LACUNA COIL

for Painkiller Mag #7 March 2003

Interview

with Cristiano Migliore - Guitar

by  Yang Yu/Andreas Stappert

all pics are linked from www.lacunacoil.it and www.centurymedia.de  
by any problems refer to webmaster

 

What does LACUNA COIL mean and what was the original idea to chose it as bandname. Do you think this idea still fit to what you are now?

“Well, the original name of the band was Ethereal. But since there were already two other bands called the same way we had to change it. We were looking for something that had pretty much the same meaning. ´Lacuna´ is a latin word meaning ´something missing´ and ´coil´ means ´spiral´. O the combination of both words for us means something like ´empty spiral´. I think the name is still fitting, cause the open meaning fits to our style of music which is not that easy to categorize and also very open.”

You are one of the first femal voc bands who brought up new standarts and reforms in some kind for modern metal music long before this way became a fashon. Did you ever had any difficualties to come out?

“The thing is that Metal music is a world of males pretty much. Most of the bands are with male singers and male members. So in the beginning people who don’t know you look at you with a little bit of suspicion in the way of: `What do those guys do with female vocals?´ But in the end it is a matter of personal taste whether you like it or not. I don’t say, that we always had good reactions after people had the chance to listen to our music. But after listening to our music a lot of people changed their opinion about us.”

Who writes the lyrics, and do you have to consider that you have a female singer and her point of view while writing?

“The lyrics are mostly written by Andrea Ferro and Cristina Scabbia, which are our singers. They talk about everyday life. They don’t write fantasy stories or stuff like that. They get inspirations from what happens to them every day. But it is not something completely easy to understand. The lyrics are written in a way that everybody is able to get his own personal meaning out of them. That we have a male and a female singer gives us a chance to create different moods and atmospheres. Mostly we use Andreas voice for the more heavy and powerful parts and Cristinas voice for the more quiet and atmospheric moments. In general we try to use the vocals as two more musical instruments.”

Do you think you have so many fans just because you have a pretty attractive front woman? Pretty eyes, erotic lips, THE attraction on the debut cover artwork ... :)

“Having a girl in the band is good to attract the curiosity of people. But it is certainly not the main point. Because if you only have this you cannot grow up as a band like we did. If the music itself is not good even the most beautiful singer in the world won’t help you to become succesful.”

How much love letters does Cristina receive per week?

“Ha ha ha. I don’t know really. I think you have to ask her about this…”

Is love/sex a inner-band-taboo? Did you ever have to face relationchip-crisis because of this kind of things within your band?

“No. As you probably know Cristina and Marco, the bassplayer, are a couple. And that was never really a problem because this was really clear before we started working as a band: One thing is their lovestory and the other thing is the band. And the band always has priority before everything else. It never really created any problems, cause we try to keep the two things seperated. So far it works.”

Where do you have the most of your fans? Germany?

“I won’t say that. With the release of “Comalies”we’re growing really fast in England, France and Spain. Germany has always been our main market until “Unleashed Memories”. But with the new album we also start to grow in countries we didn’t really expect.”

I dont see your music as the real metal stuff in its traditional meaning. But you are very successfull in this genre, how do you see your music?

“We started as a Metal band.We all like that kind of music. But we listen to any kind of music. In my free time I for example listen tobands like The Police or Dire Straits, but also bands like Carcass, Machine Head or Meshuggah. I like all kinds of music that gives me any feeling. And I think you can find a lot of those other influences in our songs. We have songs that are not Heavy Metal at all and sound more like Pop. While other songs sound more Metal. We choose whateer we like.”

Since your music has its little indie/gothic touch, do you also have that much fans from other scenes beside metal?

“Yeah. We did a lot of tours during the last years. And we always toured with bands that were not exactly our musicstyle. Very different bands like In Flames, Dimmu Borgir, Lacrimosa. Skyclad or Moonspell. And all those bands had a different audience. And we had always good reactions even from those people who normally listen to different kinds of music. For example fans of Black Metal. You would never expect black Metal people to listen to our kind of music and like it. But that is exactly what happened. I mean, we thought they would maybe throw bottles on stage or something like that. But it seems that they enjoyed our music.”

The press always only mentions Cristina and Andrea as if the other band members are less importent. So would it also work if you only had Cristina and Andrea plus some guest musicians?

“The thing is that of course Cristina and Andrea are very important and they will always be the image of the band. For us this is not really a problem. But the thing that everybody has to undrstand is that there are not only the vocals. I mean the music is written by us, by all the musicians. If there is no music, there is no singer. And if there is no singer, there is no music. We all need each other. But as I said it is no problem for us that Andrea and Cristina stand in the spotlight.”

You have 6 band members, is it a problem for you in practisicing, working out new songs, play gigs, recording seasions or what every to gather the crowd at one place in the same time?

“This is something you have to get used to. I mean think about those Big Bands with 20 or 21 people in it. For us it is kind of natural. Everyone of us has his own parts which he has to play. So as long as you know exactly what you have to do it is pretty easy to do it. Besides that we have always been good friends, even before we started to work as a band. The relationships in the band are very good. So after all it is more like a family than just a band.We know that the band is our job, but at the same time we are good friends.We see each other very often because we all live in the same city, in Milan.”

On your Web there is a tour diary (and other reports) who wrote these lines? Did you send the text to the webmaster while you are touring around?

“The webmaster is actually our drummer Cristiano Mozzati. So we write the tour diary mostly the day after a show. We have a laptop-computer with us on tour. And when we play a show in a club that has an internet-conection we can put it online directly. Unfortnately that does not work every day. The text itself is always written by a different bandmember, but basically it is Cristina and Andrea. They probably know best how to write things most interesting.”

You are nearly a month on tour to promote your new album. How are things going? Do you have a more comfortable bus company this time?

“Ha ha. Well, I must say that the first bus we had in the beginning was a very normal and simple bus without TV, playstation or anything like that. So how should we survive this? But then we had the chance to go to a garage and euip the bus with a TV-screen, playstation. DVD-player and all that stuff. So now it is pretty more comfortable than it used to be. The tour is going great so far. Maybe with Dimmu Borgir or In Flames we played in bigger venues. But on this tour with Sentenced 80 percent of the shows have been sold out with an average of 700 people every night. In London we played in front of 1600 people which was amazing. Everything turned out much better than we expected.”

Italian food is quiet favomous for its good flavor, now do you miss it while the whole time on tour? One month fastfood? (Well Pizza and Pasta are also fast food everywhere these days. Its the same with chinese food in Europe...)

“Yes, sometimes we miss it. I mean we are used to it and besides of that Italian food is really one of the best foods in the world. That doesn’t mean that you can’t find good food in other countries. I mean sometimes it sucks of course, but sometimes it also sucks in Italy. You get used to the food you get on tour. If you are hungry you normally eat it. And if it is really worse you still got the chance to go to Mc Donalds or something like that.”

What is your personal experience of the big tour beside the music and metal stuff? Do you have time to look around in the Cities your are playing in?

“This hardly happens, because we have a time schedule every day. We usually travel at night, wake up in the early afternoon, eat something, do the soundcheck, play the show and leave afterwards to the next city. So usually there is not enough time to walk around the cities and do sightseeing. I can say that I already have been in a lot of different countries but never really had the chance to talk a walk and see something.”

You put many MP3s of your songs on your website for fans to check out. What is your opinion about MP3 free downloads concerning copyright stuff?

“It could be a good thing but at the same time it is alsoa bad thing. It is a bad thing really for the record companies, especially those more in the underground like our company century Media. Cause if you have the chance to download a whole record people will usually not go to a shop and buy it afterwards. This kills the music business. Big companies like Sony or EMI don’t care about it because they have the chance to get money out of other things like selling DVD-recorders, playstations and so on. But for a small company like Century Media this is really a bad thing. On the other side the internet is a good chance to get people to listen to your music. I think there have to be some new laws and regulations so that the smaller companies have a chance to survive.”

You do alot things for your website, detailed diaries and report of you are doing etc., does the web&internet mean a lot to you?

“We use the internet a lot for communication. It makes things easier because you can communicate over long distances in nearly real time. Also I think our website is a cool way to keep in touch with the fans. So that’s why we think that is important to update your webpage as often as possible with news and stuff like that.”

Do you know THE GATHERING and Anneke personnelly? There is no real competition between the both bands of you, is there?

“Yeah, we know them very good, cause we already have been on tour together. And no, there is no competition between the two bands. Competition between bands is always a stupid thing.”

Didnt hear your new album yet. Its not easy for chinese fans to get new releases generelly. Tell us more about what you are thinking of it.

“Of course I must say that “Comalies” is the by far best album . Ha ha. I say this because on our previous albums there was always something missing. I was never 100 percent satisfied. There were songs which I would have done better If we had enough´time to do so. But this time everything sounds exactly the way as we wanted it. Of course the style is always the same, but when you listen to “Unleashed Memories” and then to “Comalies” you can really hear the difference. “Comalies” is a lot more mature album with better structured songs and also a better production. But nevertheless, if you like our previous records you will also like the new one.”

Since 1998 till now every year a new release, you are a hard working band! So I guess the band is your profession and you are having a lot of fun doing this.

“Of course. I mean otherwise I wouldn’t be here on this tour. Having fun is a basic thing for Lacuna Coil. Yes, the band is our profession, but without the fun there would be no band at all.”

 

Line-Up:
Cristina Scabbia: Voc
Andrea Ferro: Voc
Cristiano Migliore: Guitar
Marco Biazzi: Guitar
Marco Coti Zelati: Bass
Cristiano Mozzati: Drums

 

www.lacunacoil.it