For 15 years and 11 albums, the name KMFDM meant everything to the industrial underground. From 1986's What Do You Know Deutschland? to its final album, Adios, KMFDM's crunching metal guitars, assaulting machine beats, and anthemic vocal choruses established the text that many bands followed and popularized.

Founded by En Esch and Sascha Konietzko, KMFDM made pretty hate music born of Kraftwerk, heavy metal, and early techno. Never veering far from their manic mold, KMFDM were the standard bearers of a sound that slowly infiltrated the mainstream, finally resulting in infamy when the band's lyrics were focused on in the aftermath of the massacre in Littleton, Colo.

Now reformed as MDFMK, Konietzko, Tim Skold (Shotgun Messiah) and Lucia Cifarelli (Drill) make music similar to KMFDM, but with greater incorporation of so-called pop influences. The ranting vocals and squirming sounds are still there, along with MDFMK's invitation to "Come kiss the guillotine."

CDNOW: The new album still has an industrial sound, but there are pockets of pop.

Sascha Konietzko: KMFDM was mostly myself composing everything, but MDFMK was very organically conceived between Tim Skold and myself. Once we had a number of tracks, we wondered how it was going to be different from KMFDM.

We thought hard about how we could turn these into real songs. The need for a third character came in; we decided to give it a shot with Lucia. Miraculously, the chemistry was there right from the first moment. She contributed from a songwriting and a performing angle.

Your music always relies on anthemic statements addressing societal concerns. What are the basic impetuses for those ideas?

Konietzko: There are people who write lyrics only about their own miseries. And there are people who use the stereotypical industrial or love, or country song. Our stuff comes from a point that is more personal, even more so than KMFDM.

But there is still an underlying anger, maybe a criticism, maybe a sarcastic tone to it. There is some very private personal stuff going on, some of the things are obscure. I don't ask Tim or Lucia why they included certain lines.

There is so much happening within each track.

Konietzko: There is a lot going on no matter how you look at it. Whether it's from a "How did they make it angle," people will be puzzled forever. If you are wondering what the songs are all about, there is equally as much to wonder about. Everything is painstakingly pieced together on this album, but it is organic. This sounds more organic to me than any KMFDM record.

Some of the songs still have that Teutonic edge -- huge production, shouting vocals, manically driven beats. Is that something you consciously evoke?

Konietzko: Well, with "Now" for example, I don't see that as a Teutonic element. There are European pop aspects driven to an extreme both in the performance and in the sonic department, but it is not that Teutonic. Now Rammstein is very Teutonic out of a very strange nature.

I think we are more like ABBA through distortion pedals with real fucking emotion behind it. Tim is German and I am Swedish. We were raised up in this rock-and-roll free, Euro environment that is a direct line from Mozart via Kraftwerk to Einsturzende Neubauten. They are more our influence than Bruce Springsteen or Chuck Berry.

You received a lot of criticism in the aftermath of the shootings in Littleton, Colo. A statement in your press kit specifically says you don't condone violence, that you are anti-violence.

Konietzko: One of those kids had a Web site. Web sites are like assholes now. Everyone has got one. These kids rant about what they like or don't like. This kid had a Web site where he had posted cut-up versions of KMFDM lyrics; he took a line from this, a line from that. And then he amended it with his own twists and meanings. Somehow someone stumbled upon it and realized the words were taken from KMFDM, and the focus was on that.

Once again, [as] in the history of rock music, people think music influences certain people to do things. But you may as well look at what people eat. We took some heat, but very swiftly the press realized that no one really catches on to that 'cause no one really knows KMFDM. Marilyn Manson is a much better target. Then he got drawn into it. It is ridiculous.

The whole event must have hurt you on an emotional level.

Konietzko: It was kind of funny in a way. Not funny, ha-ha, but ironical that for 15 years KMFDM had been around with much credibility, but in terms of the name getting out there it was always bubbling under. Then a month after the official end of KMFDM it goes out with a bang like that. The album came out on the same day of the shooting. Then someone came up with the fact that it was also Adolf Hitler's birthday. So then they had all the ingredients for a witch hunt.

But your lyrics are very dark. In "Now," you say, "Don't believe in yourself, there is nothing you can do / Don't believe that your dreams come true." That is pretty negative.

Konietzko: It is not negative; it is very realistic. Everything that goes on in this world ... you get stunted as soon as you reach a certain level. It's about the phenomenon, especially in this country, where they love to celebrate you, then they love to kill you. Dark or not, it is not a happy world we live in. And none of the commercials and Pepsi Cola, and Tommy Hilfiger crap can change that.

But "Don't believe in yourself"? You obviously believe in yourself, or you would have not made the record.

Konietzko: It is not taken without a grain of salt and shouldn't be taken without a grain of salt. It shouldn't be used without turning your brain on.

Some lyrics ["Come kiss the guillotine"] allude to self-immolation, such as in "Gasoline" and "Rabble Rouser."

Tim Skold: We like to use strong words and strong sounds. Sometimes it is intended to get your attention. I won't say shock value, 'cause it is not shock rock. If we were painters, we would use stark colors. It is art and there is not a single lyric that spells out what it means. It is open for interpretation. It is poetry. "Today is a good day to die" [from "Be Like Me"] is poetry to me [laughs].

"I can see the future, and it looks a lot like hell" [from "Be Like Me"]. That is pretty bleak.

Skold: Yeah. We can talk about politics or religion or the monetary system or starvation or education. I am not going to be all cheery and happy about a lot of things. Mankind leaves a lot to be desired. This could be an amazing place if the lot tried a little harder. But you don't want to get me going on this. We've dug a hole that is too deep already.

So you are intentionally confrontational?

Skold: Confrontation is a good word as far as instigation goes. What you make out of these words is totally up to you. Even if I tried to explain all the lyrics, you would still find people who interpret them in different ways. It is written by humans. But instigation is a healthy process.