Sunday, 27 September 2009
Wednesday, 23 September 2009
Heavy Metal and Gender, international congress
An interesting event:
Heavy Metal and Gender
Internationaler Kongress
8-10. Oktober 2009
Hochschule für Musik und Tanz
Köln
http://www.metalandgender.de/
Heavy Metal and Gender
Internationaler Kongress
8-10. Oktober 2009
Hochschule für Musik und Tanz
Köln
http://www.metalandgender.de/
Tuesday, 22 September 2009
Nightwish Dark Passion Play tour grande finale in Helsinki 19.9.2009
The Dark Passion Play World Tour of Nightwish kicked-off in October 2007 and comprised 194 shows in 39 different countries. On September 19th, it was time to conclude the long journey at the sold out Hartwall Arena in Helsinki. The special atmosphere of the final show, preceding a two years tour break and anticipation of the new album, was tangible both backstage and among the audience. The show had drawn fans from various countries to Finland. Perhaps the most visible group appeared at the corner of the stage on the lower part of the auditorium, tirelessly cheering and waving their Italian, Spanish and French flags. The crowd further back appeared slightly passive in the first part of the set, but warmed up significantly towards the end of the show. Spectator waves revolving around the Arena, easily ignited by Marco Hietala, and the impressive light sea during the “Islander” and “Walking in the Air” were the atmospheric highlights of the evening.
The band played another great gig with flawless and powerful expertise. In specific, the sovereign appearance of Marco Hietala was striking. In this special night, the Finnish violin virtuoso Pekka Kuusisto guest appeared on the stage during the “While Your Lips Are Still Red” and surely added an extra dimension to the beautiful song. Troy Donockley joined the band playing pipe and bagpipe in several songs, as in some of their earlier shows. Special was also the appearance of “Meadows of Heaven” in the set list, reportedly for the first time ever. Perhaps this piece was intentionally saved for this specific occasion, but surely would that song have been warmly welcomed by the audiences in earlier shows as well. Visually, the show was expectedly grand and included the familiar DPP stage design with the massive anchor and the wooden boat of Tuomas Holopainen. Additional fireworks and pyrotechnics highlighted the special nature of the evening. In overall, this was really a high profile ending for the most successful period in the band’s history.
Apocalyptica featured as the opener and filled their spot with high reliability, intense playing and powerful sounds – no need to constant apologizing, which seemed to be their main theme in their interim comments. Antti “Hyrde” Hyyrynen from Stam1na was this time manning the vocal parts of “I’m Not Jesus” and “I Don’t Care”.
Once again, BogFires want to thank the Nightwish staff, especially Adam, for their hospitality.
Nightwish setlist:
Finlandia (with Troy Donockley) (Intro)
7 Days to the Wolves
Ever Dream
Wishmaster
Romanticide
Amaranth
The Siren (with Pekka Kuusisto on violin)
While Your Lips Are Still Red (with Pekka Kuusisto on violin)
The Poet and The Pendulum
Nemo
Sahara
Dark Chest of Wonders
The Islander (with Troy Donockley)
Walking in the Air (Acoustic with Troy Donockley)
Last of The Wilds (w/ Troy Donockley)
Meadows of Heaven
Encore:
Ghost Love Score
Wish I Had An Angel
The Heart Asks Pleasure First (Outro)
7 Days to the Wolves
Ever Dream
Wishmaster
Romanticide
Amaranth
The Siren (with Pekka Kuusisto on violin)
While Your Lips Are Still Red (with Pekka Kuusisto on violin)
The Poet and The Pendulum
Nemo
Sahara
Dark Chest of Wonders
The Islander (with Troy Donockley)
Walking in the Air (Acoustic with Troy Donockley)
Last of The Wilds (w/ Troy Donockley)
Meadows of Heaven
Encore:
Ghost Love Score
Wish I Had An Angel
The Heart Asks Pleasure First (Outro)
Monday, 21 September 2009
BogFires Asian Tour
BogFires go Asia in October to attend two conferences and present research papers there:
IASDR 2009 October 18-22. Seoul, South Korea:
... and to attend Loud Park (incl. Children of Bodom) and V-Rock (incl. Negative) festivals in Tokyo.
IASDR 2009 October 18-22. Seoul, South Korea:
- Karjalainen, Toni-Matti; Laaksonen, Laura & Ainamo, Antti (2009). Design for b(r)and identity: Exploring visual concept building within the metal music genre. IASDR 2009. October 18-22. Seoul, South Korea.
- Laaksonen, Laura; Karjalainen, Toni-Matti & Ainamo, Antti (2009). Understanding Cultural Exports- Finnish heavy metal music in the United States. IASDR 2009. October 18-22. Seoul, South Korea.
DeSForM 2009 October 26-27 2009. Taipei, Taiwan:
- Karjalainen, Toni-Matti; Laaksonen, Laura & Ainamo, Antti (2009). Occult, a Tooth, and the Canopy of the Sky: Conceptualizing Visual Meaning Creation of Heavy Metal Bands. DeSForM 2009. October 26-27 2009. Taipei, Taiwan.
... and to attend Loud Park (incl. Children of Bodom) and V-Rock (incl. Negative) festivals in Tokyo.
Tuesday, 8 September 2009
Musiikkiala 2009 -selvitys
A review on Finnish music industry "Musiikkiala 2009" (in Finnish) by Digital Media Oy:
http://www.digitalmedia.fi/main.site?action=siteupdate/view&id=5
http://www.digitalmedia.fi/main.site?action=siteupdate/view&id=5
Tuesday, 11 August 2009
7th Triennial Conference of the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music
Interesting conference with over 300 participants from 35 different countries:
7th Triennial Conference of the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music
University of Jyväskylä, Finland
August 12-16, 2009
http://www.jyu.fi/hum/laitokset/musiikki/en/escom2009
7th Triennial Conference of the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music
University of Jyväskylä, Finland
August 12-16, 2009
http://www.jyu.fi/hum/laitokset/musiikki/en/escom2009
Thursday, 6 August 2009
Sonisphere travel report - Pori, July 25 2009
Metallica brought its Sonisphere caravan to their fifth spot, the city of Pori in the southwest corner of Finland. The one day festival gathered 60.000 guests to the Kirjurinluoto Arena, normally used for the annual Jazz festivals, making the day the biggest ticketed rock event ever held in Finland (a record to be broken today with Madonna’s first visit to our country) and almost doubling the population of Pori for a short time.
Because of the massive crowd in the relatively small city, visitors and habitants were told to be prepared for long queues and lack of parking places in the nearby area. I started my drive early in the morning from Vantaa, and when arriving in Pori around eleven, the place was still rather quiet. I managed to leave the car next to the area, right by the Raumansilta, and face practically no queuing at the entrance. A couple of hours later, it was already a different story.
Los Bastardos Finlandeses, the group of Finnish hard rock veterans, kicked off the festival on the second stage at the noon. The laid back set was a good start for the day, but did not arouse big movement in the still scarce audience. Right after the LBF, Mastodon opened the main stage, and the atmosphere slightly suffered from the lack of people. At the same time, it was nice to get close to the stage and enjoy the gig without any rush, which was mostly impossible with later bands on the main stage. Despite the early slot, the band performed an energetic (but short) set, but the bright daylight and big stage is not a perfect setting for their complex songs. The setlist was quite balanced with songs from the recent “Crack The Sky” album, including the opener “Oblivion”, the great title song and the majestic “Czar”, and a compilation of older tunes. After seeing Mastodon recently warming for Metallica, Slayer and Iron Maiden, which cannot provide the best conditions for the opening band, I would really like to see them playing a full set, preferably in a smaller club.
Mastodon early starting time may have come as a surprise for many visitors who consequently missed the band. And yes, the organizers’ decision not to publish a precise program on the web before the event was not only strange but also a major shortcoming. And this discomfort was further crusted by not displaying or handing out the program in the area itself, except for those “info packs” priced 5 Euros (and that version even had the cancelled Anthrax on the bill). This really looked like a desperate attempt to cash some additional revenues. Otherwise, the schedule was nicely constructed, so that it was able to see all the bands with no overlapping or major waiting times, and all the bands started their sets in time.
Back to the second stage that next hosted the Finnish group Nicole. I experienced the band live for the first time and was not very familiar with their material anyway. And what a positive surprise it was. Their powerful songs combined with technical and precise playing seemingly had reached a good body of devoted listeners. This is definitely a band worth checking out.
Lamb of God had already gathered a large crowd by the main stage. Seeing the LOG gig for the third time this year, the show did not offer any surprises and was rather mundane compared to their blasting performance in Frostbite in January. A minor extra interest was provided by Buz McGrath, a guitarist from the Boston metal band Unearth, replacing Mark Morton who had flown to Virginia for the birth of his first child. McGrath filled his shoes with no problems. While the band was barging on the stage with Randy’s typical gyrating presence and know-how of Finnish curse words, the audience in the first section played their part and performed the usual LOG rituals in the form of large circle pit and the wall of death. The latter made the policemen and security guards on their heightened platform seemingly a bit nervous.
The small stage next witnessed the Finnish Diablo who gave the audience a rather standard show with good humor and selection of headbanging songs of high quality. However, as is the case quite often with the band, the sounds were a bit scruffy and somehow mute, for instance compared to more crispy and intense Nicole.
The next large US band on the main stage, Machine Head offered nothing specific to remember. The lack of strong songs and out-of-tune singing of Flynn left somewhat empty feeling, although the band was loud and passionate as usually. The set ended earlier than intended with some dramatics as the guitarist Phil Demmel passed out after some 30 minutes of playing, which forced the band to end the set with apologies. Demmel then walked from the stage with his own feed and was reported to be fine.
The Finnish Turisas was replacing Anthrax who, due to their singer problems, have cancelled their tour including the Pori show. Although missing the representative of the legendary Big Four of the Bay Area thrash scene must have been a disappointment for many visitors, Turisas gathered a surprisingly large and active crowd for their folk/Viking/battle/whatever metal. However, this setting was not my cup of tea. It was also a bit strange that the short slot was covered with lots of speaking and courting with the audience, with the overly extended version of their “Rasputin” cover, leaving the setlist quite stump. However, credits must be given for their professional and flawless playing despite of such a short notice and little practice.
Linkin Park was a strange choice to the Sonisphere bill to start with, and their halfhearted, boring, and distant hit list may have provided the fans with some good moments, but for most of the Metallica-expecting audience the show was probably a meaningless intermission performance.
LP worked fine as background music, so it was time to test the food services in the festival area. And yes, as complained by many, they were too few, resulting in long lines and stupid waiting times. Moreover, there were no veggie options available – somebody had seen something inside the beer area where the beer desks were also reportedly plentiful. So quite likely many of the visitors went fighting their hunger with the malt soup instead of decent food. Another target of complaints was the too few female toilets with long queues, but everything worked on the men’s side. Most flaws may be excused for the large crowd, as was also the slow exit from the area, but these aspects (and the program info!) should be improved if the festival is to be arranged in Pori in the future.
Before Metallica, Saxon closed the second floor with their sortiment of new songs and old NWOBHM classics. Most of the people were already securing their places by the main stage, leaving the front of the small stage half empty. This did not prevent the Saxon fans, with the average age clearly the highest of the day, from enjoying the familiar and safe offering of Biff Byford and the gang.
And then, the Kirjurinluoto Arena transformed to a very different place, as Metallica entered the stage. The guys had already served the Finns with nice two gigs in Helsinki in June, but the response seemed and sounded like the band hadn’t played here for years. This time the stage setting was an ordinary one, instead of the clever and specific circle stage design with lasers and pyros witnessed in their inhouse arena tour. However, the pyros were high and the lights got very powerful and impressive, as the night darkened along with the show. The guys were in good humor, Hetfield made his familiar comments, Lars playing was inaccurate now and then, so nothing new under the sun. But somehow the show felt extraordinary; certainly one of the best Metallica shows, if not the best, I’ve witnessed. Big part of this great experience was made by the wonderful audience constantly making noise, keeping hands towards the sky, and singing the songs out loud. Their participation was enhanced by the well-balanced set list, giving less weight to the new songs as in Helsinki shows. Even the occasional light rain brought an extra dimension to the show, at least visually. Otherwise, weather was mostly cloudy and a bit chilly with wind throughout the day, with some short moments of sunshine however.
After spending an hour before being able to get back to the Raumansilta bridge that obviously formed the hardest bottleneck for such a mass, I was able to start driving back to South. The unbroken sand slow moving stream of cars on the normally empty roads 2 to south and 11 to east added another memorable flavor to the day. The first 24H open ABC station in Tampere was unsurprisingly packed with metal heads on their way home. I grabbed a large mug of coffee and headed south in the already lightening Finnish summer night that faded to black only few hours ago.
TMK
Because of the massive crowd in the relatively small city, visitors and habitants were told to be prepared for long queues and lack of parking places in the nearby area. I started my drive early in the morning from Vantaa, and when arriving in Pori around eleven, the place was still rather quiet. I managed to leave the car next to the area, right by the Raumansilta, and face practically no queuing at the entrance. A couple of hours later, it was already a different story.
Los Bastardos Finlandeses, the group of Finnish hard rock veterans, kicked off the festival on the second stage at the noon. The laid back set was a good start for the day, but did not arouse big movement in the still scarce audience. Right after the LBF, Mastodon opened the main stage, and the atmosphere slightly suffered from the lack of people. At the same time, it was nice to get close to the stage and enjoy the gig without any rush, which was mostly impossible with later bands on the main stage. Despite the early slot, the band performed an energetic (but short) set, but the bright daylight and big stage is not a perfect setting for their complex songs. The setlist was quite balanced with songs from the recent “Crack The Sky” album, including the opener “Oblivion”, the great title song and the majestic “Czar”, and a compilation of older tunes. After seeing Mastodon recently warming for Metallica, Slayer and Iron Maiden, which cannot provide the best conditions for the opening band, I would really like to see them playing a full set, preferably in a smaller club.
Mastodon early starting time may have come as a surprise for many visitors who consequently missed the band. And yes, the organizers’ decision not to publish a precise program on the web before the event was not only strange but also a major shortcoming. And this discomfort was further crusted by not displaying or handing out the program in the area itself, except for those “info packs” priced 5 Euros (and that version even had the cancelled Anthrax on the bill). This really looked like a desperate attempt to cash some additional revenues. Otherwise, the schedule was nicely constructed, so that it was able to see all the bands with no overlapping or major waiting times, and all the bands started their sets in time.
Back to the second stage that next hosted the Finnish group Nicole. I experienced the band live for the first time and was not very familiar with their material anyway. And what a positive surprise it was. Their powerful songs combined with technical and precise playing seemingly had reached a good body of devoted listeners. This is definitely a band worth checking out.
Lamb of God had already gathered a large crowd by the main stage. Seeing the LOG gig for the third time this year, the show did not offer any surprises and was rather mundane compared to their blasting performance in Frostbite in January. A minor extra interest was provided by Buz McGrath, a guitarist from the Boston metal band Unearth, replacing Mark Morton who had flown to Virginia for the birth of his first child. McGrath filled his shoes with no problems. While the band was barging on the stage with Randy’s typical gyrating presence and know-how of Finnish curse words, the audience in the first section played their part and performed the usual LOG rituals in the form of large circle pit and the wall of death. The latter made the policemen and security guards on their heightened platform seemingly a bit nervous.
The small stage next witnessed the Finnish Diablo who gave the audience a rather standard show with good humor and selection of headbanging songs of high quality. However, as is the case quite often with the band, the sounds were a bit scruffy and somehow mute, for instance compared to more crispy and intense Nicole.
The next large US band on the main stage, Machine Head offered nothing specific to remember. The lack of strong songs and out-of-tune singing of Flynn left somewhat empty feeling, although the band was loud and passionate as usually. The set ended earlier than intended with some dramatics as the guitarist Phil Demmel passed out after some 30 minutes of playing, which forced the band to end the set with apologies. Demmel then walked from the stage with his own feed and was reported to be fine.
The Finnish Turisas was replacing Anthrax who, due to their singer problems, have cancelled their tour including the Pori show. Although missing the representative of the legendary Big Four of the Bay Area thrash scene must have been a disappointment for many visitors, Turisas gathered a surprisingly large and active crowd for their folk/Viking/battle/whatever metal. However, this setting was not my cup of tea. It was also a bit strange that the short slot was covered with lots of speaking and courting with the audience, with the overly extended version of their “Rasputin” cover, leaving the setlist quite stump. However, credits must be given for their professional and flawless playing despite of such a short notice and little practice.
Linkin Park was a strange choice to the Sonisphere bill to start with, and their halfhearted, boring, and distant hit list may have provided the fans with some good moments, but for most of the Metallica-expecting audience the show was probably a meaningless intermission performance.
LP worked fine as background music, so it was time to test the food services in the festival area. And yes, as complained by many, they were too few, resulting in long lines and stupid waiting times. Moreover, there were no veggie options available – somebody had seen something inside the beer area where the beer desks were also reportedly plentiful. So quite likely many of the visitors went fighting their hunger with the malt soup instead of decent food. Another target of complaints was the too few female toilets with long queues, but everything worked on the men’s side. Most flaws may be excused for the large crowd, as was also the slow exit from the area, but these aspects (and the program info!) should be improved if the festival is to be arranged in Pori in the future.
Before Metallica, Saxon closed the second floor with their sortiment of new songs and old NWOBHM classics. Most of the people were already securing their places by the main stage, leaving the front of the small stage half empty. This did not prevent the Saxon fans, with the average age clearly the highest of the day, from enjoying the familiar and safe offering of Biff Byford and the gang.
And then, the Kirjurinluoto Arena transformed to a very different place, as Metallica entered the stage. The guys had already served the Finns with nice two gigs in Helsinki in June, but the response seemed and sounded like the band hadn’t played here for years. This time the stage setting was an ordinary one, instead of the clever and specific circle stage design with lasers and pyros witnessed in their inhouse arena tour. However, the pyros were high and the lights got very powerful and impressive, as the night darkened along with the show. The guys were in good humor, Hetfield made his familiar comments, Lars playing was inaccurate now and then, so nothing new under the sun. But somehow the show felt extraordinary; certainly one of the best Metallica shows, if not the best, I’ve witnessed. Big part of this great experience was made by the wonderful audience constantly making noise, keeping hands towards the sky, and singing the songs out loud. Their participation was enhanced by the well-balanced set list, giving less weight to the new songs as in Helsinki shows. Even the occasional light rain brought an extra dimension to the show, at least visually. Otherwise, weather was mostly cloudy and a bit chilly with wind throughout the day, with some short moments of sunshine however.
After spending an hour before being able to get back to the Raumansilta bridge that obviously formed the hardest bottleneck for such a mass, I was able to start driving back to South. The unbroken sand slow moving stream of cars on the normally empty roads 2 to south and 11 to east added another memorable flavor to the day. The first 24H open ABC station in Tampere was unsurprisingly packed with metal heads on their way home. I grabbed a large mug of coffee and headed south in the already lightening Finnish summer night that faded to black only few hours ago.
TMK
Photos: TMK
Metallica set list:
Battery
Creeping Death
Fuel
Harvester Of Sorrow
Fade To Black
Broken, Beat And Scarred
Cyanide
Sad But True
One
All Nightmare Long
The Day That Never Comes
Master Of Puppets
Blackened
Nothing Else Matters
Enter Sandman
Encore:
Stone Cold Crazy (Queen cover)
Motorbreath
Seek & Destroy
Battery
Creeping Death
Fuel
Harvester Of Sorrow
Fade To Black
Broken, Beat And Scarred
Cyanide
Sad But True
One
All Nightmare Long
The Day That Never Comes
Master Of Puppets
Blackened
Nothing Else Matters
Enter Sandman
Encore:
Stone Cold Crazy (Queen cover)
Motorbreath
Seek & Destroy
Friday, 17 July 2009
Graspop metal meeting (GMM) June 26-28
Bogfires visited the famous Graspop Metal meeting in Belgium, June 26.-29.2009. The Graspop festival was first organized in year 1986 as a local pop festival. In 1993-1994 Bob Schumacher joined forces with the original organizers and together they changed the format into a genuine metal festival. Over two decades later Graspop is one of the biggest and famous metal festivals in Europe, and in the course of its history over 250 bands have performed in the festival, including the biggest names in the metal genre, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, Slayer, Megadeath, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and so on. This year’s headliners were Mötley Crüe, Slipknot, Marilyn Manson and Nightwish. Besided Nightwish the only Finnish band performing at Graspop was Children of Bodom. Both Finnish acts had their gigs on Sunday, so we had plenty of time to check out the other interesting bands, such as Heaven & Hell, Down and Mötley Crüe on Friday and Delain, Kataklysm, Volbeat, Journey and Slipknot on Saturday. Journey, an American band that was formed in the early 70’s by former members of Santana, was alive and well, with their new singer, Arnel Pineda from Philipines. The band had found the singer on YouTube singing covers of Journey songs. Interestingly, all Children of Bodom members were really excited to see Journey’s show on Saturday. The headliner Slipknot played a solid show with no surprises. On Sunday, Lamb of God had an early slot at one in the afternoon, but once again put up an energetic and sharp performance. Other interesting shows on Sunday were Suicidal Tendencies and Chicken foot, an all star line-up with members from Van Halen, Red Hot Chili Peppers and maestro Satriani on the guitar. Nightwish performed on the main stage before the official headliner Marilyn Manson at eight on Sunday evening. Their hour and a half set list differed a little from the previous festival appearance in Finland, featuring for example Ghost Love Score from Once and title track Wishmaster. Children of Bodom had a later slot, headlining the second stage (a tent) at ten. This is how the band bassist Henkka describes his experiences of Graspop on the band website: “Sunday was sort a reunion feeling, when Lamb Of God and God Forbid was playing too. And Suicidal. Saturday we managed to get to the festival in time to see Journey. We played on Sunday, and the tent was really hot. But the crowd was amazing. Best Graspop show ever for us”. Bogfires would like to thank COB and Nightwish for their generosity and hospitality once again.Saturday, 11 July 2009
COB, NW & HIM mentioned in the metal history of the Classic Rock mag
The British "Classic Rock" magazine writes the story of metal in its Summer 2009 (#134) issue. Of the Finns are represented the big three:
Children Of Bodom's "Sixpounder" and Nightwish's "Wish I Was An Angel" (?!? wrong name doesn't necessarily improve the credibility...;) are mentioned as "songs that forged metal" from 2000 onwards (among with nine other songs from Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, In Flames, Disturbed, Opeth, System Of A Down, Immortal, Clutch, and Mastodon).
HIM in turn is briefly mentioned as one of the "five goth metal bands inspired by the sound of the Sisters Of Mercy (with Lacuna Coil, Type O Negative, Rammstein, and Marilyn Manson - hmm...).
Descriptions:
Sixpounder - Children Of Bodom (p.71)
"This Finnish band really broke out into the international scene with the Hate Crew Deathroll album. And "Sixpounder" is a definitive example of why it happened. The fierce extremity of old is still in evidence, but it has been given a new coat of classic metal values. The song roars right in your face, but it also still possesses sufficient finesse to be more than just musical concrete. It's got class."
Wish I Had An Angel - Nightwish (p. 71)
"More than any other song, this is the best example of the way that Nightwish could combine their goth-metal music with the soaring operatic vocals of Tarja Turunen., and encapsulate it all in what is essentially a finely tuned pop song. There's a charismatic sensibility here, overcoming any uneasiness in the increasingly fractured relationship between singer and band. This suggests what might have been had they remainded together."
HIM (p.70)
"Goth imagery + Bon Jovi-esque stadium rock powerchords x dandy frontman = pant-moistening superstardom. Download: Join Me In Death"
Hmm, hmm, hmm...
TMK @ Schiphol Airport
Children Of Bodom's "Sixpounder" and Nightwish's "Wish I Was An Angel" (?!? wrong name doesn't necessarily improve the credibility...;) are mentioned as "songs that forged metal" from 2000 onwards (among with nine other songs from Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, In Flames, Disturbed, Opeth, System Of A Down, Immortal, Clutch, and Mastodon).
HIM in turn is briefly mentioned as one of the "five goth metal bands inspired by the sound of the Sisters Of Mercy (with Lacuna Coil, Type O Negative, Rammstein, and Marilyn Manson - hmm...).
Descriptions:
Sixpounder - Children Of Bodom (p.71)
"This Finnish band really broke out into the international scene with the Hate Crew Deathroll album. And "Sixpounder" is a definitive example of why it happened. The fierce extremity of old is still in evidence, but it has been given a new coat of classic metal values. The song roars right in your face, but it also still possesses sufficient finesse to be more than just musical concrete. It's got class."
Wish I Had An Angel - Nightwish (p. 71)
"More than any other song, this is the best example of the way that Nightwish could combine their goth-metal music with the soaring operatic vocals of Tarja Turunen., and encapsulate it all in what is essentially a finely tuned pop song. There's a charismatic sensibility here, overcoming any uneasiness in the increasingly fractured relationship between singer and band. This suggests what might have been had they remainded together."
HIM (p.70)
"Goth imagery + Bon Jovi-esque stadium rock powerchords x dandy frontman = pant-moistening superstardom. Download: Join Me In Death"
Hmm, hmm, hmm...
TMK @ Schiphol Airport
Thursday, 9 July 2009
Heavy metal in Seoul
As noted already during my earlier visits to Seoul, the Korean metal circles seem to be very small, or at least it is very difficult to find information about gigs, bands or anything. Foreign bands seem to rarely visit the country, and local concerts are scarce as well.
There is, however, a special event called"Asia Metal Festival 2009" taking place in the Rolling Hall this Saturday (unfortunately after I've left the city), but without any bigger names on the list: http://www.myspace.com/asiametalfestival.
According to the locals, the music market here is dominated by local pop artists and bands. CD sales are marginal, as most of the music is downloaded from the web (with the exception of classical music). A visit to the music department of the Kyobo bookstore in Gwanghwamun, practically the only decent CD shop I've found, however reveals that there is a relatively good collection of metal CDs from better known foreign bands available. The brand new "Black Clouds & Silver Linings" album of Dream Theater is currently the only metal album visibly advertised, positioned on the 5th place in the store's list and accompanied with an article in the "Hottracks" music magazine. Probably the band's 2006 concert in Seoul is still paying off.
The only Finnish representatives in the store are Nightwish, Sonata Arctica and HIM, the last mentioned with the widest selection of albums, as well as a T-shirt, available.
And talking about metal T-shirts, they are extremely rarely worn on the streets. Only one from Black Sabbath spotted...
TMK
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