From Shy To Showcase
What’s the hardest part for you in drumming, I ask and without any hesitation, Rainer replies “To cut down my ego.” Drumming has been the motor in his personal development and his first ever positive self-experience. A gap grew between the shy child and the expressive drummer. Showing off became and still is of some importance for Rainer, but also for Jarkko whose challenge is “well, everything”, he replies laughing. Actually we are speaking of super-fast as versus super-slow drumming which is a challenge and Jarkko takes his hand technique for the limiting factor.
Remi’s and Luana’s challenges are also technical. Like Jarkko, Remi hit a ceiling due to his original hand technique. So Remi reset his grip entirely as he was not willing to accept this limitation. Luana challenges the limits set by the speed of her feet. “I’m slowly getting faster, but it’s not something easy.”
A shared challenge for Rainer and Remi is also the slowness of Doom drumming. While Rainer prefers avoiding Doom drumming – at least in the bands he plays with – Remi has found his Doom love in Hamferð and works on making his Doom drumming groovy. For the self-titled brainiac Rainer the challenge of Doom drumming it is a question of staying focused and not drift away in his thoughts between the however quick strokes.
Not Sacrificing the Passion
For quite some years, Rainer made his living from drumming by teaching, being a session drummer and his bands. He quit teaching, as parents just seemed to drop their sons at his rehearsal place and paid him actually to look after them for 45 minutes. Rainer: “So working with your passion might ultimately turn like upside down, it might turn like really bad towards your passion.” He points out clearly his passion for drumming could smother completely if it became a mere obligation. “If money comes, money comes.” Nothing more and nothing less.
Rainer makes his living from being a stage worker and session musician. Luana has made her living from music since she joined Nervosa. Remi has a dayjob in IT and Jarkko in sales and trainings. Luana would like to learn to play the piano but plays no other instrument currently. Rainer sings and Remi learned guitar before drumming. During his conservatory preparation studies, he learned singing, and piano.
Over The Hills and Far Away
The exotic bonus granted for growing up (musically) in a marginal place comes at a high price. Speaking of Torshavn, Remi explains that there is only a tiny metal scene among the small number of citizens. He has in general a high esteem for local music scenes, visits local festivals with ‘small bands’ perhaps of this fruitful ‘micro-cosmos’, as he names this very friendly, highly interactive and inspiring Torshavn scene.
Bottomline, however: the Faroe Islands are Danish and as such a small part of the wealthy Europe. Looking at Luana’s home metal scene contrasts sharply: “Well, I would say that it’s difficult to be a metalhead in South America. We don’t have so much money here, in general, it’s not so easy to go to the gigs, we can’t buy CD’s or LP’s all the time to support the bands we would like, cause it’s expensive and none has money to spend on music when we need other important things to care… It’s hard to start a band, cause we can’t record something professional or spend to make it better. South Americans are full of passion, we truly love in what we believe, we try our best to always make things happen, but it’s not easy. The energy and passion is something very visible here.“
A Butterfly Effect?
In which regard has their place of origin affected their musical evolution and careers? Jarkko and Remi have regular dayjobs supporting their lives and music. Luana made her living from Nervosa. Is it more difficult for musicians from wealthier countries to make the step into a professional music career? Certainly not. Luana points out that it was very hard to get to play shows with Apophizys. Her hometown Tapejara resembles Mikkeli in that concern. Luana’s very limited financial means were rather needed for basic life support, than rehearsal rooms and transfer charges before she joined Nervosa. Jarkko explains that bands from Helsinki had better odds to get selected for touring with bigger bands as a benefit of the local networks.
As mentioned before, while playing with Nervosa for Luana the geographical distance was not really a problem. But previously it was. In times of digital communication spatial distances lose importance. The pandemic situation of 2020/2021 has proven this all the more. Still there are boundaries that cannot be crossed by digital means and adjusting with remote rehearsing or composing takes time: “the expenses to go to the gig were always big, was difficult to find a place to record, was difficult to get shows, was difficult to rehearsal cause the guys didn’t live in my city. With Nervosa, cause it’s a bigger band, I can get tickets to travel to São Paulo and do what I need, or tickets to go directly to the gigs all around Brazil or to a international tour, but still a bit hard that we compose online, and almost don’t have time to have a rehearsal in person. We learned how to do it, so now days it’s fine, but it still a bit of an obstacle”, Luana texts me.
Diversity Meets Self-Expression
But diversity is to be able to be like … Oh man, there is a lot of aspects! (Rainer Tuomikanto)
Yes, indeed. There are many aspects! Interestingly, Remi is the only drummer I have interviewed for this series who automatically refers to the social aspects of diversity. It does, no surprise, matter to him as do the musical aspects of diversity. The latter, however, is a less complicated topic.
Music that we are playing is one way to express yourself (Jarkko Hyvönen)
All four drummers have a rather classical approach to diversity, understanding it as a cross-genre influence on their playing, writing and arranging of music. Once more acknowledgement here also matters to Rainer: ”Diversity is that: being able to pull off different kinds of you know genres like really with creditability!” Luana generally agrees on that standard but adds that “Diversity means we can play whatever we want, and if we want, all at the same, without making any sense or finding meanings and explanations. Music is art and art is diversity.” On a second thought, she says that diversity is subject to liberty. Diversity provides access to a wider range of styles and genres, leaving highly specialised drummers in a somewhat more marginal position. All four agree that diversity is a critical feature of their self-expression, worded by Remi for whom diversity “is really important if you want to be creative and interesting and do like what you want to do.” And Rainer highlights the importance of playing diversely as prerequisite for diversity in writing and arranging music, of course only as far as it serves the music. „The more dynamics the merrier, I would say. It hasn’t been proven otherwise”, Rainer points out, but Remi does not fully agree: “If it’s complex and it fits, it fits. But if it doesn’t fit than don’t do it.”
It’s a total body work-out for me (Jarkko Hyvönen)
Quad blasts and other high-speed sequences make metal drumming very demanding on a physical level. Rainer regards himself very lucky that he has never faced the typical difficulties with his wrists. “It’s not that difficult musical thing it’s kind of a sport thing”, agrees Jarkko. The physical side forms part of the attractiveness of drumming to Ukri Suvilehto (1994) and a sports-like approach might also be found in Krimh’s (Kerim Lechner, SepticFlesh whom we are going to present in a later set) as well. How demanding this is when the later ages come is worth a thought for Marko Tarvonen (Moonsorrow, Barren Earth) whom we are going to meet soon in the set “Fathers”. A proficient technique is helpful but cannot balance when the physics of the drummer surrender to the constant ‘abuse’, as Nigel Glockler (Saxon) experienced more than once.
Physical strength is not only needed when playing drums but even setting up the instrument is a physical job. Look at Rainer’s huge Ajattara kit to get an idea of that. It takes him 60 minutes to set it up, only 40 when playing the Grave Pleasure kit, and Luana needs 50 minutes to set up and feel comfy with hers. All four set up themselves, which is also part of their warm-up for the show. None of them have a similar spiritual approach as for example Frost (1994) has. So “I just try to get my hands and feet kind of warm”, says Jarkko, and Luana: “I just move around a bit and try to stay warm, but I don’t play before the show.”