Gothic rock fans everywhere, particularly devotees of the “love metal” stylings of HIM, wept when the Finnish outfit called it a day back in 2017. Now, it’s time to wipe away the tears of blood as the band’s enchanting frontman Ville Valo is back under the “VV” banner with brand new music that echoes his past and happily scratches that dark, shadowy itch.
Rising instrumental swells and soaring choruses fill VV’s Neon Noir, released in late January, and at first glance it might not sound all that different from his previous unit. Further listening though and it’s clear how Valo embraced not having to worry about pleasing anyone but himself in the studio, taking his time, expanding his sonic palate in bits here and spots there. He handled all the instrumentation, production and engineering duties on the record, making for not just a solo but a near solitary effort.
Valo launches his first ever solo tour tonight (March 31) with two consecutive evenings in Philadelphia before making his way up to Boston this Sunday (April 2) at Big Night Live. Ahead of the initial dates, he checked in from his home studio in Helsinki for a crack at our 617 Q&A series (Six Questions; One Recommendation; Seven Somethings), speaking reverentially about HIM while detailing how the approach to VV was one with pointed perfectionism. Valo also told Vanyaland about his love for Ozzy and Danzig before giving some insight into all things “gram.”
:: SIX QUESTIONS
Michael Christopher: Neon Noir is your first solo full length, and I’m curious as to how the recording process felt after being in a band for so long. Was it intimidating going and doing the music completely on your own?
Ville Valo: It wasn’t intimidating, but it was quite psychedelic in the sense that [it was] a sort of like mystic solo album à la Prince and Stevie Wonder and Lenny Kravitz. Partially due to the pandemic, I ended up recording and producing engineering and writing everything by myself. So, it was a weird way to make an album and very different from my previous band HIM, because there was a lot of camaraderie – we were made since we were kids – so it’s like a band of brothers and now it was just the lonely wolf. So yes, there was quite a difference, but I think at the end of the day, this was a much-needed new experience after recording and touring for about 25 years. I think I needed a challenge. I needed to put myself up for a challenge and do something differently. And then at the end of the day, the album doesn’t really sound too different from what I’ve done in the past. That’s the age-old question: The zebra and his stripes.
How conscious were you of making it stand apart sonically something where people didn’t say, “Well, this is the same thing as HIM. Why did he even bother breaking that band up?”
Because it was time for HIM to be broken up; we didn’t want to continue touring and recording together. And then, musically speaking, I did write like 99 percent of the HIM tracks. With the new album, I just followed my guts instinct. That was the way to go, really, just following the song and following the sound. Because, I think the most stupid thing you could do when working on music is try to intellectualize it to make it an intellectual… sort of a deal that it doesn’t make much sense. I think that, for example, when HIM disbanded, the intellectual side – whether it’s the left hemisphere or not, I can’t remember how the hemispheres go – but I started thinking about, “Yeah, I got a clean slate. I can do whatever I want to.”
And I spent two years of thinking that as opposed to picking up the guitar and seeing where the song leads me. Usually that’s the natural way to go, and I was quite happy and I found it quite endearing to find myself in a… not necessarily the same place, but in the similar place feel-wise and vibe-wise musically speaking than with HIM. Because to me what it meant was, that is my musical identity that I’ve been building bit-by-bit, brick-by-brick since the ‘90s. So for me, it felt really natural and I didn’t really think about it once I started working on the album. I didn’t really consciously think about similarities or dissimilarities or what should I be doing or what makes sense or what doesn’t make sense because music at its best doesn’t make sense. It just hits you in the right spot and that’s it.
Plus, you don’t want to put any restrictions upon yourself either.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you’re absolutely right, because I think that if you start doing that before you even start, then you’re kind of in this weird situation – you’re caging yourself. And, for me, that doesn’t make any sense. All that being said, I do consider this to be sort of a transitional point between my past and whatever might lie in the future of which I don’t know anything as of yet. And the same with touring-wise in the touring set, we’re playing a ton of HIM songs – it’s about half and half – because that makes all the sense in the world to me. A lot of people are not there just for the new tracks, they’re there for my history as well and for the history that HIM represented. It’s been a cool 20 years since HIM were cool. [laughs] It’s like bell bottoms, we’re like flare trousers coming in as a trendy item of the day every 20 years or so.
That kind of leads directly into my next question, which is, in a perfect world, certainly not now, but at some point down the line, would you like to have VV stand up on its own as an entity in the live setting, or will you always have the desire to play HIM songs live?
To me, they’re one in the same, because they’re my songs and my name is Ville and I wrote the songs and I wrote these new songs and I performed both of them. So, I don’t see that as a problematic thing. It’s not as if I’m trying to do two completely separate careers, because in that case, if I would’ve wanted to really separate myself from the past, I wouldn’t have played any HIM tracks on the tour, so on. It’s not like some artists, when they start their solo career or form a new band, they want to burn their bridges down and start anew and do something completely new. And that’s all fair and square – no problems with that – but there’s nothing, of course there’s regret, but that’s the regret we all have in life; things that could have gone better and things that we messed up or whatnot. But I’m quite happy with all the experiences and the amazing journeys I was able to experience with HIM. So, there’s no reason for me to denounce my past.
***
You mentioned other artists and I was thinking of some of your influences. I’m wondering if there was anyone that you looked to as a touchstone in bands – metal or otherwise – that went solo coming from a prominent band? Maybe an Ozzy Osbourne or a Glenn Danzig and how they did it, in terms of either shifting their sound or growing their image in a different way from what they were previously.
Well, I think you bringing up Ozzy, he’s such a great example of somebody who’s been able to maintain his musical identity but still stay somehow, not necessarily current, but been able to shed his skin during the years, many, many a time and never losing the respect and never really losing the identity. He’s always been himself; he’s always been my hero and the rest of Black Sabbath. I grew up with that stuff and they’re still hugely important.
Glenn Danzig, I wasn’t even thinking about it because of all the stories I’ve just heard about his personality. I’ve never had the chance of meeting him, but hearing these stories that you can’t look at him in the eyes – that’s in his tour rider or whatever – and stuff like that is a stuff of legend. And I’m a huge fan. I love his second album, probably the most for whatever reason, Lucifuge, with “Blood and Tears” and “Tired of Being Alive” and all that stuff. When that came out, it hit me in the right spot at the right time. And I’ve always considered him to be the “Evil Elvis.” He’s such a walking juxtaposition, yin and yang in that same personality and such an interesting character. One of my heroes for sure.
But regarding the question you had, once again, you just have to trust your instinct because we can’t really know. I thought, “the song is the master,” so to speak, and I have to follow the song and if the song is good enough and if it’s good timing, that usually makes all the difference in the world. You can be a great performer, you can look good or whatever, you can have the right moves, but if you don’t have the song, you have nada. So, I was working on that and not sure whether I got there, but I’m sincerely trying my best.
One of the things I noticed on the record was the album cover where you’ve got, if you look at your eyes, you’ve got the two V’s in it. And I was wondering, is that the reflection, was that just luck of the V-shaped lighting that was used or was it purposeful to have a V in each of your eyes?
That was the idea of the photographer. It’s actually shot on film, and he had a little sort of LED stick, so he drew the V’s and the shutter speed was super slow, so it was like, I think at least two or three seconds. I had to stay still while he hit that and just that one shot worked. It was shot on black and white film. [Photographer Joonas Brandt], he’s a friend of mine and we were sort depressed during lockdown and all that covid stuff and he just came to my house when we improvised for a wee bit photography-wise. And then that picture happened, and we both thought that it sends the viewer so many different mixed messages on so many different levels.
***
A lot of people have been seeing it very… it has a deer in the headlines effect to some and to some it looks really intimidating and to some it looks really endearing. And I love that, because that’s what I love about the music as well, that you can’t be really sure. It’s not aggressive but it’s still rocking and it’s still not quite sure… I grew up with the early ‘90s, like alternative rock. My favorite albums, probably artistically, are Ritual de lo Habitual by Jane’s Addiction and Angel Dust by Faith No More. Stuff that you weren’t quite sure where it is emotionally and atmospherically and mood-wise. It took you into weird places, and that’s what I like music to do if at all possible. And that’s the reason for [on Neon Noir] the whole album going weirder by each and every song. It gets longer and weirder.
From just the album cover to then the way that the songs get longer as the album progresses sonically, do you consider yourself detail oriented to the point where you tend to obsess over small things like that?
Yeah, that’s one thing that the band always hated me for. [laughs] And that’s what I liked about working by myself, ‘cause I was able to give myself as much time as I wanted to the little tiny details. To me, they matter. It’s tough to say if all the intricacies, if they matter to the listener and I don’t really care because they’re such an important factor of the whole process for me, to be able to be in this meditative state and get lost in making music. That’s quite cool and quite rare at the end of the day. A lot of times when you’re in a band, or in the music industry, there’s a lot of noise, there’s a lot of other things than the actual music and this time around Covid – and then the fact that nobody was expecting anything of me – I was able to construct just the moods and melodies and those details you just mentioned.
:: ONE RECOMMENDATION
There’s a great writer from Argentina called Mariana Enríquez. She just released her first novel last autumn, it’s called Our Share of the Night. It’s sort of a weird mixture of sort, well I haven’t read the whole book yet, but it’s a mixture of like…what would I describe it? It’s because it is from a feminine perspective, but it has a touch of H.P. Lovecraft to it; a bit of horror mixed up with what was going on in Argentina, politically speaking, in the past, and it’s a very unique voice. She’s published a couple of collections of short stories before. There’s one called Things We Lost in the Fire – that’s really, really good. But now the new novel is like 800 pages. I’m not even halfway through yet, but it’s quite interesting. I grew up with a reading Edgar Allen Poe and H.P. Lovecraft and I was a sucker for horror stuff – Clive Barker and all. And it’s cool to be able to have somebody with a sort of contemporary voice, but doesn’t just come from a niche – she can write a bit more open, so it’s not just spectacular violence or whatever. It’s got a bit more drama going on and there’s a bit more sentimentality and emotional power behind her writing.
:: SEVEN OF SOMETHING
You are known for designing — creating — the heartagram, which is the combination of a heart and a pentagram. I’m going to give you seven things with the word “gram” in them, and you tell me the first thing that comes to mind.
Instagram.
Oh man. I hate social media and everything related to it. I’m way too old for it. I get really jittery and anxious and depressed when I even think about it. I think that when a cell phone starts beeping and bleeping too many times a day, then you are doomed. And I try to avoid it at all costs. I love what it can do communications-wise, and I can understand how it’s so important to a lot of people. But to me…even having my first email address was a big deal. I like my solitude and being sort of far away.
Alexander Graham Bell.
I’m just reading a book about the invention of recording mediums. I can’t remember what the book is called. It’s really, really good and it’s really in depth and it’s about all the old school inventors putting together first phonograms and the first sort of weird versions where you recorded on wire, like electrical wire and before that was wax cylinders. And the fight of different inventors sort of inventing stuff at the same time. [Bell] was one of them, getting the voice to translate from one medium to another, big distances and all that stuff. So, I’ve been just reading about him. I don’t know much about him – not a history buff, but I’m willing to learn.
Graham crackers.
That’s like the Theraflu and comfort food sort of thing. That’s like a hotel room, you’re hoping that there is something in the middle of night in the mini bar and that’s what you get. They’re definitely better than nothing.
Bands that are using holograms in place of their deceased lead singers.
I still haven’t seen any of those shows. I know that they were talking about doing one with Amy Winehouse, which is quite weird. And I think they did some demo material a few years ago and I think that was too soon for me, perhaps. It feels like if you do that with Elvis, it feels like such a E.T. kind of otherworldly larger than life character. It doesn’t seem weird – at least to me. But to me, the only proper hologram anyway is Princess Leia asking for help.
Gram Parsons, singer songwriter played with The Byrds.
I actually don’t know his stuff too well. Like the Byrds in the ‘60s and “Mr. Tambourine Man” and all that stuff. I only know a few songs here and there and just tiny little bits of his history. He was an interesting character, wasn’t he?
And he had a really fascinating death too, how he overdosed at the age of 26.
Is it the desert thing? Yes, his death. Yeah. Was it his mates who drove him or…
They stole his body from the airport and went to cremate him in the desert.
Yeah, because I think they made a film of that as well. Like a fictional half film, direct to DVD or whatever. But I’ve read about him a few times. That sounds a bit like Johnny Depp using the cannon for Hunter S. Thompson’s ashes, wasn’t it?
Right. Johnny Depp fired his ashes from a cannon.
Indeed. Only in America. [laughs]
A gram of cocaine.
Doesn’t get you too far. [laughs] Reminds me of the ‘80s. Scarface, the ‘80s and Hollywood.
Pentagram, the doom metal pioneers.
There’s a very interesting documentary [Last Days Here] about, is it Bobby Liebling? I can’t remember how the last name is spelled, but I have friends who know him and I knew of him before. There’s one of my mates who’s, whose name is Lee Dorrian, he used to sing for a band called Napalm Death and then he started a band called Cathedral. So, they kind of reinvented the whole concept of doom. And with Lee and his record label, he signed Ghost originally and he was sort of, I think he released some Pentagram stuff as well. He’s sort of brought the whole idea of very slow, very sludgy sort “Sabbathian” if you will, music back to the fore.
And I know Pentagram of that era, but pentagram, the symbol for me always reminds me of Venom when they [and the album] Black Metal. And [HIM] had an album called Love Metal, and that was our sort of tongue-in-cheek tribute to Venom and the whole niche idea of different genres and your own little categories that people used to come up with all the time – especially in metal. The ”new wave post whatever, metal post, Post, post something metal.” Which was quite funny at times. But yeah, but the documentary is quite a heavy duty to watch if you haven’t seen it…
Oh yeah, yeah. It’s wild how it starts off and he’s living in his mother’s basement then it goes until he’s back onstage.
And he looks like a character out of a J. R. R. Tolkien book, doesn’t he? He has sort of like an aura of this otherworldliness. I guess that that’s what your mother’s cellar does to you. [laughs]
VV + Kælan Mikla :: Sunday, April 2 at Big Night Live, 110 Causeway St. in Boston, MA :: 7 p.m., all ages, $49.50 :: Event info :: Advance Tickets
