Recently I exchanged a number of emails with a very nice Swedish guy named Yuksel Unutmaz (aka Y). Y is the guitarist for Fatal Smile and with his help I gained a few insights into their world and music. (Any mistakes are my own; computer problems ate most of our correspondance.)

The band was started by Y in a small town in Sweden called Katrineholm in 1994. In 1996, Y moved to Stockholm and eventually aquired the current lineup of bass player Marcus Johansson, vocalist H.B. Anderson (who some people might recognise from Scudiero & Token) and drummer Robin Lagerqvist (Six pack solution).

They describe their music as sounding somewhere between 70's, 80's and 90's music with a modern day production. With influences that include Whitesnake, Metallica, Black Sabbath, Alice in Chains and Deep Purple. Of late Sweden has been known for the heavier metal and rock that it has been exporting, for example In Flames, Akilles, Cemetary and the like; Fatal Smile are part of the melodic rock that is slowly rearing it's head, with songs structured around guitar riffs and melodies.

Y. summed up Fatal Smile's attitude subcicinctly when he said that "sure you can be angry, but it's not that fun listening to that shit for a long time." As such Fatal Smile treat their live show with greatest presicnet and the emphasis is on fun and putting on a good performance.

This year Fatal Smile rleased their album 'Beyond Reality' - produced by Jonas Östman who has worked with Yngwie Malmsteen. Despite the Powerman500-esk title tha album is actually comprised of solid melodic metal and yet it seems to have gone largely unnoticed by the UK music press. Fatal Smile should have recived wide-spread covereage in music press by now, if nothing else simply for the X-rated video for Bad Kharma. The video has only slightly less sex than December Wolves' 'Porn again Christain' but is far more tastefully done - that and the sex in 'Bad Kharma' is not real (sorry if I broke any dreams).

Only this year have the band really managed to play much beyond Sweden, having said this they did not only open for Thin Lizzy they also played the New Jersey Metal Meltdown but might have spent the bulk of their time there sampling the wide variety of alcholic beverages. The former of these events was a sourceo f great joy as Y. credits John Skyes as being his reason for starting to play guitar, incidentally when I asked Y. who is favourite TV detective was he picked the very classic and rather dark 'Baretta' indicating the mix of influences that form Fatal Smile's music.

Fatal Smile are nice guys and make pretty good music, so we will forgive H.B. for having seen Metallica live 7 times. As Y. succinctly put it, "Cheers and rock on!!!"