In this interview i am going to deal with one of the most promising metal band coming from Sweden. They are called Machinery, and their first step is entitled "Degeneration", realized just some months ago, showing an interesting mix between Thrash and grooving Heavy Metal. Just at the time they are entering in studio to work at the second full-lenght album, I' ve intercepted Michel Isberg; vocalist, guitar player and also former member of Machinery with Johan Westman (drummer). Let' s do some questions to know something more about Machinery past, present and future....

Hello Michel. Let's start with a presentation of Machinery. You are a newcomer and your first cd “Degeneration” was released just in 2006. I'm sure that Italian audience doesn't know you very well….so please tell me something about your beginning and history…

Hi guy!

Well hmm, let´s see…the first Machinery goes all the way back to 2001 but there isn´t much resemblance left of that band today.

Basically Machinery has gone through a lot of lineup-changes and styles until we´ve slowly formed our own thing. Me and Johan ( Westman-drummer) formed the band back then and has kinda grown up together and I guess you can say that we form together the core!

I think it was around 2003 that we started to realize that we are on to something special and started to experiment with this mixing of genres-thing!

In those days the lineup consisted with a bunch of colourful guys and all of us listened to different genres and felt strongly for that particular thing we were infuenced at the time

I for an example always liked thrash Exodus and normal heavymetal like Dio and Maiden! Johan has always had a thing for At The Gates and Nine Inch Nails. My brother Markus (who left the band oct-06) liked Amon Amarth, Strapping Young Lad and Carnal Forge and our bass player Hans ( Johansson ) was more of a stoner-guy. Huge fan of Kyuss and was always the guy who wanted more death metal in the music! A funny situation which regardless of our differencies managed to make some really cool music.

The music that is heard on Degeneration is kinda Exodus meets Iron Maiden and Nevermore with a touch of black & death-metal here and there.

In the promotional note sent by your label I red “a mixture of death/thrash…with dual vocals”, but after I listened to “Degeneration”, I found only little traces of growl vocals and death metal inspiration. I think you are more in vein of Nevermore / Testament thrash-grooving attitude. What can you say about your main influences ?

Yeah I know. It´s funny that particular promotional note comes along with the promos for Degeneration. We used to be more death-inspired and actually recorded somewhat more in that direction…but at the last moment we decided to take those tunes away and discarded the songs that only had growls in them.

Inluences come and go but i´d be lying if I didn't say that Nevermore and Enter the Hunt hadn´t any part of our sound. Also I think my admiration for James Hetfield can be heard now and then even if it isn´t intentionally.

I think that “Degeneration” showed good music/technical qualities…but now, after several months by the realization of “Degeneration”, be truly, Is there something that actually doesn't satisfy you at all about it ?

In my point of view…I really don´t think the production does justice to our music. The melodies just doesn´t come forward as I want them to. It´s a shame but I think at the time we were so anxious to get the music out so we didn´t hear how the end result ACTUALLY sounded. Stupid but what is done is done.

And there is one mistake we did that I won´t do again. We kinda underestimated the time it took to record everything which in the end resulted in that we were forced to compromise on some takes. For example…my singing on River Red could have been done more properly!

Can you do a little balance since you released “Degeneration”? What about press critics?

Since we are on a small label, our reach is kinda limited. Everyday is a fight you know. Gotta get more contacts, more distributors and so on! We all got a common goal now and that is to get on to a label with more resources which can take us further!

The critics has been somewhat unanimous…love the music. Machinery is a very talented band, creative, good tunes, awesome vocals but the production STINKS! *lol*

I am very curious to know something about the cover artwork … a very strong image, who was the creator ? any particular meaning ?

The artist who made the cover is Peter Wallebo. Basically we gave him free hands and told him to listen to the album and the lyrics and think of human decay! Great coverart…great coverart.

You can check his webpage out on www.wallebo.com