Gigs and Video

Now that the darkness and cold is already upon us and soon Halloween will open the door the realm of death season, it's a perfect time to reflect on the past year. Useful for everyone, but in here, I'll just dwell on the events of the band. 

It's been quite a good year, especially with live events. Even when the epidemic was still holding us hostage and preventing gigging for many, there were more chances for us to play than any of the previous years. It's quite remarkable. I'll even go as far as saying that this year has been a defining one in that respect.

First, there was Turku Band Festival, which we were already chosen to the previous year, only that time it was a streamed event, as no live audience was allowed. Because of Covid, just as a reminder. So this year we were able to participate live, in a small venue near Turku. There was a reasonable amount of people, considering the circumstances: One band had had to cancel due to illness. 

At this time I had also started arranging a gig to Helsinki, at Hard Rock House, so I asked that band to join us. So, in March we had a live event at hard Rock House, with Grand Sorceress. It was their first appearance live. I had also asked a Turku/Helsinki based band, The UFO Cult to join us, but they were unable to, at such a short notice. But their lead singer dropped in anyway, and we had a nice little chat. The few people who were there, on a quiet Thursday night, seemed to like what they heard.

Even when we had a little problem with our lap top, and our synth tracks would not play... Unfortunately we were unable to arrange a more well known local band to the event, who would have attracted more people. But there are always some curious music lovers, who come to check out new bands just for the fun of it. I like to do that every now and then as well..

Turns out The UFO Cult were arranging a live event for the summer, at Bar Loose, and us and Grand Sorceress seemed to fit well with their stuff. So, there would be another Helsinki gig for Hateful Chains, this time in the center. But before that, there was Monsters of Turku. 

We've been arranging this event with our drummer for several times now during these past years, this time, we scheduled it for May 14th at Utopia Club, Turku. Again, getting bands to come wasn't easy, reason being maybe the after math of the epidemic, which meant many bands were not in shape to play live yet. But Ultra Noir, our trusted friends who've joined us several times already, agreed to come. Then, I contacted an Indie band from Turku and just asked them to come. Because that's what I apparently like to do, and I actually liked one of their songs. So, we had a Monsters of Turku-event with Ultra Noir and Tender Lakes. 

A successful event with the audience with us from start to finish. We tested a few new songs from  the up-coming album and they were received well. Like a hot knife in butter... The advertisement I decided to put into the vent seemed to work out as well: One person from the audience told me they came all the way from Tampere to see us, which really warmed my heart. 

Next stop, Helsinki: In July we had the event with Grand Sorceress and The UFO Cult, which actually started to feel like a normal live night. Like they used to be. A dark cellar packed with people, all three bands with incredible energy and drive. Now this was that something we'd been missing for these last two years! The only down side was that we had a half an hour playing time, which meant we played in a bit of a hurry. But, we rocked anyway!

These pictures by Arto Alho

After this successful night we agreed with the another bands that we would try to arrange a night with the same bands to Turku. That would be a first gig in hometown for both Grand Sorceress and The UFO Cult. That chance came by in last September. I asked the local club for a free date, and it just happened that there was one available on September third. So we quickly decided to take that chance and have a three-band night at Turkus Utopia Club. We organized the event all together and went through the trouble of contacting all the media we could think of, like the local papers who made a story about UFO Cult, and Imperiumi, who make gig reports. We also marketed the event the best we could. The result was quite satisfying: familiar audience, but also first-timers to see us,  media personnel, and Imperiumis reporter who wrote a totally great review about the happening! And this time we played last, so we took full advantage of the time we had..

So, not a bad year, and hopefully next one will be a whole lot better!

Next, as you may have noticed, Crimson Sun music video came out on October 13th. We were quite happy to have its first ensiesitys on Sonic Seducer magazines web page! And it has already received such positive feedback! It's all thanks to the people who participated in making of the video, it's their performance, dancing and art that gave the video its spirit and atmosphere. 

There were some set backs in the production of it, which in the end were the reason for its delay. Because of course we shot it already a year ago, in October, on a beautiful beach surrounded by formidable rocks and dark woods. The theme of the setting sun in the song was reflected in the video and continued with a fire and the fire arts. The continuation of the theme could be seen in the candles in the scenes of the woman bathing, which activity is also mentioned in the song. The bathing scenes were possible to shoot only in January, which delayed the video in the first place. But, having shot everything at the start of the year seemed to be decently in time. 

So, the fire elements combined with the element of water gave the video enough structure and coherence to make it a rather good one, but originally I had planned to add some 3d- after effects after all the scenes were in order. Turns out this was more complicated than I knew. The person who first had agreed to create the after effects suddenly backed out and we were on our own...

I couldn't find a professional who would have enough time to do the effects, not in my social circles, not among people who knew people, not on-line either. Maybe the reason was that I had somewhat unreasonable expectations on what could be done as after effects? I guess I'll never know. On-line they said it's possible, but after all, no body had time to do them. I later heard from a person in film industry that there is a lack of professionals in that field here in Finland. So that perhaps explains something.

But what I've learned from this, is that everything must be planned better.  The video material must be good enough to not need any after effects. That is location, costumes, make-up and lights and first and foremost, a skillfull person behind the camera. Which I think we've had in both previous videos. Yeah, all that eats money. If not money, then time. Usually both! That's why it'll take some time before the next video will be shot. I'm already planning it and preparing costumes, already have one of two or three locations, have a make-up artist...and we have the next track ready. Just you wait

Here's Crimson Sun, if you haven't seen it yet :)

https://youtu.be/qWvO4zpkbsM

All the love and candle light for the rest of your year, Flora

 New Song and Video

We've been silently but relentlessly working on a new track and a musicvideo. The video is now on Youtube and the track on Bandcamp, probably soon on other platforms as well. It's been another unique journey with the music, recording and the process of video making.

Witnesses popped as a mocking, children's tune-like melody into my head, singing "We are God's organisation..." and developed from there, first into lyrics, then on a music sheet. I didn't have a clear picture of the guitars, like I usually do, just the vocals, chords and that it had to have this "tribal" beat, like in many punkish songs. So we processed the structure and basic elements with Kimmo until we had something to present to others, and the whole band took it from there. So the music is made by the whole band rather than just me alone, which is what I'm keen to develop further.

"Witnesses" continues the themes heard in "Crimson Sun". It's about Jehovah's witnessess, pretty directly so. The lyrics and ideas to this and many other songs were formed after my encounter and discussions with the Witnesses, and it was part of my own journey out of religion and faith. These discussions were eye opening, they helped me to see the problems of my own belief system, the religion I had been brought up with, and how cult-like that environment had actually been.

Jehovah's Witnesses are widely recognised as a cult, an organisation formed around an ideology, that attempts to control the lives of it's members on multiple levels. This is nowadays recognised in psychology as well, as more and more cult survivors are speaking out and bringing out their knowledge and experience to that field. If you have ever wondered why e g. Jehovah's Witnesses do what they do, why they dress certain way (they do have rules for that too...) why they make certain life choices other people wouldn't necessarily do, well, it's all because of the control of the ideology they follow. And, I would argue, also peer pressure. How ever peaceful and loving these people are, they are in a cult and in a mental prison. 

You can find out more about in here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP-tuAT9_3khttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP-tuAT9_3k

It's a great channel if you want to find out about more about Jehovah's Witnesses through an ex-member.

"Witnesses" is an attempt to describe the cult mentality and cognitive dissonance the people inside cults have. It's about Jehovah's Witnesses but it really could be about any cult, or anyone under the heavy veil of propaganda, like people in certain states, for example... The thought patters are very similar in any fringe religion and cult. The idea of being the only group that has the truth, that there is no salvation outside that group, the idea that you should give up your time to the organisation, that this life is not important anyway, only the next... 

Another level in the lyrics, which we also incorporated in the video, is the mental gymnastics people in cults constantly have to do to keep their world view and themselves together. All the information from outside, that questions their idelogy, have to be kept at bay or worked around. All the questions that rise up from within have to be locked away and twisted into something that fits the tight box of that ideology. This is why, in cults, outside influence, like TV, social media etc are frowned upon, and regular attendance to the groups meetings is encouraged, even forced. 

And, one more thing, it can be forced. The thought and behaviour control can be enforced. Although cults will love bomb you to get you in, and embrace you and welcome you in their midst, they are also prepared to turn their backs to you, if you don't behave. They will leave you to starve for the love they withheld from you, and die of loneliness. It's not always in the rulebook to shun misbehaving members, but in the case of Jehovah's Witnesses, it's a practice they base on the Bible itself.

Of course, there are people that are happy in these kinds of groups, those that really believe in the cause, some of them maybe seeing the opportunity for power. Others are not happy, and they are the ones leaving. They would rather suffer the shutting out of the group than be in that mental prison. I haven't personally been shut out from a group, (my church was, but that's another story) but I do count myself in as a cult survivor. As that, it is not my intention to just mock cult people, rather, I hope that through this process of making songs about this subject, I'll be able to understand them better and have more compassion. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xqpl3I8HWU

The video was shot  a while ago at a studio after a regular work day, where we recorded most of the instruments too. There are even some additional guitars of mine in there! We also used archive material from Finnish tv archives. They were free to use and we found some material about dancing and women's gymnastics in unison, which really fit to the theme. There are a couple of bits from a women's self defense course. The archive material is from the fifties and sixties, so our final artistic desicion was to turn everything into black and white and add some graininess to the studio bits as well, to fit it with the archive ones. The end result is quite satisfying, in my opinion. Hopefully you have enjoyed it as well!

Flora

 Live Giggin!

                                       

Live venues have been opening one by one here in Turku, Finland. First there were still some restrictions but even those last ones have now been removed. So every band has around here has been busy asking around for gig opportunities, and we have done our part. This month we have not one, but two live gigs, one we already had at Turku band Festival on March 19th and the other will be at Hard Rock House, Helsinki, on 31th March. Finally some action, finally out of town! We've been waiting for this!

As you may be aware, the work to get gigs starts months, sometimes a year ahead before the actual show date. In this case too. Turku Band Festival usually announces it's application process in October and the bands are chosen by the end of November. The festival was supposed to be held in January, like it always is, but because of the corona situation not being that good it got postponed. Luckily, the new date fit all our schedules. That is not self evident, since all of us have other music projects as well. 

Come March, it seemed like the situation would be better, at least when it came to vaccinations: more people covered. But the number of actual cases has been quite high, it's just that the disease itself isn't that serious or risky anymore for most people. Still, if you catch it, you stay home. So, the date of the festival was kept but two bands out of four actually cancelled due to illness. There was only us and Turku based Metal Band Rahko playing. Despite that there were people enough to fill the place, and even though the place itself was a bit remote. 

We played first, had a blast! The sound guy knew what he was doing. (and there was a sound guy!) We heard everything quite clearly to the stage and there were no complaint from the audience either. The set we had formed included a few new songs, so there was an element of surprise and excitement for us too. All went well and was over too soon! The only thing that went wrong was a pick that flew out of my fingers at the very last minute while playing Siouxsie on the Beach! Oh well, continued with hands only then...

Rahko was a full-on Metal band, a lot of influences from Black Metal (to my ears at least) with the female vocalist growling in Finnish. Incredible concept! It was all very well thought, energetic, aggressive music, sometimes adding beautiful clean vocal lines into the mix. The vocalist was very talented, in my opinion. I don't know how to really growl, I just sometimes use the false chords as a spice up to the vocals. But judging on how her clean vocals sounded right after growling and her speech after the gig, she knew her stuff! No sign of fatigue what so ever. Impressive! Alas, and unfortunately, they announced just at the end of the show, that this was her last one with them. Hopefully they'll all find the path that's right for them. It's just a bit sad to see a good thing end...

Anyway, Thank you Rahko, for allowing us to use your equipment and being there with us! We hope to see you around in the Turku live music scene! And Thank you Turku Band Festival for having us! We'd love to participate again!

So, next week we'll play at Roihuvuori, Helsinki, at a place called Hard Rock House. We asked about their Thursday Club slots maybe a year ago already, but then the restrictions kept many venues from opening. Even when these were at times lifted, all the venues just couldn't take the risk, having to arrange everything with the corona passes etc. So I had settled for nothing probably happening. but then they returned to us out of blue and suggested a slot 31th March. Yess! We asked around and got another band to join us: Grand Sorceress, a Turku based Fuzz Rock/Doom band. Since they had to cancel the festival this will be their debut gig! Makes me really happy to be able to help!

I hope you'll all just swarm Roihuvuori next Thursday! We'll have CD's for sale and we'll rock your socks off! And we have new material, so if you want to hear those new pieces, be there!

Love Flora/ Hateful Chains

 

                                    Yölento - Night Flight

Last week, on Valentine's Day, our first cover release came out on Bandcamp and all the other platforms. It's received a nice bit of attention, seeing as we did it of a Finnish song and in Finnish language as well. Onyx Music Reviews kindly wrote a praising piece about it, which you can read here:

https://onyxmusicreviews.com/2022/02/14/hateful-chains-yolento/

We've been working on this song for quite some time, so it was really nice to see the outcome and the fruit it hopefully will bear.

Yölento- project started out as a collaboration of just the two of us, Kimmo and me, but in the course of time we decided to make it a Hateful Chains release, partly because of the possible attention it might gather on the Finnish music scene, partly just for the fun of it, just to give out some ear candy while you wait for the next album and it's main single releases. We've been thinking out and processing ideas for other covers as well, so you'll probably hear about them at some point.  

The original song is written and composed by Juice Leskinen, one of the most important songwriters and especially lyricists in Finnish pop-music history. It was the title song on Juice Leskinen Grand Slam's album 1986 album Yölento. There were other songs that were hits, played on the radio and engraved in the minds of Finnish people for decades to come, but the title song wasn't such a piece, maybe because of it's length? I appreciate Juice's lyrics and talent in making catchy songs, but of course this album or his music in general doesn't represent the Goth aesthetic or mindset in any way. He's more a representative of the general Finnish style of pop-music.

But there was something about this song. Something in it reminded me of eightie's Post Punk or New Wave. It might have been something as so seemingly insignificant as the snare drum sound, which immediately took me to the soundscapes of  The Cure's slower and more melancholy songs. It might have been the repeating and, in the end, quite simple melodies, building up a song structure often found in afore mentioned band's songs too. It might have been the synth sounds, which were of course very eighties. Perhaps it was the combination of it all that just echoed the influences of the key music to my beloved genre. What ever it was, it spoke to me at a very deep level, and most of all due to the lyrics.

Yölento, or Night Flight, describes an aviator, or the poet himself as I have interpreted. He is out there,  flying over the night skies, in the turmoils of the world. He doesn't know which way is up, he's lost himself in the atmosphere of a whiches mount. Will there ever be a painless night? Will the work continue? Will we still be marching to peace and war, like soldiers? He ponders, and in the end, he just wants to rest in the lap of his lover. The word "rest" is repeated in the refrain in every verse, which to me emphasizes it's weight and meaning. It's one of the most beautiful thoughts I can imagine, that in your partners arms you rest and are relieved from all your woes, for a moment. 

So in the end, the reason we wanted to make this cover, was because it was a personal favourite. What better reason? So, we set out as a duo recording a favourite song, but further in the process we decided that it should be a HC release after all, and all players should be included. That meant all the instruments would be recorded by their players. And that's what we did: Drums were recorded in the drummer's cellar, literally, the bass and it's solo-part in our eight-floor-studio, as well as Guitars and my Vocals. Additional vocals were recorded by Kimmo and Ikke (the bass player), to give the choir parts a little more depth. We also knew musicians from the clasical music field in Turku, so we were able to record timpani with the kind assistance of our friend Olli Lehti, a percussionist. In my opinion, that gave the song a little extra something. 

For the cover image I chose to modify a picture of Otto Lilienthal, who was the father of both aviation and gliding. The Wright brothers based their work on his findings, at least that's what I found out reading about him. He tried out his inventions himself and sadly died as result of these experiments. So, I chose his character to represent the aviator, the poet or dreamer of this song. 

Our record label, Danse Macabre Records kindly released this song for us, and now that it's out there, I hope it will be the ear candy we sought to make it, while recording and processing of album number two still continues. So, thank you Danse Macabre!

Just before the release we also received news that Adrienne LaVey, the Youtuber who goes by the name Ligea Resurrected, had uploaded her review of our first album on our channel. It was marvelous, very analythic and a very praising review. I was quite beside myself, in a good way! I really enjoyed hearing someone describing our music from a listeners point of view, really getting it and also interpretting some things in way I hadn't even thought about. 

I'm very thankful for her doing this. It's not easy to get heard or seen even in the marginal scene of Goth music, so the work these influencers do is invaluable to all the small bands out there. So, thank you Adrienne! And thank you also Adele Sinnamon, of Onyx Music reviews, for giving a song in Finnish language such attention!

Yours, Flora

 Plunge into the year 2022

Ok, so the start of the year hasn't been that great, pandemic-wise. Cases have been on the rise so badly, that venues have closed and events have been cancelled. Same old, all over again. I don't know what to think anymore. It seems like a never ending cycle. Spring and summer comes and things get eased up again, venues open, people go to gigs like they used to. Come fall and winter, everything escalates into that miserable limbo where nothing happens and you just wait. Like winter wouldn't be like that already, without the pandemic!

This whole thing has had an effect on us as group. It feels like endless waiting. We are working to advance the music, the possibilities and chaces to play live, but it all seems to be happening in a slower pace. We have to work regular jobs, of course, like everyone else. That takes it's toll, now more than usual, because there are no opportunities to play to an audience and wind up and relax. Which is the salt of this occupation. It feels like we are not allowed to be musicians. And it's been like that for all of these years during the pandemic. Performing arts is the field that has been restricted by a heavier hand than most occupations, including bars and restaurants. Why that is, beats me. It must be the easiest way, and culture folk are expendable. They should get a real job anyway. 

Of course, I understand that measures have to be taken and everything must be done to keep the number of cases low in order not to strain the health system to much. The un-fairness of it just bugs me. But there's no other choice really, than to sit it through and hope for better. That's all we can do as a group, for that matter. Even though it seems like we're just floating in limbo and things don't seem to go forward, and we're just waiting for our turn forever, the reality is that we are doing something, all the time. Little advances, a rehearsal, a recording session, a new mix and mastering that needs to be listened to, a video shoot, an interview.  And not all of it has even reached social media yet, because not all of it at that stage yet. So we don't give up hope. We just work, prepare, then let it out, and see what it bcomes.

One of these things I have been pretty silent about recently is the Crimson Sun music video. We meant to shoot the final scenes before the end of the year, but there were curves on that road. The reason was basically the schedules of many different people, which are kind hard to put together. Must be familiar to anyone doing a group project. The scene involved a bath tub, which could be filmed around. Turns out it's not so easy to find. Hardly anyone has a bath tub in Finland anymore. But an acquaintance who lives a bit further happened to have one. And you could move it around! And the bathroom wall was a nice color too! So in order to go there to shoot we had to reschedule to the second weekend of January. 

Unfortunately I have no pictures of the scene or the filming. But there will be nudity. And a heavy chain! Which our drummer found somewhere and which definitely will be used a prop at some point. I hung some white sheets and curtains all over the place to make it look more mystical, or whatever, and put candles everywhere. Hopefully that does the trick. And the rose petals we sprinkled in the bath water. I'm trusting it will look awesome!

After that there's just the editing and some animation on top of that...

Meanwhile we'll be continuing rehearsals and recording, in order to complete album number two.

May your year 2022 be filled with hope and may it be a better than the previous one!

Flora