Assassin
Original Sound Is In Our Blood

18.06.2011

Архив интервью | Русская версия

Back in the days when Assassin were making their first steps on the German thrash metal scene, talkative persons were not in favor in Russia. There was even a saying, “The one who talks much is a spy’s best friend”. Luckily, the times have changed, no one is that paranoid about undercover spies anymore, and for us reporters such person is actually a blessing, especially when it comes to interviewing bands with a really long and winding history. Assassin are definitely one of these bands, they belong to the first wave of German thrash metal, their debut album “The Upcoming Terror” (1986) came out simultaneously with Sodom’s infamous first full-length, and just a year after similar releases by Kreator and Destruction. Unfortunately, Assassin never became as big as the three mentioned “Bundesthrash” superstars – they broke up in 1989 and reunited only in the new century, when the thrash scene started to wake up from a long and heavy sleep. Comeback album “The Club” was self-released and did not bring the band mega-success either, but the new album “Breaking The Silence” (a truly fitting name!) came out on SPV and really put Assassin back in the spotlight. It was five years in the making, but it was indeed worth the wait – what a killer record this one turned out to be! So we got Michael Hoffman (guitar) on the phone to tell us everything about the new CD, ups and downs of Assassin’s 25-year-long career, his involvement in Sodom, his friendship with Euronymous from Mayhem and many other interesting things. And not just in a few abrupt words – this man is really willing and able to tell stories!

In a 2005 interview with a Russian magazine you said that you have plans to release your new album in 2006. But in the end it took another 5 years. What happened? Why did you release this album only this year?

Yeah, the plans were like this, that’s right, but we had a lot of problems with the musicians. We were changing the bass player and drummer, and it took a long time to find the right people. We were testing a lot of people, we were making like 10 shows with 10 different players. Yeah, it took a lot of time to find the right guys and it took one year to keep the whole thing together. We found the bass player in 2009 and altered the drummer.

It wasn’t easy to find the right people. The first guy was able to play and then after one tour he left the band because he didn’t fit. There were a lot of different bass players like bass player Ufo (Walter), he was on the last album “The Club” (2005) but he has so many bands and so many projects… So we were always looking for a real bass player, and we finally found him in 2009. And then the drummer left – Frank Nellen, the drummer who was on “Interstellar Experience” (1988). He is a close friend, we spent some years together in Brazil, and we even dated sisters - he dated one sister and I dated another one. So we were very close and we both have kids from these girls, so our kids are relatives now. It wasn’t an easy decision for him to leave the band but he have so many things to do – he had separated from his wife and had too much work and so on. And we were getting serious now, we were recording the demo, the first three songs that we made and that was the problem for the band. I mean, he’s an original member. He wasn’t on “The Upcoming Terror” (1986) but he started in 1987 or 1988.

It was very difficult to find a drummer who can replace this guy. It’s not only the music stuff, it’s not the ability to play, because there are many people who can play very good and even better than our drummer and bass player. But it’s a personal thing, everything has to fit. You have to go to a party, you get out and drink with the guys, you have some fights other guys and see whether this guy can help (everybody laughs) or this guy runs away and the guy who runs away is not a good fit for Assassin. Finally we have these two guys and they are both fitting. But it took a lot of time and in the end I think that was worth it.

What can you say about the new guys - Bjorn (Sondermann, drums) and Joakim (Kremer, bass) - and their contribution to the new album? Did they only play their parts or did they write some parts or songs?

They made little parts. Robert (Gonnella, vocals) Scholli (aka Jurgen Scholz, guitar) and me – the three of us know how Assassin should sound. We have the original sound in our minds, in our blood, we know how to do it, we know what we want to do. When the new musicians come into the band first they have to make a coffee. They start to making coffee and then after some time somebody asks: “Hey, do you have any idea?” (laughs) It takes one year to ask somebody if they have an idea for a song. On the new album there is one song where they really contributed. As to the rest, the guitarists make most of the music and Robert makes the vocals. But think their contribution is their own style of playing. We say like, “I have a riff”, and usually the drummer plays to the riff, it’s not that the drummer makes a part and says, “I have this beat and you have to play some guitar on it”. The drummer doesn’t play guitar so he is not able to make a song for himself but he contributes with his own style of playing.

You produced your previous album “The Club” yourself. How did you like that experience?

Well, I was working as a producer in Brazil so I have a lot of experience working with heavy metal and thrash metal. But in the end for me it is a difficult situation – when you play your guitar and produce at the same time, you have two full-time jobs at the same time. For me it was quiet difficult to do this production but we had no other chance because we had no money to make a big production with that. The only one we could record for free was me. I think I did a good job, I think I did a good sound but it was very difficult so I would avoid doing it again in the future. I would prefer to do it with another producer where I can concentrate exclusively on the guitar. It’s already enough work to play the guitar, to think about what to play, and my fingers burn anyway.

This time you invited acclaimed producer Harris Jones to work on your new album. Was it hard to get such a producer aboard?

We had some contacts with Harris over the time. When I played in Sodom I was working with him – we recorded “Better Off Dead” (1990) and later we made some touring with him, he was a sound engineer for the tour. We were playing not in Russia, but in Lithuania, Estonia and all these countries. We were drinking a lot. One time he said, “When you guys are going to record I can make you a special price”. Five years later I called him up and said, “Harris, we want to record and you made me a special price, what about this?” And he said “Definitely yes, come on, let’s go”. It was quite easy because we know each other. The record company didn’t have any effect on it, because it was our decision to record with him. We trust him because we know him, he knows how to thrash, he knows how thrash metal should sound and we were very satisfied with that. We were working a lot, it was very concentrated working with him. He pushed the whole band, and it was great working with him. We are already thinking to make the next album with him too.

Speaking about the next album – will it be released soon or will it take another five years?

Oh man, nobody knows what will happen. First of all we’re gonna re-release our first two albums – it was the idea of SPV. They were like, “Come on, let’s make some reissue and make it special”. And we are right now recording some bonus tracks for that one. It might be some kind of special CD pack or something. Olly (Hahn) from SPV told me he wants to put out some vinyls, too. We already have two songs ready for the new album and I think the next studio time will be in early 2012. We’re gonna make some touring at the end of this year and after that we’re gonna book the studio time. I guess the next album will be out in the summer of 2012 and not in five years. (laughs) I hope so but I don’t know what will happen in the future, nobody knows, but we are planning to put it out very-very quick.

You mentioned that you’re recording bonus tracks for the reissue. Can you disclose what songs they will be?

We recorded some songs but we don’t even know which ones will be bonuses on the CD and which will not. We’re still thinking about it. We recorded a lot of songs, some covers, we even recorded some old songs but I’m a not a friend of re-recording old songs. Anyway we recorded the song “Religion” from the “Holy Terror” demo (1985), we’ve never released that on an album. We thought it was good idea to put this one on, we put together some cover versions, but if I tell you that some songs will be on the albums, and they will eventually not, people will be disappointed, so I can’t tell you too much about this. First we’ll have to decide before which songs will be on the album and then I can tell you definitely. I can tell you for example that we recorded a cover version of Casbah from Japan, because it turned out very good and will definitely will be on the CD. Very early, in 1986-1988, they brought out some demos, and they had a song called “Low Intensity Warfare”, a powerful thrash metal Armageddon song. (laughs) We really love it, we recorded it, and it turned out to be a very great song. I think this is one of the most aggressive songs that we’ve ever played.

For “Breaking The Silence” you re-recorded tracks “Real Friends” and “No Fear” from your previous album “The Club”. What was the reason behind this decision?

It’s the same as what we’re doing this time. When we start recording we have a lot of songs, we put out everything that we have. For the last album we had like 15 songs, and we’re recording them all, and in the end we decide what to do. “No Fear”, for example, is a song by Scholli, and he rearranged the whole song. On “The Club” it was the slow song, it was totally slow, it was a normal metal song, and this time he turned it up to be a thrash metal song. After recording we liked it, and we said, “Man, it’s totally different, so we can put it on the album”. “Real Friends” was another thing - we were never satisfied with that song on “The Club”, because it was played too slow. We had to put it out on the new album at the right speed. I love this song but on “The Club” it was too slow, and it lost some atmosphere and some intensity.

In the end we have all these songs and then we decide which ones to choose. For example we didn’t choose some new stuff that we had, for example, we had a slow song that was intended for the album, but in the end we didn’t choose it, because it didn’t fit to the rest of the music. We didn’t want to bring out another “The Club”, where every song is totally different. We wanted to do an album that you can listen to from the first song to the last song, and then you can put it to track one again, so it’s like one thrash train going on. We took off all songs that didn’t fit, for example the slow song, another song called “A Whole Life In One Moment”, which was on the demo we did after “Interstellar Experience” but we weren’t satisfied with that so we didn’t put it on. And in the end there are two songs from “The Club”, but SPV might not release “The Club” so we are free to put them on. And they are different from earlier versions, so we thought it was a good idea.

“The Club”, from my point of view, had a lot of elements of punk. Would you agree with me?

In reality I don’t agree too much because nobody in the band is too much into punk. Thrash metal was influenced by punk anyway, that’s right, early thrash wouldn’t exist if there was no punk. But I don’t think “The Club” is  too much punk, I think it’s more hardcore, heavy metal, thrash metal – it’s a mix of everything. If you listen very carefully to “The Club”, the first time it will be different to the next one. We even did a cover version of “Thunder and Lightning” by Thin Lizzy which is pure heavy metal, and it’s a brutal song by Thin Lizzy in my opinion. When I played in Sodom we were thinking about what to cover on “Better Off Dead”, and we decided to play “Cold Sweet”, another song by Thin Lizzy, because Witchhunter (drums) was unable to play “Thunder and Lightning”. It was always on my mind to play “Thunder and Lightning”, as it’s my favorite song by Thin Lizzy, absolutely my favorite song. On “The Club” we had an idea to do it and we did it. I think Robert did a good job on it. “The Club” is a mix, it’s more like a soundtrack (grins), it could be played by different bands. The first song could be played by Assassin, the second song, a slow version of “No Fear” could be played by any hardcore band. We had so many ideas and so many people were playing in the band at that time – Atomic Steif the drummer, different bass players, Dinko (Vecic, guitarist) who left later and so on. So many people mixed that album up a little bit.

What can you say about the track “I Like Cola” off “Breaking The Silence”? Who came up with the idea to do it?

Well, the idea was mine. I don’t know if you know the band Outo from Japan. In the very early times when people only had tapes and everybody was trading tapes, I got their tape from a friend of mine. The tape was called “Antichrist”, it has two songs on it – “I like Cola” and “Blood In My Eyes”. The first time I listened to “I Like Cola” I was getting crazy about this song, we were banging and rewinding it again and again. I even recorded a tape where only “I Like Cola” was featured on Side A, one time after the other. (laughs) I liked the song so much, and a friend of mine called Lulle (Markus Ludwig), our bass player at that time, and me were banging to “I Like Cola” for hours. We had shows in Japan in March 2010, and by that time I knew it was a Japanese band who made that demo. We played it in Japan and I thought it would be  a good idea to play an old Japanese hit.” (laughs) It’s not a hit like Britney Spears, but for us it’s a hit, a super song. (laughs) We decided to play it and Japanese guys were getting crazy over this song. When we entered the studio with Harris, we played the song again, and he said, “Man, the thing is good, I gotta play a solo on it!” And the guitar solo on that song is done by Harris Johns.

Let’s speak about the cover artwork of “Breaking The Silence” – it has some references to your first album “The Upcoming Terror”. Does it mean that you’re trying to return to your roots?

This is the interpretation that is made mostly by the media, but for us it was quite different. We had a painter from Bulgaria, his name is Plamen and he was making some artworks for us. He said, “I have some ideas”, and he came up with like six ideas for Assassin. We put all these six options in front of us, and made a decision. In the end we knew that the option we chose looks a little bit similar to “The Upcoming Terror” but it was not the main idea to let it look like it. We had the music for the album, everything was ready and we knew how the album would sound, so we needed something that fits to the music. We had an idea with blue, dark and everything, it was very dark and was one of the favorite but in the end we thought, “Well, the album is not dark, the album is not creepy, the album is thrash metal in your face, it’s like the old times”, so we decided to put this artwork and didn’t think about “The Upcoming Terror” because it wasn’t our idea. The tank wasn’t our idea, it was Plamen’s idea and he didn’t even think about “The Upcoming Terror” anyway. It was some kind of coincidence – he made this cover for us and we decided to take it.

You also have plans to release your first ever DVD with footage of your Japanese show. Please tell me a couple of words about this DVD.

We had a lot of cameras going on at that show. Meanwhile’s there’s some DVD out made by Mickey, the guy from Rock Stack Records, he already brought out the Japanese version of five songs of the show, but shot only with four cameras. We’re gonna do it with eight or nine different cameras and professional recording and everything, but we’re not sure what to do with the DVD, we are still thinking about it – is it really enough to just put out the show. Every band has a DVD with a show on it but we want to do something special so it definitely will not be only the show. Maybe we will do some kind of biography stuff, I don’t know, we’re still thinking about it, there are some good ideas which are different from all the other bands. In Assassin we prefer to do something different. It’s a long process to get the right thing out. We are thinking about doing some funny stuff or maybe only the aggressive stuff where we’re breaking everything, so we are still in the process of thinking what to do. But definitely there will be our Japanese show on it, definitely there will be some old stuff on it, unreleased stuff maybe, maybe some future stuff, maybe there will be some new stuff also. We gonna make shows this year and maybe we gonna make a mix of everything. I’m not sure yet so if you have an idea you can tell me.

Well, maybe you would want to place on this DVD some behind the scenes footage…

Yeah, something like that! We have some compromising stuff. (laughs) I don’t know if the people will like it or the censorship will like it that way. I won’t tell you now, let it be a surprise, I don’t know.

Ok, let’s see what happens. You have also played a gig in China. How did it come together? What can you say about that country?

To me what was going on in China became a surprise. I was expecting that we would come into the airport and everybody would get searched like secret terrorists, I thought that every body would listen to what we are saying so everybody has to be careful, like, “You can’t speak about Tibet, you can’t say ‘free this’ and ‘free that’.” We were thinking, “Hey, can we really play “Fight (To Stop the Tyranny)” in China? Maybe we’ll get busted for that?” (laughs) We had no idea how the Chinese secret service would get on with that. But it was totally different! Nobody searched us at the airport, we were smoking hash and weed all around Chinese towns, we were drinking, we were partying and nobody was taking care about us. And we played “Fight (And Stop The Tyranny)” in China! (laughs) It was quite cool, everybody was singing, “Fight to stop the tyranny / Fight for your rights” - Chinese people sang it. Indeed, we had two secret service guys at the show, it’s not that there was nobody. But these guys were banging, they were smiling, they didn’t care about it. I think the image of China is worse that it really is. Chinese people are very nice people, we had no problem, everybody was kind. We were eating very good food – we didn’t eat dogs, we didn’t eat snakes, but I ate a thousand year old egg! (laughs) It’s very tasty, man! You should try it.

Unfortunately I’ve never been to China.

But you should! China is a very nice country, it’s not like people think. It’s not like you have soldiers everywhere, secret service everywhere and you can’t say a thing against the government. We played a lot of songs – “Destroy The State”, “Fight (To Stop the Tyranny)”, “Holy Terror” - and the Chinese people didn’t even care.

Yes, I understand you because some years ago Russia had the same image.

That’s right! We played in Moscow, we played in Nizhny Novgorod and people were getting crazy. There was no secret fucking service, there were only good people banging. We had really good food and Russian girls are fantastic. There’s no problem because the people on the street do the same thing everywhere – they want to live, they want to eat, they want to have fun, they want to fuck, they want to drink, they want to do what they want. It’s all a kind of an image.

I agree, because I think politics and the people are now two different things in every country. You should separate politics from the people of that country.

Yeah, definitely! I totally agree with you because I see how people see Germany from outside. I talk to Americans, and they think that people in Germany wear these leather trousers, drink Bavarian, march all days and still love Adolf Hitler. But German people are like any people in the world, as I see it. Yes, there are differences, but differences are small. I have some Russian friends in Germany, and there is a mentality of people, I agree with that, not everybody is totally the same. Chinese people have another mentality than Russian people, Polish people have another mentality than Germans, but it’s not that Polish people are always stealing everything. (laughs) They’re not, it is just the image that goes on and on. But even the image changes. The image of Germans in America is now changing, because they are anti-war. When Bush wanted to go to Afghanistan and Iraq, Germans said “No, we want no war”, Americans said, “Hey, Germans are getting peaceful! One year ago they wanted a third world war, and now they are peaceful! What’s happening?!”

I have another question about China. Is it true that Robert Gonnella lived in China for a couple of years and even held a post in the Chinese football federation?

That’s absolutely right. He’s been living in China for 12 years now. And the first thing he does in any country is founding a football club. Before China he was living in Japan, and the first thing he did was founding “Fortuna Tokyo” – “Fortuna” is our local team, “Fortuna Dusseldorf”. Anywhere he lives, he says, “Man, I have to found a team”. And when he went to China in 1994 he founded “Fortuna Beijing ‘94”. He started with that and then there were some other guys from an international school and some embassy guys who wanted to play too, and so there were too many people and he said like, “Let’s put together another team”. Now they have a Russian team, a Chinese team, a German team, a Turkish team and everything. All these teams play together in one division. And just today he told me there are two divisions now and they have a lot of work, because Robert is the chairman of the whole division, and everybody’s talking to him about problems with a referee or anything. He is a football guy, he likes soccer.

I have a couple of questions about the band’s early days. You joined Assassin in 1983, right?

Not really because when I met Lulle and Dinko, it was 1982. We were listening to Venom, Metallica, Slayer and Exodus, and we wanted to do a band together but we didn’t call it Assassin, we called it Satanica. It was really early time. Then we started to look for other people, such as the singer and the drummer, and I had to go to the army. Then they found the drummer and vocalist Robert, and the drummer had the idea to change the name to Assassin. So I didn’t play in the early Assassin – I played in Satanica which turned out to be Assassin later. I came back, and we did “Interstellar Experience” together.

It was Scholli who took your place to record the first album, then you replaced him, and now you play together. Didn’t you have any troubles or kind of jealousy between the two of you?

No, we did have any problems. Scholli left the band because he wanted to leave. I still don’t know the reason why he wanted to leave but it was not me. The reason was some private stuff maybe – I don’t know. We even didn’t meet back in the day - he left Assassin and I joined. The first time I met him was 2000 or something like that. We have no problems. Right now we are close friends and we have a lot of fun.

There were some rumors that Scholli left the band to start his career in military service…

I really don’t know. (laughs) People were talking about this, but I have to ask him - “Why did you leave Assassin back at that days”? Scholli is kind of secret, he doesn’t talk too much about some things, so if you ask him you might get no answer or you might get a different answer, so you won’t know which one is real. Maybe he wanted to do the same military that I did. I came back with short hair and he had already short hair, so it’s suitable for going to the army.

I guess he’s always had short hair because on the pictures in “Upcoming Terror” he is already with it.

But he had a mustache! (laughs) Until today we are making fun of the mustache!

Let’s speak about the recording session of “Interstellar Experience”. What are your best memories about that session?

Those times were quite cool. I can’t remember the studio time too much because we were drinking most of the time, taking all the drugs that you can take. (laughs) Everybody was totally stoned all the time. I remember there were some groopies, some porno stuff, I was taking LSD and didn’t know what I was talking. The studio time was like a voyage, like a trip for us for most of the day. It was our porn and drug time. (laughs) I guess Assassin were always special in that sense – we didn’t care about anything, we did the music because we wanted to play. We wanted to play what we like to hear. When you have the right feeling, when the band is getting up and record company is supporting you, you play shows and everything is cool, you have full houses…I guess I was flying a little bit. Yeah, that was a good time.

What can you say about the song “Junk Food” from “Interstellar Experience”? Is it just a funny thing or does it have any serious message?

In reality, there is no fucking serious message in it, there is no serious stuff in the song. Every time when we were at rehearsals, everybody in the band went to the gas station and bought all the candies and all the junk food that you can get. We didn’t eat normal stuff, we just ate junk food, in reality it was like that. Somebody said, “Man you’re just eating junk” and Robert got the idea to write lyrics about it. The music is not funny, the lyrics are funny.

The booklet of “Interstellar Experience” reads that the song “Message to Survive” is dedicated to Bodo “Lazy” Ghavani. Can you tell me who is he and why you decided to dedicate this song for him?

Hey, it’s a good question – you’re the first to ask it. (laughs) Bodo is an Iranian guy who came to Germany with his family, he was a good friend of ours. I still meet him once in a while, but he’s working a lot, so we don’t have too much time to spend together. But at that time he was freakiest person of all, he was listening only to stuff like Napalm Death, all this very fast stuff and it wasn’t even enough, he was like, “Man, I guess it’s too slow for me”. He recorded their album on 45 rpm, and he even tuned his Walkman much faster when he was listening to that tape. He was listening to Napalm Death on 45 (everybody laughs) and it was like, “Rrrrrrrr”. When we made the song “Message to Survive” – I think it’s the fastest song Assassin has ever made – we thought about him, “Let’s do some song that HE will be satisfied with!” And what did he say? In reality he said, “It’s kinda slow but it’s good”. So we dedicated it to him, because the song was for him.

Another dedication on this album is instrumental track “Pipeline”. Who are those guys – Jorg Malthaus and John Pugh?

They were skating friends of Robert, he wanted to dedicate it to them. Lulle and me, we were the skaters in the band, Robert didn’t skate, but he wanted to dedicate it to them. “Pipeline” in the first way is a surf song, it’s not a skate song. We played it that fast that it turned out to be a skate song. The original version of “Pipeline” is very old, it’s from the 60’s, and it was the song for surfers. When we were in the studio, we were using skateboards like bicycles.

I know that you were a part of joke band Checker Patrol where you played with Necrobutcher and Euronymous from Mayhem. What can you say about this band and the rehearsal tape “Metalion in the Park”?

(laughs) I don’t remember what year it was, I think it was 1986 or 1987. Mayhem released their first album, I don’t remember its name right now (“Deathcrush”, 1987), and they were promoting it. They did a kind of promo tour without playing with the band but they traveled to a lot of countries and a lot of cities just to promote the album. They wanted to meet all the guys like Sodom, Kreator, Assassin and Destruction, when they were in Germany. They were living in our rehearsal room and we were drinking and partying a lot like always at that time. These guys were very cool, they were like us, there was no difference. We did the demo just for fun. When we were in the rehearsal room, we put out a tape recorder and said, “Let’s get off some thrash or some death metal stuff or any noise. Let’s make noise!” We did make this noise, recorded it and we didn’t even think that somebody will hear it later. It was just for us, just for fun.

And now you can find on the Internet, on MySpace!

You can even find it on bootleg and everything. There is also a fan club of Checker Patrol. (laughs) It was a “just-for-fun” tape, you know. When I heard about what happened to Mayhem later - the murder of Euronymous, the vocalist who shot himself, and one guy sending parts of his brain to the fans of Mayhem, burning churches and everything - I think they got too far with that. Assassin was always about partying, drinking, fucking and drugging (laughs), Assassin was never meant to be some satanic stuff. Even if we did some songs that were a little bit darker, “Nemesis”, for example, we made it for fun, it was not meant to be serious. But these guys took it too serious I think, they were getting really into Satanism and praying for Satan. We did it just for fun, I don’t give a fuck about Satan, like I don’t give a fuck about God, all this shit doesn’t exist for me.

Yes, I guess so if you recorded the song “Satan Dies in Hell”!

(cracks) Yeah, you see, it’s just fun, nobody takes anything serious, but these guys were taking it serious, definitely.

What happened to your demo which was recorded after the album “Interstellar Experience” in 1989?

That was the sad part in the Assassin history, what happened there was very sad. Dinko left the band, we had a new management, and that guy was putting us in color trousers, because he knew that me and Lulle were skaters and he also had his own skateboard and he wanted to promote the band as a skater band, so that we were supposed to wear more color and move more in a pop direction. I mean, Assassin would never be pop but still it was too commercial for me. I don’t know why we didn’t intervene in that. Dinko left the band and the management brought us a new guitar player. We were in a hurry, we had some songs ready and the guitarist changed the songs. He didn’t even listen to thrash, he didn’t even know what thrash is, so the whole demo was too weird. If an album had come out in this style, Assassin would have split up after that album definitely, because it was very bad, very boring music, everything was boring. Robert was trying to sing, he even took a teacher, a vocal coach, and he was trying to sing which was bullshit. We were doing ballads, and nobody would expect Assassin to do ballads. I think it was even good that some people stole our equipment those days. (laughs). It helped us not to bring out that album.

Let’s speak for a while about your Sodom era. What are you best memories about that time and why did you leave that band?

The time with Sodom was very good. Just after I left Assassin, a friend told me that Frank Blackfire left Sodom and asked me I wanted to play there. I had known Tom (Angelripper) for a long time from the early days, we met at some clubs, at shows, we were banging together, drinking together. I thought, “Man, let’s try it”. Then Tom called me and said. “Do you want to play in Sodom?” And I said, “I don’t know. Let’s meet and play one time to see if it goes good”. We made a little session, everything was OK, everybody was satisfied, we were happy, and then I joined Sodom. It was a quick decision for me and for the band – Assassin had split up, I had nothing to do. We played a lot of shows in Germany, Mexico, Japan, Finland, we had a lot of good times. I was always feeling good with Tom, Tom is a great guy, but I always had problems with Chris Witchhunter, the drummer.

Was it because of his alcohol addiction?

I don’t have problems with alcohol, man, I took up everything, I guess I’m sweating alcohol all day! I think it was a way the alcohol met up with him - he was changing. When I joined the band he already had changed. I knew him from the early days and he was a cool guys but when I joined Sodom he was already strange – he was crying sometimes, he had troubles with his girlfriend and this alcohol problem went too far for him. He had no control over the situation, he was acting like a rock star sometimes, one minute he cried like a baby and next moment he said, “Hey, hey, hey, where is my drum stand? I need a drum stand! I want to sit higher than you guys”. But it’s not that I had to leave because of that only - everybody has to live his way, it was not too bad for me. But then I had an offer from a guy from Brazil, he opened up a studio and because I was already producing, I worked a sound engineer, I played guitar and I was also making different music – I played blues and jazz and all that– so he asked me, “Man, don’t you want to come to Brazil and work a little bit for me?” I said, “Yeah, sure”. I was visiting him for a few weeks in Bahia, a city 40 km from Salvador, right on the beach – coconuts, girls, a lot of marihuana, a lot of cocaine… I supposed to be there like three weeks and when I woke up it was already six weeks (everybody laughs), and when I was supposed to come back, I felt like, “Eeeehhhh…” That was a heavy decision for me at that time. I was thinking like, “What can I do in my life? I’ll come back and… We’re still having a problem with the drummer, so…” (sighs) In addition, when you’re living in Germany, it’s always cold and I hate when it’s cold, I love it when it’s warm. (laughs)

I know, we have the same weather in Russia.

Yeah, you’re freezing there!

Do you know anything about a thrash metal band from Dusseldorf called Deathrow? I haven’t heard about them for a very long time!

Yeah, they were friends of ours! We rehearsed in the same building, there were two rooms, one for us and one for them. We spent a lot of time together. We were something like rivals but in reality we met, we  were drinking together and everything. I think we even had some shows together, we were like friends. I’m good friends with Milo, the singer of Deathrow, we still meet, but there’s not much to tell you about it. They were always a little bit bigger than Assassin, but just a little bit. Later we were happy that we outlived them. (laughs)

Can you talk to Milo about a possible interview for our website?

I can try, but I can already tell you that this guy doesn’t want to talk about Deathrow anymore. I was even talking to Milo about a reunion or anything, but they don’t want it anymore. They have no fun with thrash metal, they don’t want to reunite, they don’t like each other anymore. I think the problem started for them when they changed the guitarist. On the third album they had this guitarist Uwe Osterlehner, and he broke up Deathrow with his playing. He was a good guitarist, he played very good, but he made Deathrow too complicated – that was the end of Deathrow. The third album, “Deception Ignored” – I don’t like this album, I think it was total bullshit, it’s too complicated, there was no feeling of thrash metal anymore, there was only the feeling of showing the people how good they play guitar. I didn’t like it, I think fans didn’t like it either and the band broke up because of it in the end.

Once you mentioned that you had a project with Damo Suzuki from the band Can. What kind of music did you play?

(surprised) How did you know that?

You mentioned it in an interview with a Russian magazine. It’s very strange for me – the guitarist from Assassin and a man from a kraut rock band!

That was a very strange happening. When I was doing Assassin, as I said, I played some blues stuff just for fun, not to record anything or make an album, not even to play live, we just were paying in a rehearsal room with some guys. One day this Japanese guy came into the room – I didn’t know this guy, I didn’t know that this was the guy from Can. I knew the band Can but I didn’t know the guy. We were playing a little bit, we were improvising - and he asked me if I wanted to play some shows with him. He said “Just play, you don’t have to think, you just play and play on. Do what you want, do what you do, just play your stuff and I’ll sing what I want”. (laughs) So we had a project band with no rehearsals, and we did two shows in some club in Cologne. I had an effect board, I was playing around with some effects and yeah – he did like it. The whole thing was like a time warp to the 60’s, you know - all these hippies around, a lot of marihuana… We did a great show there and people said “Wow, this is outstanding! This is real psychedelic!” (laughs) But I was just playing around, I was so on drugs… It was psychedelic music in the end, I think it was real psychedelic like early Pink Floyd, songs that went for 30 minutes, and we were playing for hours! It was only then that I found out, “This guy is the singer from Can, cool!”

Unfortunately I’m not close to this music…

You have to take some LSD and you will like this music! (laughs)

I think with LSD or marihuana you will like any music! (everybody laughs)

No, not any, man! I think, for example, Living Death is shit anyway! Their first album (“Vengeance From Hell”, 1984) was so bad. You can take any drugs, you can be unconscious, but you still won’t like it!

I think the sound on this album was very bad, but the music itself was great.

Yeah, the music is great, but the singer and the sound are totally bullshit. I don’t like this singer (squeaks) “U-wow-u-i-i-i” (everybody laughs)

So, Michael, I’m out of questions. Can you say a couple of final words for your Russian fans?

I hope we will play in Russia this year, I want to play in Russia again, because it was great in Russia, I had a good time. Russian people are great, we have to play there as soon as possible. We will try to arrange some shows in the fall, so maybe there’s an idea for somebody who’s reading this interview to contact us, and we will play anywhere in Russia – St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Moscow, anywhere.

Assassin on the Internet: http://www.assassin-online.de

Special thanks to Stefan Kaminski for arranging this interview

Konstantin “Hirax” Chilikin
March 4, 2011
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