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Interview with Jonas Karsten of Vanity Beach, by Margarita Khartanovich.

We talked to Jonas Karsten of Vanity Beach about their long-awaited second album ‘A Life of Vice’, a new line-up and producer, rock stars, 500 girls and 8 boys in Moscow and many other curious sidelights.

It took Vanity Beach a pretty long time to release the second album. Why so?
The album was ready for a long time. We were receiving offers from some record labels but nothing was really ok. So, we were waiting for a good offer as we pay for the record ourselves. We don’t have anyone else paying.

And your first album was recorded in Australia, right?
There was one friend who wanted to put it out. But the first one wasn’t really an album – it was more like a collection of demos. It won’t be available anywhere anymore. People might check that one up first and get the wrong picture. We haven’t got big shows yet. Until we establish ourselves as a new band basically then later on we can put old stuff back again. At the moment we concentrate on the current album and work at the new songs.

Your line-up has changed a lot since the first album was released. Did it affect the sound of the new album?
Not really. Of course, they play differently. They have affected the live sound. Apart from that you can’t hear it on this album. Basically they didn’t do anything on the album. It was almost ready. Then Jesse (bass) came along, and we finished the album. New members will play on the new songs. We have material for one album already. I’d like to think about our next album as the second one.

And what will it be like?
I think it will be more noisy and aggressive. And weird, really weird! Not totally different though. ‘A Life of Vice’ shows where we were. It has more bass, it is more organic. Simply we know more about music production and see a lot of things differently now. So the next album will show where we are at present – it will be better and brighter. Better songs. I like post punkish, industrial stuff, really heavy stuff. There will be a lot of reverse, more machinery sound like the lost music sound, like from the Neverland. A bit more house.

How do you see your band at present?
As a rock band. Like no rules. Just Rock ‘n’ Roll. Like Guns ’n’ Roses did in their second album. I like that kind of things.

You keep telling stories that you recruited the new band members at some after-party. Do you remember what the party was?
No! Just a big blur.

And the producer of your new album was Jonny Lee Michaels (The 69 Eyes). How did you get him to work with you?
We come from the same background musically.

So, personal connections matter? They always do. First come connections then another thing and another thing. Besides, Finland is a small country...

How did you connect with Chibi from the Birthday Massacre to have her appear on your song ‘The Knight Murders’?
When we started there were a few bands out there that had similar sound. On all different continents pretty much. We were in touch with the Birthday Massacre, emailing each other.

Who will produce your next album?
We don’t know yet. We’ll see what will happen. The thing that I would really like to do is to get Marilyn Manson’s synth player (Chris Vrenna) to produce our next album. It’s really a question of money. Our money basically. As we have to pay for it...

Any plans to tour soon?
We are touring in Finland this fall. We played in Berlin last year. And we would like to come back. We are actually going there in July...to write new music, to get a great vibe of Berlin!

Did you like it there in Russia?
I liked St Petersburg more than Moscow. That’s one of my favourite cities. It’s very beautiful. I like Moscow too. The audience was really cool! There were mostly girls: like 8 guys in a whole venue and 500 girls. That’s a good thing! I’d rather have only girls in the audience.

What do you think about Finnish rock music? Swedish music is better than Finnish. There ARE great bands like HIM, for example. But come on, all these Finnish heavy metal bands...they are awful!! I hate it! I don’t even know the names of the bands – I don’t like them. I like a lot of Swedish bands. Swedish hard core, Swedish Techno, grunge core. We have good grunge core dance as well. I don’t like that many bands who, people think, sound like us. I listen to really, really good bands. It’s more old stuff like Bauhaus or Ministry.

You are also a DJ. What do you prefer: having a band or being a DJ?
Having a band. I love doing music. It’s the same thing pretty much. Sitting at home doing the music or doing it at a bar.

Your new album is called 'A Life Of Vice.' What is a vice for you?
There are a lot of bad things out there. I’m trying not to go in that direction as long as I can do that. We all have vices. I smoke, for example. But we also have priorities...

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