Kalmah

Kalmah is a Finnish melodic death metal band from Oulu, formed in 1998. In less than a year after its formation, Kalmah was signed by Spinefarm Records. The word "kalmah" is Karelian and could be translated as, "To the grave" or "To the death." The band's musical style is primarily classified as melodic death metal with their sound including strong influences of power metal, thrash metal and black metal. Musically, the band has been compared to fellow Finnish metal acts Children of Bodom, Norther and Wintersun. In 1991, Pekka Kokko and Petri Sankala founded the metal band Ancestor. After Ancestor had recorded two demos, Antti Kokko joined the band as lead guitarist. In 1998, after five demos, Ancestor disbanded and Kalmah was formed. The new band consisted of Pekka Kokko performing vocals and guitar, Antti Kokko on lead guitar, Pasi Hiltula on keyboards, Altti Veteläinen on bass, and Petri Sankala on drums. Kalmah began to write songs for a promotional CD entitled Svieri Obraza. With this demo, they acquired a recording contract with Spinefarm Records and headed to Tico-Tico Studios to record their debut album, Swamplord. By November 2001, they returned to Tico-Tico Studios to record their second studio album, They Will Return. By this time, Veteläinen and Sankala were replaced by Timo Lehtinen on bass and Janne Kusmin on drums, respectively. In 2002, Kalmah played shows in Finland and at Wacken Open Air. In February 2003, they recorded their third studio album, Swampsong. In 2004, keyboardist Pasi Hiltula left and was replaced by Marco Sneck. The band released The Black Waltz in 2006 and For the Revolution in 2008. Kalmah toured in Canada and Finland to promote the latter album. Kalmah's sixth studio album was released in Japan on 24 February 2010, Canada on 2 March, Europe on 3 March and North America on 6 April. Recording and mixing took place from May to August at Tico-Tico Studios in Finland, and mastering for the disc took place at the Cutting Room in Sweden. The track "Bullets Are Blind" was released in December 2009 on a 2-CD collection included with the 35th anniversary issue of Soundi magazine. In March 2010, 12 Gauge became the first Kalmah album to be released on vinyl. The album was mastered for vinyl by Joona Lukala, Noise for Fiction, and released by Svart Records in a limited run of 500 copies. In 2012, Kalmah finished filming a new music video for their upcoming album, due to be released in 2013. The band have kept fans up to date with their process via social networking website Facebook by uploading different photos, as well as a short behind the scenes video from the day of filming their video. They also announced that they currently have 6 songs finished, and they plan to enter the studio in January 2013. The artwork for their seventh studio album will be created by artist Juha Vuorma, the man also behind the art of Kalmah's first 3 albums. In April 2013, it was announced that the band will release their seventh studio album, Seventh Swamphony, on 17 June. Kalmah's eighth album, Palo, was released on April 6, 2018. A single from the album, "The Evil Kin" was released on February 9, 2018 The story of Kalmah begun in 1991 when Pekka Kokko(v, g) and Petri Sankala founded Ancestor. After 2 demos Antti Kokko joined the band to handle the position of lead guitarist. In 1998 after all in all 5 melodic trash/speed/death metal demos and 5 different bass players it was time to clear the table. Acenstor was buried and refounded as Kalmah. The Line-up was completed by keyboard player Pasi Hiltula. With new enthusiasm Kalmah started to write new songs for the praised promo CD. With raging melodic death/trash/speed/black metal promo ‘Svieri Obraza’ the band had finally done the breakthrough and reached a contract with Spikefarm Records. The band wasted no time and headed to Tico-Tico studios with line-up Pekka Kokko(v, g), Antti Kokko(g), Petri Sankala(d), Pasi Hiltula(k) and Altti Veteläinen(b). The story of Swamplord begun. Swamplord “Swamplord” was unleashed to the world in the winter of 2000. The album immediately gathered tons of raving reviews and no wonder, the power and intensity of Kalmah’s metal is simply breathtaking, to say the least. The band did dozens of interviews and the praise from the scene kept flooding the Spikefarm office and the band’s website. They also played a few shows in Finland before heading back to the rehearsal-swamp to write the follow-up to “Swamplord”. They Will Return By November 2001, the band was back at Tico-Tico Studios recording “They Will Return”. The line-up had changed a bit due to the departure of Altti and Petri. They were promptly replaced by Timo Lehtinen (from Catamenia) on bass and Janne Kusmin behind the drumkit. “They Will Return” is an album displaying all the aspects that make Kalmah such an incredible band: from the stunning execution and rich melodies to the huge intensity and overall finesse of Kalmah’s music, there was no question that Kalmah had great things ahead of them. Swampsong In summer 2002 Kalmah played couple of gigs in Finland and gig at Wacken, which was a success. In autumn the band started to write new material for the next studio album. After heavy practising and rehearsal sessions swamplords were back at Tico-Tico again in February 2003 with 10 new killer songs. The new album was titled ‘Swampsong’. Heavy guitar driven melodic swamp metal masterpiece was finalized at Finnvox studios. It was time for The third, the magical. “Swampsong” was a great follower after the highly acclaimed “they will return”-album by fans and media. Some gigs were played, also abroad, and everything was developing in the right direction until in 2004 keymaster Pasi Hiltula decided to pull back and go on with his other duties. The band started thinking then if a new keyboarder was needed but after one rehearsals with Marco Sneck (Poisonblack ) auditioning, it was all clear. A new quintet was born. The Black Waltz With new blood in veins the five Swamplords started to prepair the material for the fourth album. In november 2005 the band entered Tico-Tico studio to record a true swampmetal masterpiece, “The Black Waltz”. All in all 11 new Kalmah songs were recorded and mixed. With the final mastering touch of Mika Jussila from Finnvox the Waltz was ready. The dance has begun. The Black Waltz started a new era in bands history. For the first time in history Kalmah made it to the official Finnish charts at position 38. The album with deep vocals was a bow to the bands history. For the Revolution With new strength after Waltz success Kalmah was eager to move on to the next album and the writing process started right away after Waltz was released. But it always takes 1-2 years for Kalmah inspiration to blossom. In 2008 new release “For the Revolution” hit the market and gained even more success than the Black Waltz. At this time the chart position was 17. For the first time ever band managed to pull out the very first tour outside Finland as they flied to Canada to show the timber-jacks how Finnish chanisaw works. 8 gigs in a row and most of the places were sold out. It was a great success. After more gigs than ever in Kalmah’s history band begun writing new material for the next swamp masterpiece. This time it was all about inspiration as with the previous albums. From the very first songs old speed and trash metal influences pushed through. Decorated with modern Kalmah melodies it sounded like Kalmah – surprise. 12 Gauge In year 2010 the 6th album “12 Gauge” was released. 9 new songs spreading Kalmah trademark “Swamp Metal” all over the world. After successfull Canada tour and release band got first chance to spread the message on big summer festivals in Europe. Such festivals like Metalcamp and Summerbreeze are known to every metalhead. The album itself was a success. Band gained more fans than ever. Seventh Swamphony Year 2012 was time for changes. Marco step aside and Veli-Matti Kananen stepped in. It was time to evaluate what we have done and what we deep in our music veins want to do next. The first song at the rehearsals “Seventh Swamphony” was the pacemaker. With new angle, not so straight-forward structure, orchestrations etc. we were turned on. We took our time rehearsing, re-thinking, evaluating new material. And it was sure worth it – or maybe we are getting old… Nevertheless we felt strong again entering studio in the beginning of 2013. Recordings at Tico-Tico studios went smoothly as always. This time we had the chance to try world-class mixing/mastering wizard Jens Bogren and we sure did. We were excited from the very moment and very pleased with the end result. “Seventh Swamphony” – the 7th studio album from Kalmah is now waiting for the release 14.6. Palo After five years with all personal duties like building a house and moving to Helsinki area caused a longer break in recordings as usual. During those years new continents where marked to our live map and e.g. Canada was toured from east to west. Nevertheless the new material already started to take its form after Seventh Swamphony but not until three years later it was time to push it up and start actually wrap it up. Within the last year insipration gave its most and all in all 10 new Kalmah songs were arranged together within the band as always. This time recordings were spread all over. Drums were recorded at Sonic-Pump studio and bass were recorded at Soundwell Studio in Helsinki area. Guitars, vocals and keys were recorded at the good old Tico-Tico studios at Kemi. This time we wanted to be back at our roots and let Ahti Kortelainen do the mixing as well. Album was mastered at Chartmakers by Svante Forsbäck. All in all it took about half a year and little listening breaks in between made the whole process smooth. So here we are almost 20 years later after Swamplord standing stronger than ever with Palo. 关于沼泽之王的故事开始于1992年，那时候Pekka Kokko (vocals & bass), Anssi Seppänen(guitar) 和Petri Sankala (drums)组建了一支叫Ancestor的乐队。出了几张小样磁带之后，Pekka的弟弟Antti于1997年加入乐队。Ancestor在1998年出了demo-CD"Under the Burbot`s Nest" 之后解散。 1999年，留在乐队的Pekka, Antti 和 Petri找到了键盘手Antti-Matti Talala，乐队正式改名为Kalmah。小伙子们需要一个像这样新的开始。Kalmah的首张CD"Svieri Obraza" 于1999年秋天在Oulu的NEO-studios录制完成。3首容纳力量，旋律和速度的歌曲小样昭示着这群小伙子的音乐前程。这盘磁带只是一个引子，他们的目的是最后得到厂牌的合约。 2000年春天磁带被送到Spikefarm 录制。Spikefarm 的人感到相当惊喜很快便与他们签了约。然后他们就开始录制首张专集"Swamplord"了。这时乐队的成员稍微有了一些改变，键盘手Pasi Hiltula代替了Antti-Matti Talala的位置。Altti Vetelinen的加入则弥补了贝司手的空白。 2000年10月，小伙子们第一次正式在Tico-Tico studios（还记得这个工作室么？Eternal tears of sorrow就是在这录制专集的）录制专集。他们一共为"Swamplord"录了8首歌。Ahti Kortelainen负责录制和混音。乐队成员是：Pekka Kokko(吉他，主唱), Antti Kokko(吉他), Petri Sankala(鼓), Pasi Hiltula(键盘) 和 Altti Vetelinen(贝司)。Swamplord这张专集于11月11号在芬兰发行，并于转年在俄国，日本，德国，荷兰，瑞士，澳大利亚，美国，加拿大和巴西同时发行。 2001年，对乐队来说是动荡的一年，其间发生了几次人员的变动。秋天，Petri 和 Altti因为个人原因离开乐队。来自Catamenia的Timo Lehtinen(贝司) 和 Janne Kusmin（鼓）代替了他们。乐队改组以后，新成员用了5个星期就完成了下一张专集的创作。幸运的是他们准时完成了歌曲创作。工作室在12月初成立了。专集"They Will Return"的录制非常顺利。混音和录制由Ahti Kortelainen完成。专集中包括7首新歌，1首是重新编配的demo"Svieri Obraza"里的一首歌，一首是翻唱Megadeth的（Megadeth是Antti`和 Pekka的音乐理念的重要影响人之一）这张专集于2002年2月4号在芬兰发行。