Anton Kabanen – Battle Beast

When Battle Beast first majorly came on the scene in 2010, Finland yet again showed the world why they’re one of the premiere places across the globe to discover fantastic new bands. Having begun life in 2008, and after winning the prestigious Wacken Metal Battle in 2010, Battle Beast released their debut album ‘Steel’ a year later. Hit January 2015, Battle Beast’s newest album entitled ‘Unholy Savior’ will land. On behalf of Metal Obsession, I had the recent pleasure to speak with band guitarist, backing vocalist, and chief lyricist, songwriter, and composer, Anton Kabanen. An insightful, yet soft spoken character, much of our interview was spent dwelling within the complex and emotionally triggered state of Anton’s mind.

Beginning on a strong note, I asked after the band’s newest release, ‘Unholy Savior’. “It’s our third album and so far it’s our most versatile album music-wise. I hope it’s gonna be a killer and people might like it. We like it ourselves, but we hope that now it’s out of our hands, it will succeed and people will come to our shows and enjoy the music. In our music we don’t try to become something that we are not because the biggest difference in that album is hopefully the versatility. People are already speculating about it, but will we see. Time will tell.”

I asked how he felt ‘Unholy Savior’ to expand upon the sound of Battle Beast. “To me it’s always been natural to write this kind of different music: more orchestral, more synthesizers, and a part from heavy metal.” Anton began. “So to me it’s nothing new from a writing perspective, but it’s the first time we’ve put these kinds of songs on an album and it was a natural process for me. I wanted to capture the emotions through the music – the emotions I was going through when I was writing the music – and it required a certain approach. I tried to make the whole album more personal music-wise and lyric-wise. So it’s like a living thing, like how human beings feel differently depending on the day and depending what happens to them. That is what the music is representing.”

Leading into a more sombre note, Anton and I discussed the heavy emotional impact the recording of this album had on him personally as a musician and a creative. “It was hard times. And I was pushing myself. Kind of ‘what’s real and what’s not real?’; ‘who am I, what am I doing here?’ All those kind of questions that have something to do with your existence and your place in this world, and maybe in this whole universe. It’s something that every human being goes through at some point in their life and if it is a journey, maybe it is a journey that never ends for some people. But that was the driving force – the main driving force – behind that. During the summer, we had a concert every weekend and it was very hard to work consistently on this album. I mean, as a producer on this album, it’s finally finished and it might not be exactly the way I want it to be because originally I was supposed to mix the album but then the band members wanted someone else to mix it. This affected the overall sound even though I was very much a part of the mixing process in the studio. When we changed that plan it also affected the schedule and got delayed more and more due to the sort of stress over things that needed to be changed. It was a huge problem. It was like hell. But finally it’s done; finally it’s finished. I wouldn’t do another album like this. You’ve got to learn from your mistakes. We had to fight our way through it. But you always learn something.”

‘Unholy Savior’ out January 2015 via Nuclear Blast Records

I imagined the thrill it must have been for Battle Beast when they largely came into the public light in 2010 following their claiming of Metal Battle, and the journey since then. “It has been a privileged journey for this band for a relatively young band. It’s once in a life time that you get opportunities as we have had. The ride has been exciting and a lot of things have happened. The only thing I can say is that we’re trying to do the best we can at the moment, and even though you’ve got to have plans for tomorrow as a band, you’ve got the have the vision for what you want to do and what you’re going to do. But everything changes; nothing goes one hundred percent as planned. But we are very grateful for the success of our band.”

Closing out the interview, I asked Anton if a tour of Australia would be possible soon, “I really hope so. We’ve never been [to Australia]. I think it’s very possible but I don’t have any confirmed information, but it’d be really awesome if we could do a tour there maybe next year.”

To any final words he’d like to offer his fans anticipating the release of ‘Unholy Savior’, Anton had this to say: “Yeah, definitely! I really hope people will check it out because I think everyone will find something that appeals to them. It’s versatile – the music – across the whole album, so it’s definitely worth checking out. [There’s] a lot of good stuff on it for everyone. If we come to Australia next year, I really hope everyone’s there on the tour. And I hope people from Australia will come to Europe or somewhere we are playing, then we could meet there.”

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