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Necrophobic - Joakim Sterner

17/12/03 || Lord K Philipson

Necrophobic logo Lemme quote myself from the review of their latest Christ-basher “Bloodhymns”, “Sidegård’s vocals are among the better black metal vocals I have ever heard, similar to Caligula’s of Dark Funeral…”. So, seeing I like Tobias´ vocals so much, what better than interviewing drummer Joakim Sterner, long-time friend/bitchasscunt, about everything but Tobias vocals? Necrophobic´s been hanging around in the scene for quite some time now and it seems there’s no end in sight just yet. I’m happy about it, they provide quality black/death metal albums on a regular basis for me to enjoy, so I can’t complain too much. If you don’t know these guys, you are fucken retarded. Naturally, my first question for this fucker would naturally be:

Lord K Philipson: Do you have anything to add?

Joakim: Thanks for the interview. It was a pleasure answering all your questions. It felt it was just one, but…

As I’m typing this I have all of yer albums spinning at random in my winamp… I’ll stick to my words in my review of the latest Necro-album; “Bloodhymns” is by far yer best effort. I’m not sure I actually said that, but I do think so. You have now released a bunch of albums without actually changing much of anything in your sound. It’s pussy-ass black/death metal all the way. In a good way I might add. Bands tend to at least change a bit over time; you are true to yer roots… Whatever those fucken roots may be I have no idea… Why is this?

Kentha, you’re such an ass-kisser. You don’t like our music. You just want to still get all our albums for free, ha ha ha. No, seriously, thanks for your good critic. To answer your question regarding why we still are the “same”…I guess it has to do with that I am in control of this band and if I like a band, I want them to stay the way I want them to be. I guess Necrophobic is the death metal version of Iron Maiden. They keep delivering good albums and keep their style. The way they like it and the way their fans want Iron Maiden to be. It’s no secret that I have Iron Maiden as my absolutely fave band, so it comes pretty naturally that I play in a band that keep the same style as long as the band will exist. If you’re not familiar with Necrophobic, you will probably think we use the same riffs all over again, but that’s not the case. Everytime we put an album out, it’s fresh and new, BUT we’re true to our kind of dark and evil death metal and all our ingredients that are very important for our sound.

One thing I notice nowadays by listening to yer new shit is that you aren’t that bad a drummer anymore. Do you actually rehearse by yerself these days or are you too old, too bored and too bald to actually care about improving yer drumming-skills even further? I’m not impressed yet I might add.

You will never be impressed by my drumming. I’m not a natural talent. I have learned to play drums all by myself and I guess I learned the wrong techniques from the start and I guess it’s hard to develop to a master drummer there of. I don’t practice, apart from when we rehearse. I guess I’m too lacy. I play with strength instead of technique. That’s totally wrong. But, as you say, I have improved, but not in a way I’m satisfied with. My band mates always tell me that I have a bad self-confidence. They say that feeling this way about my drumming hurts me development. I guess they’re right. Anyway, my drumming is appreciated by our fans and they claim my drumming is making the right groove for our type of music. That’s nice to hear once in a while.

Some of yer song-titles man… “Blood anthem”, “Cult of blood”, “Bloodthirst” etc… What’s up with that? Explain this without mentioning the “Bloodhymns” title. Are you guys fucken vampires? Speaking about vampires, what kinda NHL team do you wave for? Explain this as well without mentioning the “Bloodhymns” title.

I’m not so much into NHL, but if I have to pick a team from the NHL, I’d say New York Islanders. I can’t even remember why anymore, but it has to with that some old hero in Sweden from my fave team in Sweden (Djurgårdens IF) became a pro in that team. Yeah, I managed to answer that one with out mentioning the title “Blo…”. About our titles…well, there’s a few of them contain the word “blood”, but not all of them are from the latest album. The word has a strong meaning and stands for a lot of things. It’s also very symbolic. By the way you asked the question, it seems like you think it’s corny, but we take all our lyrics really seriously, deep or straight in your face kinda lyrics. We still take them seriously.

To make this more serious for a second… You were on the cover for Ablaze Magazine, some piss-poor metal-mag from somewhere. Does that make you a rockstar? What kinda criteria’s needs to be fulfilled to be called a rockstar? I guess being bald, 4 foot 3 and a poor drummer doesn’t really cut it. Who acts like the biggest rockstar in the band? I bet it’s Johan, one of yer guitarists. Tell us something that happened on tour that made you actually feel like a rockstar for a minute or two.

First off, Ablaze Magazine is not a piss-poor magazine. It’s one of the biggest death and black metal magazines in Germany. I even got surprised myself how big it is as I saw it could be bought at the airport in Berlin. At the airport!!! Anyway, I don’t consider myself as a rockstar and I didn’t know that I would be a cover-boy of a magazine. Sure, it’s cool that I was on the cover, but come on, you know me. I’m not a rockstar. I guess Tobias is the rockstar of Necrophobic, but in a good way. He’s not acting like a rockstar, but his presence makes people freeze. I can’t really remember a certain moment during the tour that made me feel like a rockstar, but I sure remember our visit at last years Wacken festival. It was sick! We could go anywhere before someone came up to us and asked for autographs and wanted to take photos. You saw it yourself (or maybe you were too drunk there in the backstage area, ha ha ha). We also saw those that tried to take pictures of us and tried to hide it from us, like when we crossed an area, they had their cams ready and lifted them fast, took the picture and then hide their cameras as fast as they brought it up. Then, I actually felt strange. The situation made us all feel like “rockstars”. It wasn’t like that on the tour. Of course we signed a lot of autographs and there were a lot of pictures taken of us. Some people were shaking just to stay in the near of us. I’m just happy to see that our music reach out to people and that they like it.

We have been friends for over a decade now, we are getting old man… Does talent improve with age? Do you actually realize those semi-grinding parts you perform on yer albums wears you out more and more these days?

I still don’t know when we first met. I know I was too drunk back in those days, but I remember that suddenly I had a very tall and big friend that had, and still has, a very similar humour that I have. I don’t know if talent improves with age, but I certainly know that I would never play those beats that I came up with for “The Nocturnal Silence”. I mean, they’re not “Pete Sandoval”, but they’re still too complexed to play today, if you know what I mean. The semi-grinding parts are still used today, so that’s not harder now than they were before. On the contrary, actually.

Lemme hear some sales-figures for all of yer releases. I know that the “Unholy prophecies” demo from the early 90´s sold shitloads at the time. I don’t wanna hear any bullshit about “we don’t know coz we never get any royalty-statements blafuckenbla…”. Spit it out, I won’t think less of you, I promise.

We never talk sales-figures. All I can say is that we’re not in the same league as Cannibal Corpse. You should never believe sales-figures, because it’s always false. We get royalty money, if you’re interested…

And by selling that amount of albums, you have prolly received some royalties at one time or another. What was the biggest for and what did you buy with it?

I invested them all in Telia stocks, ha ha ha…

I have like 21 questions left for you, are you hanging in there? Before I go on you can tell me you love me. Try to include the word “coyote” somewhere.

I’m still here och det vet du, coyote. I love you vovven!

Ok, so I lied in the introduction, sue me. I’m going to ask about Tobias vocals now. Would you agree if I say he’s among the elite in black metal shrieks? He’s got good range and shit. Do you think he’s worrying more about doing a good vocal-performance live or to look good for the eventual chicks in the crowd? Coz we do know that it’s Tobbe and Johan who are the posers in the band. Who’s the main-scorer of cunt in the band? My money is on Johan.

I don’t agree that Tobias is among the elite vocalists in the black metal scene. However, I think he’s among the elite in the death metal scene. He’s getting a lot of credits for his vocals and I think he deserves it. I don’t think he’s worrying about his live vocal performance, but it has nothing to do with if he will look good instead of sound good. All of us doesn’t care shit about if we play wrong or sing wrong when we play live. We just go up there and put on a great show. It doesn’t matter if it’s 20 people or 10000 in the crowd…those who have paid to see us, get the same type of show, no matter what. The show is more important than the playing. If you want to hear us play right, listen to our albums instead. The last sentence of your question is nothing we do. We all have girlfriends and we don’t cheat on them. When girls come up to us after shows, we still talk to them as we do with any other fans. Some may think we’re boring just because of that, but we don’t care. It can be flattering, but that’s all…

Seeing that we hung out a lot in the early 90´s when the scene was completely crowded and everyone helped each other out, knew each other and whatnot… Name some of the bands from that time that never really got the attention they deserved as well as some good memories from back then. When it comes to bands, I’d say Morpheus. That mini-lp is a classic. It’s a shame they completely fucked everything up with the full-length though.

Eeh, right now I can’t remember any band from the early days that didn’t get what they deserved. I also can’t come up with a special memory from those days that is so special that I feel it’s worth mentioning here. I mean, sure I had a really good time and it was cool that the scene was so strong and a lot of gigs and so on. Yeah, one thing I thought was cool was that we travelled a lot more to see bands. You know, when all of us travelled to Fagersta, because Babs seemed to get all the international cool bands to play there instead of Stockholm.

“666 – we vomit on the crucifix” is a line from “The third of arrivals” from one of yer albums. Are you completely sure that it should be “on” and not “at”?

I’m completely sure that it shall be “on” there…

I want you to rate the following drummers from 1 to 10, 10 is ace, 1 is not. You get it. Or do I have to draw a fucken picture? I can’t draw for shit though…

Leif Edling:

Does Leif play the drums?

Mark Portnoy:

Sorry, I’m not familiar with that guy…

Markus Ruden of Morpheus:

I thought he was good, but he doesn’t play with groove.

Steve Asheim: Really good with the kick drums.

Myself back in the days:

You played with a really good groove.

Doc from Vader:

He plays like a programmed machine.

Matte Modin:

What can I say…? They guy kicks (drums) ass!!!

Peter Stjärnvind:

A better death metal drummer than a death rock drummer. Great, of course!

Yourself:

Good old school death metal drummer with groove. I know my limits.

Uli Kusch:

Once again…who???

You suck at doing the 1-10 ratings, but I’ll let it slide. Anyways, what’s your biography? I’m only kidding. As far as I know, pretty much anyone in a band in Stockholm is whoring with a few other projects but I can’t recall ever seeing you having another band on the side, am I wrong here? Anyone in the band doing side-projects nowadays? Would you like to start a band with me? You know I’m one of the few who actually has groove when it comes to song writing.

All of us are involved in so called “side projects”. It’s just that we don’t always have the time to make bigger efforts on them. Right now, we only have time with Necrophobic. Yeah, playing with you should be cool. What kind of music would it be then?

Death Metal. Who’s actually the better guitarist of Sebastian and Johan? Again, my money is on Johan. Who should I credit for all those beautiful harmonies and shit you have in yer songs?

Sebastian is the better guitarist, but Johan is really good as well, of course. You shall credit all of us for the harmonies, but it’s only the guitarists that play them, ha ha ha.

You played Wacken last year and also put me on the guestlist among others. I wanna say thanx for that btw. How was Wacken treating you guys? What was the single most insane thing that happened during yer stay? From what I remember I just saw you running around semi-drunk, looking like a small version of Kerry King. How many bands did you actually witness? Who impressed you? I have to say that Amon Amarth prolly did that festival’s best gig. It might also be becoz those guys were like one of the 3 bands I saw. I kinda feel sorry for missing yer gig, I think I missed it anyways, can you forgive me? I can send you cash… Talking about cash, don’t you owe me cash since I worked for you in Stockholm selling shirts? I didn’t even get a fucken free shirt you bastards, I should end this interview right here really….

Wacken was really cool. I already spoke a little bit about it here earlier, but for me, it’s the best fucking festival a metal person can attend to. It’s the “Mecca” for all metallers. I can’t recall how many bands I saw, but I think I enjoyed Immortal the most. I thought Macabre didn’t do a good show and I felt very disappointed afterwards. Anyway, we met them and talked to them a little bit. They actually wanted to take a picture with us. Yeah, Kerry King, ha ha ha. There were actually a stupid German whispering to his friend “Look, there is Kerry King” at the camping area. Me and Freiman were looking for a friend in the camping area, but how scan a German be? Do they really think Kerry King would walk at the camping area at Wacken when Slayer didn’t even play that year? I don’t know if it’s insane, but I was in the limo of Bruce Dickinson and shook his hands after his show. I was totally drunk, but I just felt that I had to. I was the only one he allowed to do it. There were a lot of other people there. The Rock Hard guys thought it was so funny that they wrote about it their Wacken Special in the magazine. Yeah, since you missed our show in Wacken you automatically had to sell some shirts for us and not get paid for it any way. It’s a hard world, baby and you know it! How rough can I be (???).

I’m listening to “Helfire” here.. Is that a typo, the title I mean or is it one “l” on purpose? What I wanna say is that you really know how to play those kicks and that snare. What is your gear? If you use a double-pedal and not 2 bassdrums, I’m out of here. Line the shit up baby and tell me what it cost you.

The title of that song is “Helfire” with just one “l”. I use a double-pedal. Hallo? Haaaaaalllloooooo!!! Where did you go? Come back. I have more questions to answer for you! The gear is Tama and consists of 1 bass drum, 1 snare, 2 tom toms, 1 floor tom, 1 hi-hat, 2 crashes and 1 ride. It didn’t cost much, but drums are fucking expensive anyway. I hate when something breaks. It’s not like buying a new pick or a new set of strings.

18 and life, you got it. What band fucker? In case someone misses out on this, it’s question number 18.

Ahh, you’re back now. Skidrow, by the way…

Ok, so In Flames are making it big now. I know the guys and I think they deserve it. What’s yer take on the Swedish scene right now? Is Stockholm housing the better bands or is Gothenburg? I mean, come on… fucken At The Gates man…. Name your single fave album from respective city, no Joakim, you cannot pick yours.

I like the Stockholm scene better that the Gothenburg scene. It’s not just because I come from Stockholm myself. It’s just that I think we have rawer bands from here. The Gothenburg bands seem to be too much melodic, in the wrong way. Playing “happy” melodies instead of dark and evil stuff. Anyway, my fave album from Stockholm is “Under the Sign of the Black Mark” (Bathory) and from Gothenburg it has to be “Slaughter of the Soul” (At the Gates).

So really.. what are you fuckers up to right now? I need a new album to review you know. Any new songs made, what are the plans? You know, the works.

We have like 4-5 songs in work and a lot of unused material. We plan to record it sometime later this year for an early 2004 release. I really can’t tell you more about it because we don’t have any titles or lyrics yet. We have the concept very roughly, but…

I can’t let this interview continue without asking this in honour of Scott Myers… Have you ever seen eel-porn?

No, I haven’t. Have you seen eel-porn? What’s it like? Who is Scott Myers?

Scott Myers is a cool fucker who used to write for another site. I don’t know what eel-porn is like really, I only saw a picture that the Chief of that site (WTD) sent me. I didn’t jerk off. Ok, I did. Busted. Fuck it, I have 6 fucken words for you. Dark Funeral.

Are you or are you not playing session guitar in Dark Funeral? I would love to see you in corpse paint, ha ha ha. Lord K and the Funerals…play in Stockholm now! But only if you play…

For the fucken losers not knowing about Necrophobic. Name one song off each of yer album that would make them a good introduction to as what you are all about. – “The Nocturnal Silence” (The Nocturnal Silence) – “Spawned by Evil” (Darkside) – “The Third of Arrivals” (The Third Antichrist) – “Dreams Shall Flesh” (Bloodhymns)

Would you like to ask me a few questions? I’m kinda running out of shit to ask you, brother…

Yeah, sure…

Joakim:: When is Leukemia Fanzine’s next issue coming out?

Lord K: Never, fanzines are gay.

Joakim: What do you love the most, to play guitar or drums?

Lord K: Guitar, doing drums messes up your hair, not that you have any to mess up nowadays.

Joakim: What’s the latest album you actually BOUGHT?

Lord K: Avril Lavigne. And I like it.

Joakim: When will you arrange a metal festival in Örebro?

Lord K: I don’t think that’ll ever happen.

Joakim: Why are you so kind to EVERYONE?

Lord K: Pure fucken bad luck. I don’t mean to.

Back to normal, me asking you shit. What’s the worst track you guys ever made. One on any album that you just can’t listen to and gladly skip with the remote control when it comes up?

The thing is that we don’t record bad songs. We only record songs we like to 100%. That’s why we don’t release shit albums.

Are you true, grim or necro? You can’t choose all 3…

I’m the Necrostar…

I think we are about to sum this one up.. Is there anything you’d like to mention that we haven’t covered just yet?

You know you asked me if I ever wanted to come and visit you when you lived in Malmköping. I said yes, I will do that before the next edition of the fanzine you did would come out. You haven’t asked me if this interview will do instead for that old fanzine and you have won the bet. That you did the interview before I visited you in your apartment. I will also answer that unasked question from you: No! You will only win if you publish this in your old fanzine before I visit you.

Now let’s see how much of a rockstar you are… Name a guy in any Swedish band you’d like to perform lethal wrestling-moves on. No sir, you can’t pick me.

Ok, then I will take another BIG person. What about Angus Young or Ronnie James Dio?

Joakim, those guys are not Swedish. Well, well…I almost forgot.. Have Joakim Sterner ever: ( yes or no )

...Thought he was a rockstar?:

While sober…no!

...Fought with a band member?:

Like really fought, fists and shit? Yes.

...Thought “it’s time to quit this bullshit, I’m in the fucken mid 30´s”?:

No way!

...Listened to Papa Roach and liked it?:

No.

...Lied in this interview?:

Yes, but you don’t know where…

...Been on a magazine cover that matters?:

Yes.

...Fucked a piss-ugly chick?:

In my opinion, no.

...Written a single riff for the band?:

Yes. (Have you seen the song credit list of our albums?)

...Realized that riff was utter crap?:

Yes.

...Wanted to be me, you know, tall, beautiful and talented?:

Yes ( I felt I just had to say it).

...Wanted this interview to end like 30 questions ago?:

No, I started from the bottom!

You can thank me now and all that for spending my precious time on you. I love you man. Naturally I have to end with the following question… What’s up man, how the fuck are you?

I’m fine. Thank you for asking. You are very considerate and polite!

Interviews