Formed in 1997, Jacks Of All Trades is firmly stepping forward on the path of their careers. Most recent highlight is their ascent in the Finnish mainstream markets through a deal with Warner Music Finland. The release of Superior is the sign to mark this development. With their heavy rapcore music this is a band to follow in the slipstream of bands like POD and Project 86. Is this Superior the last step before world domination? Time to find out!

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In the last interview I did with Jacks Of All Trades the band expressed their desire to get a real good chance to record an album to the best of their abilities. Superior is your new album released by Warner Music Finland. Are you happy about it?

Yes, we are happy about it. Although even it's released via Warner Music, we recorded that album before we got a deal from them. This means that we had to pay that studio session from our own pockets so it was quite a short one. We recorded and mixed that album in 10 days. When we think about that, we are truly satisfied with the album. So we are still waiting for a change to make a great album with lots of studio time. Maybe next year :)

If you would have had more time, in what way would Superior have been different, do you reckon?

Yes it might have been bit different. We would have had more time to play everything in, so all small mistakes we hear there would have been corrected. And then of course we could have spent more time in mixing and make all new things in there. But we are satisfied with this and the songs would have stayed the same anyway. Actually this kind of studio working is all we know. We've always done our album in huge hurry and we
like to work like that.

What would you consider as your favorite tracks on the album? Do you actually listen to it at home?

We used to listen it a lot last winter after we made it but now when it's released, not so much anymore. Favorite tracks? It's bit hard to say 'cause we have some tracks that are really nice to play on stage and otherwise some other tracks are nice to listen from
CD. The Lies And The Truth is the best for just listening and maybe No Doubt is the killer one on stage.

Your album R U Ready had some Spanish influences that come from J-Blast's past in Latin America. The Spanish inheritage has vanished on Superior. Nor are there any Finnish influences or Finnish guest appearances. Instead you opted for a full English album. Am I right with my assumption that you aim for an international crowd even more than before?

You are propably right. Our first album was kind of a blender mix of all ideas that we had. It was fun to have friends in the studio. But it was three years ago and now we've lost all our friends. Just kidding! This was just something we decided to do on our own. About Spanish inheritage, it was bit forgotten also. We did record a Spanish version of Soulsell in a hurry but it did not work out so well.

I noticed the album was mainly recorded in two sessions. Three songs were recorded in May 2001 while eight songs were recorded in November 2001. Two more songs were recorded at various points in history. It almost becomes like a compilation of the efforts from various recording sessions. What are the reasons for doing it this way?

Situation in May 2001 was that we did not have enough money and time to spent in studio so we continued recordings in November 2001. All these songs were mixed in November session. And about those two other songs, Blacklist Of No Good was re-recorded 'cause our first version was too brutal for radioplay. And Point
Of No Return was already on our Liar EP but our record label wanted it to be on Superior album so we made it again. Not so good idea anymore.

At some point you signed a deal with Warner Music Finland. That must be a dream come true. How did it come about and does that deal open new doors for the band? And where is the album actually distributed?

It was a dream come true but it also means a lot more work and devotion from the band. We negotiated a long time about this deal and it has opened some doors to
us. We've got a lot of publicity in Finland, got signed to biggest booking agency, we've played on the biggest secular festival and now we are on a movie soundtrack also. So it has been good to us and we are thankful for it. About the distribution, this first
release from Warner won't be distributed abroad yet. It goes a bit slowly inside Warner Music. For example Holland, Warner Music Holland should be interested in
us if they want to release our album in there. And they won't be interested of us before we are a big name in Finland and sold thousands of album in the domestic markets. So that takes time. Hopefully our next album will be released internationally.

That almost sounds like you were better off internationally with Little Rose Productions who released R U Ready. Via them that album found its way through all the independent channels and you did that US tour with Pillar. This sounds like it's good for you in Finland alone. What are your expectations of this Warner Music deal?

No we disagree with that. We believe that this album will go to all the same contacts we had when we promoted R U Ready? anyway. And now we have been collecting new contacts for three years after that so this album will be well announced internationally. Plus we have some kind of small presentation of us to all the Warner Musics around the world. Our expectations are quite low with this first album. Warner did good job with a Finnish pop/rock band The Crash so when time comes, I think they'll do good job with us too.

You also did an album for Lowroof Records/Intensive Elements called Teaser
which is a compilation of old tracks and three, by then, unreleased tracks. What is your exact relationship with them?

Our relationship is good :) Lowroof made good work with this project and hopefully they get our album to people in Central-Europe. Obviously we can't make any
other projects with them anymore but we are hoping that this deal with Warner would help Lowroof to get their money back from Teaser album.

Money back? Have they lost money on the project?

No, we don't think thay they lost any money in it but you always have to pay for CD printing and promotion so you'll wait a while until you get your money back from sales.

Something else now. Jacks Of All Trades does quite some concerts and tours. Yet I wonder if this band is a full time occupation or do you have  side jobs or do you go to college?

Everyone does something else also. JAR just finished his army service and Lary is just starting one. J-Blast and Roki are studying. But we are truly hoping that soon we can make this a full-time job.

What do you like doing besides playing in JOAT? Do you have hobbies or do
you play in side projects?

The band takes quite a lot from us. It's a job and hobby combined. Of course we have some time to chill out with friends and everybody is quite into various sports. Lary plays guitar occasionally in some bands we know and JAR is putting up a really heavy band with some friends. They are planning to play music like Living Sacrifice combined with Blindside.

Finally I want to look into the future. What may we expect from you in the future? I read on your site that you recorded a song for a movie soundtrack?

Future, still bit blurry but we are planning to record a new full-length next year and just make some progress as a band. We might go touring to USA next March. Not any big plans anyway, Just taking it slowly and playing for sure. This movie soundtrack is
released in few weeks, we are waiting to get some feedback from it and let's see what happens.

So, what is the movie soundtrack all about actually? What movie and what song?

We made a cover version of an old Finnish melodic rock song. It was originally performed by a famous artist from here, Frederik. And now he sings on this track and
we'll just play it with our style. It's a good one. The movie is a Finnish movie, aimed to young people. It tells about a roadtrip of two guys who are about to die in cancer.

There is a tour coming up through Belgium, late September. Last year you toured in that part of the world as well though it was, from my perspective, poorly organized. I only heard the dates last minute. So, what will this tour encompass?

This is going to be a mini-mini-tour. We are planning to play just four shows. Three in Belgium and one in Holland. The gig in Holland is in Schijndel, in a great pub
called Holy Cow. We are playing there on 22nd of September. We had some problems with our booking agency in the past and now we are not working with
them anymore. We are doing this thing by our own, just because we don't want to leave our friends in trouble in Belgium. In future we'll start to work with a new
booking agent and we'll let you know when we play a big tour in there. But come to Holy Cow anyway. :)

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