AMORPHIS: New Audio Interview With ESA HOLOPAINEN Available

A 19-minute audio interview with AMORPHIS guitarist Esa Holopainen conducted last month by Vassil Varbanov of Bulgaria's Tangra Mega Rock is available for download at this location (MP3, 4.3 MB). A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

Tangra Mega Rock: Is [your new vocalist Tomi Joutsen] a pleasant guy to be on tour with?

Esa: He's a great guy! When he came in the band, we did those 4-5 weeks in the States — this was our first tour with him. In the course of time we found out not only he's a great vocalist, but also what kind of a person he is. We have a very good chemistry, and he's definitely one of us now. He understands our black humor, as we joke all the time on tour, and he's a great guy, very down to earth and the last person who's gonna pretend being a rock star.

Tangra Mega Rock: What about you? Do you consider yourself a guitar god?

Esa: Ha-ha, no! Definitely not, even though I'm involved in the album "Guitar Heroes", which is going to be released here in Finland. I think I'm a very down-to-earth person as well. Of course I appreciate when somebody likes what I'm doing, but I'm definitely not a guitar hero or something.

Tangra Mega Rock: Is it true that six years ago, when you did this show in Macedonia, you were forced to land at Sofia Airport because of a snow storm?

Esa: Yes, that's really true. We were heading to this festival in Macedonia and the trip became unbelievable, because the plane couldn't land in Skopje due to the really bad weather. The concert's organizers were on the same plane with us and decided to land in Sofia. It was better to leave the plane there and book a car to Macedonia. So yes, we stayed at your airport and then were driven from Sofia to Skopje. It was very, very weird.

Tangra Mega Rock: Now you'll visit Sofia to play at the 20 Years Nuclear Blast Festival together with your label mates EDGUY, BENEDICTION and AGATHODAIMON. Do you have friends among these bands or they’re just good colleagues of yours?

Esa: We've met EDGUY at a couple of festivals and we know them. We toured with BENEDICTION over ten years ago, so we're familiar with them, too. We all do very different types of music, so I think it will be a good package in Sofia.

Tangra Mega Rock: Two more questions to go. In the booklet of "Silent Waters" we can read that the new AMORPHIS logo has been designed by a girl with a very Bulgarian sounding name — Viara Gentchev... We tracked her on the Internet and found out she's based in Finland doing design and artwork stuff, as well as DJ-ing in clubs. How did the whole thing happen?

Esa: Our bass player Niclas Etelavuori knows her very well. They're close friends and... I think he met her a year or two ago and she told him about her art study. She tried drawing a new AMORPHIS logo and it became pretty nice. It also fit the artwork for our new album very well.

Read more at www.radiotangra.com.