Estonia's METSATÖLL have been crafting an exciting blend of Heavy Metal, old Estonian Runo-singing and Folk Music on traditional instruments since 1998. Having released their newest album, "Iivakivi" (translated into English, "The Fertility Stone") earlier this year and recently signing with Spinefarm, METSATÖLL have been catching the eye of a great many Folk Metal fanatics with their highly unique sound.

What are your anticipations for Heathen Crusade 3? What do you think the festival is going to be like for METSATÖLL?

"What we want it to be like... we are really looking forward to giving a goddamn good concert! This is the main thing, so let's see what happens! (laughs)"

What do you think of America so far?

"I really goddamn like it. You know, it's actually like in Estonia, but it's cheaper in here! (laughter) You know, the food, the beer and the people are beautiful. We always talk like, Americans are fat or something like this - you ain't. (laughter) You are beautiful people."

Have had any time to go sight-seeing or just shopping?

"This is a bad question because the others went shopping, you'd have to ask this from them (laughter), but actually as far as I saw, everything is great."

What are your thoughts on signing with Spinefarm?

"You know, this was a difficult task because we seven points there in the contract that we wanted to change and if one we didn't like, then we would say that we ain't going to sign it. But actually, they agreed to every agreement that we wanted to do and everything went okay. And this is insane in some thoughts because... I don't know why, but actually, we can be METSATÖLL, we will always sing in Estonian, we will always play the music that we want, we will never make an English album, but we are really satisfied."

What can we expect from the next album?

"I think you could expect something like 'The Fertility Stone', the 'Iivakivi', but more difficult, more harder Metal and more Folk. (laughs) I don't know how to say this, but something like this."

Now that you're on Spinefarm, is there any possibility of reissuing the METSATÖLL DVD's in the NTSC format?

"Never. They didn't want them. We're going to make a DVD of our tenth anniversary of our existence. Yes, we've been existing about ten years and we understand if you like this, you can give this our DVD, but actually, we have to do it. They don't want this old material, they only want the new one. Actually, we are going to release ourselves the DVD and a little, small maxi-single with one Estonian band and they don't want nothing to do with it. (laughs) And then we will do something with Spinefarm."

Explain how Estonian culture has influenced your song-writing.

"It's simple - I am Estonian. (laughs) Simple! Actually, this nature of us that is also like you have here in Minneapolis, it all has a little influence with us... something like this."

Tell us a little bit about the song-writing process.

"We are the most democratic band in the world, I think, because everyone writes the songs - I write, the drummer writes, the bass player writes and the bagpiper, and whatever instruments he has, always writes. Just in Estonian radio, there was a case when a singer talked that it would never make a band where there ain't no leader, but we don't have a leader. We also, the four of us, write the songs and we hope and we believe that the music will be interesting on the next album."

What are your thoughts on the rise of National Socialism within the Metal community?

"This is a goddamn good question. I don't know... we hate Nazis, so far as we can say. But it's really hard to understand this, why this comes up, because looking at this American Metal scene, maybe... what what was the four kings of Metal for Estonians about twenty years ago, it was METALLICA, MEGADETH, ANTHRAX and SLAYER, all built political lyrics and stuff like this and it never mentions Socialist, okay. But still this in Poland and somewhere, it always comes up and this is really hard to understand, for us, why. Because Heavy Metal has always been neutral music... we don't understand it. Actually we don't understand why this comes up with Metal music. This is something that we don't understand."

Tell us why you choose the particular instruments that you use.

"Many people think that we are making this true Estonian Folk Metal - we ain't. We come up with the songs with ourselves. We like to write the songs that we want to write and actually, we use these bagpipes and kantella and those instruments as a second guitar. You know, as other bands use the second guitar, we use the bagpipes and stuff like this and write our songs. You can't call us a true Estonian Folk Metal band because we write the music ourselves, so we're just an Estonian Metal band - we write the Metal music in our key."

What kind of subjects would you like to sing about on future albums?

"This is a really good question - this is the best question I've had because I don't know how to answer this! (laughter) But we'll see. Yes, we are trying to get away from this war because there has been war, sex and stuff like this, so you're right - we have to look for something new. But we will - don't you worry about it! (laughter)"

Do you feel that Soviet repression during the Iron Curtain has made the Estonian people stronger and more unified?

"Yes. It's really hard to tell you because you ain't been there, but if you had been there, this was a horrible time. You know, when a friend comes from a foreign land and his SLAYER and METALLIC vinyls are broken in the border because this is some fascist and stuff like this and we've all seen it. Yes, I believe this has been a little process for being more unified, but we are glad it's over because now we are here and this is super! (laughter)"

What does the future hold for METSATÖLL?

"We want to do more live gigs - more, more and more. We don't want to sit down back there in Estonia, just watching TV..."

METSATÖLL's soundman who has been watching TV during the interview - "We want to watch TV in other countries."

"(laughter) Yes, we want to watch TV in other countries! (laughter) We want to do more live shows - more and more and more, like today. And more music. I think it's the future, I believe that we will be into more music than we are more into work like we are in Estonia now, you know - one of us is the builder and electrician and goddamn warehouse worker. I think one day we'll just go fucking say 'go fuck yourself, all! I'm a goddamn musician at last!' I believe we are more into music and we are going to explore the different sides of this Metal music from America or Sweden or something. We'd like to gather this also into our music and we'll see about that."

Is there anything else you'd like to add?

"Yes - America rules! (laughter)" [FIN]