N°34 APOCALYPTICA - QUUTAMO

"Contemporary Cello Music Form Finland". This is how Eicca Toppinen once described his band during a concert I attained. Don't really remember which of the four concerts it was but I can tell you that I've enjoyed every one of them. Apocalyptica is special, it's rare and it's difficult if you don't like it with the first notes you hear.

Seven albums the Fins have already. It started off in 1993 when four cellists tried to translate well known metal and rock song to four electrical cello's. Eicca (the big one with the long blond hair), Perttu Kivilaakso (the small one usually playing without a shirt, Paavo Lötjönen (the black haired dude with the slick haircut) and Mikko Siren (on drums) are the current members. I did say FOUR cello's because it started of as a quartet of cello players but evolved to a fourtet of 3 celllo musicians and someone on drums.

Perttu only joined in around 2000. Before him Max Lilja played in the band untill 2002. I used to call him the assasin cellist since he always wore John Lennon sunglasses on stage and always sat still as a statue on his chair. Antero Manninen is the other fprmer member but I never seen him perform. Antero was replaced by Perttu and Max was replaced by the drums.

Apocalyptica created their fame when producing a first album called 'Apocalyptica Plays Metallica By Four Cello's'. This album contained contemporary versions of Enter Sandman, Master Of Puppets and The Unforgiven. They continued with their second album called 'Inquisition Symphonie' which also contained music from other metal band than Metallica's. On this album you'll find a great translation of One (Metallica), Refuse/Resist (Sepultura) or Domination (Pantera).

In 2003 their first album with self written compositions would mean their biggest breakthrough. 'Reflection' is a beautifull album filled with cello music. No more but certainly no less. Two years later they continues producing self composed songs but the drums kicked in on this album. This album called 'Apocalyptica' contains a first song with lyrics. The Apocalyptica lyrics are always sung by guests but amongst these guest we have some really big names such as Nina Hagen or Gavin Rossdale.

In 2006 the boys released an album called 'A Decade Of Reinventing The Cello' with their best works so far. this album was followed by the utterly awesome 'Worlds Collide'. Dave Lombardo and Corey Taylor performed on this album. Then it took them 3 years to created a complete symphony and although released last year I must admit I haven't heared it yet. But I've been told it's not a cd with separate songs but it's more like a true Symphonie all together. My guess it's probably another great shot at bringing classical instruments into the rock and metal scène.

So I've seen them perform four times already and I am kind off looking forward to see them a fifth time this year at Pukkelpop. They're not really a festival band in my opinion but then again I won't miss out on them and I'm pretty sure I will enjoy them as I did with their previous gigs. I hope you'll enjoy this video as well:

Oh and if anyone understand what Quutamo means in Finnish you might start think about the next link. I didn't knew what it meant (thank you google) since the ony Finnish I speak is the translation of the Metallica song 'One', once annouced by Eicca as 'Uutse'.

N°4 LORDI - HARD ROCK HALLELUJAH

Off course I've chosen to walk the Eurovision contest path especially because I'll always  remember where I was when this song won the contest in 2006. I was in holiday in Rhodos, Greece at that time and I didn't watch any of the songs participating that year. Actually I wasn't really aware there was this metal rockband from Finland wearing masks and cosstumes. But as soon as I heared the news I was thrilled that a band like this actually won.

The day after I even had a discussion with a Greek lady who thought the monsters should have won since that wasn't even music and she couldn't see if they sang it live. Off course they roared it live and off course the show was more important than the song itself but then again it was a pretty damn good song. Once I heared a stripped down version on the radio sang by a Belgian singer, playing it on an acooustic guitar and it really really sounded good. If any song holds it up when played accoustic it's a damn good song and I'm saying this with Nirvana in the back of my mind.

Anyway, Lordi. They're from Finland and they all wear masks and go by beast names. They even wore their mask throughout the whole week at the contest. Up till now there's merely speculations on who's who in the band. Another fact is that the Rovaniemi square in Rovaniemi, Finland was renamed to Lordi Square after their victory in 2006. They made 8 albums in the past 11 years and they toured with bands like Nightwish and Type-O-Negative.

Lordi also participated in creating two movies. The Kin came out in 2004 and is a shortfilm about a novelist trying to publish a book about superhuman monsters (played by the bandmembers) who kill people. The band co-wrote this short movie but although they participate in it at no point their music is played.

In 2008 they wrote a complete movie called Dark Floors. This ones about an autistic girl who gets stuck in a hospital elevator together with some other people. When they finally reach the next floor the hospital is abandoned apart from some monsters which are again the Lordi group members. Only in the end credits you'll hear a Lordi song.

As you can read there's plenty to tell about these crazy Fins but i'll leave it for now. Just open up your mind, watch and listen to their performance in the 2006 Eurovision Song Contest Finals.