Christian Mistress is so hot right now that I found myself fantasizing about the perfect interview with the band. In my mind, I envisioned it being after hours at Olympia's iconic Old School Pizzeria, where each member of this metal militia has worked. I pictured each of the members donning an apron dusted with flour, armed with pizza cutters and battle axe guitars, or wooden spoons and drumsticks, hair flowing, cans of Oly scattered around and the smell of garlic and metal in the air.

For Oly home-towners, there's a lot of pride when people you see in your daily life - people who've made you a killer pizza pie, who you've listened to at house parties, or who've rocked your head in the middle of Fourth Ave - are on the cusp of greatness. There's a certain sense of awe that's more than the normal fan can understand.

But what the normal fan does understand - along with NPR, Thrasher Magazine and Relapse Records - is that the music of Christian Mistress speaks straight to the heart. It's nostalgic, yet eye-opening. It's metal, yet soul. It's a twisted, yet straightforward way of playing good fucking rock music.

Instead of the Old School Pizzeria fantasy (and understandably so), my interview with Christian Mistress, who signed with Relapse Records last June, is done via email - the band's fourth interview of the week. Each member does his or her best to respond, with the days counting down to Roadburn Festival in Holland and Christian Mistress' 2012 European tour. And just around the corner, on Feb 28, is the release of Christian Mistress second record, Possession - the band's first with Relapse.

Vocalist Christine Davis, guitarists Ryan McClain and Oscar Sparbel, bassist Johnny Wulf and drummer Reuben Storey talk about the sound of the new album, the cover art and how they got picked up by Relapse Records.

After listening to "Haunted Hunted" on Possession, it's clearly a different story than songs from the band's debut album, Agony and Opium. The sound quality is pure, heightening every chug and pound, enhancing the mesmerizing vocals, and allowing the listener the full details of Christian Mistress' work.

"The recording quality is drastically better," says McClain. "We had more time to practice and get tight this time around."

McClain says it's also a more metal effort, a fact that permeates the feel of the whole album.

"Agony and Opium is a raw hard rock record. Possession is a development from that place into a new horizon for us - it's darker, moodier and has an uneven temperament at times," says Sparbel.

The artwork on Possession is just as heady as the music.

Artist Benjamin Vierling designed an image of Davis' hand, palm up, fate lines exposed. A spiral of flames is near the wrist, touching the point of a diamond shaped quadrant of m's, (m is the old Masonic symbol for the Virgin Mary, explains McClain). Smoke emits from the flames, billowing up and around a pocked planet. From the fate lines, lightening bolts shoot into surrounding wild ginger plants. Davis tells me they chose ginger plants because the blooms are black and they grow in the woods around Olympia.

She also tells me the symbols are a composite of ideas from lyrics on Possession.

Where the black flowers bloom under the light of the flames reaching higher.

In this hand do lines divine all we don't see and extend to divide you from me.

With all the thoughtfulness, hard work, and natural talent Christian Mistress displays, it's no wonder the band is gaining international notoriety. it's also no wonder Relapse Records decided to sign the band.

"We met someone from Relapse at a show we were playing on tour; he came up and said hi. At that point we were dealing with a lot of different record label offers, but Relapse was able to offer us everything we wanted - worldwide distribution, vinyl and CD formats, no pressure to change our minimal Internet presence, and above all, simplicity," says Davis.

"Relapse was simply the best," adds McClain. "It feels notably different now just because of the press we're getting. It's awesome."

Along with a ton of hot press and the Roadburn Festival and European tour, Christian Mistress will tour the US sometime in 2012, and may tour Europe again in the fall.

Catch the band at the record release party for Possession, March 2 at Olyphant Art Supply, before the days of house shows and slices of Don Ho's are a thing of the past.

Christian Mistress

record release and Nuts Magazine release party
Friday, March 2, 8 p.m., $5
Olyphant Art Supply and Gallery
117 Washington St. NE, Olympia
360.352.6348. christianmistress.com