Finnish melodic death metallers from Wintersun are ready to release a new album and also, they started crowdfunding avaible in March, what for, below you can read an interview I had with Jukka Koskinen (bass) about the crowdfunding, the new album and touring plans.
Cheers from Antichrist metalzine, is my pleasure talking with you Jukka, how things are going?
Cheerios! Things are going great since we have surprised everyone with a new album! It has take a longer time to plan everything but we made it in secrecy. And of course the greatest is that we have finalized something practical!
You started a crowdfunding which will be avaible from March and the purpose of this is to build your own studio. When did you guys came with this idea to create your own studio?
This has been in the makes for a long time since Wintersun albums are massive productions and therefore we haven’t been able to fulfill our true vision how our music should sound like with the current resources. Unfortunately we haven’t been able to afford for a studio (and way further from using 3rd party studios) since for truly understandable reason record labels have a lot of costs, employees to feed, etc. and that leave’s the bands cut not that big. Now due to our great label, Nuclear Blast, we created a new model together that grants us the opportunity to pursue this dream – to release Wintersun albums with the best production and original vision!
You have prepared also a special pack for the fans added in the crowdfunding, tell me more about it.
Crowdfunding came as a hint from the fans actually, which then grew into something big and here we are offering something truly special for our dear fans! We are offering only one perk called “The Forest Package” that is a multi content package with several items including our new full-length album. The price is very reasonable since the normal price would be more than a double we are asking for. We want to offer something great as a thank you as well to our fans who have always been there waiting when would something happen with Wintersun. All the details will be revealed in our crowdfunding campaign starting March 1st!
Are you positive regarding the fans, friends that will contribute and help you in this crowdfunding?
Yes, we feel very good about this since we are really offering something that you can’t really resist if you are a Wintersun fan. People have been taking the crowdfunding as a positive thing. To be clear, the crowdfunding is selling an item (in our case a very positive one) directly to the people without 3rd parties in between. We even have everything ready and not ask for people to invest in something that is not ready, especially in our case. All this is purchasing our new album, rather than asking for money just like that from the people, if you know what I mean. Crowdfunding is a great idea indeed in general.
The new album is also done entitled as‘’The Forest Seasons’’, is it a concept album?
In a way yes but then since it’s about “a full circle” that is a year with four seasons (spring, summer, autumn and winter), though the seasons are different from each other. The album consists of four totally different and unique songs but then merge nicely together for a whole. The spring songs, Awaken from the Dark Slumber, is about when everything comes to life after the winter. It’s also how you yourself wake up from a sleep that you have been in your whole life. This song is very uplifting though it has a very dark first half, presenting the awakening. The summer song, The Forest that Weeps, is a majestic male choir driven song that shows the harshness of the summer that can happen in north, greyness and rain – a lot to handle. The autumn song, Eternal Darkeness, is by far the most brutal song by Wintersun. This monster is about all dying, dark dark times like in the autumn. Last but not lest the winter song, Loneliness, is slower tempo song with the most beautiful clean vocals Jari has ever made. Pure love song about loneliness, melancholic though somehow and peaceful feel in the song.
On what musical direction you went through ‘’The Forest Seasons’’?
This time there’s the clear focus serving the song’s feeling rather than being too progressive like we have done more in the past. Though the sound is true Wintersun for sure – contrast and dynamic, that is epic!
Do you have in mind shooting a video for one of the new songs?
Yeah, we didn’t shoot a music video for Time I, but this time there’s a plan to make one. Whether it will be a normal kind of a music video from one of the four songs, or maybe something quite special, we don’t know yet which way to do it. In the coming months we’ll know and direct it.
About 5 years since ‘’Time I’’ was released, but I want to ask about the ‘’I’’, was supposed to be a ‘’time II’’ someday and you left this on hold?
Originally there was supposed to be “Time” which would have consisted both albums together. Then we decided to make a big compromise and release ‘’Time I’’. Due to the unfortunate compromises we had to make with our current resources, we decided to wait with Time II and complete it with the best production possible. Don’t get me wrong, Time I sounds alright, but it’s 60% of the vision we had and still do so we want to take the band to the next level and finish Time II with better resources, where the crowdfunding comes in.
Do you have touring plans for spring, summer festivals?
Summer festivals are on the way and great to be back playing live! We will have a bunch of festivals to be announced soon (some already are) and we are also looking into touring possibilities for the autumn!
Thank you for this interview guys, again it was my pleasure! Good luck with the crowdfunding and hope to see you soon!
Thank you for having me for this interview and we definitely try to play and see as many people as we can on the road soon!
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