Interview Mutant Blast
Mutant Blast, the force behind a unique metal thrashing death ‘n’ roll sound, is gearing up for their new album planned to be released September 2024 on Rockshots Records. The upcoming album promises a fresh blend of death’n’roll, thrash metal, and heavy metal, showcasing Mutant Blast’s evolution since its formation in August 2020. With influences ranging from classic metal to ‘90s extreme crunching, the band has crafted a distinctive and powerful sound that sets them apart in the metal scene. The second single, “Acid Rain” taken from the upcoming album called “Soulsteeler”, is a very catchy and forward-rolling song with great melodic riffs delivering a high-energy experience with nods to action, movie references, and current world events. Here resonates a strong image reminiscent of Annihilator’s old production.
Answered by
Toni Huhtiniemi – guitar, b.vocals
Tomi Malinen – vocals, guitar
Jon Asher - Why did you form? How did the idea come to be?
At first it was idea from our former bass player Julle to start a death’n’roll band and he asked me at first to play guitar and I sayed “Yeah”. I was asking ES to play drums and finally we asked Tomi to sing or playing second guitar and he wanted to do both. It’s the short story of Mutant Blast’s birth. (Toni)
Jon Asher - How would you describe your sound in five words?
Metal thrashing death’n’roll – and heavy! (Toni)
Jon Asher - Your upcoming album, how do think it will be received by fans?
We are trusting our new stuff, there is lot of good riffs and melodies. Really good song writing also. It will be strong metal album and fans will love it.
Jon Asher - What kind of listening experience is trying to give fans with this album, its singles?
Singles are really strong, memorable and about the shortest songs from the album. It will be good experience and after listening the singles they wanna hear the whole album. At least we’ll hope it! (Toni)
Jon Asher - How is the writing process for the band?
Tomi composes most of the material and almost all the lyrics. I will arrange some songs and compose something also. We will think together with Tomi lot of backing vocals etc. (Toni)
The music comes first. I may have a vague idea where and how the vocals would go but it may take months until I get an idea for the lyrics. Once I get the idea or the theme I usually write them with one sitting. For solos, I try different takes and then listen what works the best and then write it clean so I can play the same solo on the record and live. (Tomi)
Jon Asher - Are any of the band members known on the local scene from any other bands?
Our bass player Eero plays guitar in Waltari. Tomi and Eero plays in Rokkikone what is cover band for finnish old rock band Popeda. (Toni)
Jon Asher - How did you decide on the tracks for this album? How much more music can fans expect? - What can people expect live from your band compared to other bands?
A good energetic liveshow! We will give all we got. (Toni)
Jon Asher - Where do your lyrics come from? What inspires your writing?
Lyrics can vary from world events, movies, dreams, imagination to real events that have happened in my personal life. (Tomi)
Jon Asher - Are the songs a collaborative effort?
Yes, some songs are more and some less.
Jon Asher - Does the band have a main songwriter?
Tomi Malinen (vocals/guitar)
Jon Asher - How does the music affect the lyrics and vice versa?
It does have an effect to a certain degree so that heavier songs may have heavier themes, but because we write the music first, the lyrics have little or no effect on the music. (Tomi)
Jon Asher - How would you describe the evolution of the band’s sound?
At first it was more death’n’roll style but now there is lot of thrash metal and even heavy metal also in our sound. I think our sound is fresh and unique now. (Toni)
Jon Asher - Name the Top 5 band influences of the band/ Top 5 Bands that your band sounds like that fans like.
Metallica, Entombed, Iron Maiden, Exodus, Annihilator (Toni)
Jon Asher - What metal genres influence you as a band the most?
Death’n’roll, thrash metal, heavy metal and littlebit hard rock & death metal. Old school metal is the thing, no post metal or core at all. (Toni)
Jon Asher - Describe the album as a whole
The album is full of groovy thrash metal songs blasting away in high gear! It contains both slightly older, re-arranged songs and more recent compositions. We worked on the album for about 1.5 years and put a lot of effort into it to make the album as good as possible. We hope that as many fans of heavier music as possible will find the band and get to hear the end result!
Describe each song track by track
Satan’s Pawn
The song has a heavy intro from which leads into fast verses and rocking solo. The song lyrics come from a vampire movie set on a graveyard with some satanic themes.
Alone in the Wasteland
A tight forward rolling and very grooving & striking song.
This song is set in a post apolyptic world and is about surviving in such harsh environment.
Into the Night
It is a very fast paced song, one of the fastest song on the record. The spirit of “Kill ‘em All” and old school thrash metal is strongly present. Tomi wroted this song in 2021 on one sitting just playing riffs on guitar. Very minor changes after the first demo was made, mainly to the bass and drum parts. The song is mainly about calling for action, some movie references and some current world events mixed to the lyrics. It may not be nice poetry but it is full power & steel and doesn’t hold back.
Black Mass
The song is about dark visions which appear in nightmares. This song has a Slayer/Sepultura style intro, alternating lead vocals between Tomi and Toni and a funky solo.
Final Day
The slowest and very atmospheric, but at the same time very heavy song on the album. We wanted to do something different this time.
This song begins with a spooky horror movieish intro which leads to stomping verses and a melodic chorus. The lyrics are also set in a horror movie environment; lost alone and the dread of the unknown.
Acid Rain
Very catchy and forward rolling song with great melodic riffs. The song becomes a strong image of Annihilator's old production. Acid Rain was based on an idea and a demo Tomi wrote back in 2008. The demo had almost all the parts, main riff, verse, chorus but something was missing so he couldn’t make it a whole song back then. Then Tomi just recently went back to the original demo and just added the solo part and that’s it! The lyrics can be interpreted many ways and it may or may not be straight forward. It’s up to the listener to decide what it means.
Mind Control
This song is a middle tempo thrash metal song with some odd time signatures. They lyrics are about media bias and how they control people’s decisions.
For the Sake of Humanity
It is a very epic thrash metal song with many different atmospheric parts and melodic solos. This is a story about morality of warfare and invasion of foreign territory. The song is certainly our most ambitious song to date. Ends the album nicely before the cover song.
Prowler
Cover song from mighty Iron Maiden. It was Toni’s idea to play something different and traditional heavy metal. We wanted to do some song from Di’Anno era and Prowler was just fit perfect in our style. We put little of our metallic style & own sound and tried to honor original version at the same time and we did it! Very satisfied with this one.
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