Trouble: Can you tell us a little bit about your self's?

Calypso King: We are from Finland. A small town in the Helsinki, metropolitan area.

Trouble: Where do you draw your influences from?

Calypso King: From Booker T and the MG's, the Meters, JB's. Yeah, late sixties, early seventies. Yeah, soul funk. Soul 45's from the late sixties, that kind of stuff.

Trouble: Why have you broken away from your old record label, Jive?

Calypso King: Well it's not really a label, it's more of our own thing. Independent. We just had to put a name on the label. Something had to be figured out, ha. But Jive is not dead. There's going to be new releases on Jive, by new bands. There's also a new label called 'Timmion'. Yeah, ha ha.

Trouble: Dim Yun, is that Chinese?

Calypso King: No it's Finnish. That means real cool! Well yeah, we're doing stuff like when ever there are some rehouses going on, we just figure out something good with us guys, and just play something on, and make it a record.

Trouble: How did you guys meet up with Phillip and Soulfire records?

Calypso King: Yeah, well he somehow got our first 45 into his hands, and he , well a friend of ours was touring in America and he had a few singles with him, and Phillipe got it and he contacted us and he wanted to make a 45 with us. Or at least he wanted to hear some of our stuff. Well it didn't turn out well that time. Ha. We didn't have a, what do you say? We didn't get a mutual agreement. A disagreement, yeah.

Trouble: That was a disagreement with Phillip?

Calypso King: Well not a disagreement, we just wanted to play the kind of stuff we play, I think...

Trouble: What kind of stuff did Phillip want you guys to play?

Calypso King: Well, we just recorded some things that were just kind of rocky. He wanted more soul. He said too much rock and roll. Too rocky. But then we made our second 45 also, an independent release and he contacted us again and then we found a mutual understanding. It was probably a good thing that it did not work out the first time because we had just put the band together and we did not have any material, and we were not ready for it. So it ended up nice in the end with Soulfire records.

Trouble: Did you go over to New York to record?

Calypso King: No, No we recorded in Finland, and we use the old methods, analog sound systems. Just regular and we sent the tapes to New York for test pressings.

Trouble: Where did you get the analog equipment from?

Calypso King: Well, we just have this old reel, how do you say it? Reel to reel, yeah, and we just put a few mikes in a room and well, just recorded. Just that.

Trouble: How many mikes did you use?

Calypso King: Well, in the first recordings we use like two mikes, and in the second perhaps, we like put mikes in every instrument. We have a Sony cassette deck from the somewhere in the seventies. It says high fidelity, but the result is I do not know? Ha ha. But we wanted it that way, because that is the way it sounds real, yeah.

Trouble: What is there going on in Finland in terms of a funk scene?

Calypso King:Well it's really, you know the word funk in Finland means all kinds of music, stuff like Red Hot Chilli Peppers, ha, to JB's, whatever, it's like a couple of real good DJs and they have records equal to Keb's but perhaps not so many but they are not paying as much as Keb is, you know getting the same records but you know, there is a small group, and it is growing up.

Trouble: Who are the big DJs in Finland?

Calypso King: DJ Dynamiitti Risto, DJ Sampo ,Pablo, Didier and they also have a record shop in Helsinki called Lifesaver, and they also have tapes and do clubs and stuff.

Trouble: Have you linked up with any of the other bands on Soulfire yet?

Calypso King: Eh, no we have not, we have not even met Phillip. At the moment Phillip is in Germany in holiday or something

Trouble: Why do you produce limited edition 45s?

Calypso King: Well, we think it is good because we can do 500 copies of a 45 and get them away, there is no risk. It does not cost much more to do 500 or 200. We press them in Czech republic.

Trouble: Why there?

Calypso King: It is cheapest place, and they use very heavy vinyl, very good quality, the first 45 was 80 grams. We could not get the big center holes, but we call them a window break, ha ha! Well it's nice, you know.