HIM'S VILLE VALLO
DARK MESSIAH
OR
FALSE PROPHET?
POLITICS Of The HEART
HIM frontman Ville Valo has been hiding in
the spotlight for years. Here he gives up a bit
of down time to share his thoughts on
himself, his band, the new album 'Dark
Light' and, of course, smoking.
Words: Ville Valo. Images: Sam Scott Hunter.
As I write this, we as HIM are currently on vacation and sitting
in a local pub called Punavuoren Ahven - which means 'the red
hill perch' - on Albertinkatu in Helsinki, Finland. Our keyboardist Burton
is in the UK on his honeymoon, and linde the guitarist is with his family,
so you won't hear a peep out of them.
But Mige our bassist and Gas our drummer
are here so I'm expecting them to contribute to 'Ville
Valo's first written feature' 'cos I need all the help I can get!
Hammer's journos have kindly stepped to
one side to let me write this myself, so where to
begin? With a beer I guess...
When I wasn't drinking, I used to drink 20 cups of coffee
a day. You didn't know that I used to not
drink? Well, when I was about 13-years-old, I got drunk for the first time
at a friend's party. I drank wine and stole whatever
I could from my dad's cabinet. Everyone has
that one drink they can no longer drink, and mine's gin-
it just makes me want to puke cos I got so drunk on it that one time.
My dad used to drink the occasional whiskey, and my
parents have told me that once when I was very
young - maybe 2 or 3-years-old - I was in the bath and my parents
were hanging out chatting. I looked up and asked what
he was drinking, and he said, "This isn't for
kids." So obviously I said I wanted to taste it.
Thinking that it would put me off forever, they let me
have a sip. Apparently I drained the glass in
one go and absolutely loved it. They were horrified.
That was the start of my downfall.
So I'm sitting here with a beer, and I honestly can't
wait for this holiday to end so I can start
working again - it keeps me in better shape. It's good to concentrate
on something constantly, so when I don't, I end up not
doing anything at all. I wake up and watch a
movie, maybe cook a little bit,
drink a couple of cups of coffee, two cans of Redbull,
smoke like a chimney and just hang out with friends.
I'd been away from Europe for such a long time - four
months - doing the 'Dark Light' record that it was
weird when I came back here. For the first two days,
I started drinking at eight o'clock in the morning
because of the time difference [Los Angeles is 11 hours
behind Finland - World Time Ed] which was really weird.
But one of the good things about being in a rock band
is that things like that don't really matter.
It's like when we tour. We usually play about
five gigs in a row and then have a day off. So the night of
the fifth show is always the party night, which is effectively our Friday.
But then we have a lack of a Sunday 'cos we start
playing gigs again. And our Saturday could be on a Wednesday
so it totally fucks us up. When we have a day off
our bodies get all jittery at about stage time -
it's not only in
regular jobs that your body gets used to a routine -
so to distract ourselves we tend to drink a few beers.
The downtime jitters are a large part of why lots
of people in bands get drawn into doing drugs whilst
they're on the road, just tio fill time.
And, of course, on holiday I smoke a lot too.
I think it's pretty weird that I've become so well known for smoking.
I don't know why that is when lots of other people
also smoke - but then I guess a lot of people don't smoke on stage.
I only started doing that because I got nervous being
on stage, but now it's just something I'm used to doing when I'm up there.
Not as something to lean on, or as a gimmick, but
to better my performance.
I've had a few concerned parents complain about my
smoking, but they can fuck off. I grew up watching
Humphrey Bogart films and stuff like that,
and cigarettes were always very important in those
films for their symbolic value.. er, whatever that may have been.
They made people look cool, and those people were
usually the bad guys too. Smoking also smells good,
and kissing is better when you smoke.
Don't believe what they say, it's all bullshit!
I don't worry that it's doing me damage, 'cos
loads of other things ar too. My lungs are still OK though
and my pecker still works fine
so I don't have any problems. My doctor says
that smoking isn't good for my voice, but I consider it quite
the contrary because it roughens it up.
I've not got a bland voice, but it's too sweet,
Basically what I'm doing is the equivalent of people switching
strings on their guitar
to give themselves a heavier sound. My instruments
are my vocal chords,
so if I want to rough them up to sing a ballad,
I'll smoke a cigarette or sink a little Jack Daniel's to make
the baritone a bit deeper.
So I'm using my instrument, and it's all analogue
which is pretty good. Look at Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits
or Mark Lanegan, they couldn't have sounded like
that without smoking 60 Marlboros a day.
It's very important, but you have to know when to
stop if it's going to become damaging, what with my asthma and everything.
But the asthma and smoking is where I get the
intake of breath noise while I'm singing. So that's part of my sound too.
Those things didn't consciously become part of my
sound, but I've always noticed it and I've always loved grumpy
male voices. I've got a pretty low voice so it's not good if it's too plain
or boy choiry.
On the new album there's a song called 'Drunk On
Shadows' and I sound like a drunken sailor
on it and that's the whole idea. It's good to be
rough and imperfect.
Especially nowadays with all the studio gadgets,
'cos it's easy to kill the performance which is
something we try to avoid.
With the new album we didn't care how the songs would
come across live, because that restricts the
writing and recording process - you can always work
out later how to do it live.
That's what I liked about Sabbath, in that they were
unsophisticated live but on record they sounded huge.
You've also got two more senses when watching bands -
the smell and the visual aspect of the show.
It's a fine line though. I like that we're not
using backing tracks for anything live,
'cos even though it sounds really good, it's also
super-restrictive. I like it when shit happens on stage,
that's rock'n'roll. It's supposed to be chaotic,
and unexpected things are meant to happen.
That's how Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and The Doors were.
You've got to fuck up, you've got to find your limits
- what's too little and
what's too much. You have to go over the top every
now and again and not thing about it consciously.
Writing stuff down to say in-between songs, that's
blasphemy. Bands that do that are pissing all over rock'n'roll.
Bands using backing tapes, saying the same jokes,
having stylists and make up artists backstage- I just don't get it.
Rock'n'roll is supposed to be dirty, coincidental,
weird and different. Hopefully that's how we play.
Shit gigs are as important as good gigs, but I was
fucking embarrassed after the New York gig when I
got too drunk and all the tabloids here ran headlines
like 'Ville Fucked Up The New York Show' in big fucking
letters. But then I just had to laugh about it.
The pressure was huge at that show, especially after
being away from home for so long.
But you have to learn your limits and you only do that
by making mistakes. Unfortunately, that's the only gig
of ours that people have been talking about.
The New York Times carried a horrific review,
that said we were the shittest band ever, and how dare we fly
across the Atlantic to just drink our heads off.
But then other people loved it.
Dave Windorf from Monster Magnet told me that it
was the most rock'n'roll show he'd seen in ages,
so there's always opposites. I don't want us to
become this one trick pony though, where I get drunk
and fuck up every night. But every now and again
the Baudelaire living in me gets a little crazy.
I didn't plan to go out there drunk and fuck up, I
just fell over.
I was in such a drunken stupor that I was getting
into it. I went down
on my back and sang from there. It's a Jim Morrison
trick but I enjoyed it, and the band were just laughing
at me as they played.
I know now that I can't party 'til 6am the night
before a show, and then start the day
with hair of the dog and thing that I can make it.
Especially now our sets are longer,
and we're playing new countries where we have to
prove ourselves every night.
But it's good to fuck up, so that next time I'm
getting close to it I can see it coming and pull back.
I'm going to ask Mige about it. Mige, how did
you feel about my New York performance?
"Oh that gig. I've experienced that sort of thing
before from playing under the influence
myself, and I guess it kind of took my breath
away a bit. But I didn't see why everyone made such
a big deal out of it. Of course you were really
over the top, but
it's a part of the natural development
of a rock band to have these
incidents. It would be pretty boring and predictable if we
were a tea-drinking band. But that incident got
great headlines, so I think it was a milestone for us."
If you'd have fucked up like I did?
"I'd have been fired!"
Nah it would have been cool. I would just have
been like, 'What the fuck's going on?!' Actually
you did it in Italy.
"When somebody passed a joint? I didn't realise
what kind of joint it was,
so I lit it up and it was so strong that I took a
few drags and it all went dark. FOr the last
couple of songs I had no idea."
And then he went backstage and passed out straight away.
"I didn't get fired then though, so I guess if I'd have
done it in New York it would've been fine too. If people want
to go and see something
perfect then they can watch a ballet. I'm sure no one's drunk
there.
Rock's encouraging you to do it again."
"The best gig I saw," adds Gas, who appears to
have finally woken up, "was that [Finnish} punk band
Plastic Tears when the singer fired the drummer
and guitar player on stage. That was funny!"
You did get fired once on stage actually Mige.
'Cos I took over on bass.
"Oh yeah you did alright too. That's a secret
that you've managed to keep out of the press all this
time though, that you're good on bass."
I think I only did it the once though in the 90s,
somewhere in Finland. And I only lasted two
and a half minutes.
rest..buy the magazine.
It's a great article and there is a bit more of
Ville's words and stuff about Ville in it.
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