Monday, March 16, 2020

Bloodnose the Pirate

THURSDAY 12.3.

[A note to the reader: The first part was written before "shit hit the fan", on thursday morning when there still were things called as "pandemic zones" and the coronavirus wasn't spread to Finland almost at all.]

I've never actually realized how much of a big influence Dead Kennedys has been for my guitar work in Finntroll until I listened to them this morning after some time. After a couple of songs I just had to switch quickly to Blodsvept to snicker silently how much Ett Folk Förbannat, Häxbrygd and Två Ormar bear some very DK- styled riffing in general, and how the end of Mordminnen is particularly "influenced" by the end of Ill in the Head. All similarities are completely incidental if anyone asks.

And as a pons asinorum, it is also time to discuss a bit about the guitar work in the upcoming album.
I composed the new material to be way less guitar-driven than in Blodsvept, which also meant that the guitars will be more about simple solutions, less dividing of the parts than usually and way more trashing and buzzing than actual "riffing". However, as all of the parts are still written and arranged by yours truly, it still is clearly the usual hybrid mishmash between black, thrash and punk but whenever I had the chance to thrash myself out, I did that with pride. So expect seeing a lot shouldercramps and twisted expressions on stage later when the guys are going to sweat these songs in public!

During the last week, I spent some time going through the drum takes with Nino and a considerable time to fight with the tuning...I mean, to perform absolutely flawlessly all the rhythm guitars myself  in advance due to various reasons before the actual guitar recordings start. I was recording them at my home studio room, which was a great move because I could actually play things every now and then while my kids ate or played together somewhere in the house. Due to that, I also declare rock'n'roll dead. Sorry about that, really! Ironically enough, it took me roughly 50% of the time to keep things in tune, but at least every single note is now finally captured (and backupped on four different locations, hah!) in order to make sure nothing will stop us.

Except for that dreaded coronavirus.

As some of you may know, Skrymer has been residing in Germany since the early 2010's. And ironically enough the area he comes from was just declared as a "pandemic zone" the evening before he was supposed to fly to Helsinki for tracking his guitars. Well, he did get to Helsinki still, but was forbidden to enter the studio facilities (a lot of people work there) due to high risk of him carrying the virus. He was told to get tested, but in the end he sorted out another place to track down his guitars "sometime next week". Somehow I feel way more confident now when I know there are at least my takes on his guitars recorded. Sigh.
I visited the studio briefly in the morning in order to insert my guitars to the projects and instructing the people what Skrymer will need as backing tracks. Routa is supposed to start his guitars on saturday, and I'm going to pay him a visit after that.

[All below is written on monday, 16th of March.] 

I have no idea who to credit for this pic. Sorry!
SATURDAY 14.3.

After having been visited Routa briefly at the studio, I read the news and realized it started to look like that the coronavirus-stuff is starting to affect the whole country more than I thought at first. It began on thursday when all bigger public gatherings were cancelled until June (which also means that the best festival ever, Steelfest, is now also cancelled. I am a proud supporter of my friend Commander and his Fest, and if you consider yourself being a fan of good music and the Best Black Metal Festival Ever (tm), support the Horders from this link!) and then apparently half the people went nuts.
 
Suddenly everyone was hoarding stuff like crazy, which meant that us normal, non-panicking people were fucked for what it comes to groceries. Roughly 25% of our groceries from the list was missing (YES, ALSO THE FUCKING TOILET PAPER. SERIOUSLY.) because all the goddamn brainiacs were buying things like crazy on friday.

I mean, just look at this fucking moron. Seriously. This is Finland. We're not running out of food or you will not die of hunger or diarrhea if you catch the virus. But we're running out of stuff for us NORMAL people all the time now because people shop the shelves empty in panic every time they are filled. I NEEDS THISE 20 PACAGES OF RICE IN CASE I BE QURANTIEN FOR TWO WEEKZ DUHHH. Saatanan tunarit!!!!

But you know the drill. It's the same everywhere now. Regular, healthy (physically, mind you) people panicking, overreacting and trying to convince themselves being safe from a pandemic because they are now surrounded by stacks of everyday things if the zomb...world wa....nasty flu virus attacks. It also seemed that the Finnish government was considering of following the footsteps of many other countries, and to shut basically this country down for a while. I was also starting to think that there is actually a strong possibility that some people in the band or studio will catch it, and then due to quarantine it's game over, man.

MONDAY 16.3.

It definitely seemed now that the coronavirus was the "real deal" (no, despite of that, I still don't think anyone should buy 40 rolls of toilet paper or a year's portion of pasta). And while I wasn't especially worried about myself and my family (my 90-year old grandma will probably send the virus to quarantine, being the lady of iron she is), I couldn't help thinking what a lung-eating superflu does to my kids with asthma medication, while my wife (and my mom!) kindly reminded me that I have that too. 
[cartman] But mom, I have an album to do, I can't stress about my lungs right now! [/cartman]

Me and my wife were already told to work remotely since friday "until further notice" and the officials were talking about shutting down more things. And I realized that I need to be "that guy" and cancel the planned party at the studio and spread the guest musicians for different days in order to minimize any possible damage. We just can't afford to get sick and quarantined right now, and as a producer, I cannot risk my friends and acquintances'  health anyway for a stupid metal album. Survival of the fittest is awesome on black metal rethorics, but infecting people deliberately with a plague is rather...I don't know, sad? It sounds something like a bad USBM band would do.

So I needed a backup plan. I drove to the studio and had a brief meeting with the owner Nino, our engineer Juho and Routa about "plan B". We agreed that we will continue business as usual as long as nobody gets sick or there will be nationwide curfew. We still have three weeks before the mixing starts, and in the worst case we can also record things during the mixing were there parts still missing. But as I said to the guys- if shit really hits the fan, I'm making the decision to halt the album production until further notice. I haven't signed a single paper with anyone where I promise this album being released 14.8.2020 and if this stupid COFUCK-19 compromised our album quality, I wouldn't be willing to deliver the master until it's finished the way it is supposed to be finished.

I drove back  from the studio just in time to catch the special government information on the national TV, where new measures on fighting the virus were announced. All the schools and kindergartens will basically be shut down for a month, all public activies (libraries, swimming halls, etc) and borders will be closed and everyone is advised to stay home from tomorrow until mid-April. This will mean that we will have a jolly good time with the kids 24/7 for a month while simultaneously needing to home-school them while both adults still "working" remotely and me having the studio going on. And we can't even go anywhere due everywhere being closed. At least we have a yard of our own, but I'm pretty sure it will rain hails and nails outside constantly from tomorrow evening until mid-April. That, or "it's too cold, we want to come in already".

Later I read that the national liquor store had never sold as many 3-liter wine cans as today. I wonder how many of those were bought by parents reading the news? Anyway, if I don't start licking doorknobs on the third day of this breathing car accident referred as "self"-quarantine,  expect to hear from me after the weekend when we have banged all the keyboards in. Also, stay the fuck home unless you're doing a Finntroll album.






5 comments:

  1. Hi Henri,

    In France it's quarantine and curfew, even if in my Verdon Region, it's kind of freedom, we are in the middle of nature, far from cities.

    Big positives thoughts, may the force be with you and your immune defenses, all of you, family, friends, guys from the studio, from Finntroll !

    For now my piano don't have the Coronavirus, the work progress. Between two Rifvader work sequences, I transribe Kitteldags to a playable cool version which could be played by other people than kind of Liszt / Rachmaninoff clones under cocaïn, and begin Slaget vid Blodsalv transcription !

    Cheers !

    Yann

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  2. But if it were impossible to record the remaining instruments / voices / choirs etc. in the recording studio, do you think it would be possible to record them at home and then mix them?

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  3. Take your time, stay sane, stay safe!

    Social isolation is bliss nowadays. My IT-company went to remote mode here in Russia, and many companies who can also do.

    Toilet paper hysteria is hilarious :D It came from a RUMOR that Hongkong supermarket network Wellcome will run out of TP and rice noodles -> panic videos from Hongkong buying rice noodles and TP -> whole world goes crazy. Personally it's the last thing I would hoard :) In the end of all, washing your ass is more hygienic and less anus disturbing, especially during diarrhea :D

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  4. @Sanderz, it's an idea that was briefly thought, but I will not settle to compromises after all. The facilities of Sonic Pump (the room, mics, preamps etc) is so much better than what I have for acoustic instruments, and the whole idea of paying for the studio is to get the best possible sound we can.

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  5. I hope everything is going to be alright (just build a castle made of toilet-rolls and stick there for a couple of months). If the album is going to be postponed, it's a bummer but very understandable in these circumstances.

    Stay safe and healthy!

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