INTERVIEW WITH JYRKI69, BUDAPEST, 17.02.2009

For our first 69 interview, we sat down with Jyrki69 before their show in Budapest, and got answers to some of our burnin’ questions!
Big thanks goes to Inka Laitinen from EMI, Matzi and of corpse, Mr. Globetrotter himself, Jyrki69!

ANGELS RISING: So before we start, this interview is for Angels Rising, we’ve been talking about this before, do you remember what it is?

JYRKI69 : Yeah! Mmmmmm, it’s…. erm…. Tell me. *laughs*

AR: Angels Rising is a website that unites fan sites and other people who support The 69 Eyes in many different ways….

J69: Great! Wow! Beautiful idea!

AR: And now we’re gonna do the interview for that website.

J69: Great! Fantastic!

AR: You’re currently on a break from the studio and the recording of the new album. Did you miss touring during the past months?

J69: Yeah, now after being here of course. There is some strange fantasy kind of feeling in touring. You are in these ancient legendary cities, different city every night and…. We’ve been doing this now for a week and the only thing I actually dislike is that the time is going so fast. I hardly… for instance, we just played in Prague but I didn’t see Prague and I can’t see anything, I just saw the venue and few people in the audience so sometimes it goes too fast but I really enjoy this. I don’t know, maybe in previous life I was some strange traveler as well because this is really a part of my personality, to travel like this. I really like this.

AR: And does touring actually improve the recording process once you’re back in the studio?

J69: Yeah, well you know we started in January with Matt Hyde to do the pre-production for the album and we went through all the songs, we chose the songs that are gonna be on the album and then right after this, a week after we are home we fly to Los Angeles in the U.S. where we are gonna do the actual recording. We will be there like two or three months to get the whole thing done. It’s really exciting and it’s fantastic to have Matt Hyde working with us. He’s a fantastic guy, he’s great and the biggest message from Matt Hyde for us in the first place was that he wants to make a record which sounds like The 69 Eyes and how do The 69 Eyes sound, that’s the thing he hears… his favorite record is “Blessed Be” and after that we of course have a lot of songs which are like that kind of rock’n’roll, that kind of songs, but he wants to have the ultimate goth’n’roll album and The 69 Eyes album made, which is like mixture of gothic rock and rock’n’roll and classic rock, in our style that sounds perfect. Songs are ready already, they are really vampiric, majority of they are about vampires still… I’m really enthusiastic to start to do it, it’s great to do with Matt and I’m really thankful that he’s with us and we totally trust him. And the greatest thing is, he likes the comics and movies like I do and he is a classic rock producer, classic rock means like AC/DC, Led Zeppelin and also he really understands what gothic means. He is big vampire movie fan too so it’s really great to have such a person.
 

AR: It seems everybody is addicted to the actual Twilight saga…

J69: *laughs* Well, he’s not addicted but actually what he said about it is that they are promoting The 69 Eyes already in the States because of that movie so he said it is fucking right time for us so that was cool.

AR: After all these years, and you celebrate 20 years this year, what inspires you to keep playing and creating music?

J69: I think we are… and I’m really thankful that The 69 Eyes is still exciting band for people. And there are a lot of people who really don’t know and have no idea that we play that long. Because I think we are still sort of like a new band for many people. And that’s cool that we are still exciting and also we are still excited, that’s another factor. And these two which are strongly present that are really keeping the spirit alive and make this extremely fun and like I said exciting.

AR: What do you listen to and/or read on this tour?

J69: Oh God. I’ve been watching…. I took some old horror movies that I haven’t seen for a while. I have like the original Halloween movies, I have a box-set of Halloween, I’ve been watching them. Then I have Alien box-set with me, then I watched Beyond the Valley of the Dolls again like checking out the old classics I mean. Well I have to say that Halloween 3 was crap. But I mean I have all this and every night after show I go to the tour bus and watch some horror movies on this tour. Oh yeah, I started to watch, erm… erm…..  hold on….  What is this new movie with Johnny Depp?
 

AR: The new one?

J69: Sweeney Todd.
 

AR: Oh, yeah.

J69: I actually started to watch this one but I didn’t finish it yet.
 

AR: It’s a cool one.

J69: Yeah it is. So…. I’m pretty into horror, I’m watching horror all the time on this tour, that’s my theme on this tour. What I’ve been reading… I bought one of these books by Obama. No I mean Osama, sorry. (smiles). I mean the President of the States so….. like he’s been writing a few books, he’s a writer. But also what I’ve been listening to… actually the last record I was listening to was some of Presley’s albums, One Night. *laughing* Seriously.
 

AR: *laughs* I believe you.

AR: Recently you introduced your new project, Pirates of the Baltic Sea. What can you tell about the experience of being a part of the reality show „Operation Earth“? What was the goal of PBS in the beginning, what is implemented and what are PBS' plans for future?

J69: The idea of being in this TV show was first of all that we experience something new at the same time. And the idea is like people will experience it also through us. Because it happens at the same time as it’s filmed. So we are on the sea or we are meeting people or we are getting into the thing to save the sea or start the campaign. So the idea of those shows is not like we are trying to teach people about it, it’s more like we learn and we hope that people who watched the shows also learn through us. That’s the thing. Because somebody asked me like do I think that I can make people understand that taking care of the environment is important through these shows, but I think it is more like I learn through these shows and I hope that people who watch this show would learn with me. That’s the idea. But it is of course a very important topic, more all the time so…. From my point it is of course important what we are doing but also it was a selfish thing to have experience from making a TV show. I wanted to see how it is, that’s one of the reasons why I did that show. And also we had some time because we were in Helsinki so why not, it’s cool to do new things. And I’m just waiting, next time maybe I’ll do a movie or something.
 

AR: Yeah, we’ve seen you were fishing….

J69: Oh yeah, that’s also one of the things. It’s just… somebody asked me to do it and I’ve never been fishing and it was in front of Finland and it sounded strange so I just went there and once again I was a total layman because I was never fishing before. I haven’t even watched the show because it was a cool thing to do and what the hell - I was there, why should I watch then? I mean, they did it and why not?! It was a cool experience, I’m surprised some people watched that.
 

AR: Everyone watched that.

J69: Yeah well… but I didn’t. I don’t know. I didn’t think about why I’ve been doing that but it was cool to go for fishing. And really strange.

AR: You’ve already sort of marked this anniversary with the “Goth’n’Roll” release, which had release parties in Croatia and Bosnia, and now we’re expecting the new album.

J69: It was actually just a documentary about those five years. I can’t remember everything so it is cool to have a kind of diary or something like that, a Goth’n’Roll diary.
 

AR: Will it also reflect your two decades on stage?

J69: Yes of course. Like I said, when we did the box-set we had to go through the whole material and honestly I discovered… because I needed to listen to these two records, since I wanted the lyrics to be right in the booklet, because if I go to the internet and check out any of our lyrics from the internet they are always really wrong for some strange reason, I don’t know how, why. So I just wanted to get them right. They are on the booklet. So I had to listen to the records and I was surprised how could they vary, really. Because I don’t remember. They were, they are so magic if you listen to them. I realized they are like fucking cool records. Ok, we did the box-set and it was the best way to do it this way. But also as we started to work with Matt Hyde, producer of the next album, I sent him the box-set and he checked it out and was like what the hell these are coolest stuff he heard for years and now he is telling us that “Blessed Be” is his favorite record and he wants us to do that kind of vibe to be on the new record as well. So it works and in that way it was also important to do that.

AR: When comparing The 69 Eyes now and back in 2000 when you spread over Europe for the first time, how important and how hard it is (now when the fan-base is growing) to keep in touch with the people who supported you back then?

J69: Is it growing? Because I think it’s the same like three years back or so on. I don’t know, it’s hard to tell. But… I mean there are new people on each show and some older familiar people. I don’t know. I have no idea what is going on in that way with our band. I just hope that we still remain exciting and also, you know, the reason why we are doing the next record for instance with a great American producer and in L.A. is not that our records are selling a lot, it’s because first of all the records industry still think it’s.. they can, you know, make money from us, they want to invest in us. And they have a reason because I think there are a lot of people who already love our band but they never have heard of us. I think there are a lot of people who have empty space in their hearts, who should hear us, that’s why we wanna make a better and better record and more like a record that people want to invest at. I think we are still more like a small cult band known to some secret people.
  

AR: The question was actually how important it is to keep in touch with the people who supported you back then?

J69: Well you know it like works in circles. Some people do the website like two years, somebody two and a half.., it’s pretty normal that somebody, you know, some people are enthusiastic to do something for a few years and then they got other things, their life moves forward, but it’s great to do something for people that are excited in their lives and creative and maybe that connect them to other people. You know, we are a hobby for some people. It’s cool, it’s interesting. And especially this tour is a small cult tour and it’s cool to meet as much people as possible and I hang out in the audience seeing Tiamat every night and meeting people.
 

AR: That’s cool!

J69: It’s a nice and warm little tour. And I hope always will be great. Sometimes, for instance, when we were touring with Within Temptation we always wanted to go in the audience.

AR: AngelsRising.info has 2 years behind its belt now. What do you think about our network of European The 69 Eyes fan sites?

J69: It’s great and I’m happy that we… it’s an honor for us and me to inspire people to do something, to socialize through the internet and that way to start to have us as a hobby or to start to band or draw or whatever. We are like popular culture, we create a kind of physical power that transform us to someone else and they have our same little fire to do something inspiring. That’s the same thing that inspired us, like I don’t know, Mötörhead or Elvis or some other band.

AR: What do you want to say to all your fans united under the Angels Rising?

J69: I hope to meet you, guys. Don’t be afraid. Just don’t forget to wear the sunglasses.

AR: Well, you just need to turn around, some of them are here now.

J69: Cool, great!

AR: Shall we join them now?

J69: Yes. Let’s go.

(c) Angels Rising, 2009. Please, don't re-publish without permission!