MINDLESS SINNER
CHRISTER GÖRANSSON
An interview with vocalist Christer Göransson must instead circle round endless frustration and trouble with record companies.
To tell the tale about Mindless Sinner we have to begin in Ryd, a small suburb to Linköping in southern Sweden, around 1981. This bunch of young kids – calling themselves the ”Rydbangers” – are growing their hair and listening to heavy metal all day long, while drinking beer.
Their private house band is called Purple Haze, although the band lacks a singer. One day, Christer Göransson, who always sings along to the stuff they listen to, decides to try out as singer for the band. He is a few years older than the rest – guitar player Magnus Danneblad is actually Christer’s buddy’s kid brother.
The self taught vocalist takes the band by storm and is invited to join. The band changes its name to Genocide, after the Judas Priest song, and starts rehearsing.
- We were school buddies, we liked heavy metal and hard rock and tried to imitate our heroes. It was stuff like Judas Priest, Black Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne. Heavy metal was pretty new then, the NWOBHM had just started to pulsate. It feels good to have been there from the beginning, Christer Göransson says.
Genocide soon changes their name to Mindless Sinner. They keep on rehearsaing, record some demos and the songs get better and better. In 1983 the idea of making a self financed record pop up in the guys heads. However, it would all turn into a record deal, due to the bands talent, and also because of their friendship with local act Axewitch, who had already scored a record deal with Fingerprint Records.
THUS, THE ”Master of Evil” demo turned into the ”Master of Evil” MLP, by the help of Fingerprint Records. But as the release came, in January 1984, what should have been a day of glory was stained by disappointment and frustration.
The album cover, which was horrible, was never shown to the band until it was too late to change it. There was a band photo on the back cover, but the company failed to place the right names to the right guys. And, worst of all – Fingerprint got plural crazy and wrote Mindless Sinners instead of Mindless Sinner on the cover.
- Working with Fingerprint was crap. But I was 18 years back then and we were happy just to get the chance to record a record. We thought that we were going to be rock stars, Christer Göransson recalls.
However, the record was out on the market and Mindless Sinner were not going to miss out on the chance to reap what they had sowed. But reaping without gigging is not easy. As was the case with more or less every band signed to Fingerprint, no tour was in sight and Mindless Sinner had to resort on getting concerts themselves. Which of course seldom took them outside Linköping.
Mindless Sinner - Turn on the Power (1986)
THEN CAME 1985, which was to become the year of waiting. Waiting for the finished album to come out.
- The release was postponed all the time. We found out that the record company had financial problems. I think that they signed to many bands.
The whole year passed and in January 1986, ”Turn on the Power” finally hit the streets. With an awful album cover again, and this time also with mixed up song order.
- We were satisfied with the songs and the production on ”Turn on the Power”, but again, the album cover just came out. We wanted a picture of the band on the cover.
”Turn on the Power” is an excellent album. And, as stated earlier, it really seems to have the potential of commercial success. The songwriting is very catchy and varied and Mindless Sinner never suffered from ”defects” common among other Swedish heavy metal bands – such as weak vocals and even weaker English. Had Mindless Sinner been properly promoted from the beginning and had the chance to play all around the country, and had ”Turn on the Power” been released in January 1985, as planned, when the time for it was more ”right”, who knows what would have happened.
- Had it came out in January 1985 instead it had been more right for it’s time. That was the beginning of the end for that kind of heavy metal. It’s all about being at the right place at the right time.
To the band there was also another problem with the album. The songs had begun to feel old to them, and no longer representative of where they stood at the time.
- We had started changing style, when Bon Jovi and all that had come. We always tried to adjust, but we were two years late with everything. Today, I don’t think we should have done that, and instead have stuck to what we were doing. Personally, I think ”Turn on the Power” was the best thing we recorded.
Right for it’s time or not, ”Turn on the Power” never even got a chance. Cause shortly after the release, Fingerprint Records went bankrupt and no more than the initial first pressing of 1000 copies were made. Today a vinyl copy of the album is very hard to come by, but also an album somewhat overlooked by heavy metal collectors. Probably because of the cheesy album cover.
THE STYLE CHANGE of Mindless Sinner eventually led them away from heavy metal and into the landscape of AOR. Thus, in 1987, the band decided to shorten the name to Mindless in order to better suit their style.
- You know, Mindless… That could also be the name of a party hard rock band.
Today, Christer Göransson can look back on a career that never went out into bloom.
- To begin with, we should have had another record company. We should have played more gigs. We should have had a manger, but we didn’t know anybody, didn’t have any contacts.
As we all know, Mindless Sinner was not the only talented Swedish heavy metal band that never made it. Christer Göransson refers to ”the Swedish mentality” as one of the reasons.
- A band in England, for example, is very serious about their thing from day one. But we went to school, had jobs and made sure we had something to fall back on, even though we had dreams in the back of our heads.
The humble vocalist also points on that there were more examples than Mindless Sinner.
- That a band like Madison never got a breakthrough is a scandal. It’s like 40 times better than ”Turn on the Power” if you know what I mean.
Well, while Madison were good in their own right, your’s truly strongly prefers a treat of Mindless Sinner any day of the week, and I’m sure many heavy metal fans feel the same way. It’s an unfair world.
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