MAUSOLEUM GATE Interview with Jarkko 05/10/2025
MM: You've titled this record "Space, Rituals and Magick" is this a transmission from the void, or a warning to
those who dare listen?
Hah! A good one! Mainly you can expect a obscure piece of heavy rock. If you fancy a mainstream things with rectifier modelling guitar sounds or trigger drum sounds things - it might not be your thing.
MM: Which track on this album feels most like a ritual and what's being sacrificed in its execution?
Well it must be the final song: Witches Circle. It was meant to be a three minute acoustic piece written by me but our keyboard wizard Wicked Ischanius turned it to this massive epic. He is a genius I can say.
MM: What's the role of magick in your music illusion, revelation, or rebellion?
A very big role in my lyrics I can say. Of course “Magick” - the way its spelled- refers to Aleister Crowley. And Witches Circle was inspired the book about him. His last days which were described in that.
MM: The album pulses with texture and atmosphere was that intentional alchemy or chaotic emergence?
Well both actually. I see that the album kind of revealed itself to us in this long journey. Sacred Be Thy Throne came a great song actually by accident. Me and Jari were jamming and he came out with this fantastic melody - the “hu-hah” part and I wrote the harmony on it. This describes very well the album work.
MM:Tell us about the album art work
Well as well as the music goes Timo -Derek Riggs of this band- made his most ambitious work yet. And the poster also which was kind of an extra thing. I think his beautiful art combines with the music great.
MM: If you could build a concept album around one figure historical, mythical, or fictional who would it be?
Hard to say really. Maybe Blavatsky or Crowley or finnish Pekka Ervasti.
MM:What compromises have you refused to make, even when the industry snarled back?
We don’t make any compromises. Never. So we have not refused. When we started there was a lot talk about “demo-like-sound” and there still is. Let it be so. This is Mausoleum Gate sound.
MM:You've shredded stages across Europe what's been the wildest gig
It must have been the Keep It True 2015. From the great unknown to same stage with the youth heroes like Mantas and Abaddon or Uli Jon Roth. Muskelrock 2017 was great too although the powers went out a few times.
MM:Touring exposes everything fatigue, ego, addiction, doubt. What's your poison, and how do you survive it?
To be honest we have done so little touring that I can’t say nothing really. For our scene its pretty much to survive moneywise. We do gigs very rarely and choose our gigs. This is the way we like this.
Your top 3 albums of all time?
Uriah Heep - Salisbury
Led Zeppelin - 4
Black Sabbath - Master of reality
If you could jam with any 3 musicians—alive or dead—who'd make the list?
Ozzy
Tony Iommi
Jimmy Page
Your 3 essential items for surviving a tour?
Food
Drinks
Top 3 countries you'd love to tour but haven't yet?
Denmark, USA, Great Britain
24-hour road trip—what musician's riding shotgun with you?
Books, Music
If your personality were a song, what would its title be?
Black Sabbath - Solitude
Festival chaos or an intimate sweat-soaked gig?
Of course intimate sweat-soaked gig!
hat's one lyric from the new album that you'd want carved into your gravestone?
Sacred Be Thy Throne. The song title.
If you were a mythological creature, what would it be—and what would it protect?
Hard to say... maybe its my passed dog Milla. A great living creature really.
Final words? The stage is yours...
Stay Heavy and listen the album! Its a an album I would buy and I am serious about this! Facebook
