Concert Reviews - Ensiferum w/Tarujen Saari

What an unexpected night.

Juho and I went in (too early) for the Ensiferum show. After the last time I saw them, back in September, I was expecting sort of a similar thing - to run into lots of people I know, hear some awesome music, and have an awesome time. I can't say that's what happened.

I am sure there are a lot of things I could say about Tarujen Saari. Not many of them would be positive. But, I am a fan of talking, so I'll tell you anyways.

Tarujen Saari

For starters... stage attire? We have an undead bride playing violin that looks like she had an Evanescence music video puke all over her, and not in a good way (I have been known to like Amy Lee's style). Then there is the old-school rocker (with a terrible voice) who was in leather pants and a Tarujen Saari shirt. The singer had a goth/Morticia Adams thing going on in her too-tight fake corsetted dress with her hair shaped like boobs. Then there was a guy who looked like he wanted to be a pirate but just settled for whatever he had in his closet that was too big and full of bling, and an affeminate guy in a kilt. What the bloody hell? No symmetry at all.

Musically, the singer sounded like she might be able to sing but wasn't trying very hard to do it successfully. Musically, the only one of the musicians who had any style was the violinist, and I couldn't hear her half the time.

And then there was the random weird stuff that kept happening. Most of it was vocal, like weird laughter or vocal parts that either made us laugh hysterically, or cry. Here is a picture that pretty much says everything you need to know about Tarujen Saari.

Juho doesn't know whether to laugh or cry...

As for good old Enska... I don't know what it was. Maybe it was just me and the fact that I wasn't really in the mood for going out, or the fact that there wasn't a massive crowd of my friends like last time, or the fact that the crowd did consist of shirtless pasty 18-year-old dipshits... well, whatever it was, I didn't enjoy it that much.

The setlist was actually better than during the From Afar tour, because they didn't play either of the Heathen Throne songs and played more older favorites. I finally got to hear Lai Lai Hei live, for example. There were also some older favorites, like Victory Song, Token of Time, and more. They skipped Smoking Ruins, which I was a bit disappointed by, since it was on their setlist. The orchestral intro version of By the Dividing Stream was pretty wicked, I must say.

Ensiferum

As for live shows... I've yet to see them in their sexy Finnish flag kilts, but their stage set was really cool - Emmi had the shield and swords on the front of her keyboards, like always, and they were wearing their usual kilts (Pete's Ensiferum kilt is pretty awesome). What was unusual, was the addition of a viking-like guy on the left, carrying a sword and ale horn, and a mostly-naked "viking" in a fur diaper on the right. The purpose of these two were to do backing vocals and chants, and in the fur diaper guy's case, vocals on a couple songs (because Pete can't sing, I guess).

Now, viking-guy was fine and I had no problem, but I really had to question Aleksi Parviainen's attire (cuz that's his name - you may recall me making fun of his suck factor back in May of last year because he is the singer for Soulcage). The guy sets off my gaydar seriously, sticking his chest and gut out like he's completely overconfident in the most odd way possible. His hairy diaper and his fur "boots" (that looked more like someone strapped a dead animal around his feet than boots) were ridiculous. He looked like he had been wearing fur pants at some point but someone came up behind him, ripping the legs off, so there was nothing but underwear and hairy pantlegs bunched around his ankles. He did not look viking.

Aleksi (Soulcage) on vocals

And the things they had to do were a bit stupid. I was hoping to see them have some sort of small sword-fight during one of the songs, but I was not so fortunate. They just touched their blades together and walked away from each other. Booooring!

Aleksi did a good enough job on vocals for the song Vandraren (a cover of a Nordman song that appeared on the From Afar album. A sort of 50-50 moment for me was when they invited him back to do another cover, Battle Hymn. What I didn't initially realize was that it was a Manowar cover! I was torn between joy and amusement. Joy, because I love Manowar and think they are the funniest thing ever (though this is far from their best or most amusing song) and amusement because Aleksi couldn't sing it very well. He's got a bit of the Eric Adams going on, sure, but his voice was cracking in the big wails and his stage presence still annoys the hell out of me.

The only other thing I can think to mention is just that I am convinced Sami Hinkka (bass) was drunk out of his mind. He seemed unnaturally energetic and was running around and making faces like a complete madman. It was hilarious to watch but I wondered if it was a bit too much for Pete and Markus.

Sami looking insane

Overall, it's hard to see a bad Ensiferum show, but this was nowhere near as nice as the last one. I think a lot of it was just me, and the show itself was really good. Crappy crowds do a lot to ruin a show for me (even though I was watching from the balcony) and the opening band put me in a rather unforgiving mood - we even bailed out before the encore. I've seen Iron before and didn't care about the other songs. Still, gotta love Enska!

Setlist:

By The Dividing Stream (orchestral intro)
From Afar
Token Of Time
Deathbringer From The Sky
Elusive Reaches
Dragonheads
Into Battle
Smoking Ruins ~ not performed
Windrider
Old Man
Vandraren (Aleksi vocals)
Stone Cold Metal
Lai Lai Hei
Ahti
Battle Hymn (Aleksi vocals)
Blood Is The Price For Glory
Victory Song + outro
EC Tears (Kaisu vocals)
EC Twilight Tavern
EC Iron

Ensiferum ft Aleksi on vocals

Year: Mar 2010
Opening bands: Tarujen Saari
Who I went with: Juho
Location: Nosturi, Helsinki

Concert reviews - Ensiferum

I have decided that I will indeed grace my readers (all none of them) with a review of this show, because, well, frankly it was a great show. The reason I hadn't really intended on reviewing this show was that I hadn't been paying a WHOLE lot of attention to it.

After having a few drinks we went upstairs to the balcony bar to watch Tracedawn, who was already going. I haven't actually heard them before but I had read online that these guys are quite young and they are. Really young. And I don't know any of their songs but they were pretty good. They had a nice show, the music was fine, and that's pretty much that. As I said, my attention in the opening bands was not at its best.

Tracedawn

Metsatöll: Markus Teeäär and Lauri Õunapuu

Metsatöll was second on the line-up. This is an unusual Estonian folk metal band. They were actually the main highlight and reason for coming for a couple of friends, like Markus and Erkka. I had been only half paying attention because Jake had showed up and there were lots of people appearing to talk to. As far as folk music goes, it didn't really jump out at me as being incredible. That being said, it wasn't bad. The singer was good, looking like a proper hairy viking-type, and their torupill (Estonian bagpipes)/etc player was really quite phenomenal. The overall impression didn't leave a great mark on me though. That could just be because I wasn't really watching though.


Of course, the main highlight for us was Ensiferum. Garance had flown in from France for the show, so you know it had to be a good one. And it was. They opened up with the intro song off their new album and went right into an explosive rendition of From Afar and Twilight tavern. Pete Lindroos was looking happy and comfortable in his new full-time-no-other-obligations position of lead singer (as you should know, he is no longer the vocalist for Norther) and was having a great time.

Ensiferum, Sami Hinkka

Sami Hinkka was playing a really excellent looking bass and looking very good (and very viking). Markus Toivonen was playing well and I'm betting he's happy with the present line-up of the band. I couldn't see Emmi Silvennoinen (or Janne Parviainen) because she was not in my line of sight but I could hear her and she was playing very nicely. I recall having really liked her performance the last time I saw them back in Calgary and I was very pleased to hear that they had added her as a permanent member to their lineup.

Ensiferum, Sami, Pete, and Markus

And what can I say? I'm a sucker for a bunch of men in kilts and war paint. Scottish, Ensiferum-logo, Finnish flag, whatever these guys are in, they look great and they look hot. I love it.

The set was great. I was really glad to hear a lot of the new songs live, and they played almost the entire album. The new songs feature a lot more symphonic stuff, a long more clean/chant vocals, and a lot of power! Unfortunately though, with all the new songs they left out a couple classics, like Token of Time (which I heard in Calgary so I didn't miss it) and Lai Lai Hei, which I was really sad not to hear. However, hearing Iron and the entire sold-out crowd doing the TÄTTÄDÄDÄÄ TÄTTÄDÄDÄÄ together. I think my favorite from the night had to be Smoking Ruins though. I love everything about that song: the music, the lyrics, the clean vocals combined with Pete's growls... the whole thing was just solid and epic. Fantastic.

So here is the setlist from the show.

Ensiferum, Pete Lindroos

1. By the Dividing Stream
2. From Afar
3. Twilight Tavern
4. Little Dreamer
5. Elusive Reaches
6. Wanderer
7. Heathen Throne
8. Guardians of Fate
9. Tale of Revenge
10. Smoking Ruins
11. Slayer of Light
12. One More Magic Potion
13. Tumman Virran Taa
14. The Longest Journey
EC Treacherous Gods
EC Battle Song/Porilaisten Marssi
EC Iron

Enska is definitely one of my favorite bands these days and I'm really glad I've seen them again now that I know them infinitely better than the last time I saw them live. Great performance, great new songs, and an overall great feeling of good times, battles, and metal.

Enska

Year: October 2009
Opening Bands: Tracedawn and Metsatöll opened for Enska
Who I went with: Garance, Matti, Jake, and joined at points by Teemu, Sebastian, Kasper, Varpu, Erkka, Markus, Atte, Aki, Antti, Marko, and more!
Location: Helsinki - Nosturi

Concert Reviews - Ensiferum & Amon Amarth

I am exhausted. The show last night was pretty intense and I didn't get to bed until after 1:00 a.m. We caught the Amon Amarth with Ensiferum concert. It was kinda cool, before the show, Amon Amarth was standing by the shirt/etc vendors to sign autographs. Lucky me, they went to get ready for the show right before I could indulge. Such is life.

So the first band to open was The Absence, I believe, from California. They were... not bad. As soon as he said they were American I thought, "oh great, bring on the thrash." However, the music was decent and the singing not bad. They also all sported impressively long hair and wicked beards. Except the drummer, he looked like he might be a member of Our Lady Peace in his spare time, hah! Given my usual leary outlook on American metal bands, I was considerably not horrified by them.

Belphegor was another classic example of how to ruin a great drummer by turning his work into NOISE. Mindless smashing siunds were all I heard. Like I expected from the first band, these guys brought on the thrash. It did a great job of reving up the crowd and all those moshers seemed to really like it, but I've been well known for not having any taste for thrash. Other points of note include... well... ok, listen, to all you singers out there... if you can sing with a growl, sweet, but if you can't talk with it - don't. We don't care, I promise. This guy was trying to growl while he spoke and he honestly sounded like Kermit the Frog if he had gone hardcore. I could only laugh at him. It was ridiculous. The guitar player (I think) was really creepy looking and the singer brought out what I might've thought was a BDSM mask if I hadn't been at a metal concert, which was just kind of strange. Whatever you're into I guess. Really, I wasn't impressed with them at all. Also, I found them to be just a bit too loud. Yes, I realize I was at a metal concert, but it was just... harsh, and not in a good way.

Sami Hinkka (bass) and Petri Lindroos (vocals and guitar) of Ensiferum

Next on the list was Ensiferum. I was actually more stoked to see Ensiferum than I was to see Amon Amarth because I'm a bigger fan of folk metal than death metal. This happened to be another episode of "can that scrawny little guy really growl?"

Markus Toivonen (guitar) in the front and Emmi Silvennoinen (keyboards) of Ensiferum

And he could, and he was wicked. I wasn't familiar with anything they played except the intro, which is from Victory Songs, but I truly enjoyed all the music. The bass player was playing on a 7-string bass, which was incredible, and they threw in a metal Stairway to Heaven intro to one of their songs that was pretty cool. I really like the keyboarding in Ensiferum so I was sad that their touring pianist seemed to be turned down a bit and most of the time I couldn't hear her. The music was still great but I could've used some more of her. I imagine there won't be any complaints if they keep her in as a full time keyboardist for the band because, when I could hear her, she was very good. Unfortunately, they didn't play for very long. For headlining with Amon Amarth, I really think they could've done with a longer set that around 30 minutes. They could've eliminated Belphegor entirely and just had Ensiferum play through there too - that would've been ideal to me.

The visible parts of Ensiferum

So lastly was Amon Amarth. I haven't listened to them much but for a straight-up viking/death metal band, they're pretty sweet. I liked With Oden on Our Side so I bought Twilight of the Thunder God at the show, and I've since been enjoying it.
They opened with TotTG, which was sweet. Others that I caught, were Free Will Sacrifice, Guardians of Asgaard (so heavy and so awesome), Where is Your God?, Valhall Awaits Me (the only song of theirs I really know offhand, and really enjoyed), Hermod's Ride to Hel (another one I vaguely recognised, which was also amazing live), and Cry of the Black Birds (unbelievable). They introduced a couple older ones to me, like Death in Fire, which was wicked and heavy, and I have to say, the mosh pit took up pretty much the entire floor of the Warehouse and looked pretty brutal.

As for the band, I didn't see the drummer pretty much at all, but I could hear him and that was enough, he was great. The bass player was on a 5-string, playing low and heavy, the guitar was intense, and the singer was amazing. He's really smiley and makes the crowd feel like the band really appreciates being able to play for us. As for the music, for me not recognizing most of it, and it being heavy death metal, moshing music but without the thrash, I loved it. It made me want to bang my head and growl, which not a lot of music does. They had some nice looking synchronized head-banging and the band toasted their horns (literally) of ale (beer?) to the crowd in the oldschool viking manner.

Ted Lundström and Johan Hegg of Amon Amarth

Amon Amarth raising their horns to toast

This was their second time in Calgary, first time headlining, and I left the show with a good feeling just of having sincerely enjoyed myself in the presence of a band I don't really know very well. I really hope they come back again once I get a bit more familiar with them. I enjoyed the show a lot and I'd recommend them to anyone who likes that heavy viking/death metal.

Drinking the toast

Year: October 2008
Opening bands: The Absence, Belphegor, Ensiferum
Who I went with: Michael Widmer, Graham Widmer*, Gianna Romano*
Location: Calgary - The Warehouse

* Sorry about the shit pictures - The Warehouse is terrible for getting good shots for some reason.

Amon Amarth, head banging