There are few bands which possess the legendary stature of Norway's Mayhem. And I can't imagine a higher level of pressure than that of Mayhem's guitarist. Following Euronymous' death in 1993, the band was left inactive for a time, until they brought in Blasphemer and put out the ferocious Wolf's Lair Abyss. While some fans will always be divided on the question of whether Mayhem should have forged onward, the guitarist managed to carve a decent reputation for himself.
Fast forward to 2011: Blasphemer departs. Now what? Into the band comes Teloch, a Norwegian guitarist who played in several other black metal bands and was a touring guitarist with Gorgoroth (another demanding gig, to be sure). I had the pleasure of seeing Teloch perform with the rest of Mayhem over in NYC (well, minus Necrobutcher, who had visa issues to wrap up), and was granted the opportunity to ask him about the band's new album, Esoteric Warfare, and other aspects of being in the group. By the way, if you haven't sen them, definitely get on that as soon as possible. For my part, I'd fork up good money to see them again.
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Greetings, congratulations on the release of Esoteric Warfare, and good luck on your upcoming US tour! How have you found the crowd reaction to be for the new material?
Thanks. Seems they like it! Always exciting to present new material at gigs.
You joined Mayhem in 2011. Did you feel an immense amount of pressure to live up to expectations? Or did filling the role come naturally?
To me its strange to end up in this band cause its never been a goal of mine to play in any “big” bands. I was satisfied with doing my own shit with my projects and release things when and if I felt like it. Don’t get me wrong, I'm not complaining [laughs]. This is the band that got me to quit death metal, as I was doing at the time, and start doing black metal instead. When Mysteriis was out I was totally blown away. Of course I had heard of the band before with Deathcrush, but I wasn’t too fond of that album. Little did I know, when I was walking around in my hometown listening to Mysteriis on my Walkman, that I one day would play in this band. I never think of how “mythical” or how big this band is, I’m just trying to do my best on my little banjo.
How much of the songwriting did you contribute for Esoteric Warfare? How do you go about putting riffs together to create a song?
Attila wrote the lyrics and I wrote the music. I never had a standard way of making songs. Sometimes I start with playing around a drumbeat and add guitars on top of that or I start with a bass idea or a even maybe some vocals. But mostly it starts with the guitar of course.
Of the older Mayhem material, do you have any favorite songs to play? Perhaps some you weren't as into from a listening perspective, but appreciated more once you were tasked to play them.
I'm really into playing the De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas songs. Lately "Buried by Time and Dust" have been my favorite to play live. Also some of the Deathcrush songs have grown on me lately.
Black metal has gone in many different directions during the past ten years. Do you find yourself gravitating more to the traditional, orthodox style, or are there some newer variations you find interesting?
Man I have no idea, only thing I know is that we are not very good at checking out what is going on in the scene music wise. We stick to our own thing anyway. We are always looking forward instead of backwards in some extent. That said, the latest album was kind of a mash up of all the Mayhem albums previously released.
As far as I know, this US tour is the first time Mayhem has come to the United States since December of 2011. If the fans miss you this round, will they have another chance to see you this year or next? And is another round of shows planned for Europe this year?
Yes, this is the first time since 2011. We had some goals of doing another round not so far in the distant future with more focus on the new album. Right now we play more of a 30 years anniversary setlist. We have to get that out of the way first then start focus playing more songs from the new album. But who the fuck knows? Its always a big hassle for us touring the states. Its very time consuming and expensive. But the hassle is always worth it in the end, can't let down them fans down you know!
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[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4HXz0crB2A[/youtube]
