Heathen Harvest: Thank you for taking the time to look back into the past with us. Mz.412 was one of the very first (the third, if I’m correct) bands to be signed to Cold Meat Industry and was formative in making the record label the legend that it is today. So let’s start with those early years, Sweden in the late 80s and early 90s. I imagine that the Swedish Death Industrial (if that was even a term at the time) scene was very small then. Did you and Roger Karmanik know each other prior to the formation of Cold Meat Industry?
Henrik Björkk: I got in touch with Roger after we recorded the first Maschinenzimmer 412 recordings back in 1988. I had picked up some of the early Cold Meat Industry stuff (most notably In the Shadow of Death and Memorandum´s first album), and I was instantly hooked by the music and artwork. I felt a strong connection to what we were doing and, of course, wanted to investigate if Maschinenzimmer 412 could be released on Cold Meat Industry as well, so I sent a cassette with what later ended up as Macht Durch Stimme. Roger loved it, and the rest is history.
When you speak of “the scene”, I never felt like there was much of one — at least not around where we lived. There were occasional concerts and a few distros trying to spread the stuff around, but compared to other subcultures or styles of music, this was extremely underground and obscure.
Henrik Nordvargr Björkk
HH: It’s clear that you saw some great potential in what Roger was doing with Cold Meat Industry, and him with your work as well. I’ve often heard the the CMI circle referred to as a small family. Like many families, not everyone agrees, but they manage to get along and support each other. How would you describe your relationship with the early CMI roster? Were you in touch with Petter Marklund of Memorandum? Do you have any idea what happened to him? Early CMI communications seem to come from Linköping, sort of between the Stockholm and Gothenburg. Was this near where you lived? I imagine the major cities were where the music was getting passed around. Where were you getting the records that influenced you?
HB: I did not have much contact with the other CMI artists until 1994-95 or so, and it was not until they opened the shop and held CMI parties and mini-festivals that I started to meet other artists. I have never met Memorandum, and I have no idea what became of them. (I think I heard something about working with Meshuggah, but I might be wrong?). LInköping was a two-hour drive from where I lived, and I went to visit Roger / CMI on a regular basis back then. I got most of my musical influences from there as he had the best distro around. It really was the central “hub” for all of this back then, and I never felt that the major cities played a big part in the whole movement, but I could be wrong.
HH: After the release of “Malfeitor” and “Macht Durch Stimme” in 1989 and 1990, it’s clear that you stepped away from CMI and focused on your EBM project Pouppée Fabrikk for about five years. Was there anything in particular that that brought you back to Mz.412? Were you still following the releases by CMI in the early 90s? It seems that, when you got back CMI in ’95, that things were starting to pick up. How did your inclusion into the “And even Wolves Hid their Teeth…” compilation come about? Maybe Roger can verify, but I believe this compilation was the first CMI release to break through into the United States with proper distribution through Projekt / Darkwave.
HB: Back in the eighties I was very much into the EBM / industrial scene, and my focus drifted towards Pouppée Fabrikk as that band really took off with touring, regular releases, etc. Due to that, I lost track of the noisier side of things for a few years, but I never completely fell out of love with it. I guess the urge to create music was — and still is — too strong to just ignore. I also kept in touch with Roger every now and then and kept myself up to date with what was going on.
If memory serves me right, the Wolves… compilation came up roughly about the same time as we were recording In Nomine…, and Roger insisted that we should have a track on it, which we of course agreed upon.
HH: After the release of “Malfeitor” and “Macht Durch Stimme” in 1989 and 1990, it’s clear that you stepped away from CMI and focused on your EBM project Pouppée Fabrikk for about five years. Was there anything in particular that that brought you back to Mz.412? Were you still following the releases by CMI in the early 90s? It seems that, when you got back CMI in ’95, that things were starting to pick up. How did your inclusion into the “And even Wolves Hid their Teeth…” compilation come about? Maybe Roger can verify, but I believe this compilation was the first CMI release to break through into the United States with proper distribution through Projekt / Darkwave.
HB: Back in the eighties I was very much into the EBM / industrial scene, and my focus drifted towards Pouppée Fabrikk as that band really took off with touring, regular releases, etc. Due to that, I lost track of the noisier side of things for a few years, but I never completely fell out of love with it. I guess the urge to create music was — and still is — too strong to just ignore. I also kept in touch with Roger every now and then and kept myself up to date with what was going on.
If memory serves me right, the Wolves… compilation came up roughly about the same time as we were recording In Nomine…, and Roger insisted that we should have a track on it, which we of course agreed upon.