Mice interviewed by Adonis

The Republic of Finland (called Suomi in the Finnish language) is one of the world's most progressive and advanced nations. This is in spite of what many would consider to be less than optimal circumstances, including a harsh climate, little variety of natural resources, a very small population and a long history of being dominated by its more powerful neighbours

The  little variety  and  harsh climate  has certainly given the scene some unusual suspects during the years and now you will witness an interview with one of them.

In the year 1979 Mother Nature created an interesting being named Mice. Mice has over the past years been involved in, and is now a well known musician in the scene. He is known never to say no to contribute to a production and is well liked by nearly everyone.



Adonis: How nervous are you right now?

Mice: Who? Me? *hides under the bed*

Adonis: Why are you nervous?

Mice: Lalalalalala! I can't hear you; I'm in my happy place! Lalalalalala! But seriously, I'm a silent guy. I tend to be relaxed and speak a lot when I'm drunk, but now I'm sober so...

Adonis: Could you enlighten people about what kind of person we are dealing with here? I am not thinking about anything scene related. I met you at Breakpoint 2007 and that was a rather pleasant experience; I still try to convince my girlfriend that you were just a holiday chick I made out with. So please try to write a little something about the person Mice. 

Mice: Well like I said before, I'm pretty much a silent kind of guy and harmless when I'm sober. I'm just a simple man who enjoys the simple things in life like a cup of coffee, boobies, evil humour, good movies and music. Since we met at BP you already know that I'm also a friendly guy who loves beer and talks too much when drunk :)

Adonis: I am curious to hear something about what you do for a living. I am of the opinion that all Finnish people are like The Dudesons or Nosfe and I am sure that puts a lot of images into peoples head. It would be nice if you could confirm my assumptions or the opposite.

Mice: Heh, well I don't do anything strange for a living. I work as a warehouseman or stock clerk (or what ever it's called in English) at Stora Enso factory. I drive different kinds of forklifts and monitor some computers and devices so that people around the world will get tons of paper. I studied to become a sys-admin, but I haven't worked a single day as one and I probably won't as long as Enso keeps on continuing my working contract.

Adonis: I just mentioned The Dudesons above and I wonder if that is the only thing younger people do to kill some of their time in the country with  harsh climate ?

Mice: I have no idea what the kids are up to nowadays. Heavy metal is pretty popular here up north, so my guess is that at least some of the youngsters will end up playing some instrument in a band. At least there doesn't seem to be new sceners, I'm probably the only active one in my small hillbilly town.

Adonis: I know you got your first computer in 1986. Why, What, How?

Mice: It was a Commodore 64 and I got it as a Christmas-present after writing a heart-warming letter to Santa Claus. My mother told me that she had never seen me so happy as I was when I was opening the gift where the C64 was. I guess I was born nerd. Anyway, I mainly played games with it. I do remember trying to compose something with some weird program and I did own a drawing-board, but I don’t think I ever got anything saved with my cassette drive though :)

Adonis: I somehow doubt you continued to use the first computer you got, so how does the history look like when it comes to computers?

Mice: After C64 it was a decision between Atari ST and Amiga as they were both popular back then. I ended up getting an Amiga 500 since it was more common and I could copy games, demos and programs from Broom/Zenon and some other friends. After A500 I bought Amiga 1200, later on I bought 030-card for it, and then I exchanged the 030 to 060. A couple of years ago I bought myself a pc, but I've still got my A1200/060/60MHz in good shape and I still use it.

Adonis: You started to play guitar when you are were around 10 years old. Did you make music on the computer before you started to play guitar or how did your music career start?

Mice: Honestly, I can't remember. I'm pretty sure I learned the basics of guitar first since I still suck in tracking ;)

Adonis: What type of music do you play if we talk about none-computer music?

Mice: I've pretty much tried playing every kind of music, most often I end up playing heavy/progrock. My favourite thing was playing progressive instrumental music with my band Body By JAYK, but we're more or less dead nowadays. http://www.freewebs.com/bbjayk should still be up though and if someone's interested, you can download our first (and last) CD as mp3's for free. I also played in a Kingston Wall cover-band, but I guess only some finish people know that band. Nowadays I mostly play guitar for scene-oriented stuff, usually ending up making co-operations with Buzzer (always a pleasure).
 
Adonis: You have in the past mainly used ProTracker when you composed music. What do you use to compose your songs these days?

Mice: I still use ProTracker and AHX on Amiga. On PC I use SkaleTracker for composing mods and not long ago I registered Renoise which I use for making mp3-tunes. I've also got GoatTracker, but I've only made one SID with it so far.

Adonis: Which  active  musicians do you respect most and why?

Mice: Tough question.. I guess I should mention Virgill for still being active and always composing great stuff, Chromag for doing unplugged and for not being afraid of me anymore, Romeo Knight because he joined the mighty BRS-posse, I never even dreamed of being in a same group with such a legend ;)  But seriously there's plenty of good active musicians - for example - I've always liked demotunes by Amusic (& Leviathan), Zeebr, Little Bitchard, Vincenzo, etc When I try to think of the names of musicians, for some reason my brain starts looping "Radix-Reed-Dizzy-Radix-Reed-Dizzy..." so I guess I won't even try to continue answering this one. Hmm... Well I also have to mention Esau since it's always a pleasure to hear new stuff from him on Amiga.

Adonis: During the years you have made many really good songs. Have you ever thought about making a CD with them?

Mice: Liar, stop flattering :) I've only made a few okay'ish tunes and no way am I going to make a CD of those. I have been thinking of making new mp3-remixes out of some oldies, but time will tell if I ever get anything done with those.

Adonis: You are currently a member of Brainstorm. What is Brainstorm and how would you rate the overall activity in the group?

Mice: Brainstorm is a demo-group. I guess you already know what demos are? Hihih, but seriously, Brainstorm is just a bunch of creative boobie-lovers. Overall activity is actually better than I ever imagined it to be and every member is alive. That's really important since it's really hard to communicate with the dead and they usually smell bad.

Adonis: When I look at the member list I see a lot of different countries, which is rather unusual compared to other groups. Does the fact that you have a team spread out that much have an impact on your team and if yes in what way?
 
Mice: Doesn't really matter where one lives these days, we keep in touch with e-mail, IRC, etc. Meeting face to face is of course hard, but most of us attend to parties whenever we can.

Adonis: I believe everyone who says Brainstorm these days also think about ZINE; but what other irons does Brainstorm have in the fire?
 
Mice: We've got plenty of musicians so there could be at least more music-disks. We're constantly working on something new but I don't really want to reveal anything. You can expect plenty of releases from us in the future.

Adonis: It would be a shame not to talk a little about ZINE, since that is what everyone talks about these days. What will it be like and does Brainstorm plan on making this a regular release and not just a blast from the past?
 
Mice: I'm not giving any comments about ZINE, you just have to wait and see it yourself. I'm sure there will be more issues later on, would be silly to release only one new issue and stop there. Diskmag-scene needs more competition, that's for sure.

Adonis: What is the idea behind this  new  magazine? Is the editor staff of ZINE competitive minded or just casual people releasing something for the fun of it?

Mice: Like I said above, diskmag-scene needs more competition. We do everything just for fun though, so we're not doing Zine just to compete with anyone. In short: Casual people who will beat Hugi & Pain anyway ;)

Adonis: I have a delicate question which I simply have to ask now that I am interviewing a guy from Finland. Is it normal that you hook up with your other male friends in a sauna and do things there? Or is that just some huge misunderstand?  Finnish Sauna 

Mice: Yes, Finland is a sauna-nation and if you mean drinking beer and suffering from the heat with "do things there" you're absolutely right. There's nothing gay with naked men sitting in a small "room" and sweating, is there? :) 
Btw. cold beer tastes sooooo good after a hot sauna and a cool shower. I recommend you try it some time.

Adonis: If people are dying to meet you in real life; when will they get the chance to do so in the year to come? Do you know now what parties you might show up to?

Mice: I haven't made any plans yet because my present job-contract ends in September and I don't know what I'm going to do after that. I might visit Stream or some other finnish party if I've got the time. One thing is sure: If I can, I will go to Breakpoint. After this years experience I don't want to miss it.

Adonis: Can you name the three experiences you have had with something scene-related which have meaning for you and make it worth to continue in the scene. This could be persons, parties, productions or whatever keeps you going.

Mice: Well first thing that pops into my mind is this years Breakpoint. It was my first party outside Finland and it was really nice to meet old & new friends and all the Brainstormers who were there. Such a friendly atmosphere and an excellent party in every way is what it's all about. Don't really know what other specific experiences would be worth mentioning. I could always mention more parties I've visited, but to be honest, it's the whole scene-thing; making and watching nice productions, meeting people and partying with them etc. which makes me continue.

Adonis: I believe we have reached the end of this interview and I would like to thank you for all the nice answers. Is there something you would like to say before we end it for real?

Mice: Well greetings to everyone who knows me and everyone who actually took the time and read the whole interview. Also thank you for the interview, pleasure was all mine :)