Interview с Nightwish : DARKSIDE.ru

Why did you choose Annette in the and? What was especial about her?

Well, it was pretty much the combination of everything. The most important things that we were trying to look for in the new singer was the personality and the voice. Both things were needed the same in the same person. And when we heard some of the demos and some of the old songs of Annette, we were immediately hooked and we realized that it was something we were really looking for. Something completely different from Tarja, but still…there was a lot of power and emotion in her voice. And then when we met her a few times the decision immediately clicked, I mean we shared the same Scandinavian mentality, that dark sense of humor (laughs) So long long ago we knew the name of the new singer pretty well.

So the whole band voted for her?

Everybody! I mean that was democratic decision of the whole band, everybody had one vote and in the end it was pretty obvious, I mean every single gut in the end voted for her.

For the new album you wrote 13 songs which are included in the album and the album lasts 75 minutes. Aren’t you afraid that the album turned out too long?

We had some debates about that if it’s too long or not, but honestly we didn’t have the heart to leave any of the songs out. (laughs) As simple as that! And we decided to take a risk, I mean the album is very long, the first song is 14 minutes, so we just did it. But you needn’t listen to the album from the beginning to the end every time. You can listen to one song and then click to another.

I was just going to ask you about it. The first track- “The Poet And The Pendulum” lasts about 14 minutes. I think it’s rather risky and dangerous to place such a song at the beginning… Don’t you think so?

Well, I wouldn’t say that’s dangerous. From the commercial point of view we shouldn’t have done it ever. But the basic reason for this is the song which is called “Meadows Of Heaven”, and it’s the last song of the album. And it was obvious from the very beginning that “Meadows Of Heaven” had to be the last song, because it has a perfect feeling in it and it’s the perfect ending for the album. And then if you have a really long song like “The Poet And The Pendulum”, I think it should b

e either the first or the last track of the album. You really shouldn’t put it in the middle like track № 5 or track № 7, because it just wouldn’t work. So because of “Meadows Of Heaven’ we decided to put it as the first track. And the other reason is that you always try to avoid a kind of clichés in everything that you do and it would be a kind of cliché to put the longest song as the last one, so we just turned it all around.

And what is the song about? I mean “The Poet And The Pendulum”.

It’s a kind of a soundtrack of my personal life a couple of years ago. I’m a really positive human being and I enjoy life and I think that this world is a beautiful place, but sometimes I feel absolutely like, “oh, it’s shit, life sucks!” And you don’t see the light in the end of the tunnel. And this song really has this thoughts. And it was really symbolic to kill myself in the song, and the guys did it in a very concrete way.

You also wrote the song “While Your Lips Are Still Red” which became a soundtrack of one film. How did it happen that you got involved into cinema?

This is because the Finnish movie director, called Markku Pölönen. He lives quite close to where I live. Just one day – I think it was last November – he called me and said, “I’m doing this new movie, called Lieksa. Would you like to do a kind of theme song or the theme of the main character of the movie if you are interested?” And when I went to see him and so some parts of the movie I was immediately hooked and said, “Yes!! I wanna do this!” So it was our director who inspired us do it.

And what’s the plot of this film?

I haven’t even seen it yet. So I don’t even know exactly. I know that it’s about Finnish country-side, about this group of people who are moving from one place to another. It’s a kind of a drama.

You once mentioned that your previous vocalist Tarja Turunen is a wonderful singer and it would be difficult to replace her. Now that you’ve already recorded a new album and your single is sold out gold, can you say that Annette was able to replace her?

I think so. I mean I don’t like this world “replacement”, I would say like a follower. And yeah Tarja was incredibly good in what she did, she worked out he

r own stile if singing in this kind of music. She was really fantastic, but I think we have a fantastic singer and person in the band now. She is something completely different when it comes to the voice, but we all like her, and in such situation you need just to follow your heart. We all love g\her and that’s all that matters at the moment.

You also said that you’re a bit afraid of performing in native land. Do you think that people in Finland won’t accept Annette?

It’s not just in Finland, I think it’s everywhere. I’m not just scared, I’m a little bit concerned because music has very deep emotions, and especially video clips, and Tarja was a kind of icon for people. And now we have a new singer that follows her. The opinions of the people seem to be really divided. There’s been even some threads coming from people, it becomes a little bit concerning especially for Annette’s sake, that people might do some harm. After all it’s just a rock band, this kind of things happen, it’s all about the human relationship, which are the hardest thing in the whole world. And let people understand that this is her job.

Annette said that it was far more difficult for her to learn and sing the old stuff of Nightwish, than learning the new stuff. Do you think she managed to perform the old stuff as good as it’s possible?

I think she is doing phenomenally well the old songs. We all were a little bit afraid how she will cope with them, but she’s been practicing like hell in the past months and we just had our first rehearsals with her about two weeks ago. (the interview took place on 02.09.2007). We played songs like ”Sleeping Sun”, “Nemo”, “Wishmaster” and she sounded really really good. It’s something completely different< I mean the manner, the tone of the voice from what it was with Tarja. She is absolutely not trying to imitate her at all. So it’s just her voice, but the melody and the feeling are still there. And it would be a huge shock for many people to hear her singing, but it’s something fresh as well, so just keep an open mind.

And how did you manage to hide Annette from journalists’ eyes? I think a lot of journalists and just fans occupied the studio where you were recording your stuff…

First of all I think that media, especially the Finnish media we

re not so attacking us with questions. If they wanted they would find out who she is, it was enough just to follow us for a few days. But they were not interested in that as much after all. Because I mean we were together in the studio for three weeks, everybody knew in which studio we were. And if they really wanted to find out who she is, they could have done it, but for some reason they were maybe too lazy to do it so, I don’t know. (laughs) But we tried not to be with her together. We booked different flies, and we were in different hotels, we were never together.

And what does the title of your new album mean? “Dark Passion Play”…

I think this album it’s the darkest, the most melancholic album we’ve done so far and for me the three words to describe this album best are “dark, passion, play”. There is a lot of darkness, there is a lot of passion and the album is just like one big play.

And why there is a pendulum in the cover. What does it symbolize?

It comes from the first song “The Poet And The Pendulum”. So once you get the lyrics and read through them, it’s obvious. I won’t reveal this secret as yet. So just when the lyrics are available, just get them and read.

I know that there were some problems with copyrights for your DVD “And of an Era”. How did you manage to release it in the end?

I don’t have a clue to be honest. I was so occupied with other things and fed up with the whole drama, so I just left the whole thing to the management to decide and argue over. (laugh) But in the end they managed to fix it over and now everything is cool. Frankly I don’t even know what was going on and happened in the end.

In Finland “End of an Era” got the gold status after just one day of its release and tickets for the upcoming tour in the USA are sold out. Did you expect such a success?

I really didn’t. I mean it’s really really encouraging to see that the people, our fans are still out there, that they are giving us a chance. I was expecting much much worse when it came to the reactions to the new singer and the new album and the upcoming tour – everything. So this is really flattering and I’ve just gotta thank them! I really hope that they are coming to the concerts for the music and not t

o see just much spoken band.

And whose idea was to publish a Nightwish mobile magazine? (There people could download the ringtones, wall-papers with Nightwish – ed.)What’s the aim?

Oh really? I didn’t know! (laughs) I don’t even follow all this stuff that’s happening around the band. But o think it’s just a little trick for the fans.

Why did you choose the song “Eva” for the first single? What’s especial about this song?

For me personally “Eva” is not even our first single. It was a kind of a teaser for the album. And also its role was to introduce the voice of the new singer. Annette did really a good job, she sang this song perfectly and this is the easiest song of the album. And it’s a good start, but I never considered it as a single release, cause it was only downloaded from the internet. So actual first single is Amaranth which was published about a week ago.

And why did you decide to make “Eva” an internet release and not a usual release?

I don’t have a clue. Again this is the record label’s idea, maybe they wanted to try out something new, like contemporary things with a modern technology. Well I wasn’t really that happy with the idea, because I want to have a CD in my hand, maybe it’s old-fashioned, to have a visual component of music. I want to read the lyrics… And I don’t follow what happens in the Internet at all. I’ve just bought my first computer ever about three weeks ago. (laughs)

Really??

Yeah! (everybody laughs) I’ve never ever had a computer in my life and I’m 30 years old, but people began to complain that I don’t read their e-mails, so I decided to but it and have the Internet on it. (laughs)

And who was the author of the artwork for the single “Eva”?

It’s the same guy called Toxic Angel who made all the cover artworks for the new album.

In the artworks of your singles and new alum there is a computer graphic while your previous releases were painted. Why this change?

Well, we just wanted to try something new. I mean I like all of our covers, I mean the first covers were painted and I like them a lot. Then we just decided to try something new.

And we had this guy – Toxic Angel and he did all the work with the computer. We immediately liked the work, and he has been doing the cover artwork for the collection and now for “Dark Passion Play” album. Well it’s just like experiments in different things. There is no deeper meaning behind it. I don’t know what we’ll use on the next album.

In one of the interviews Annette mentioned the opportunity to record with Nightwish a song in Swedish. What’s become of this idea?

(laughs) No! It was more or less a joke. I mean we’ve done a couple of songs in Finnish in the past, and now that we have a Swedish singer why not recording a song in Swedish, but there is absolutely no concrete plans about it. Maybe somewhere in the year 2020 we’ll do something of the kind – I don’t know.

She also said that we she came to the band she changed her image completely. What are these changes? I know for example that she used to be a blond…

Yeas, she used to be a blond, but before that she used to be black-haired, and before that she used to be red-haired… But we didn’t tell her anything, maybe she felt that now she is in a metal band and she should wear dark hair, I don’t know. But none of these was ever planed. We just told her, “Look the way you feel comfortable looking”. We didn’t tell her – everything was just up to her.

And who worked out the style and the costumes for Annette?

Herself. She makes all herself.

Nightwish was accused of plagiarism. The song “Eva” sounded allegedly like a song “Whirlpool”. What’s became of this situation?

Absolutely nothing. I haven’t heard about the thing ever since. If you go to YouTube and listen to the song we’ll see that there are three melodies and a chorus are a little bit alike and that’s it. I’ve never even heard about this man or this band or this song. It’s a ridiculous thing.

So it was the kind of PR from the side of this song author…

Yeah. It’s always a possibility. I don’t know. I’ve never even heard of the guy or met the guy, so maybe – I really don’t know.

You said in the interview to the web-zine Metalrules.com that on the new album there will be Celtic instruments and chur

ch chorus. Why did you decide to use Celtic instruments this time and where did you take church chorus from?

Well, I like Irish and Scottish folk music and and I like the sounds of their instruments. And I just wanted to see how they will work out in Nightwish, because we always systematically take some new instruments into the music in each album, and we’ve never used these instruments before, so I just thought, “Let’s hire some people to do that stuff and see what comes up”. And it turned out to be great. I think that the parts with chorus and Celtic perts are the main parts of the album. It’s really really nice.

Let’s now speak about two new video-clips of yours – “Amaranth” and the second (if I’m not mistaken it’s “Bye Bye Beautiful”). Who was the author of the clip “Amaranth” and why there is angel in it?

The idea came from our director, who also worked at “Nemo” video - Antti Jokkinen. And this clip is based on one of the most famous Finnish paintings of all times called “The Wounded Angel” by Hugo Simberg. And the director’s idea was that, “Let’s take this painting, and see what happened to angel before and after the picture”. And I personally think that it was a perfectly cool idea. And you see the video and the band is playing beneath the crash. And the second clip yeah, you’re right, will be the song from the second single “Bye Bye Beautiful”. And the video will come out soon.

And could you reveal to us what this clip will be about?

(laughs) This clip will be a shocker to many people, for sure! So don’t expect anything that Nightwish could do as a video. It’s the strong sense of self-irony, the plot is very personal, it’s like fooling around. It will definitely divide opinions, but it will definitely be a shocker.

Sorry for such a strict question, but is this song addressed to Tarja Turunen?

Yeah, it’s like a farewell song to Tarja, to previous singer. And it’s not a secret, I’ve always been open about that. But people shouldn’t be offended about the song, either, because it’s not made in a bad spirit at all. It’s not about hatred, it’s more about how could this all happen, about frustration and sadness about this situation in the end of which nobody was innocent.

As far as I

know at first the song “Amaranth” was called “Reach”. So what made you change the title and make some changes in the song (I know that the final version differs from the original)?

I just didn’t like it. That’s basically why you do demo-versions to be able to choose whatever you want. You can listen to it and see what’s wrong with this song. With “Reach” I thought there was some idea behind the song, but I didn’t like it, I didn’t like the lyrics, I didn’t like the power, I didn’t like the chorus and I didn’t like the melody. And we decided to change all these things and in the end “Amaranth” became the first single!

And whose idea was to make two versions of single “Amaranth”?

Well, I think there are even more versions! (laughs) It’s also the record label idea, the band has absolutely nothing to say about it. It’s about selling as much as possible from us, it’s more a record label thinking – to keep the singer aside this matters. It’s really cool for the collectors as well – different bonus tracks, different covers and etc.

Why did you record Marco’s vocals as well?

Back then we didn’t have the vocalist, so then we recorded all the songs with Marco vocals so that we could see how the vocal line will go and work out.

And did you regard the variant to leave Nightwish only with male vocals without any frontwoman?

Absolutely not!! It never occurred to us, we never even thought about it, and I don’t want people to think that we could ever consider such variant. We’ve had female vocals in the band for 11 years, and that’s like part of the band. I can’t even imagine Nightwish only with male vocals.

And can we expect to hear these songs with Marco’s vocals?

I don’t know, maybe we’ll release them as bonus tracks with the upcoming singles. I don’t know!

One of the songs from the new album that surprised me was “Sahara”. Why did you decide to sing about Sahara? The vocals on this song are not characteristic of Nightwish…

Yeah, it’s something Arabic or North-African… This song is totally based on the dream I had. It’s not like there is a real life behind this song, no. It’s the dream that I had one night about this guy who is f

leeing in Sahara like 5 thousand years ago. It’s a kind of fantasy.

And in general what inspires you to write songs?

For me doing songs is the way to escape from this world. I just write songs about things that really interest me, about big emotions in my life, writing song is like making a whole into my head so that all the demons could get out from there. (laughs)

How much is the record of the new CD different from “Once” (previous album – ed.)?

The feeling is strong on both albums. Some people say that this record is something completely different from what you’ve done before, but I need to disagree, because you can still hear the music that requires the dark bunch of the band. I think the extremes are more present in this new album and the female voice has changed, but the ideology of the music and the spirit have remained.

And what about the process of recording? I know that this time you recorded in famous Abbey Road Studios…

We used actually four different studious. We worked in three studious in Finland and then we had to go to London to Abbey Road Studios to record all the orchestra and Celtic instruments.

Do you follow the events that happen in Tarja Turunen’s camp? Have you heard her last works?

Well, I haven’t really been following. I’ve just heard that she is doing a solo album which will be out soon and I’ll definitely check it out, but I am not really following.

In one of your interviews you said that to prepare for the show you need 5 minutes to be alone. What do you do in these 5 minutes?

I’m never scared about going to the stage, but I really need these 5 minutes, I just reread the set-list, try to find the necessary mood, think of what’s gonna happen in the next two hours of the show, just think about the songs and concentrate to do my best. And I smoke a cigarette as well.

What do you think – when can we expect Nightwish with a concert in Russia? Everybody is waiting Nightwish to come here again…

Yeah, and I personally feel really bad that we didn’t come to Russia during our last tour with “Once”. I really don’t know why. But we’ll definitely do our best to come here

again. I think next year. Every time we’ve been there the show and the people were really fantastic, so everybody really wants to come back there.

You said that singing is the most terrible nightmare on stage. Why is that?

I don’t like singing and I’m not that good at it either. But I had to do it during a few years before we got Marco in the band. So I’m a little bit dramatized about that and I never ever wanna do it again! (laughs)

As far as I know this autumn Spinefarm Records is going to re-release 5 your previous albums. Could you tell us – what will be included into those additions? What bonus material can we expect?

I’ve just heard about the whole thing like two days ago. I didn’t even know that they were going to re-release it. So to be honest I have no idea what’s happening. (everybody laughs) It’s again the record label’s thinking, they don’t usually tell the band what’s going on.

If you could change anything in the history of Nightwish now what would you change?

I wouldn’t change anything, I mean really all the turns and spears that we had in the past, all events good or bad, all our decisions have led us to this point. And you have to learn from your mistakes and everything so I really don’t see anything that I’d have changed.

Annette once said that she hopes to give Nightwish Swedish positive emotions. Do you think she’s succeeded in this?

Perfectly and absolutely. I think she is one of the most open-minded and positive and bright people I’ve ever met. So she definitely brings some light into us. So she balances the whole crue a little bit which is really really nice.

Do you think that members of Nightwish are open for side-projects? For example Marco is doing well with Tarot and Brother Firetribe…Doesn’t it interfere into Nightwish issues?

It doesn’t interfere at all. I mean there still much spare time in between the albums, in between the tours. Everybody has his own little side-projects, so everybody can do something else beside Nightwish, and Tarot is really thing for the heart for Marco, he really likes it. And I also toured with one Finnish band, but Nightwish has always been a priority for us. So I think it’

s not a problem.

Which song from the new album turned out the easiest and the hardest for you?

Making a long epic is always the easiest for me, I don’t know why. But making of “The Poet And The Pendulum”, “Sahara”, “Seven Days To The Wolves”, “Meadows Of Heaven” were the easiest ones. The most troubles we had with such songs as “Amaranth” and “Cadence Of Her Last Breath” to actually make them work.

Is Tuomas of 1997 and Tuomas of 2007 two different persons or not? What has changed in you during these 10 years and what remained the same?

I’m really the same guy I used to be ten years ago. I’ve become maybe even more humble, the really low-self-esteem than I had, and the most important thing that changed in me is that I’ve become more cynical about the things that are happening. There is no that open-mindness of that time, maybe not open-mindness, but I a little bit afraid of people. Seeing all this drama that’s happening you become more cynical.

When you founded the band Nightwish back then did you expect such a success?

Never ever! I thing it’s one of the strangeness of Nightwish, because we never aimed for anything, we never had any expectations. None of us ever wanted to be a rock-star. Nightwish was formed just to play music with friends, just to have a little good time. And everybody in the band had different thoughts of what we wanna do in our lives. It just happened by accident that this became like a full-time job. So I think this keeps the whole thing very honest.

You said that the best concert of Nightwish was the last concert with Tarja Turunen. And do you have any concerts that you are ashamed of at the moment?

No not really. We’ve never discomfited the concerts, because of being drunk or because of rally really bad playing or something. Not really and I hope it never comes.

Nightwish and Children of Bodom opened Finnish metal scene to the world. What do you feel now that many bands try to follow you and for many young musicians you’re a kind of idols?

It’s really flattering. To speak honestly I’m just honored. When we started there were idols too, I mean Stratovarius, Amorphis, Sentenced – they were really before us to clear the wayto the metal market. If we had been able to do the same for the young bands it’s just like a flavor.

You’ve been in Russia 4 times already. Which visit to our country do you remember best of all and why?

I can say that all the 4 times when we were in Russia – in Moscow and St.-Peterburg – were really fantastic because of the people. It’s like the same kind of enthusiasm involved and passion people like for example in South-America. It’s always really encouraging and it gives energy to the band.

And to round up this interview maybe you have some words to Russian fans…

Yes!! Now I speak for the whole band – I’m ashamed that we didn’t even have time to come to Russia during the last three years and we’ll try to remedy this somehow next year. Everybody is really really looking forward to coming back there, because our concerts in Russia were always great! So wait for us – soon ebough…

Interview by Ksenia “Wolfin” Khorina
Questions also composed by Blindman, Bonez
10 сен 2007 the End


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Nightwish

I don’t regret anything

S-Studio

Ehwas

Fernando