TUSKA OPEN AIR METAL FESTIVAL 2010

words byВ Evil Trin, photos: Evil Trin

Day1, 2 July 2010В - EAT SHIT

I run into Kaisaniemen Puisto completely out of breath literally minutes before the start of this year’s Tuska Open Air Metal Festival, because our little international group drank till late the night before and wasted precious time arguing who takes the bus and who gets the bicycles.
Shit, I’ll miss Barren Earth!
I choose the bus and arrive just in time to hear Highway To Hell from the Inferno tent PA andВ В sneak past the security to the shortcut to the Sue Stage where the new local supergroup Barren Earth is just about to kick off the three-day metal festivities in the centre of Hellsinki. (Unfortunately, as of next year the festival will be moved to some industrial area. Farewell, Kaisaniemi, you will be missed!)

With two former Amorphis members from their “classic” lineup - Kasper Mårtenson and Olli-Pekka Laine – plus Mikko Kotamäki of Swallow the Sun, Sami Yli-Sirniö of Kreator, Marko Tarvonen of Moonsorrow and Janne Perttilä of Rytmihäiriö, Barren Earth grabbed my attention  last autumn with their EP Our Twilight and drove me completely insane with their debut album Curse Of the Red River, which came out this spring.
Their set starts with the faraway guitar wail of the eponymous first track in front of somewhat scarce audience, but it is only 1.45 p.m. on a workday, the queue at the entrance, however fast moving, is long (this year’s Tuska is sold out), and it’s a bit too hot.

I can’t wait to enjoy Barren Earth as just a fan, so I leave the photo pit after the second song, put away the camera and imerse myself in this prog death beauty.
The announcing of Barren Earth in the Tuska bill had overjoyed me and my expectations have skyrocketed. The 45-minute set completely lives up to them with wonderful musicianship and setlist, though everybody in the band is so consumed by their music, that the stage show is practically absent.
As time moves on, the crowd is expanding and the band plays the album single The Leer, the radio hit Our Twilight, Cold Earth Chamber and my absolute personal favourite – Floodred, whose piano and guitar solo is simply majestic.

According to the running order next are the thrash legends Testament on the main stage and they gather a pretty big audience. The band has quite the presence and the otherwise reserved Finns organise a massive wall of death and a moshpit during The Formation Of Damnation. During most of the time Chuck Billy runs about like a maniac, plays the air guitar on his mic stand and instigates the crowd. A mass choir ensues at Practice What You Preach. It is followed by Into the Pit, More Than Meets The Eye, The New Order, The Persecuted Won’t Forget.
The decades on the stage have their say and Testament definitely leave a very pleased crowd and a very good impression on me.

After Testament I go back to the Sue stage to see the local melodeath band Insomnium, which I really insist on seeing.
The stage is engulfed in thick smoke and it is almost impossible to photograph, but nevertheless I manage to take a few pictures fit for publishing.В 

Of course, I remain for the entire set and, though there is not much interaction with the audience, the melancholic melodies from the last two albums of Insomnium – Across the Dark and Above the Weeping World - are sheer pleasure to listen to.

After the end of their set I sprint through the dust back to the main stage photo pit, which progressively turns into a mud pit courtesy of the water hoses, used by the security to spray the heated crowd.

If it weren’t for Nightwish, hardly many people outside of Finland would’ve suspected of the existence of the band in which Marco Hietala plays with his brother Zachary – Tarot.
Created in the 1980’s as a glam outfit and with a rich discography, the band doesn’t impress me much live and the choir, which came onstage during the second song remained all the way to the end of the set. Why is yet to be established. In other words I get rather bored, especially after Testament who drove us nuts from the same stage just a while ago.

I figure it is time for me to take a break and go to the backstage bar to have a beer, while waiting for one of my very favourite bands – Pain. On the next table in front of a beer grimly and quietly is sitting Ihsahn.
Not far from the bar is installed a press bench with a laminated letter addressed to Peter Steele, which reads “Dear Peter Steele, it was a sunny Saturday afternoon back in July 2003. You showed me the best way to warm up before a performance at the Tuska stage. Bench press! So here it is again, the very same bench behind the very same stage and it's all yours, brother! Rehearse in peace, Korak.”

The staple of any metal event in Hellsinki, little Rony Г–sterlund, turns up with his father, brandishing an inflatable trident.

Pain take the Sue stage dressed in black suits and ties, looking very much like grooms, but this doesn’t in the least deter them from tearing our heads off from the start to the end.

В 

The tent and the opposite shady hill are full of people who jump up and down and sing along to Zombie Slam, Walking On Glass, It’s Only Them, I’m Going In, Monkey Business, On and On, Same Old Song. At the final song – Shut Your Mouth – the crowd is extatic. - Apparently everybody loves Peter Tägtgren.

Back at the main stage starts the first Norwegian attraction for the day – Satyricon. I am not familiar with their music and am not a big fan of black metal in general, but I have to admit that I like them better than last year’s black metal band at Tuska – Immortal, which made me laugh my ass off with their stage antics and posing.

The majestic Ihsahn comes up next in the Sue tent. Obituary play at the same time on the Inferno stage, but without a second thought I choose the Norwegian line, especially after being enchanted by Ihsahn’s latest album, After. There are few people, maybe because the majority  prefers Obituary. Well, too bad for them – Ihsahn delivered one of the best performances at this year’s Tuska.

Without much ado Ihsahn and the band behind him, Leprous, who are great in their own right, plunge into the first track from After – The Barren Lands and proceed with material predominantly from the last two solo albums. Ihsahn and his trademark eight-string Ibanez create an eerie atmosphere and winter darkness in this bright July afternoon.
I don't hear my favourite track Austere, but one can't have it all. Instead the keyboard player Einar Solberg, who plays as if possessed by demons, sings the clean vocals on Unhealer, originally sung by Mikael Г…kerfeldt in Ihsahn's previous album, angL. Of course, Ihsahn pays tribute to the Emperor fans by playing Thus Spake the Nightspirit.В 
The set ends with the brilliant Frozen Lakes on Mars and I go back to the main stage, which will host this year's first headliner Devin Townsend Project, which will perform the album Ziltoid the Omniscient in its entirety.

Whilst we wade in an orderly fashion through the mud in the photo pit, the PA is blasting the Tuska anthem.   What started out as a Finnish tango a few years back (the style is different each year and the lyrics are adjusted in accordance with the festival bill and dates), has “evolved” into an kiddy song, which brings a big smile on everybody's face.

When the song ends, Ziltoid turns up on the screen to insult at the huge audience, gathered for the obviously historic performance of the entire album.
“You want some metal, Tuska,”  Ziltoid asks. “You're not getting any. You've been naughty. EAT SHIT!”
It must be an important moment if today's edition of Helsingin Sanomat has devoted a half-page feature on the matter, but I don't really dig it. Perhaps I don't do the right drugs.

Either way Devin Townsend is entertaining enough so I stick around for a while to watch him for a bit, but eventually get a bit bored and go backstage to sample the bar's assortment. Later I am told that I missed the appearance of Chuck Billy for one of the songs. Oh, well...

After Devin Townsend Project we move the festivities to the Ronnie James Dio Memorial Gala in Tavastia. The event has been sold out well in advance and all the proceeds are going to a charity.
The club is packed up to the rafters and it is rather hot inside, but it is a very small inconvenience, compared to the sheer two-hour pleasure from the brilliant performances of Ronnie James Dio songs. I don't recognise most of the singers, besides Marco Hietala and Ari Koivunen.
Koivunen only sings Catch the Rainbow and Don't Talk To Strangers, but Hietala takes the stage numerous times – After All (The Dead), Stand Up And Shout, Neon Knights, to name a few, and my personal favourite for the night – Stargazer.
There are also Heaven & Hell, Long Live Rock N'Roll, Holy Diver, Rock N'Roll Children, The Mob Rules, Gates of Babylon, We Rock, Man On the Silver Mountain, The Last in Line, Children Of the Sea, 20-th Century Greensleaves, etc.

GALLERY DAY 1