The creation of “Darkest Times”
Featuring artists just happened
Mikko: “My dream is to play with Marianas Rest somewhere in Helsinki. You know that band, definitely?!” He smiles to me. In more than one way, Marianas Rest is connected to the Dark River Festival, as natural as the ski stadium where the festival takes place. They proved, a band from Kotka can make it these days, which feeds the hopes of other local bands such as Beyond The Hate.
“In Memoriam” (feat. Jaakko Mäntymaa)
“So let’s see how it goes. And actually, Jaakko, from Marianas Rest is featuring one of our songs in the album”, Mikko says. – “The last one” – “It’s called “In Memoriam”, and that is a song written by Jyrki.” Mikko: “Jaakko is featuring the Finnish lyrics”, and Jyrki explains that the song consists of two English verses and an English chorus plus the verse featured by Jaakko growling in Finnish. Later they add some more details: “And with “In Memoriam” song, Niko stated that let’s ask Jaakko from Marianas Rest to do the Finnish verse because Marianas Rest is having Finnish texts also in their songs. Four out of five of our band members are born and raised in Kotka area, and also Marianas Rest is from the same area. Mikko knew Harri (Sunila) from Marianas Rest from the past, and via that we got familiar also with other Marianas Rest guys.”
“Black Within” (feat. Katri Hiovain-Asikainen)
“Both guest vocalists were brought up after the songs were composed. In “Black Within” Jyrki thought that female vocals would be a nice addition to the song and Katri was a natural choice because we already knew her well. We get to know Katri back in 2018 during the Emergenza Finland band competition, and have also played many gigs together with her prog metal band Numento over the years in Helsinki area. Mikko also collaborated with Katri already with his previous project band, so working with Katri was already familiar for us.”
“Summa summarum, using external guests on the album wasn’t conscious plan but it just rather happened.”
How did you experience the cooperation, and how much input did they give or did you want them to provide?
“Co-operation with both Katri and Jaakko was very easy and pleasant. They both are extremely professional with their voices and in studio working. Lyrics for the songs were written by us, so they didn’t need to involve to that. Katri made some small changes in order to match the singing with the music.”
“We gave to both free hands to arrange and compose the singing parts. Jaakko decided to follow the demo version made by us. Katri composed her part totally from the scratch because we didn’t had her parts in the demo song.”
Professional production team
The guys proceeded to tell me about the creation and production. Jyrki says: “Now we have to put like a lot of effort in and also money for these songs. We have recorded drums, and acoustic guitar, and most parts of the vocals in Helsinki Sonic Pump Studios. Pekka Posio, who recorded, and produced and mixed our EP, is also involved here. He is also recording, producing and mixing this album. Mastering will be done from Svante Forsbäck from Chartmakers.” – “Actually, next week.” – Niko: “Its going to be quite epic album because it’s twelve songs and over 60 minutes of music.” – “Epic is the word.” They relied on partners they knew before, and of course all this is long done by now.
“Darkest Times” marks the greatest project as a band so far. “We’ve been doing it three years now.”
“Two years almost, since we started the recording, but demos way earlier.”
Pekka is more than only a producer
How did Pekka get in originally?
We meet Pekka in 2018 in the same Emergenza band competition where we meet Katri. We became friends, and Pekka has helped us a lot during the years; playing tips, what kind of gear to purchase, about the songwriting etc. True professional in the music. Pekka mixed our 2019 single “This cold morning”. And then, he recorded, mixed and was artistic producer in our 2020 EP “Betrayal of time”. So him doing the same stuff with our debut album was kind of a natural continuity of our cooperation.”
They approached new grounds in terms of stylistic tools for “„Darkest Times“”. “ …. compared to the EP, we have added like orchestrations by Jyrki, all kind of piano, cello, violin, …” Mikko says while they all name all kinds of new elements they used. Jyrki sums up: “I’m like, I would say that we have lifted it our like a level of music way higher than it was before.” – “So I hope so.” Someone says as they all laugh out loudly. As the laughter fades, Jyrki resumes: ”At least we think so. Hopefully our audience will feel that same way too.”
Writing the songs for “Darkest Times”
Our conversations naturally flows – apart from still shouting at another due to the noise and we dive deeper into the realms of their creative processes.
Making songs together
Mikko: “Usually Jyrki and the guitar players come up with a song or track and demos that they bring to the training camp. And we start level up there the drums. And then Niko will make the lyrics. And I make the bass tracks basically. …. Is usually doing the song structure.” Niko: “But the music comes first. And when I write lyrics, I. I hope I will match the spirit that was already there. And of course, go on. But doing the dark song, I most about that melody.”
Jyrki: ”I think what has changed is that we are more like …” he pauses to think over his wording. “Me and our other guitarist Kimmo is doing the songs. Right now, we are saying to all the members that please write songs. But nobody has made anything. But we are developing those songs or making the changes now together. For example, I am bringing the song but everybody can say how they see the song develop together. …. And our main master producer, Pekka Posio, was giving pretty professional views on our songs in the recording phase. We are doing a lot of changes and decisions then on making our songs more interesting. …”
“He has good ideas how to make the riffs and the structure more interesting”, Mikko adds. “Yeah, yeah. And of course we have learned a lot of like song writing. Like how to put the parts together, a lot of during the years. We just learned by doing so” Jyrki continues.
The guys also point out how much they appreciated the feedback from the reviews of their EP. Although their learning by doing approach reflects their willingness to develop and push, it can be an obstacle, as Tommy encountered in his drumming:
I thought I could play everything immediately at fast tempos (Tommy)
What was the hardest thing for you to learn when you started drumming (supposedly as a kid)?
“Yes, I started playing drums in my early teens. I would say the most difficult thing in learning to play the drums was that I did not have the patience to learn the correct technique. As an young and eager student of drumming, I thought I could play everything immediately at fast tempos, and getting frustrated when I realized that it was not possible. Now tens of years later, I understood that it would be a great benefit to have a teacher giving you the advice how to take the next step in developing your skills. Before the drum recordings, I had the privilege of getting lessons from the amazing Rolf Pilve; and that really made a difference in improving my technique, rehearsal methods, way of thinking; and the whole concept of drumming; and how to develop yourself to the next level.”
Drumming – Human vs Machine
Nowadays, demos with new material usually already contain most of the instruments, even if the composer would not play each of them. The computer helps to illustrate the ideas. Consequently, sometimes it seems the drummer has nothing to do but replay the digitally composed drum parts. Only if it were that so easy.
How does Tommy experience and reviews this from his own point of view?
“This is a great question which I think is very relevant nowadays. Also in our case our composers Kimmo and Jyrki provide the demos of new songs, which already have their own made drum parts. There are pros and cons in this. As having the drums in the demo, it gives an understanding how they see and vision, how the drums should contribute to the overall feeling of the song. I have also felt that it can give a nice challenge to me to be able to play the patterns, which have been recorded by a machine.”
“But as you say, sometimes it might not be feasible as I only have two hands and feet. Maybe some of the cons of having the drums in the demos is that it might ‘lock’ the drums and leave less to room for creativity and other ideas. I think this is an evolving process in the future and we have discussed also the possibility that demos are without drums and I can come up with my own suggestions and then we can compare it to the once the composers envisioned. This approach might give additional nuances into our new upcoming songs in the future.
