Lou: Thank you for agreeing to the interview. To get us started would you mind telling us a little bit about Plutonium. Who is in the band and how long have you been together?

J. Carlsson: Plutonium started in 2003, and we have been the same persons since the start: J. Carlsson ? Lead Guitar, Vocals, Programming and Dictatorship, Lars H. ? Bass and H.Fossmo ? Guitar. I decide most things and the others may be seen as session members.

Lou: Where did the name Plutonium come from?

J. Carlsson: I wanted a very concrete name, attached to the dystopian feelings we want to express with our music. Also, Plutonium is known as the most dangerous element on earth. Plutonium in the size of a grape can easily wipe out the whole of mankind.

Lou: Which five words describe your music?

J. Carlsson: What about: Agressive dystopian industrial extreme metal?

Lou: Where do you get your inspiration from when writing music?

J. Carlsson: I guess you mean both music and lyrics here! Since I´ve been playing guitar for more than 15 years it´s a bit hard to track any special bands or musicians I get influenced by these days, but I have to say most music I appreciate do have an impact on me. And the music I listen to most of the time is classical music, industrial/electronic music or extreme metal. Nowadays I also get a lot of inspiration from the sources that inspire my lyrics. Movies, books and things happening around me seem to trigger rhythms and certain tones inside my head.

Lou: What has the reaction from the press been like for "One Size Fits All"?

J. Carlsson: So far I´ve only seen a couple of reviews, which is understandable since the promos weren´t send out until 12th of february (release date for the album), but most of them are pretty good. The worst so far has been a german webzine who gave us 5/10, and that is still quite ok...however, since my german is a bit rusty I can´t comment that review, maybe he had some interesting point of view? The drum machine seems to be the biggest obstacle for some people, and in some way I can understand that, eventhough I enjoy static programmed drums. We will actually make some changes there for the next album. However, your review was probably the most overwhelming words I´ve read, thank you for that!

Lou: How did you decide on what photographs were to be used in the album's artwork? I found the cover to be extremely striking and memorable... and possibly a little humorous.

J. Carlsson: I had some ideas of what I wanted in the booklet. I got the idea for the cover quite early in the recording process, I think I saw some advert with the ?One size fits all?-sentence, and I always seem to get annoyed on silly slogans, songs and commercials, so why not use it and add some dark cynical humour to it? It was the same thing with the title of our debut demo (?Wind Of Change?). As for the other pictures, it came along the way so to say... I´m glad you found the humour and cynicism in them. The fact that we incorporate dark cynicism and satire (to some extent) doesn´t mean we are some kind of joke band, it´s just our way of doing things. We are not interested in fulfilling the typical metal clichés.

Lou: If you could bring any figure from history back from the dead who would it be and why?

J. Carlsson: Tough question! I don´t know if that would be a good idea at all...but let´s say Aldous Huxley or George Orwell. Why? It would be interesting to have their point of view on the evolution of the western world, you know the ?big brother?-society (as well as ?big brother? as tv entertainment), the ?war on terrorism? and all that stuff...it would be interesting to see how they reacted to all this things, maybe they would like to return to their graves after visiting our ?enlightened? society...

Lou: Are there any things on "One Size Fits All" that you would like to change?

J. Carlsson: No, not really. Unfortunately I caught a cold while recording the vocals, so some parts feels a bit strained every now and then. Of course some minor things could be better, but considering the album as a whole I am satisfied.

Lou: When I listen to "One Size Fits All" I can easily imagine it accompanying a film of some kind. If you could write the music for any film in history, what would it be and why?

J. Carlsson: I´d love to make music for a movie. I´ve even studied Film theory for half a year (that was long ago though), and I love watching movies. Most of the movies I´ve liked have had great soundtracks as well so it´s kind of hard to tell. I guess our music could fit to ?Metropolis? by Fritz Lang or ?Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari? by Robert Weine. That´s at least two of my favourite movies from the twenties. I can recommend you and all your readers to check out an early swedish film - ?The Phantom Chariot? (Viktor Sjöström) - based on a novel by the famous swedish author Selma Lagerlöf. It´s a chilling experience! But I have lots of other favourite movies, ranging from drama, comedy, gore, documentaries - whatever, as it is a great movie. Some directors I appreciate: Kubrick, Bergman, Fulci, Murnau, Lynch, Jodorowsky, Waters, Buttgereit...I could go on forever. Unfortunately all cinemas here are flooded by boring brainless hollywood crap. Fortunately there are no problems getting your faves on DVD these days.

Lou: I've had a look around your website and I can't seem to find any gig dates (perhaps I'm just not looking properly - it has been known!). Are you planning to tour with this album? If so, where do you plan to go?

J. Carlsson: No, you have searched the site properly - there are no touring dates! We have some problems in the band concerning the live shows. We will play live, it´s just a matter of when and how! We have some technical and personal problems to solve first though. Personally I´d like to have more songs to choose from in our repertoire before entering the stage as well...but, wait and see!

Lou: Do you have any merchandise that our readers could buy? If so, where can they buy it from?

J. Carlsson: Khaoz Star have opened a T-shirt shop on this address. There you can find t-shirts and other stuff related to Khaoz Star and their bands. Unfortunately, everything is written in swedish on that site and most shirts are a bit expensive in my opinion, and it will probably cost more to order from foreign countries! I´ve had my thoughts of printing some kind of exclusive edition of t-shirts and sell it through us and Khaoz Star. If anyone is interested, just let me know!

Lou: What's next for Plutonium?

J. Carlsson: Right now we are working on some new material. We have two songs finished for the moment and a few sketches to work with and we will probably record a demo of those songs to listen and evaluate for ourselves sometime in spring. Also I´m pretty busy with taking care of the promotion of the album. Thank you for the interview, Lou, hope my answers will do! Those of you who got interested in Plutonium can visit our sites, or contact us through plutonium_platoon@hotmail.com .

Take care and control!
J. Carlsson


http://www.plutoniumsite.com/
http://www.khaozstarrecords.se/
http://www.myspace.com/thetrueplutonium/
http://blog.myspace.com/thetrueplutonium/


More Links: One Size Fits All Review, Plutonium Forum Thread.