Finland is a country of many faces, one of them is for sure metal music. The amount of bands performing within this type is astonishing. Thanks to the courtesy of the leader and singer Petri Eskelinen of Finnish gothic metal band Rapture which was a headliner during the first Finland Metal Night , 26.04.2008 we can travel thorough the history of the band, music inspirations and find out a little about Finnish melancholy hidden in their music.
DP: Rapture has released so far three studio records, so definitely you
are not freshmen’s on the music stage, when project Rapture was brought
to life?Petri: Our musical adventure began around 11 years ago, after my first band split up. Samuel Ruotsalainen our previous drummer and Tomi Ullgren - guitarist asked me to sing with their band…I didn’t take me lot of time to say: “yes! why not!?!”
DP: Was it ‘love at first sight’ or you had some different expectations?
Petri: Well, it’s something that I’ve been never thinking about to much. I guess it was, I like music that they make and they like my singing. Is this not a perfect match?
DP: Your music inspirations… Where do you find them?
Petri: Well I am taking directly from “life” in general… It’s very hard to speak about my inspirations, for the reason my music background is very wide. I listen to so many different types of music - from metal to punk and hard-core and pop, industrial, drum&bass.
DP: Having so broad musical horizons you must have much to say within the lyrics you create? What is the idea hidden in Rapture compositions?
Petri: It’s talking about things that people would rather try to put behind them. We just want to draw a picture of something. The music is also very melancholic … I would compare it to the old, gothic era of Paradise Lost, maybe some Anathema. Many people say that we sound like the “Brave Murder Day” era of Katatonia. I think lot of influences come from the early 90’s. What differ us from the other bands playing similar music is that they are from US. We have our own, I think different (Finnish) idea about how the lyrics should be written and the music composed, I guess it has more authentic melancholy, sadness and emotions for we are Finns . There must be something in it for the reason, we get lots of support from the people, who are saying that music we play and lyric we write have really, deeply touched them. It make them feel that is someone else there who is feeling in the same way, they’re not alone with those emotions.
DP: It is said that are three words characterizing metal music: fear, regret and loneliness. What do You think about giving people such bad emotions - it’s kind of catharsis for them?
Petri: Yes! I definitely think music should give extreme emotions to people, however I don’t see us giving them bad emotions, I see us giving sort of point of reference or a point where they can say: “Hey, I might not be alone with this”. We are sharing with them the things we have in our freaking minds. Art has always been a form of therapy for people.
DP: So as a music therapist (laugh) do you have any other medicines for the people, meaning side projects?
Petri: Yeah, few. Everyone of us have several different side projects in various stage of development, which sometimes differ a lot from what we do with Rapture. Me for example, I have another band, a hard-core group, the other it’s some kind of electronic music and ambient, drum&bass. Tomi (main guitar) plays in Impaled Nazarene (sic!) and Diablerie. Kimmo (guitar) plays in The Chant, Alexi (guitar, yes Rapture have 3 guitar players!)- in Fragile Hollow - he’s got a hundred projects going on. Our drummer - Pete - he has a couple of projects as well. Iain (bass) plays also in Fragile Hollow and few other bands also - he is very active.
DP: As I mentioned in the beginning of our interview you’ve released as far 3 studio albums, last one was run out in 2005. What are Your musical plans for the closest future?
Petri: We are writing new material, we hope to record demo by the end of the summer and then try to find a new label and the hopefully, hopefully, hopefully to record new album - early next year.
DP: How wonderful, I bet all your fans can’t wait the moment of realizing new CD. I bet you will gain today a new bunch of fans here in our country. How do You like Poland?
Petri: Ooo ! I like it a lot ! It is probably my fifth time in Poland. I’ve been to Warszawa, Kraków, Oświęcim, Gdynia. I love the people here - everybody is so nice, beer is cheap, food is cheap. (laugh). I know from the very close and trustworthy source that some of our band members have especially appreciated local bear called Lech and Tyskie with raspberry juice. This is thing we definitely do not have in Finland!
DP: Have You ever played, performed for polish audience?
Petri. No, this will be our first time. For Rapture this is the second concert outside of Finland. We’ve played one show in Estonia and now we are here. So lets see what it will be like, but knowing you Poles we will rock together this club to the roots.
