Lacuna Coil didn’t create for a while, and that was ok. When the pandemic cleared their calendars shortly after the release of 2019’s Black Anima, the Italian gothic metal veterans used the time to recharge and focus on non-musical activities. Frontwoman Cristina Scabbia doubled-down on her longtime passion for gaming and started her now-popular Twitch channel.
“We’re like batteries. Sometimes we’re exhausted and need to recoup energy to offer more,” she reflects, dialing in from her boyfriend’s pub, Valhalla Birreria Steakhouse, just outside of Milan. “There’s no need to be prolific if you aren’t inspired. Quality must go above quantity, especially in art.”
The band’s journey back to creating music took a detour through their past. In 2022, Lacuna Coil marked the 20th anniversary of Comalies by releasing a reworked version of that landmark album. The project reignited their creativity, and the insights they gained heavily shaped their new and 10th LP, Sleepless Empire. The record is a heavy, sweeping meditation on “the chaos of a generation trapped in a digital world that never stops” and features guest spots from vocalists Randy Blythe of Lamb of God (“Hosting the Shadow”) and Ash Costello of New Years Day (“In the Mean Time”).
“Now everything is super-fast — you just click and [it’s] in your smartphone — and people get really tired of everything,” muses Scabbia. “[Sleepless Empire] was our reflection on how we fit in a generation where everybody [feels the] need to do stuff constantly, to produce, to be seen… We’re always interested in anything new and don’t look at it with an old-school eye. But we saw it all coming, all the stages: from cassette to CD to streaming to the return of vinyl and cassettes. It gives you a sort of comfort. We feel even more protected from whatever happens.”
With decades of hard-won experience and success under their belts, they have nothing left to fear. They aren’t rolling their eyes and complaining that it was better in their day. And it’s not even a case of adapt to survive. Lacuna Coil are naturally rolling with the tides and thriving because of them. “I love doing Twitch. It’s not that I do it to stay young or convince people that I’m the cool girl,” Scabbia asserts. “I genuinely love video games, the nerd world and everything new coming out.”
Ahead of Sleepless Empire’s release, we talked with the Lacuna Coil singer about her most cherished objects in the entire nerdy world.
FAVORITE COFFEE MAKER
Batman and Skull Moka Pots
I love any kind of coffee. I love espresso. I love mocha. I love ristretto. I love American coffee, Turkish coffee, Cuban coffee. I’m fascinated by the world of coffee. It’s the first thing I think about when I wake up. I have many moka pots. These two are cool because they represent my worlds. One has skulls on it, it’s a Bialetti, and that’s kind of metal. And the other is a Batman moka pot representing the nerd world. Metal, the nerd world and me in the middle — perfect!
FAVORITE TABLETOP ROLE-PLAYING GAME
Dungeons & Dragons
I don’t play much, but I play whenever I have the chance — and they’re always one-shot because I don’t have time to follow a campaign. But I adore watching people play, and I’ll go online and watch Critical Role. I love the fact that you can act through your character and create a different persona. That’s the beauty of D&D. At Lucca Comics & Games [a comic convention in Italy] there is a space called Performance Area where artists create [items] for a charity auction. That’s where I got myself this D&D sculpture.
FAVORITE TATTOO
Metal/Cat/Gaming Pad
I got this done in 2017 or ’18 by Brando Chiesa, who is a renowned tattoo artist and good friend of Oli [Sykes] from a Bring Me the Horizon. I told him, “I want all my passions in this tattoo.” I wanted music, metal, cats and video games. I wanted a pad from PlayStation 1. That’s not where my passion for gaming started, but [PS1] represented when it started to change completely.
FAVORITE FETISH ITEM
Gaming Pads
I love video games, and I have to admit that I have a little fetish for pads. I have at least 20 different ones for the PS5. There is one called Edge, which is more for pro gamers. The blue-gray one is a limited edition [of] 17. There’s one for Astro Bot, which is one of my favorite games. I have five or six that I use in rotation.
FAVORITE ACTION FIGURES
Berserk
I’ve always liked action figures, especially my favorite characters from video games or manga. These two are from Berserk. The tarot cards are Berserk as well, because my collection goes everywhere in the nerd world. I like figures you can interact with: Remove the little blades, change the head… It’s cool. It gives a 3D vibe to something that you usually only see in 2D.
FAVORITE NORSE-MEETS-NERD PUB
Valhalla Birreria Steakhouse, Borgo Ticino, Italy
I meet my friends here — even the Lacuna Coil boys come — and we eat all together. [My boyfriend] Chris [Grillo, who owns the pub] takes a lot of pride in the quality of the ingredients. I’m so proud of what he’s accomplished. The pub is based on Norse mythology and the nerd world, which he’s strongly passionate about. That passion really brings us together.
FAVORITE FAMILY HEIRLOOMS
Mom’s Wedding Dress, Dad’s Pool Stick
I couldn’t keep everything that belonged to them once they passed. So, I decided to keep things with sentimental value, nothing with economic value. When I went to retrieve [my dad’s] pool stick at the bar where he played, they opened this little closet dedicated to him, and the lady that owned the bar told me stories about him. It was very, very emotional.
Of course, I couldn’t get rid of my mom’s bridal dress, which is ironic because I was never interested in marriage. But to me, that’s mama. My parents are who gave me strength — and who still give me strength. I love them more than immensely.
FAVORITE FOOTBALL CLUB
AC Milan
My family and I have always been supporters of AC Milan. I’m always up for watching a football game. Whenever I have the chance, I go to the stadium in Milano to support my team. I’m wearing one of the two shirts AC Milan sent me with my name on it. The other two are from two historic players: [Gennaro] Gattuso, who is one of my all-time favorite players, and [Andriy] Shevchenko, who is super iconic for Milan supporters.
FAVORITE JEWELRY
Ring Collection
I have many, many, many rings. The majority are silver, because I usually don’t like gold. They are almost all one of a kind and made for me. Some are commissioned by silver artists that I know. I wear them all, but it’s hard because there are many and they’re really bulky! I don’t put them all together, but I wear them all in rotation. Usually it’s either six or four [at a time], because I never wear anything on the thumbs.
FAVORITE TOUR GIFT
Dave Mustaine’s Angel of Deth Guitar
We toured with Megadeth and I sang “À Tout le Monde” with Dave every night. He gifted me this badass guitar, [but] said, “It’s kind of damaged.” I was like, “It doesn’t matter. It means you used it.”
FAVORITE LACUNA COIL SUPERHERO COLLAB
Batman: Death Metal
Batman is absolutely in line with the vibe of Lacuna Coil. It’s such a cool collaboration, and unusual that a band ends up on the cover of something so iconic. It makes me very proud. When I was little, I’d have never expected this, not in a million years.
FAVORITE MASCOT
Snalien
One of these statues was given to me [when I was] creating the Twitch page. I was looking for a mascot for the channel and my community and I decided it was becoming [our] symbol. It’s funny to see something very aggressive, like the alien, mixed with a snail. The meaning we attribute to it is: You can do whatever you want to because you’re destroying everything in front of you — but you take time to do it.
FAVORITE ILLUSTRATOR
Yoshitaka Amano
He’s one of the greatest illustrators in history and creator of many iconic anime and Final Fantasy characters. He is a Japanese sensei, which means master.
Two years ago, I met him at Lucca Comics. Some dear friends asked me to get something signed. It became a quest. The stars aligned [when] I found out the Italian translator was a Lacuna Coil fan. She [introduced me to] Sensei Amano. I almost cried because of the tension and happiness. He signed all the stuff, and we kept in touch. When I went to Tokyo, [he] invited me to his studio. He showed me a lot of original art, and came to the Lacuna Coil show with his family. Recently, he came to Milano [to] exhibit his collection. I was there at the opening. I will forever be a fan, a supporter and a friend.
FAVORITE “TIME MACHINE” PROJECT
Il diavolo mi ha venduto l’anima [The Devil Sold Me His Soul]
There is already a book that tells the story of Lacuna Coil from the beginning. But I never explained how I got into music, what I did when I was a little girl, how I started singing, how I entered the nerd world. So, I started to collect memories and send them to the publisher, who put them all together… It was a time machine.
I wanted it to be like I was talking with a stranger in a pub. I wanted it to be motivational as well — to inspire people who have a dream and tell them that you can have the talent, but there is a lot of hard work [needed] behind that. The most complicated part was finding the time to do it, because I was recording an album. It took a lot of energy, but I am very, very happy that I did it.