Suiciderock: For everybody who does not know so much about you could you be that nice and give a little bit of information about you and the rest of the guys?
Jimmy: No. *laughs* Well, we are The Bitter Licks, we play Rock'n Roll. That's basically all introduction you need.
Raffe: And you gonna love it.
Jimmy: If you come to see our shows, you can have a good time. If you listen to our record you can have a good time but you can also have a really bad time and you will find yourself crying in some corner. I don't know. We're a Rock'n Roll Band! That's all about it!

Suiciderock: And about the members?
Jimmy: Okay we start with Raffe.
Raffe: Hey I`m Raffe. I play the guitar and harmonics and I`m singing background vocals. And I love the band!
Jimmy: Hey I`m Jimmy and I play guitar, sing, write songs and...
Raffe: Look cool!
Simon: Hi I`m Simon. I play the drums and also the percussion on the record.
Jimmy: Uh, you play the percussion also?
Julius: I`m Julius, I`m doing the lead vocals. I play the percussions live, but in the studio Simon does this job.
Jimmy: He also plays the tamborin and he is styled really black.
Julius: Yeah and I do asshole things. I`m an asshole.
Jimmy: And a mad man.
Julius: Sometimes.

Suiciderock: What made you start playing music and what type of musical background do you have?
Raffe: Me and Jimmy started up with a funk band and during this time we were already thinking about doing something with Rock`n Roll. It's in our hearts.
Jimmy: Like Raffe mentioned we played in this funk band. We`ve always been into music and his dad is a saxophone-teacher. So music has always been a theme in his family. I think my musical background goes to Slash, Keith Richard and to everybody who was raising his finger against the photographers. That`s what I wanna do. Music is a thing that reaches a wide audience. You can play any kind of music. You can play Rock`n Roll, you can play techno, or whatever. Good music gets around and something that's gonna stay in the world.
Simon: As long as you have your heart in it everything is fine.
Jimmy: And a big reason for us why we started the band was the scene in Tampere or generally in Finland., because most of the bands are terrible. I mean they are forgetting about the whole point of music.
Julius: And about Rock`n Roll.
Jimmy: Yes, and about Rock`n Roll. It seems that everybody wants to get to the top only. No matter for what price.
Raffe: They don`t give a shit about music.
Jimmy: Where are the bands from the 60's and 70's, bands with heart and soul?
Raffe: Bands who have cocks and balls.
Jimmy: We have cocks and balls also, but it`s mostly about soul and put our heart in music.
Raffe: Cocky assholes with bunched balls. That`s what we are.
Jimmy: That`s what you are. *laughs*
Raffe: Yeah I speak for myself. *laughs*

Suiciderock: Can you still recall your first memory referring to music?
Julius: I was about 4 or 5 years old and my sister was something like 12 or 13 and she had this video of Kiss and the dudes without masks. I remember jamming in that crazy night and I hate myself for that and I loved that.
Jimmy: That`s good. *laughs*
Julius: I remember lots of stuff when I was young. That`s my first useful memory.
Raffe: My first memory goes back when I was 4 or 5. My parents listened to some African music with good rythms. I remember those early Saturday mornings. At this time I figured out that I love music.
Jimmy: The first memory I can think of right now was when my mum bought me a Bryan Adams CD. I was maybe 9 years old. My mum bought me „Cuts like a Knife". I`m from Canada you know. No, he has good songs definately. All respect to Bryan Adams.

Suiciderock: You had some changes in the line-up. What was the reason for that?
Julius: First there were only Jimmy, Raffe and me.
Raffe: We had a couple of Line-up changes.
Julius: The whole thing started when those guys were jamming with their funk band and I started to hang out at their rehearsal place. I just wanted to kick some ass. I wanted to play some Rock`n Roll with Raffe and than Jimmy came up. We had this jams in the parks during the winter time and than we went to the apartement with the guitar and the police was involved also, because of too loud noise. In my opinion we didn`t make so much noise and than it came to our first rythm section, you can tell about it.
Jimmy: There was a band called Freevolvo I think they toured in Germany also. It's a pretty small punk band. Their bass-player used to play bass for us. He also played in our funk band, but at one point he just said that he don't really understand why we have been so cocky on stage.
Julius: He just wanted to stand there. He was just playing and playing.
Jimmy: I think he wasn`t a Rock`n Roller in his heart.
Raffe: He loves music and he wants to play.
Jimmy: But anyway, he was our bass player and than Antti Hietalla who plays for the Tiger Bombs. We just went seperate ways. We wanted to do our thing, that means we wanted to go with The Bitter Licks. That was our first rythm section. Our second rythm section was with a guy called Dino, who plays in Downfall.
Raffe: And there was Gareth. Yeah, I saw him at a karaoke bar. He played bass and he knew Julius.
Jimmy: Oh, you are a karaoke fan?
Raffe: I`m a fucking killer karaoke singer.
Jimmy: We played about for one year in this rythm section.  It just didn`t work out. Let's say they were just different. They just didn`t get the point of our thing and probably we didn't get the point of their thing.
Julius: And than came Simon. And actually Dino the last drummer.
Simon: He introduced me to the guys. I guess this happened at some bar.
Julius: He said why don`t you take Simon as your drummer and that he is too old and fucked up.
Simon: So I was the better looking guy.
Jimmy: Yeah, we wanted the younger and better looking guy.
Julius: We even had one jamsession before when Dino didn`t know about.
Simon: We played some cover songs for something like 5 hours.
Raffe: The first time I saw him was when he was licking up his Jallovinna.
Simon: It was actually one year ago on New years.
Raffe: Yeah, about onehundred metres away from here. I saw him for the first time with a almost empty bottle of Jallovinna.
Simon: And I became his best friend. *laughs*
Raffe: So the first impression was he is cool.
Jimmy: And I was living on our managers floor at this time.
Raffe: But that`s how we started.
Simon: And now I'm officially in the band for about 6 month.
Julius: But Raffe's old friend Erland, who is a really good guitar player.
Raffe: He was actually in my first band when I was 12. That's when I got to know him. We kept in touch.
Jimmy: I know him from the army, because we cooked soup together.
Raffe: Tampere is such a small city.
Simon: We found out yesterday that he was at the same confirmation camp as Matti from Bloodpit.
Julius: We didn`t have a bass-player and we had gigs and we needed somebody who plays the bass. And Erland was the only solution for this problem. We gave him a live record, told him to rehearse this songs and we played some jams and the gig.
Raffe: And so we were done and he was the king.
Jimmy: He is a very down to earth guy with a attitude. He couldn`t come today because he is still trying to get sober.
Suiciderock: But today it's New Years Eve, so why is he trying to get sober?
Jimmy: He is a script writer.
Julius: He is making a script at home about New Years Eve.
Raffe: I think he is doing some kind of experiment.
Suiciderock: Will this be the fix line-up than?
Jimmy: Yeah.

Suiciderock: On your page it says „We're your new favourite band and there's nothing you can do about it.". What is the reason for this?
Raffe: Just listen to the fucking record.
Jimmy: Have you listen to the record?
Suiciderock: No not yet. We just got it.
Jimmy: You should see us live!
Julius: We are more a live band.
Jimmy: You know every band has a biography and something like this guy was born there and this one here and I was just sitting there and thinking what the hell I could write. I asked the guys what should I write into our biography and I just felt like we are your new favourite band. If you come to see us, we will be your new favourite band. You should have come a few days ago.
Raffe: I was disappointed, because you didn`t show up.
Suiciderock: We were working.
Raffe: It's not fair to do an interview without having seen the band live.
Jimmy: Yeah but they are trying to find out what we are about.
Suiciderock: Yeah but you could have played today, so it was a little bit unfriendly of you to play a few days before.
*everybody laughing*

Suiciderock: What do you want people to walk away with after one of your shows and what can they expect from your life performance?
Simon: You have to walk out with a big smile.
Julius: They should walk out with positive agression. Something between love and agression.
Simon: You have to be sweatty and smily.
Raffe: And with wet pants. Straight in your face. The songs should still play in their heads after leaving the show. I know this will happen. We had this little tour that lead us to Helsinki, Tampere, Jyväskylä. We had great gigs there. It was just like party party. I did stage diving for the first time in my life in Helsinki.
Julius: The people went crazy.
Simon: The people saw the good energy.
Raffe: During our third gig I bunched one guy.
Suiciderock: Why?
Raffe: Because he came to near. I jumped on the amplyfiers to play a solo and the guy came to close. Our manager still has the picture of that night.
Ossi (manager): The guy was so wasted.

Suiciderock: Where do you take your inspiration for the songwriting from and who is responsible for the lyrics?
Raffe: Shitty things.
Jimmy: There are lots of things inspiring me. If you`re refering to my lyrics than love, hate, death, depression...
Julius: Agression.
Jimmy: Lots of things. Everything that comes to my mind. I also like lots of artists like Johnny Cash and people like that. The last song on the album „Little Johnny" it's one of those songs. Musicwise I listen a lot to Punk rock from the 70's, Iggy Pop and the Stooges, just whatever comes in my head. It's not restricted to one story. I don`t mind to play country, I don`t mind to play rock, whatever sounds good at the time. That`s my best answer for that I guess. *smiles*

Suiciderock:  Who came up with the bandname?
Jimmy: I actually don`t know.
Julius: Originally it was supposed to be The Licks. 
Jimmy: Everybody was convinced.
Julius: Everybody had this papers to write all the names down.
Raffe: So we had this name The Licks, but someday we found out about that Juliette Lewis thing.
Jimmy: No, no, no listen. We had the name first. So Juliette get rid of the name. The Licks was kind of a dirty name, but the name was gone.
Raffe: Than I came up with The Hollicks, like alcohollicks, but it wasn`t good enough. And the old bass-player made up the name „Bitter Licks".
Jimmy: Have you ever been to the internet page www.bitterlicks.com?
Julius: It`s for some kind of spray for horses and so we added the.
Jimmy: Band names are always shitty.  

Suiciderock: It's New Years Eve today. So what was the most stupid New Years resolution you ever made?
Simon: We don`t do that.
Jimmy: Last year I tried, but I was drunk from the 1st January until the 5th January, it simply didn`t work.
Raffe: You know people in Finland have this people don`t drink the whole January. I think I can`t promise that. I think I can stay sober for one day.
Jimmy: I believe in him. That`s my New Years resolution. Though I know that I can't keep it.

Suiciderock: How will you celerbrate New Years Eve?
Simon: I will actually head to Helsinki in about an hour.

Suiciderock: Your future plans for the band?
Simon: We will take January pretty easy, we will arrange some old songs and write new ones, we will make plans for the future and think about our next EP, which we are going to record in the beginning of the new year.
Suiciderock: Do you already have ideas for new songs?
Jimmy: We have a bunch of new songs.
Simon: We have a lot of songs ready and we are gonna record them. We already rehearsed them very well.
Jimmy: And we have that big plan to conquer the whole world, but isn`t that everybodys plan? No, we just wanna play Rock'n Roll and we want to have a few coins in the pocket so we can play our music.
Raffe: And we wanna play Rock`n Roll without kissing any asses.
Jimmy: We don't like this screaming teenagers, who just like the way we are looking. The way we look is just some kind of an addition to our music. I don`t wanna someone boring on stage, who stands there and looks like an idiot.
Simon: You should have a good show.

Questions out of the questionbox:
Raffe: Describe your perfect date? Right now, right here. If you had one wish free what would it be? Get out of this date.
Jimmy: My question is what is your most recent dream? I had a dream that somebody slipt my throat and that's all I remember. So it was a nice dream.
Simon: Do you think that one suits me? If you would be the director of a porn video, what would it be about? It's like a long time fantasy of me. I would sleep with 2 women at the same time.
Julius: You haven`t done it yet?
Simon: Okay maybe me and three girls this time.
Jimmy: So you are directing and acting?
Simon: Yeah.
Julius: This are not my questions: Did you ever visit a dance training? No. Well, yeah, but in my own way I was drinking a bottle of wodka in the park. But no I never visited a dance training. Oh, no I was actually lying. In Junior high we did the classical dance courses like Tango. Okay next question: How would you ask for a marriage? This is a big question. I would create some iceworld, but the snow would be black. Black Snow Castle and I would just ask „Will you marry me?". That`s it.