Mat: Since youre a new band on the
scene could you please tell us something about yourselves, the formation
of the band and how it came to have both this constellation and its musical
direction?
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Tapani: Celesty, formerly known as Celestial,
was formed 1998 by drummer Jere Luokkamäki. He had dreamed about
a band for a long time. First line - up was totally different than
today, but original members are Jere Luokkamäki and Ari Katajamäki.
1999 Tapani Kangas, decided to join the band guitarist. After few
weeks of playing Tapani, Jere and Ari started to have an idea what
kind of band they are looking for. After a short time they decided
to fire members and replaced them with new members.
At summer 1999 Celestial went to studio, and they made a short demo
for themselves, and after a short listening they decided to fire that
time vocalist. Year 2000 didn´t start so well: Tapani and Ari
went to the army and there was left only Jere, Ari and Tapani in the
band. They changed name Celestial to Celesty and Jere, Ari and Tapani
started looking for a functional and first- rate line-up.
At spring 2000 Tapani found guitarist J-P Alanen, and he decided to
join the band. J-P already knew vocalist Kimmo Perämäki,
and Celesty asked him to participate with the band. Kimmo joined Celesty,
and at autumn 2000 Celesty booked studio for their first demo. Demo
``Warrior Of Ice´´ was released at spring 2001, and name
Celesty began to sound familiar in people´s ears. Jere found
keyboardist Juha Mäenpää at spring 2001, and now Celesty
started to be what the band had been looking for.
After couple of gigs with Sonata Arctica, and some smaller gigs in
Finland, they went to studio at March 2002 to make their second demo.
``Times Before The Ice ´´got a great receiving everywhere,
and band also noticed the huge difference between the old and the
new demo. Record companies also started to contact Celesty, and Celesty
signed a deal with Arise Records at spring 2002.
Celesty will enter into Fantom Studios (Fin) for the recording of
their debut album in August 2002. During these recording sessions
Celesty will record a cover of a Helloween´s track to be included
in the album ``The Keepers Of Jericho´´- A Tribute To
Helloween Part II.
Mat: Obviously youre very young but
I still think that your music has the sound of a way more mature band.
What is your musical bakground that is the reason for this? Have you had
some sort of education or is it more self-learned?
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Tapani: I think that one reason for that is
that we have a group that is getting along with each other, and we
all have our personal abilities and everyone is bringing
something for our music. We are a team. Not a bunch of individuals.
Of course all of us have had some project bands before
Celesty, so i guess that is one reason why we sound experienced.
It was easier to play together when everyone have played
with some other group earlier. Some of us have had somekind of training
for playing your personal instrument when we were younger, but mostly
we are self-learned, and i personally think that self-learning is
better in someways, because you can practice music you like.
At the moment only J-P (our lead guitar player) is going Music school
beside his normal school.
Mat: The Finnish scene seems like an never-ending
source for great melodic metal and of course youre being compared
to bands like Sonata Arctica and Stratovarius. But how do you feel that
you differ from those, and what do you think is the reason for this Finnish
succesful concept?
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Tapani: Well of course if someone says that
youre as good as Stratovarius we take that as an compliment.
But if someone compares us to them like you sound like Stratovarius
i have to say that, that person has lost his hearing...hahahaha...Of
course we have fast drumming, guitar solos and high tone vocals, but
i think that Stratovarius sounds like STRATOVARIUS and celesty sounds
like CELESTY.
Lots of people have asked about the Finnish recipe for powermetal
and Idont know it...there is just lots of great powermetal and metal
bands here in Finland. The only answer i can give to you is that we
have born with metal in our hearts!
Mat: And now some questions about your awesome
debut-album. How did it happen that you were signed by a Spanish record-company?
Arise Records have loads of great metal bands signed but how did it happen
in your particular case?
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Tapani: Well Javi from Arise contacted us about
the helloween tribute album, and asked that would we like to join
that
.and of course we wanted IT IS HELLOWEEN!!!! one of our
greatest musical influences!!!!!
He heared our music from our website and contacted us. Soon after
that
we sent our demos to them, and they offered us a record deal. We thought
that if we have a european record label, it would be easier to get
your music heard in Europe. We also like that Arise Records is not
so big record company.
Mat: How has the album been received in
the media so far and are you satisfied with what youve accomplished?
What are the major differences and evolvements compared to your previous
two demo-albums?
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Tapani: Well the reviews have been mostly good,
from 9/10 to 5/7 stuff like that. But of course there has been some
not so good reviews, but you have to remember that the
review is always just an opinion of that person who is reviewing the
album. The differences are that there is new songs of course, and
we also have developed as musicians.
We also had more time to be in studio, we recorded our times
before the ice demo in about a week or so, now we were in studio
a bit over month. So of course you can hear the difference although
the quality of our last demo was good. We also have a new story about
four elements
.
Mat: Where do you get your musical and lyrical
inspiration? Im sure from other bands of course, but do you use
other sources too and if so, which ones? What are the major topics concerning
the lyrics?
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Tapani: The lyrics and the story are written
by myself and Jere (our drummer), and everything is made by ourselves.
We dont use any ready stories. We created the world and
the people in it ourselves. But of course we have read fantasy and
epic stories like Lord of the rings and Finnish Kalevala. But those
influences are not seen in the lyrics. I personally think that we
have managed to create an interesting storyline with interesting characters
Our musical influences are , Gamma Ray, Helloween, Stratovarius, Rhapsody
and Manowar. Every member has their own personal influences, and you
can read them from our websites biographies.
Mat: And since were on the subject,
whos mostly responsible for the song-writing, lyrically and musically?
Is this a one-man job or do most of the bandmembers participate?
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Tapani: The music is mostly made by Myself
and Jere, we usually bring a song to rehearsals, and then we start
to work it together with the band. For example if Juha has a good
idea for a riff, then of course we will use it.
The lyrics and the story are written by myself and Jere. No one else
participates in lyrical process.
Mat: Whats the situation in the band
right now? Is there anything special coming up or is it more of daily-basis-routine?
Can we expect a tour soon and even see you on some Swedish stages? Do
you already have any festival-gigs planned for the coming summer?
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Tapani: Well we dont have a booking agency
yet, so we dont have so many gigs at the moment but i hope that we
manage to get a tour manager soon. But at the moment we are discussing
about the festivals of next summer in here Finland, but nothing is
confirmed yet.
But i really hope that they contact us from Sweden Rock, isn`t that
a big metal/rock festival in there? We have sent them some mail about
it. We would really like to come to Sweden to play! i guess there
is lots of Metalheads there that would like to listen to some POWERMETAL!!!!
Mat: And before we end this interview some
short questions:
Cereals or porridge for breakfast?
-Well i would like to have porridge, but it is so hard to
start to make it every morning, so i'd go for cereals, they are easy and
fast.
Electric or accoustic guitars?
-Both! You can make lots of different kinds of music with both of those,
so Isay both of them are equally good.
Listening personal non-metal choices?
-I listen lots of different music styles, but they usually are played
with instruments but every music is good, i honestly can say that
if somebody composes music, it is worh of existing! Some of my favourite
non metal bands are for example Offspring and other Skatepunk
bands , and swedish ABBA, i admire Benny and Björn for composing
all that HIT material!
Evening with the girlfriend or out with the
guys?
-It depends, but when you are living together with your girlfriend, then
i`d choose out with the guys! ( i relly hope that Merja (my girlfriend)
doesn`t see this...hahaha :)
Sauna - pure heaven or a hot sweaty hell?
-Pure heaven! For example in summer Nothing is more relaxing than after
hard days work you go to a Sauna and just sit there and relax. After the
sauna you drink couple of ice cold beers outside and just watch the world
go by!
Tour with this band if you can choose anyone
you like:
-Well my personal favourite would be Manowar, but i think our music style
is a bit too different, although we take influences from them.I think
maybe Gamma Ray, Kamelot, Sonata Arctica, Rhapsody or Stratovarius would
be great. ( I just noticed that there is all of our musical influences
in that list...hahaha....but is hard to decide, they are all great!)
Yesterdays left-over pizza or a nice
home-cooked meal?
-These really are tough ones....Nice meal is always great, but so is pizza!
But i choose home cooked meal...maybe mashedpotatoes and meatballs,
and some brown sauce....hmm...i noticed that i just got bit hungry, maybe
there is some yesterdays leftover pizza in the fridge....hahaha...
Mat: And finally - any words of wisdom or
funny facts about the nearest future
you want to share with the readers?
-
Tapani: Well
i hope you enjoyed reading this interview, i sure enjoyed answering
to it. And also remember to check out Celesty`s new album Reign
Of Elements in your local music store, and if they dont have
it, then grab the owner from the head and tell him to order it...or
else!!!!
But always remember to keep your sword up high for METAL!!! I hope
we meet someday...somewhere...until then STAY METAL!!!!!
Best regards. ~Tapani~
That was all I had for now, Tapani - the staff at metalcovenant.com
wish you all the very best for the future, and we sincerely want to thank
you for keeping the spirit of Metal alive!
Related links:
www.celesty.net
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