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Tina:
First off, how has your tour with Into Eternity been going?
Esa:
Err really nice! We've been touring for about 2 weeks.. that gives us
about three more weeks to go. Nice people too, the Into Eternity guys!
Tina:
How do you find it touring with your new singer, Tomi?
Esa:
Very good! He's excellent live… everyone who sees him live is really
surprised. He's really, really good! Numen:
How did you guys find him?
Esa:
It became like word of mouth. It was like… Tomi and other guitar
players knew him then. That's how he came into the band. It's how his
voice would fit into the band if we asked him to come over to rehearse
it. And that's basically how it went - we listened to quite a lot of other
demo tapes and other singers as well, but we ended up with Tomi because
he was far better than anyone else.
Numen:
Were there any other singers that you were actually looking into that
you didn't end up going with?
Esa:
Uhh seriously, no. We asked a few guys to come over and rehearse in place
with us but I think there was no-one that we really, really wanted.
Numen:
Okay, we looked at the website and we saw that a lot of his favourites
Amorphis songs that you guys all list off… a lot of his were the
older ones with the harsher vocals. So are you guys gonna be heading back
in that direction?
Esa:
We'll see. We definitely want to do some more aggressive vocals on the
next album because that's what Tomi does the best. We'll see.. it's interesting.
Because we've basically done quite a lot of new songs for the next album.
We'll see - we haven't done any vocal arrangements yet.
Numen:
Along the same lines, on Far From The Sun, early on in it, you went back
to a lot of your old guitar sound but then it changed after a few tracks…
Esa:
Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of new stuff what we brought into the band,
music as well on Far From The Sun, a lot of the old, old things…
Tina:
Earlier in the fall, you guys were touring with Type O Negative, in the
U.S. Didn't you have JP from Charon on vocals at that time?
Esa: Yeah, but that tour was cancelled
because of…of…
Santeri: Peter [Steele] - Because of Peter's heart-attack!
Esa: [laughs] Yeah, because of Peter's
heart-attack.
Numen: Was it true that it was a heart-attack?
Santeri: Well, that's the information
we got - that the doctor had said that you are not in a condition to tour
so…
Tina: I heard that you didn't want to continue
the tour without Type O… is there any truth to that?y
Esa: Ummm no, it was like - it would
have been no sense to do the same tour like just Amorphis, you know? I
think we don't fit that many people - with Type O it's a lot, so it makes
more sense. So since that, we started to arrange our own tour, which is
happening at the moment.
Tina: Since you released Far From The Sun, have
you found that you have been receiving a better response at shows up here
in North America?
Esa: Kinda yeah. But still, it's like…
last time we were touring it was in 2001, so it's many years before we
actually came back to touring. But it's been a good tour this year!
Numen:
Pasi wrote lyrically a lot of the more recent albums. Who's going to be
stepping up and taking that place?
Esa:
We'll see - lyrics-wise, we don't know yet what's going to happen. Basically
we'll probably stack on with the same themes that we had before, but we'll
see who is going to actually write the lyrics.
Numen:
Since Pasi departed, what's your relationship with him been like? Or is
there even one any more?
Esa: Uh yeah, we're friends, and we
departed as friends. And it was the band's and his decision together that
it's better that he leaves the band, because he couldn't have done any
more tours. And it would have made the rest of Amorphis work really really
hard, and he wanted to concentrate on his family life. Yeah, he still
has some music projects going on in Finland, but I don't know how he's
going to do shows anymore.
Tina:
I heard To Separate The Flesh From The Bones [Pasi's new project] and
-
Esa: [laughs] Yeah!!
Tina: That was insane! I couldn't believe it
was him!
Esa: [still laughing] Yeah, that's
him, and Niklas is also in that project. It's old stuff, grindcore.
Numen:
You guys recently changed labels - is there any advice you'd give other
people when they're looking for labels?
Esa: Umm… not to do too long
deals! [laughs]
Santeri: Or not to do too many albums for one label. I think I'd strongly
advice them to be careful about that.
Tina: How were you affected by changing labels
and vocalists at the same time?
Esa: Well… it didn't happen uh
- changing labels happened a year and a half before Pasi left. And Far
From The Sun was released in Europe a year before it was actually released
in the States. Due to the troubles with Virgin, they wanted to wait one
year before we actually got to release it, that they're going to release
it or not. That's the major label thing.
<
Tina: Well, what do you think about being on
a major label now?
Esa: Umm, maybe a good choice in some
places… some places not.
Numen: Did they ever pressure you to try to get
a certain style or -
Esa: Oh that's the thing about Virgin,
they've not pressured us at all!
Numen: They have no input on your style at all?
Santeri: No, they didn't say anything
about the music. They even asked us about the singles and the video stuff.
Tina: What improvements have you seen between
Relapse and Virgin?
Esa: [grins] Heh, well, it was easy
to get out of the Virgin deal. [laughs] With Relapse, we were stuck in
it for like… ten years or whatever. With Virgin, we just talked it
over and they said that "Okay, if you want to leave, just leave"
but they also said "If you want to continue, they would like to make
another album". But we said that it didn't make any sense, because
there are so many territories in Europe where Virgin didn't really do
anything for us. There were some good territories, like Finland and some
others…
Santeri: GREEK!!
Esa: Greece! Yeah, but there were
some Virgins that didn't do anything for us. The Finnish Virgin is such
a small label that it can't really push like the French. It's ten times
bigger, you have to put some money in it. Because they won't do it anyway.
Tina: I hear that Greece is a crazy place to
play shows.
Santeri: Yeah, it's a nice place.
Numen: Have you ever heard of While Heaven Wept?
The vocalist, he loves going over to play in Greece, that's his favourite
place. He's actually from the DC area and he's never actually played a
DC show but he's played hundreds in Greece!
Santeri: [laughing] Yeah it's no wonder!
Good food eh, a lot of food!
Tina:
Okay, back to the album… why did you choose not to have any guest
musicians on your last album?
Esa: When we started to fit all our
stuff to the songs, we noticed that it's a lot of stuff already [cracks
up] We didn't want to add anything more!
Tina: I also noticed that the first couple of
tracks, there's a very strong folk sound and then on the rest of the tracks
it has a more commercial or easier sound. Why did you choose to do that?
Esa: Ummm… I don't know…
perhaps we have become more commercial! [laughs]
Santeri: For the major label - be blessed without words [laughs] without
saying anything.
Tina: Your first two albums also use very traditional
Finnish themes, music… would you ever consider revisiting something
like that or writing lyrics in Finnish?
Esa: We hadn't really thought about
doing re-Tales [of a Thousand Lakes] because those albums are in the past.
We still like the albums a lot but it makes no sense to repeat yourself.
I don't think we are going back into that… grrrroooves! [laughs]
Tina: And what about writing lyrics in another
language?
Esa: Ehhh we'll see. Definitely we
put the lyrics in English, but we'll see if there's some interesting ideas
or themes or stories.
Tina: When I interviewed Mikael from Opeth, I
asked him if he'd ever write lyrics in Swedish and he was like "Noooo!
It would sound horrible!"
Esa: [laughs] Yeah! But we wouldn't
sing in Finnish, no, definitely not.
Tina: No? Why not?
Esa: It doesn't fit into our music
[laughs]
Tina:
Okay well that's about it, thanks so much for taking the time to talk
with us!
Esa: Hey, no problem! Take care!
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