Interview by Tarja Virmakari – Photos by Stefano Catalani and Michele Aldeghi
Polish death metallers VADER have just concluded the 2nd part of their European ‘Back To The Black’ Tour; hitting Germany, Denmark, France, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Italy, Switzerland, Czech Republic and Slovakia – playing their classic albums: “Sothis” and “Black to the Blind” in their entirety. The tour also included several festivals for which VADER had prepared a special concert set.
Metal Shock Finland‘s Tarja Virmakari caught up with Piotr “Peter” Wiwczarek at one of VADER‘s Italian shows (on April 25, at The Theatre, in Milan-Italy), and sat down with him talking extensively about the current tour; Peter also spoke widely about the band’s upcoming plans. Join the conversation below.
Check out also Tarja’s earlier interview with Peter, during the 1st leg of Back To The Black -tour, at the end of January 2013: HERE.
The photo-reportage from the entire Milan-show (April 25, 2013, at The Theatre) is coming up soon, stay tuned! You can see some of them below:
One of Finland’s finest longstanding metal bands AMORPHIS recently released their eleventh studio album, “Circle” via Nuclear Blast Records.
As described on amorphis.net the concept of “Circle” is a story that spreads through all of the album’s lyrics, written by long-standing collaborator Pekka Kainulainen. Here is a short summary:
“The protagonist has been dealt a bad hand at birth. He’s always felt himself an outsider with strong potential to become marginalized. Through an accident, after a crisis, he finds a connection with his inner powers. A guide is sent to him, from some other time and place. He gets a chance to take hold of his own life and change his destiny. From the past of Carelian Finland he finds his own spiritual tribe and the power to turn the course of his doomed life. This is a story of survival.”
Tomi Joutsen hasbeen vocalist for the band since 2004, blending his contrasting vocal style which helps create the unique sound that AMORPHIS achieve. Metal Shock Finland‘s Blackdiamond spoke to Tomi about the new album, the upcoming festival season and much more besides. Check out a few excerpts from the chat below and listen to the full interview on the player:
Tomi expressed his thoughts about “Circle” and its response so far:
” I think people are really into this album, I don’t know why. Maybe because it’s something different this time and maybe we found fresh elements for this album. I’m really looking forward to the festival season, it’s great to play new songs on stage. I think it’s going to be one hell of a year for Amorphis.
We wanted to have a small distance fromKalevala this time, I think it’s timeless, with timeless issues. It’s a story about a man, he finds a new way of seeing his life. Almost everyone has to stop and think ‘what I am and what I want from my life.’ Maybe sometimes you have to look backwards to see your future.”
Tomi shared what he thought about the sad news of Jeff Hanneman‘s death:
“For me it was a huge surprise, I knew he was sick but I didn’t know it was so serious. When I heard the news I was really shocked, I mean really shocked. Slayer were of course a really important band and I’m glad they are continuing, but it’s not the same without Jeff. He did some great songs with Slayer and I think he was a person who didn’t want to do any compromises, so it was a great thing. Yeah, it made me really sad, it was a sad day.”
On the future of AMORPHIS, Tomi revealed the following:
“We have to keep working with the “Circle” album and I hope we go to the United States with this album also. I hope it’s not going to take too many years till we release another album. I think we don’t want to have any breaks or holidays, so I think we are really busy in the next year.”
Dutch symphonic/gothic metallers DELAIN have grown in popularity since releasing their second album “April Rain” in 2009 and are a huge part of the ever growing market for popular rock music with a darker nature.
The band have just returned from a successful tour of South America and have this week (1st May) released their new album “Interlude.” It is a limited edition digipack with CD and DVD, featuring new songs, covers, remixes and live tracks.
Metal Shock Finland‘s Blackdiamond caught up with vocalist Charlotte Wessels just prior to the album release, on her return home from the tour. You can read some excerpts from the chat below, and listen to the full interview on the Soundcloud link:
Talking about the new release “Interlude”, Charlotte stated:
“We’ve got some new tracks, some covers, live tracks, remixes as well and a DVD. It’s a very complete package of the kinds of things we’ve collected over the years. At one point when we looked at all the material, we thought there is so much stuff, it actually deserves a record of it’s own. So we reworked everything, re-recorded some stuff and that became Interlude – we’re very happy to have it and to release it very soon. The live tracks bring back good memories from that gig, so it will be cool for people who were there to hear that and for people who haven’t seen us before.”
Charlotte talked of working on a new album:
“We’re in a writing phase, so we’re collecting as many ideas as possible and this is the way we usually work. It’s not complete songs yet and when we have those, we’ll start selecting them and finishing them, and see which are the best.”
Discussing “We Are The Others”, the song inspired by Sophie Lancaster, Charlotte expressed:
“ I remember when I heard about Sophie Lancaster, I had a very strong reaction to it. There are many things that get me upset, as much as discrimination, whether it’s on the basis of ethnicity, sexuality or a sub-culture as in the case of Sophie. When we were writing “We Are The Others” it took me quite some time to think we were actually going to do this. It was actually the first time I wrote about a real person and she had friends and family grieving for her. That’s why I was very happy that we got so much support from the Sophie Lancaster Foundation, who are doing such great work in education about this topic. Online there was this big community feeling and I’m really proud of that and if anyone thinks about this kind of stuff because of the song, that’s wonderful.”
For more information about DELAIN see the official website at this location
Formed in 1998, FREEDOM CALL are a German power metal band. Tarja Virmakari from Metal Shock Finland (and Truemetal.it) had a chance to chat with Chris Bay, (the band’s founder and guitarist/vocalist) just a couple of weeks before the release of the new “Best Of” -double album “Ages Of Light 1998-2013”. During the interview Chris spoke about having a tough task while choosing the songs for the album, and also about the CD 2 “Masqueraded“ and the “different” song-versions on it. Please join the chat here below.
Metal Shock Finland’s Dave Pearce caught up with Owen of TRIAXIS at Hammerfest 5 not long after he had played the Second Stage and here is what he had to say about his influences, about their style of music, the music business and what they have been up to since the release of their album “Rage and Retribution” and what Triaxis is up to in the future.
Metal Shock Finland’s Dave Pearce caught up with Chris and Dan of ABSOLVA at Hammerfest 5 not long before they had to play the Second Stage and here is what they had to say about their influences, about their style of music, the music business and what they have been up to since the release of their album “Flames Of Justice” and their up and coming tour.
THE ROCK ALCHEMIST – Italian Rock Band from Turin with a strong sonic identity that blends modern rock with progressive, hard, alternative, and pop elements!
Kimmo Kuusniemi’s SARCOFAGUS return with a Historic 2010 Concert Video Premiere on YouTube! Click image to watch the video
One of Finland’s finest longstanding metal bands AMORPHIS recently released their eleventh studio album, “Circle” via Nuclear Blast Records.
