Interviews

Recently I had the privilege of catching up with Tumppi from Adamantra who has been a very busy lad lately with the band, upcoming albums, and getting involved for the latest Metallimessu record.  

 

Suzi: How are you all at camp Adamantra?

Tumppi: We’re doing just fine, thanx for asking! The band is pretty hyped as the final mixing session is booked for October. After that the mastering session and then we’ll have the album in our hands! There is a good and excited atmosphere in the band, and we are all eager to finally be able to rock the stages!

 

Adamantra formed in 2005; how did you all get together initially?

I guess the real starting point for this band was when Jukka and Panu realised that (though been friends for a long time and played in the same projects from high school) they both were composing on their own and really needed some way to get it out in the open. Well, naturally they concluded that they were lacking a band;=) Some riffs had been haunting them from the times of an earlier prog-symphonic metal band Bride Adorned (that both Jukka and Panu were involved in, as well as I, Tumppi) and different ideas started cooking.

So, Panu and Jukka did some primitive demos with their computers and started to recruit the members that would later form Adamantra. Mikko (Sepponen, drums) was a friend of Jukka’s and was pretty soon rehearsing the first riffs with Jukka and Panu. They needed a singer, obviously, and tried out some vocalists for the job. Eventually, Jukka called me and asked me if I was interested in helping them out with “this powerish prog-demo of ours”.  By that time, Tommi (Ahtila, guitar) was already in the band bringing his songs to the rehearsals. So, there was the basic form of Adamantra, a bunch of dudes bringing Jukka’s and Panu’s musical perversions to life ;=)

Janne (Koivula, keys) was in the band’s first live line-up, later to be replaced by the amazing Risto (Kupiainen).

 

Your debut album was mixed by Mikko Mustonen who has previously worked with Northern Kings. What was it like getting him involved?

Getting Mikko on board was a true blessing, since he is a dear friend of ours from our early days (we actually were at the same high school and formed Bride Adorned back then). We’ve kept in touch as the time’s been passing by, so Mikko was a natural choice for the mixing of the album. We actually tried to get him to produce the whole thing but unfortunately were unable to get this busy producer-guru away from his other projects (Northern Kings, Finnish Idols 2007-winner Ari Koivunen etc.)

Mikko mixed us three demo-mixes earlier this year (two of those are released to our MySpace-site as we speak, ‘Shattered’ and ‘Beyond Disillusions’) to get some feedback on the songs. They were extremely well received (which was the Demo Of The Month in May’s issue of Soundi and Demo Of The Month in Imperiumi.net), by both labels and media. This promo pretty much nailed it down, who will be mixing the album, that is ;=)

 

You describe yourselves and your music "with an amount of overstatements to match a copy of the Oxford Dictionary of English". - I think that's a brilliant statement! I put the challenge to you to come up with one of your most creative, highly exaggerated overstatements regarding your music :)

What do you get when you mix the magician of Fantasia with the elegiacs of an ancient Smyrnan epigrammatist? You probably know the answer already ;=)

 

In 2007 you locked yourselves in the premises of D-Studio and vowed to stay in there until you'd worked out an incredible album. What was that experience like?

The guys behind D-Studio are dear friends of ours, so the choice for the recordings to be made was quite easy. I believe that we’ve managed to capture the magical atmosphere pretty nicely on the album – but You’ll have to wait a bit longer to get a glimpse of what is cooking there;=) In the mean time, enjoy the few tasters (but FULL songs) in our MySpace!

 

The album came out late August of this year. It's still early days but how well do you think it will be received?

Well, we are finalising the plans for the official album release as we speak and I think the album will be released sometime in the beginning of 2009. We’ll just have to wait and see but the feeling from the press and fans that’ve checked out the sample songs is that this release is going to something of an event. Let’s see what happens..I think that the album offers something good for the “normal” consumer of Progressive Metal. There are (of course) some “power metallish” and classical, epic influences every here and there but I believe that the album will be fairly accepted in different genres of fans, especially since the dish to be served is quite versatile.

 

Tumppi, you will be featured on an upcoming Metallimessu album - how did that come about?

Mr. Mustonen needed some backing vocals to the project that could read notes and deliver the job in short time. My background is from the Chamber Choir of our high school, so I offered my help in the matter. After recording the different choir parts with a few friends I also did some needed lead vocals backings. They were also one lead singer short so I did the lead vocals on one of the hymns.

When asked about if I had any objections in singing religious stuff, the answer was a short one. I’d be happy to do it.

 

As a Christian myself, I think it's an awesome idea to get old-school hymns reworked into "new-school" metal masterpieces. What's been your experience with Metallimessu and its audience?

I think the Christian community have accepted the idea of arranging familiar hymns in the vein of metal fairly well. But, of course there are also those who do not understand or tolerate it. Anyway, I heard that the churches arranging these Metal Masses have been packed with people! I haven’t had a chance to take part in those, I only sing on the album.

My experience was extremely good! I consider myself a spiritual person, though not involved in the Church or any other religion. I try to keep an open mind about everything and avoid prejudices.

  

What can fans and potential fans expect from a live Adamantra performance?

Metal, epic stories, wild energy accompanied with good looking lads. Oh yeah, and good music ;=) It is unlikely you will leave our gig venue disappointed :D

 

What's the funniest thing that's happened to you at a gig so far?

Usually the funniest things are not that funny when they happen but get a bit amusing afterwards! At one gig I was waving my hair and moshing like a maniac. After a few songs I realised that I had a little too much on, so I tried to pull my shirt off. The shirt, however, had a mind of its own, of course! It was way too sweaty to come off so I was dancing around the stage in the midst of the song, trying to pull the shirt over my head. The result was that I had to pull the shirt back down. That didn’t have any affect whatsoever on the moshing! After the gig I was trying to find out just what had been going on. My necklace had tangled to my hair, and when I pulled my shirt off backstage I lost quite a bit of it (hair, not the shirt ;=)

You never know what’s going to happen in a live situation!

 

And finally, would Adamantra ever be persuaded to perform at Eurovision?

Hmm..Let me say that there would be a lot of persuading in the picture! There’s nothing wrong in the Eurovision Song Contest but I doubt Adamantra ever striving to get to the Contest. The ESC’s usually have a nice variety of songs with exotic scales and rhythms (from countries like Turkey, Albania, Azerbaijan, Armenia etc.) so Adamantra wouldn’t probably be so different from the other stuff in the ESC’s. But our music isn’t something representing something Finnish..if that is the meaning of the song contest, as some have stated here in our homeland. However, never say never.

Suzi