Just about a year ago, I featured Ukko's Hammer in No Echo's ongoing New Hardcore Band Spotlight series. But as I've listened to the Denver group more in the time since then, it's become more apparent to me that they lean further into the thrash metal side of the crossover spectrum.
This is obvious when you listen to Ukko's Hammer's 2025 self-titled debut album. Released back in March, the 11-track collection finds them forging a commading sound that reminds me of late '80s Noise Records bands, and the less death-metallized end of the Entombed discography. And to bring it back to my original point, there's also metallic hardcore coursing through Ukko's Hammer.
Also known for his work in Denver hardcore outfit Civilized, Ukko's Hammer vocalist Zach Reini spoke with me about their album, and his connection to the Finnish themes he colors his much of his lyrics and artwork imagery with.
The last time we spoke, you explained how Ukko's Hammer started out a solo project. Is the band lineup locked in now, and are those the same musicians that played on the new album?
We’ve gone through a couple of line up changes since the demo. Initially we were a 5 piece with 2 guitars, then down to a 4 piece, which stayed pretty consistent up until the recording of the album, with the exception of a couple different drummers.
We recently added another second guitar into the mix with Chon, the longtime documentarian of the band, but he wasn’t on the album. We’re locked in now once again as a 5 piece with our third drummer.
Did you pen most of the music found on the album?
I wrote most of the music as well as the lyrics, but our bassist (also named Zach) wrote the music and lyrics for "Ukonilma," and Andy/Zach wrote the music for "Skin and Bone."
Our process for this first batch of songs is usually I, or someone else, brings a riff or a demo of a song and we work together to flesh it out and make any edits then, so at the end of the day it’s a collaborative effort with me steering the ship most of the time, if that makes sense [laughs].
From the music to the artwork to the lyrical mood, the album clearly leans metal. I think if Ukko's Hammer was on a label like Metal Blade or Nuclear Blast, that crowd would eat it up, but there might be some resistance due to the hardcore or crossover tag. What is your take on that?
I definitely see that connection and I agree we’re definitely leaning towards the more metal side of things. It would be awesome to be on a label like that, but I what keeps us in the hardcore/crossover realm is the DIY attitude. We wanted to put out a record on our terms and on our timeline, so it made sense for us to do it ourselves.
It’s also that thing where we’re a bit to metal for punk shows but too punk for metal shows. Tags/labels aren’t really important to me. I'm just happy to put it out there for people to enjoy and they can call it whatever they please.
That said, If either Metal Blade or Nuclear Blast wanna put out the LP's second pressing, my inbox is open [laughs].
How do you approach the lyrics? Where are you mining inspiration from, and do you have a personal connection to Finland?
My dad’s side of the family is from Finland, so that’s where the connection is. My grandpa on that side was the first born in the US, and I never got to meet him, so starting to learn the language and the unique mythology and putting my own spin or take on it is my way of tapping in with that part of my history.
A lot of the lyrics are heavily influenced by early labor movement songs, the IWW Little Red Songbook for example, which also had a lot of Finnish-American ties early on. Mixing those anti-capitalist ideas with Finnish mythology as well as some [JRR} Tolkien here and here is where a lot of the lyrics come from. Like one of the songs is talking about destroying Ukko the sky God’s hammer and redistributing the fragments to the people of the world as a metaphor for our collective power, which is pretty cool personally.
Mythology is a great way to describe metaphorical concepts and the best part is there’s no rules because at the end of the day they’re just stories [laughs].
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Have you had any contact with folks from Finland who have discovered the band?
A couple! I was introduced to my friend Tatu in Finland by a mutual who plays in Psychic Death from Washington state. He rocks with the band pretty hard and I’ve sent him a couple of care packages of shirts, tapes, and stuff. A tattoo artist in Helsinki also ordered the LP which is rad. I haven’t been to Finland yet, but it’s definitely on my list of places to visit/play.
Talk to me a bit about the album's artwork.
I’ve actually had the artwork on deck for a couple years now haha and we finally got around to using it. I wanted to have an over-the-top '80s thrash metal cover, so I found Misha Mono on instagram and loved his style and it perfectly fit for what we were going for.
It depicts the folk hero Lemminkäinen being ripped apart by a water snake in the river of Tuonela while he was on a quest to kill the black swan of the underworld, which is about as ridiculous as you can get without being too cheesy. And it’s pretty metal [laughs].
For the tape version of the album, Damien Records put out a cassette that was based on a Polish bootleg of Reign In Blood in an oversized vinyl case. It came out awesome.
Chon did the photo on the insert all on film with no Photoshop. I didn’t mention before but Chon is a scene-wide documentarian and everyone should absolutely check him out.
What does the band have planned for the rest of the year? Will you be trying to hit the road a bit moving forward?
We got a handful of cool local shows lined up for the summer and we’re currently working on some new material that will hopefully develop into another LP or at least an EP.
We don't currently have any hard and fast plans for touring, but we have some things in the aether we’re trying to nail down. Extensive touring isn’t really in the cards for us at the moment with our other life obligations, but hopefully we’ll have some weekend runs in the future to make up for that.
What else are you up to musically these days? The Denver punk scene seems strong this past decade or so, at least looking from the outside.
There’s a lot of cool stuff happening here and there has been for a long time. I have a bunch of one off solo projects that range from grind and hardcore to ambient techno and dungeon synth. So I’m pretty all over the place but my main focus is The Hammer.
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The Ukko's Hammer album is out now on all music streaming sites, and the cassette version is still available via Damien Records.
Ukko's Hammer on social media: Instagram
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