LACUNA COIL - Ready To Strike
by Martin Popoff

Italian gothic rockers Lacuna Coil (translation: empty spiral) have spent years in the trenches honing an exotic metal and pan-world blend that caught the world by storm with 2002's Comalies. In fact, reaching back, 2001's Unleashed Memories got toured in the US, and fans were immediately mesmerized by the band's top-flight live shows, the dual vocal attack of Andrea Ferro and Christina Scabbia making for an interesting blend over a comely art rock churn.

Comalies, in fact, became Century Media records' biggest selling album of all time, aided and abetted by fearless, tireless touring, of which '04's Ozzfest was a certain highlight. back now with Karmacode, Lacuna Coil are the target of fierce attention. can they repeat the success of Comalies and in fact stretch beyond that record's half million in sales worldwide? Time will tell, but so far, the DeadCanDance-vibed single Our Truth, introduced on the Underworld: Evolution soundtrack is turning a lot of heads, and the album as a whole is plush, considered, heavily textured.. a classy and different hard rock experience all 'round.

"We've actually learned a lot since we recorded Comalies," says guitarist Christiano "Chris" Migliore. "We toured for a long time, especially here in America, and this reflects on the songs. It's heavier than anything we did before, but at the same time there's a lot of melody, and our usual trademarks. We had more time to work on the songs, and a bigger budget this time in the studio. We actually had the chance to focus a lot more on all the arrangements, all the little details, which we've never had a chance to do before. So this album sounds exactly the way we wanted it. Songwriting-wise, we didn't exactly what we used to do before, the same process we've always used. We start by writing all the music first, and then when we have some sort of structure in the songs, Andrea is and Christina start working on their vocal lines. So we actually use the vocals as an additional instrument, which makes a melody that fits the rest of the music."

Do you find the band moving into a different world, where business concerns are coming in and people are asking you to do stuff revolving around commercial concerns?

"For sure there are some differences compared to what we used to be, as a band, as one of the many bands that Century Media has. We have EMI distributing the album now so we have a lot more chance to be found in all the stores. Everybody is telling us 'Oh, this is going to be a huge album; it's going to be great,' but we don't know. We feel that something is happening, but I don't want to say anything until it's happened (laughs)."

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