Terrorizer spoke to Children of Bodom frontman Alexi Laiho about his battle with the bottle and the Finns' gung ho new opus, 'Relentless, Reckless Forever'.

Read on for some of Alexi's thoughts...

ON THE BOOZING

"I still drink, but I don't wanna be [drinking as much] any more. For one example, I have a condition that's  like chronic insomnia, so I can't sleep, and I have doctors telling me that my body doesn't produce enough Melatonin, which is the hormone that makes you wanna sleep. So, I used to try and drink just so I could sleep, but it went to the place where it was nine o' clock in the morning and I was still drinking, with no fucking sleep at all. I realised that alcohol always gets me riled up, as opposed to chilled out, so it was a bad choice."

ON HIS LAST NERVOUS BREAKDOWN

"It was after a tour that we did with Dismember, because I really hit rock bottom. I had some sort of breakdown, I didn't know what was going on. I was committed to a mental hospital, and I stayed there for about five days, and that was the time I decided that I never wanted to feel like that ever again. And I never did. It takes many years to get over it, but I made the effort, and I had the attitude that I really wanted to feel better."

ON 'RELENTLESS, RECKLESS FOREVER'

"With this album we were more efficient, so the shit that we used to do in six weeks we can now do in three weeks. I'm so much fucking happier with this album, because our solos are the best shit that we've ever done. [The song] 'Not My Funeral' is lyrically about somebody who would tell me that if I keep living the way that I do, I'm gonna die. I'm like, 'Fuck that!'. It's not gonna be my fucking funeral. Even if I would drop dead right now, that's okay, but I don't want anyone else to tell me that I'm gonna drop dead tomorrow if I have another beer."

You can read more from this interview in the current issue of Terrorizer, out now.

'Relentless, Reckless Forever' is out March 7 on Spinefarm

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