New Release coming soon! And it's About Cult Life Again...

Before our next release is announced and the name revealed, some context and back ground is in order. I have done a series of posts on Instagram about this, specifically about growing up in a Charismatic Christian church, or as outsider definitely would call it, a cult. I'll share the posts here as well, and probably some more will come. 

Here you go!

Open Your Eyes to the Revelation!

Photo by @jasual_audio_visual

Did you know that Flora was raised in a cult?

"The church I grew up in was part of an American Evangelical Christian movement called The Christian Fellowship Ministries, or Potter's House Christian Fellowship. They emphasized obedience to your pastor, heavy commitment to the church, spreading the word/converting people," gifts of the spirit" like speaking in tongues, and giving your money to the church."

Read more here (the images might be disturbing to some)

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/raised-with-demons-how-the-potter-s-house-church-keeps-its-followers-under-control-20230410-p5cz9n.html

"Obedience was the first and foremost requirement in this church. They didn't even send their young pastor candidates to bible school, but thaught them themselves, pastor to pastor. This way the head of a new church was always subject to his 'mother church'.
Obedience was ensured by requiring heavy attendance from the church members: there were two services on Sunday, one on Wednesday, and there was Saturday 'outreach' and morning prayer meetings.

Shunning, cutting of contact to members who left or somehow rebelled, was also one of the methods of control. Questioning your pastor and things like academic education (which would teach you to question things) were frowned upon.

What I learned through the up-bringing inside this kind of church, was to be obedient in an unhealthy way, and not to question matters of faith.

Coming out of the cult mindset and the process of rejecting the lies was a long journey, taking several years, a few crisis and turning points. Rejecting the lies I was taught and the lies I told my self, was crucial."

And the story of that rejection is the subject of our next song and music video.

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

 

                                    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

New Album Out Now!

It's oddly satisfying to say that out loud and to write it down. The album Invite was finally out on May 7th, and it makes me so proud and happy! This process has finally come to it's goal, we have reached an important milestone on our journey. The plant we have nurtured is blooming. But it has not yet come to it's full fruition and there's still much to be done to realize it's full potential and to make it heard by as many ears as possible. 

Promotion and live shows, that is, but unfortunately we can only start planning for live shows here in Finland, and that's a big maybe too. All depends on how the summer will turn out. But we'll start planning and booking as much as we can! Hopefully it will work out and we can play somewhere, that's all I can say. When the borders open in Europe, it's time to start planning for that too...

Promotion has been going on before and after release, most of all in Germany. I'm glad, really glad, that there is the boost from the record label. And I mean it's a big help! So far there's been several interviews, including Sonic Seducer, Imperiumi, and NEGAtief. Thank you for all of them, for including us in their releases!

You can find Sonic Seducer May issue in here:

https://www.sonic-seducer.de/index.php/de/aktuelle-ausgabe/die-aktuelle-ausgabe

 And Imperiumi in here:

https://www.impe.fi/imptv/1

What has kind surprised me with the interviews especially, is the interest in the cover art. I didn't really expect that, but it has been quite pleasant as a creator to explain the origins of the art. The phenomenon which usually happens when you release art/music is that the audience makes connections and assumptions about it that you didn't have in mind originally, and didn't expect, but when brought to your attention, you see your creations in a new light. Like when you're compared to a band you didn't have in mind, for example. To me it's refreshing and interesting. Of course the audience could interpret your art in a way that frustrates you, not like you intended. Eldritch comes to mind, somehow. But once the music is out, it's not in your full control anymore. I remain interested and eager to see what people will finally make out of Invite.

There's also been radioplay in various German underground music channels, like I mentioned in the previous post. The song they mostly played was Siouxsie on the Beach, which is also something I didn't expect in the sense that it's not our rockiest song. But, of course, I named it after Siouxsie, which in itself  bares much cultural weight in the Goth scene, and it's perhaps our easiest song, most radio  friendly, so to speak. Maybe relatable as well? On a metal based radio show perhaps a different song would work, like She Smiles? But yeah, it's been great to follow the shows and podcasts and to hear your song played!

Before the release date we also received our own copies from Germany, two hundred neatly packed Hateful Chains cd:s. They came to our local store which handles packages as well. Having only an approximate estimate what kind of space two hundred would take, we went with bikes. This is the result:

                                                 

But we were able to get them safely to the secret location where we'll keep them buried under all the junk. Kidding, of course the purpose is to sell them. Mostly in connection of live-shows, but otherwise as well. There were several pre-orders form early birds already, and to pack them safely for posting we  first had to get some padded envelopes. Luckily they came quite fast and the pre-orders have been sent. Thank you all for ordering! 

I also found that there are several record stores in Finland that sell our album, so there's actually a quite good distribution in our area. For Europe I cannot tell for sure, really, but with a quick googling I found a German and an Italian store that sell it. In Finland you can find our album at least in Levykauppa Äx. 

So it seems our little debut album has had a nice covering around Europe among alternative music magazines, radios etc. And now you can find the album in multiple places. So, go and get it!

Love, Flora