Korpiklaani And The Tales Of The Forest

Korpiklaani are one of Finland's leading folk metal bands, and among my personal favorites. It's because of this that back in April 2006, following the release of "Tales Along This Road", I sent the band an interview. Be it lack of communication, technical problems, or just that one of the guilty parties drinking too much beer, it took the interview 10 months to reach me back (after I managed to revise it a bit), that being while the band is already working on a brand new album. But, as the famous saying goes, its better late than never, so there's no reason not to move the clock backwards, drink some more beer and discuss the experiences and songs we've been through in the near… and distant, past.

First of all, I'm glad to see a new Korpiklaani release, but it's actually haven't been that long since your 2nd album came out. Why did you decided to work on another one so quickly?

We didn't really decide that. We never do. We don't have the exact schedule planned for the albums. We record an album when we think that we have enough good songs to fill an album. Of course, we have to plan ahead at least a bit because we have to book the studio and everything and of course the record company wants to get some kind of a schedule as well so that they can plan their part as well.

On "Voice of Wilderness" I felt it flows on the same road as your first album, but with your new album, you took it to some-sort of a different path. Do you feel the same about this?

At least we never intentionally took a different road. The musical style may of course have changed but that is just natural progression and not a pre-thought decision. The songs just turn out the way they do, we never decide beforehand what kind of song we are going write now. If you have followed our career from the Shaman days to the present day you can clearly see the path we've traveled. The first Shaman album and the latest Korpiklaani album could be from different bands, but still there never was any intentional or unintentional change in the musical style. Just a natural progression.

In "Tales Along This Road" you can hear, of course, this is still Korpiklaani, but you can also sense some new influences, what can you tell us about these? Are these influences now more apparent since now you can have more versatility with the melodies, having a new Accordion player?

The addition of a permanent accordion player did of course change the band but not so much when it comes to the song writing, because on "Tales Along This Road" 90% of the songs were still written by Jonne [Vocals & Guitar]. The bigger change was in the overall sound of the band because the accordion was now present on every song and not only as a guest instrument on a track or two. That gave the album a more folky sound even though the music itself went to more metal direction. In my opinion at least! The change will be bigger on the new album "Tervaskanto" that will come out in May 2007, because there will be, I think, 5 or 6 songs written by Juho [Accordion]. It will still sound exactly like Korpiklaani but the songs are different to the one's written by Jonne.

Speaking of your new Accordion player, how did he join the band and become a regular member?

After the release of "Voice Of Wilderness" Juho himself contacted Jonne and basically said that "I play accordion, I want to be in your band." The decision wasn't hard because he was a great musician and a nice bloke as well!

On each of your previous albums you used guests, if on instruments, or voices. Did you take anyone to help you with the new album?

If we talk about "Tales Along This Road", we used mainly only one guest, but on the other hand he did a lot of stuff for us. A friend of ours, Mr. Virva Holtiton, wrote all the Finnish lyrics, and also played his Kantele on one of the tracks and did also some traditional throat singing. He and his Kantele also appeared on the stage with us in Turku, Finland!

Why did you choose to put the song "Happy Little Boozer" as an opener for the new album? As I feel, it fits more to the "old" Korpiklaani style, rather then what most of the songs on this album sound like.

You really should ask that from Jonne, because he was responsible for the track order. I never thought that there was anything special about that song being the opener. In our ears the album is just continuation to the previous one, and we didn't really think that there were any songs that were somehow different. So, to answer your question shortly: Why not?

Why do you use a "Beer Song" on every album?

Do we? Maybe so. I've read somewhere some guidelines for starting writers and although it was meant for "real" writers and not musicians I think they were good for song lyrics as well. One of the main rules was that "Write only about the things that you know." Of course we could write songs about anything, but that wouldn't be real us.

Does it have a connection to the fact you became more popular in Germany, which is known for their Beer-Crowds?

No, because we were writing beer songs before we were anything in Germany. In Finland there's just as much "Beer Crowd" in concerts as well. As I said before, that I read somewhere that a writer should only write about the things that he/she knows – then it should not really be a surprise to anyone that we occasionally have a song or two about different kinds of alcohol.

Who do you think handles beer better and have the tastiest brands, the mighty Finns or the large-bellied Germans?

I'm not a beer expert and definitely not qualified to judge anyone's beers. The main difference between Finnish and German beers is that all the mainstream beer in Finland are very much alike but in Germany there's a lot of variety in the mainstream as well. Then again, in Finland there are many smaller breweries outside the mainstream and they are just as good and vary as the German ones.

Are Korpiklaani live performances always wild and full of alcohol or do you make some of them a little more subtle so people can see and hear your music more clearly? Is it different for every country / place?

I'd say that subtle is not the best word to describe our concerts. All our concerts follow pretty much the same formula: We start with full blast, maybe one or two slightly slower songs in the middle of the set and then we end with the full blast!

As I mentioned your live performances, and Germany, I was lucky to see you guys perform at the well-known Wacken Open Air festival. Were you excited about this concert? How was it for you?

I can of course speak only for myself, but I am quite sure that every one of us was really excited about that, but also a bit scared. It is a huge festival and still, after all our own tours we were not sure how the reception would be. As it turned out, it was brilliant. Maybe we were a bit nervous during the first few minutes but the audience was huge and they were all enjoying it so we got over it pretty fast.

Can you tell us the craziest thing that happened to you during Tours?

I can't remember anything that I would describe as crazy. There's a lot of funny stuff going on all the time but usually it's always so much connected to that time and place and if I tell them now, those stories will just make everyone else roll their eyes and think "my god, he's boring".

I know you have a connection with other Finnish Folk Metal acts, like Finntroll, or Moonsorrow… What can you tell about this? Does it include playing / being guests in each other's bands sometimes?

As you probably know, Jonne was a guest musician in Finntroll for two years so there's at least quite strong connection. Of course we know the musicians and all because in a country sized like Finland it would be impossible to NOT to meet them! However, we are not so much in contact with them and as far as I know there's not much musical interaction going on either.

Talking about Finnish Folk Metal bands, it appears that most of them have a strong Finnish culture bond, singing about Finland's folklore in their mother language. Korpiklaani on the other hand, sing mainly in English and have some other influences too. What do you think, apart from what I mentioned, makes Korpiklaani different than other acts and why do you get these differences?

As far as we are concerned there are two main differences. First of all, the roots of Korpiklaani are in traditional Sami folk music and the metal part of the music came later. Many of the bands in the same genre are basically pure metal bands with the folk melodies and instruments added on top of it. The second difference is that we use genuine traditional instruments. If you hear a violin on our album you can be sure that it really is a violin. No synths, no plastic.

Back to your new album, what can you tell about the meaning behind the album title "Tales Along This Road"? Do you have a specific concept behind the album, or as the title hints, it is many different tales combined into one "book"?

The story behind the name is basically the idea of our life being the road we travel and all the things that happen or we do are stories we carry with us and pass on to the next to come. The album itself is not a concept album in the sense of for example King Diamond's "Abigail" or Jethro Tull's "Thick As A Brick". Most of the songs, the Finnish ones at least, are connected thematically but not story-wise. I think the biggest reason why they sound so connected is the poetical form of them. They were written by a friend of ours, Mr. Virva Holtiton, and he used this old Finnish poetic Kalevala-measure in them.

What do you think about the growing interest in the Folk Metal genre? Is it positive that more and more bands play this sort of style?

In general I think that music is probably the best way for a teenager to spend his time. Whether it is folk metal, jazz, prog rock or whatever, it doesn't matter. So, if people start to play folk metal because they want to play that kind of music, it's good. If people start to play folk metal just because it's popular, it's bad. Whatever you do, it should be something that comes from inside of you and not something that you think that people want to see you do.

This small folk metal boom is good at least in that way that it introduces people to their own past. In my opinion it is important to know where you come from and I believe that at least some of these folk metal bands have introduced some people to their own history. And knowing the past is always good. The down side of this boom is that there are some bands that are actually using this music to promote their racial beliefs and possible extreme nationalist values.

Back in the days you where called Shaman, did it bother you that another band (Shaman, from Brazil) used this name and became familiar with it? Was this the reason you chose to change your name at the end?

That was exactly the reason why we changed our name. And we didn't decide to change the name, we were forced to. After all, I think it worked for us. Shaman is not so original name and there probably is thousand bands named Shaman around the world but I am pretty sure that we are the only Korpiklaani!

If I remember correctly your last song at Wacken was "Il Lea Voibmi" from the Shaman period. Do you regularly use songs from that time?

That is the only Shaman-era song we play these days. I once listened through both Shaman albums and even the old Shamaani Duo album just to see if there is anything that we could possible fit in our live set. There is a lot of interesting stuff that I believe quite many of our older fans would like to hear, but the music is just so different that it wouldn't really suit to the current band and the current live set.

Do you think that what you did with Shaman will re-appear in some-sort of way through Korpiklaani, if in certain songs, or style?

The past is always there, you can't escape it. Musically I don't think we'll be going that far back, but with this band you can never really be sure of anything!

What does the future hold for Korpiklaani?

The next album is already in the works and if all goes as planned it will come out in May 2007. The festival season 2007 will start from Hungary in March and from then on it's pretty much a festival appearance or two every weekend by the end of the summer.

Thank you very much for answering, any wise words for your loyal followers here in Israel?

The wisest thing would probably be to stop thinking that you could actually get something wise out of us!