print interview

D-Side 2003

1. Is the title of your new album a reference to the Boyd Rice and Friends album?

The appointed title was not deliberately elected or constructed with reference to Boyd Rice and Friends, but more willingly established as a seemingly suitable title akin to the concept of Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio and the concept of this particular record - Cocktails, Carnage, Crucifixion And Pornography – CCCP.

Your titles are always filled with irony and maybe cynicism? Is it a necessary fuel in your creation? Is irony important in your way of life?

I find it difficult not to be ironic when you observe the world around us. It bleeds smells and twitches in agony, and unless you are able to laugh at life’s peculiar beauties and infinite discomforts and make the best of every insufferable situation that life forces us to endure, even at the expense of someone else, one will probably find it quite hard to bear the cross of being alive.
When you are no longer able to face life with a grin and a sword, then life will decline to upsurge no more….

2. Your lyrics are also overwhelmed by images and symbols, especially catholic ones? Have you got a catholic block inside your head?

I like to operate in images, every image serves its purpose, this is how my mind works; and using symbols serves my purpose quite well. Symbols are personal and engender a variety of subjective impressions relative to everyone’s individual past, present and future, unique for each and every listener, making the context of every text, coequally individually subjective; giving room for both interpretations and misunderstandings.

Do you consider your life as inseparable from your art or do you make a kind of border between the two? In brief, do you lose yourself into decadence and depravity (well, maybe it’s none of my business)?

Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio is the uncompromising and egotistical canalization of Tomas Pettersson, his personal preferences, understandings, visions and thoughts, and depicting anything through either sound, text or imagery, without absolute honesty, would be to deceive myself.
My life is my art and my art is my life, I won’t separate the two.

3. Who did collaborate to Cocktails, Carnage, Crucifixion and Pornography (sorry, I don’t have any credits about it)?

I rarely collaborate, ever; the process of creation is always the same, I make the music, I write the lyrics and I control everything that concerns Ordo; texts, music, layout and production, but there is however the unmistakable participation of Rose-Marie Larsen, as on the foregoing releases of Make Love, And War.

Did Rosemary Larsen participate to Cocktails …? If yes, what did she do?

Rose-Marie is featured on track 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10 and 11, and featured photographically throughout the entire booklet, so she is definitely participating.

4. Where is taken the intro anthem from? Wagner?

As you are not the first person to ask this particular question, it seems justified to admit that I naively assumed that everyone would know their history well enough to recognize the intro and the outro as the national anthem of the former Soviet Union - CCCP - Cocktails Carnage Crucifixion And Pornography, but as this apparently was a mistake on my behalf, it needs to clarified once and for all, that the intro and the outro is the national anthem of the former Soviet Union.

5. What is it exactly, according to you, to be a lion for a day?

Live life to its fullest, even if it this life guarantees that is won’t last more than one day, instead of living for a lifetime, but in restraint.
Be yourself, not someone else.
Live as you please.
Rule instead of serve.
Dare instead of fear.
Realize yourself, no one else will.

6. Who is the Suspender Princess who has a beautiful tango dedicated to? Is she the Holiest of Harlots?

I won’t tell….

7. Do you consider Jesus on the cross as a pornographic image?

Life is the consequence of sex; religion an appliance by which to control mankind’s natural instincts, and Jesus on the cross, the religious ornament Christianity’s understanding of sexuality; a god-given son born of virgin birth and crucified as a virgin, the pinnacle of Christian perfection, devoid of sex, devout to chastity.
In that context Jesus on the cross is certainly a symbol of sex, but certainly nothing that turns me on.

8. What is the sound used in « Tango » and in « Eucharist » which seems to be two blades rubbing each other?

The sound is metal against metal, the sharpening of daggers.

9. If you had to convince someone about the spiritual and sexual pleasure one can have with fetishism and sadomasochism, what would you say to him/her?

Accept yourself, realize your fantasies and surrender to your desires.
Let go, and see where it takes you.

10. What would you do for the good of humankind?

I have done all that I can, I have talked incessantly for more than 10 years, and there is nothing left to do. All hope is gone; mankind can’t be salvaged and is destined for ruin.
The question of mankind downfall has stopped being if, and has exclusively changed into when and how….
But if I could do something for myself and possibly for the good of humankind, I would be to build a time machine and un-invent the chewing gum; that would the greatest achievement of all.

11. Is the video by Fetish 23 about to be released?

Mikael “Fetish 23” Prey is currently working on the realization of CMI - 100, and until he is done, ORE has to wait.
So until he is done I am currently working on this accomplishment myself, and as far as I am able to realize some additional video footage and find some individuals who are willing, able and interested to contribute with a little bit of nudity and decadence, then I am quite sure that there will be a video or DVD available next year.

12. Who do you recognize as influences? SPK? Death in June? Swans?

If one has to be acknowledged in favor of the others, it needs to be SPK, but there are others as well - Lee Hazelwood, Johnny Cash and Brigitte Bardot, just to mention but a few.

13. What is your last favorite book? Your last favorite record (from another artist than you, of course)?

Favorite book - H:sons - Encyclopedia in Sex; a great book from 1966 which never goes out of style.
Favorite record - Without trying to be partial I must say Shape Shifter by Coph Nia; a brilliant record, which embarks further on a path already commenced.

14. A dated discography, please?

May 30th 2003
Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio
Cocktails, Carnage, Crucifixion And Pornography - CMI 124

April 6th 2001
Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio
Make Love, And War, The Wedlock of Roses, And Equilibrium - CMI 84/94

March 30th 2001
Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio
Make Love, And War, The Wedlock of Equilibrium - CMI 94

October 13th 2000
Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio
Make Love, And War, The Wedlock of Roses - CMI 84

June 1998
Ordo Equilibrio
Conquest, Love & Self Perseverance - CMI 64

April 30th 1997
Ordo Equilibrio
I4I - CMI 54

January 1997
Ordo Equilibrio
The Triumph of Light.... and Thy Thirteen Shadows of Love - CMI 44

June 1995
Ordo Equilibrio
Reaping the Fallen, The First Harvest - CMI 32

15. Contact?

For additional information, inquires or possible proposals, Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio may be contacted at either of the following addresses -

Homepage - www.ordo-rosarius-equilibrio.net

E-mail - contact@ordo-rosarius-equilibrio.net

Mail -
Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio
c/o Future Legends Management
P.O Box 15091
104 65 Stockholm
Sweden