Next question!

What other things do you hate that you haven't written songs about yet? Is there anything that makes you happy?

We hate a lot of stuff. Not all of our songs are about hate though. Some are about getting wasted. We are happy when we are wasted. Happy drunks. We might write a song about people who buy records by bands from this city with singers who sing out of tune. They are the ones who are REALLY stupid! And they're gonna love us! Now where's my beer?

Got a song to share with our readers? Want to tell us about it?

We have this song called "Lars Ulrich". He's such an easy target, but we had to do it anyway. It's about how he can be such a lousy drummer, and still be in polls for "best metal drummer". It's almost as funny as saying Håkan Hellström is the best singer in Sweden. I wish he still wore that funny fucking sailor outfit though. He used to be so cute. Håkan that is. A funny sailor dude singing out of tune about how he's drunk and lonely and the masses go: "We love this guy!" Ha, ha! Lars Ulrich is kinda the Håkan Hellström of Metal. A funny Danish guy who's drunk and plays drums like a fucking windmill.

One last thing, what can we expect from Djembefitta in the future? Any chance you'll play live? Or put out a proper record?

If we can stay out of jail and someone gives us a shit load of money we'll do it. We are only in it for the money!

Djembefitta - Lars Ulrich

Patrol Mag interviews Mathias Stromberg from The Bell: https://www.patrolmag.com/index.php?id=364

Watch a multi-part video interview with singer/songwriter Ane Brun at FaceCulture: https://www.faceculture.nl/artist.php?id=298

Brightest Young Things interviews Peter Morén: https://www.brightestyoungthings.com/interviews/byt-interview-peter-moren/

Absolut Noise has a new interview and mp3 from Nina Kinert: https://absolutnoise.blogspot.com/2008/04/nina-kinert-pets-friends-interview.html

The White Heat webzine has a great feature on Norwegian avant/jazz/metal act Shining: https://www.white-heat.com/?page=articles&id=26

Ratatosk talks to Norwegian "splatter folk" act Thinguma*jigSaw: https://www.ratatoskonline.net/article/interview-thingumajigsaw

Global Domination talks to Smattro Ansjovis from long-running Swedish grind act Birdflesh: https://www.globaldomination.se/interviews/birdflesh