Even though no final promises
have been made, the producers trust the Parliament to make the right decisions.
They base their trust on the fact that both the Education and Culture Committee
and the Audit Committee of the Parliament have expressed their opinion that the
lottery funds should be used exclusively to support the actual cultural and
sport activities of the beneficiaries, instead of to partly cover e.g. rental
costs of cultural bodies, like the government had suggested.
Author: Eduardo Alonso
{mosimage}Directed by Martial Fougeron, this French drama was awarded with the Golden Shell (Concha de Oro) at the San Sebastian Film Festival in 2006 ex aequo with Iranian Bahman Ghobadi’s Half Moon. However, in spite of its inner violence and its tough tale, the film is empty and results pointless.
{sidebar id=42} In less than 80 minutes, Fougeron tells the growing violence of a mother towards his son through excessive protectionism, selfishness and extreme authoritativeness. It is the portrait of an unbearable mother’s love. One can easily connect this idea to François Truffaut’s masterpiece The 400 Blows. But while Truffaut’s is a complex psychological portrait of troubled youth, My Son is simple and it does not ask as many question as it tries to.
Although such a punishment from a mother is touching and the boy’s psychological suffering (rather than physical) is shocking, the film becomes implausible. It is hard to believe the passivity of the father and the transformation of the mother out of the blue.
Nevertheless, there is something really outstanding in this film. Nathalie Baye in the role of the mother is superb and she keeps the son together and clearly justifies the prize she also won in San Sebastian. It is pity that there’s nothing else in the film that tops her acting. Fortunately Fougeron’s narrative styles is marked by sobriety and My Son avoids falling into a TV drama.
{mosimage}Last Monday
was an important day for rock fans in Finland. It was a day marked on the
calendar for many months. The Canadian prog rock trio Rush played in the
country for the first time in more than 30 years of career. The band didn’t
disappoint and it offered an extraordinary show at a sold out Hartwall Areena.
More than 12,000 people were happy.
Three years
ago, many Finns traveled to Stockholm. It was their only opportunity to see the
band’s 30th anniversary tour. It was a unique chance to see a band that does
not tour Europe very often. This year Rush were back and this time they didn’t
forget about those Finnish fans. “We didn’t know that we had so many fans
here”, says bassist Geddy Lee during the press conference before the show. “On
that show in Sweden, we realized that we needed to come and play here.”
Guitarist
Alex Lifeson admits that they are having a lot of fun on this tour. “After
Neil’s [drummer Neil Peart] tragedy, we didn’t play for long. But that period
of absence made us realize how fragile life is. We love playing so as long as
we can plan well the tour and keep healthy, we’ll tour”.
The tragedy
Lifeson’s refers to dates back ten years. Within a few months, Neil Peart’s
only daughter and his wife died. He retired for four years. Peart was not
present at the press conference, but Geddy Lee said that “he hasn’t been
happier on a tour”. The drummer wrote a road book about his experiences and
feelings after that tragedy. He has written some more books about being on the
road with a car, a bike or a motorbike. He is planning to drive around Finland
after the tour. “We are not worried about him”, Lee says. “He is a very a safe
driver”.
The press
conference soon transforms into a friendly talk in which the musicians share
their memories and experiences. Both remember the first gig together. “We knew
only six or seven songs, so we played them over and over in front of 40 people.
We made 10 dollars”, tells Alex. “After the show we went to a diner nearby and
had french fries. We planned our future as musicians. It was so exciting”, adds
Geedy. “But of, course, it was very important our first show with Neil. We
opened for Uriah Heep and we had just 26 minutes to play”.
{sidebar id=35}Those 26
minutes are much different than the nearly three hours that a Rush gig lasts
nowadays. There was a great atmosphere at
the ice hockey hall minutes before the show started. The merchandise stands
were crowded with hundreds of people buying t-shits, posters, pins, Neil
Peart’s books… Cash flow big time. A bit after 8pm, lights out and the intro
video was displayed
And the
trio started. They played loud, but crystal clear, although perhaps the guitar
was a bit too loud and drowned the vocals and the bass at some point. Audience
got excited and stood up. However, most of the people sat down for most of the
concert, the audience was pretty responsive and warm, at least for a typically
cold audience as the Finnish is.
Neil Peart,
Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson are superb musicians. Even when they used the
support of prerecorded midi samples, their playing is top class, almost
perfect. Their music is complex. Songs travel through many places and create
many textures. It’s a massive sound.
As Lee had
confirmed, the show is pretty different from the previous tour. It started with
a set of songs from the early eighties, including Limelight, Digital Man and
Entre Nous. It took some minutes for the band to warm up, but soon the trio
works like a clockwork machine. “There’s not much room for improvising and
jamming on our set”, Lee explains. “It has a precise choreography”. Lifeson
adds that “we usually improvise in the rehearsals or the sound check and if we
hit some nice notes or arragement, we’ll add them to the show”.
Indeed, the stage production is part of the
magic of the Rush show. Lights, sound and video are perfectly synchronized. The
green lasers all over the venue created a great sci-fi atmosphere that fits so
well with the music and the synths parts of the songs. The videos add superb
animations and funny sketches (with Finnish subtitles) like the one with the
South Park kids introducing the hit Tom Sawyer.
But at the beginning of the second set,
something not on the script happened. Alex Lifeson blew up the amps and, Far
Cry, the single of the latest album Snakes & Arrows, was finished with just
drums and bass. That felt kind of awkward as it took some minutes to fix the
problem.
The second set continued with four more
songs of Snakes & Arrows. That could be a bit too much for the fans waiting
to hear the classic. But this is the best release from Rush in many years.
Songs like Workin’ Them Angels, Armor and Sword or The Way the Wind Blows
proofed that it is possible to sound fresh and relevant after 30 years of career.
“This album was a lot of fun to record”,
tells Geddy Lee. “We felt like we could have continued composing and record for
a double album. It was a pity to stop that momentum”. Snakes & Arrows, as
previous albums, is not based on electronic sounds. “We intentionally decided
to write songs on acoustic guitar and bass”, continues Lee. “Electronics were
not involved. It’s something we used to do many years. We did a full circle
back”.
The three members seem to enjoy the time on
stage. Lifeson is an extraordinary guitarist and Neil Peart gave a clinic of
how to play drums and Geddy Lee, with a t-shirt from the museum that read "kunnon kansalainen" (decent citizen, jumped and
sang beautifully. He keeps his voice in a very good shape, maybe thanks to the
soup he takes before every concert. “
There’s nothing much plan for the band
after this tour. As the guitarist confirms, they have recorded a couple of
shows in Rotterdam for a dvd released. “It is format that suits us very well and
it gives us the chance to see the show”, he laughs.
The press conference is over and reporters we
hurry to get some photos and autographs. We are a bunch of crazy fans, anyway.
{mosimage}With more
than 1,5 million albums sold, Eppu Normaali is one of Finland’s rock
institutions. It is already 30 years since the band, formed by the brothers Syrjä,
took the name of one of the characters in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein: Abby
Normal, translated into Finnish as Eppu Normaali (epänormaali, abnormal). Last
Friday, Eppu Normaali played at the Hartwall Areena in Helsinki and they
presented their new album.
Like it
happens with many other Finnish brothers, Eppu Normaali is a band of brothers.
Two brothers and cousin. Martti Syrjä (vocals), Pantse Syrjä (guitar) and their
cousin Aku Syrjä (drums), along with guitarist Juha Torvinen and bassist Mikko
Saarela formed the group in 1976 in Ylöjärvi, very near Tampere. They started
playing a basic punk rock, following the trend of that time marked by Ramones.
But they did it in Finnish!
The first
performance of the band was in 1977 as part of a national rock competition held
in Tampere. Progressive rock was still very popular and Finland was not ready
for Martti’s sarcastic lyrics. Martti’s writing has always been outstanding and
has become one of the most reputed Finnish lyricists, a skill inherited from
his parents, writers Kirsi Kunnas and Jarkko Syrjä.
Of course,
Eppu Normaali didn’t win that competition, but they gained the attention of one
of the judges. Rock legend Juice Leskinen recognized the band’s talent. Soon
after that, the legendary Poko Records signed Eppu Normaali. Their first album,
Aknepop, was released in 1978. It wasn’t a great success and at the time only
2,000 copies were sold.
Since then,
the group has released 14 studio albums and 2 live ones and the records sales
have obviously increased much. As a matter of fact, Eppu Normaali must be one
of best selling Finnish bands. A greatest hits collection sold over 200,000
copies in 1996. A great number indeed for a small country.
{mosimage}In spite of
releasing a new album every year, the band’s breakthrough didn’t happened until
1984 with the release of Rupisia riimejä,
karmeita tarinoita, that includes hits like Nyt
reppuni jupiset, riimisi rupiset, Taivaassa
perseet tervataan ja Pimeyden tango. Mikko Nevalainen had replaced Mikko Saarela on bass in 1979 and the
band was getting close to more eighties sounds and AOR, almost like Finland’s
Dire Straits.
Rock fans
will soon recognize the inspiration of some of the Eppu Normaali’s album cover.
Their second album is a tribute to The Who and their Maximum R&B, in this
case translated to Maximum Jee & Jee. Even funnier are the adaptations of
the Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Cosmo’s Factory and Willie and The Poor Boys.
For the Finns, they were Akun tehdas (Aku’s Factory, 1980) and Aku ja köyhät
pöjat (Aku and the Poor Boys, 1983).
{mosimage}A second line
up change happened in 1989. Mikko Nevalainen left the band and Sami Ruusukallio
took the bass and still holds it. However, it wasn’t the happiest times. The
band toured less and less each year and lack of inspiration was present in the
recordings while Martti Syrjä suffered problems with alcohol. It seemed the end
of Eppu Normaali when the band decided to take a break in 1994. That break
lasted 11 years.
In 2004, the
group reunited and recorded Sadan vuoden päästäkin. It was a great success,
achieving platinum on its release. It didn’t take that long to have new album
out. Last September Syvään päähän was released and again, the album has sold
great. It is a good album, a collection of rock tunes with intelligent lyrics.
This time the artwork was done by the duck artist Kaj Stenwall and the trivia
says that Juha Torvinen played a couple of songs with a one of Ron Wood’s picks
and Aku Syrjä played with one of Charlie Watts’ drumsticks.
{mosimage}Thirty
years have gone already, but it is not too late to discover, live or on record,
one of Finland’s finest bands. Don’t let the Finnish lyrics scare you!
{mosimage}Here’s another group of frustrated youngsters that vent their anger through aggressive metal music. Malummeh’s sound is highly influenced by Swedish melodic death metal and American metalcore, which certainly isn’t the most unique combination nowadays.
Malummeh may be rightly angered, but they haven’t really found an interesting way to put their anger into music. Everything is done by the book: tightly played thrash riffs, occasional guitar melodies, singer screaming his lungs out – and so on. It’s just hard to figure out why anybody should pick up Revival and not one of the dozens of other similar records.
he band certainly have some strengths, I am not saying that. Unfortunately, song writing is not one of them. No matter how many times you listen to Revival, it is quite difficult to remember anything of it, save the seemingly endless metalcore onslaught everybody into this kind of music has heard a million times before. Malummeh is a band who can name one of their tracks Open Your Eyes and sincerely believe the idea is not already overused.
Malummeh is one of those bands that do all the right things. The sad thing for them is, that in rock music that doesn’t really mean that the music would work. Quite the contrary, actually: you can do many wrong things and still make it work, whereas doing everything right often paints a picture of a band unable to come up with anything genuinely new.
2/5
{mosimage}Samettivallankumous (”velvet revolution” in English) is essentially, as far as the line-up and the style of music go, Ville Härkönen & Velvet with a new name. They make alternative country in Finnish, which – as a concept – is quite refreshing in a way. Too bad the concept doesn’t really work the way it should.
It is quite difficult to point one’s finger why it doesn’t feel so good. The track En voi särkeä sun sydäntä vielä is a case in point: with its audible heartache it sounds like a real alt. country song should sound (minus the out-of-tune-guitar solo), but the emotion it awakens on the listener is lukewarm at best.
Of course, country music is by its nature a very American thing, but I cannot see why a Finnish version of alt. country could not work. Maybe it’s just that it would take a little more to localize a style of music than just use use all of its essential elements without questioning anything.
The album’s lyrics are penned by a variety of writers. Samettivallankumous front man and main composer Ville Härkönen has himself written only one lyric, and the band has had contributions from such people as notable Finnish indie rock musicians Janne Laurila and Ville Leinonen, and even the movie director Markku Pölönen. Therefore it’s understandable that lyrically the album is quite a disjointed, although at times successful affair.
Despite some interesting moments, Täällä mies, kuuleeko nainen? is a mediocre record.
Rating 2/5
Categories
Tales from Denmark
{mosimage}This autumn’s
main exhibition at Ateneum museum travels to Denmark and brings an overview of
Danish 19th-century art. Starting from the Golden Age, it presents 90 works from major Danish artists including C.W.
Eckersberg, Christen Købke, J.Th. Lundbye, P.C. Skovgaard, Vilhelm Hammershøi
and L.A. Ring. This is the most extensive collection of Danish Golden Age art
ever seen in Finland. Also side activities are organized: the
festival of Danish music is this weekend. On the right: M.L. Nathanson's Elder Daughters Bella and Hanna (C.W. Eckersberg, 1820)
In spite of
economic depression and poverty, between 1815 and 1850 Danish art blossomed in
what it is known today as the Golden Age of Danish art. This is the time of
storyteller H.C. Andersen. Artists created skillful portrayals of their surroundings
and friends, creating warm paintings of everyday life. At that time, Danish art
differed from that of the other Nordic countries.
The exhibition
is divided into two major sections: landscapes (nature) and pictures of home
(people). Landscape painting grew in popularity in the 1830s and it made
artists participate in the making of a national identity. Artists like Thomas
Lundbye felt it was their mission to “paint their beloved Denmark with all the
simplicity and modesty so characteristic of it”.
Artists
also found inspiration inside home and soon portrait painting started developing
along with the rise of a middle-class lifestyle. Among others C.W. Eckersberg
and Christen Købke emphasized family relations and the passing on of
traditions.
Tales from
Denmark also extends to the art of the late 19th century, when Nordic artist
communities were created, like Skagen, which included Michael and Anna Ancher
and P.S. Krøyer. Friends at work or evening get togethers were often depicted
by these artists.
This
exhibition is based on Ateneum’s own collection of Danish art. In 1953, Norwegian-born
ship owner Hans Beyer Tobiesen donated 14 high-class paitings of Danish 19th-century
art. For the past years this collection has been deposited at Finland’s Embassy
in Copenhagen. Paintings from the Statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen, the Nationalmuseum
in Stockholm and private collections completed the 90 works on show.
Tales from
Denmark is not only an art exhibition. Lectures, workshops, dance and music for
children and adults complete until the end of January four months of events.
This weekend the festival of Danish music features wind quintet Carion.
Front page painting – Evening at Skagen (Peder Severin Krøyer, 1893)
Until 27 January
Ateneum, Kaivokatu 2,
Helsinki
Opening
hours: Tue, Fri 9-18, Thu 9-20, Sat, Sun 11-17, Mon closed
Admission
8/6,50 euro. Free for visitors under 18.
More information: www.ateneum.fi
{mosimage}Pooma are definitely an interesting band, quite unlike any other band in Finland at the moment. Their lush, atmospheric and ethereal pop music could be compared to such bands as Sigur Rós, Portishead or Radiohead, with also influences from all the quintessential shoegazing bands (Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine and so on).
Persuader is a record that demands serious attention from its listener. There are no catchy choruses or other pop elements to be found, and the band’s sound is somehow very unassuming. However, in the right mindset it sounds actually quite fabulous. The mood of the record is almost like of a fairytale – a somewhat twisted fairytale – or a dream. It really sounds like a carefully constructed piece of work.
Persuader’s appeal is still a bit limited. It would be hard to pick favourite tracks, since none of them really stand out. Nothing really grabs the listener’s attention. Vocalist Tuire Lukka has a seductive voice and the musicians are experienced. They really can create an interesting atmosphere, but too often it feels like that’s all they can do.
Anyway, Persuader is a promising debut. They still have some way to go before they’ll be able to reach the worldwide top of their genre – whatever that genre may be – but they are quite a welcome addition to the Finnish musical climate nevertheless.
3/5
{mosimage}For the last couple of weeks I have
been hooked with the autobiography of the American writer and filmmaker
Samuel Fuller. It reads like a novel. A Third Face: My Tale of Writing, Fighting and Filmmaking
was written just a couple of years before his death in 1997 and is an
exciting tale of a very exciting life – or it would be better to say of
four or five different lives in one.
Samuel
Fuller, born in 1912, is better known by his movies, but before going
behind the camera he was a screenwriter, a pulp novel author, a
volunteer in the 1st Infantry Division during World War II, a teenage
crime reporter and a copyboy for Hearst’s New York Journal American. Yes, in his eighties, by the time he started writing his autobiography, he had some good stories to tell.
The
first chapters are dedicated to Fuller’s devotion to journalism in the
1920s and 1930s. He was just a kid when he began working as a paperboy
and a copyboy, running up and down the legendary Park Row of New York,
delivering messages to Mr. Hearst’s kitchen. The author was in love
with newspapers and writing. It was the golden age of journalism and
the reader can easily recall the smell of the ink and the linotype
machine. Many years later in 1952, Fuller recreated and paid tribute to
the era in his movie Park Row, one of his most popular films.
In
his teenage years, Fuller dreamt of becoming a reporter and so he did
when he turned 17. He became a crime reporter, no less, going from
school to the morgue and the most dangerous suburbs. Samuel even had a
little encounter with Al Capone.
Like
Kerouac in the 1930s, the young journalist left New York and travelled
across America with his typewriter portraying the country and the
economic crisis. He started drawing cartoons, writing books and even
being a ghostwriter for a popular author, whose name Fuller promised
never to disclose in his life.
Despite
being a published author much earlier than a filmmaker, Samuel Fuller
is known for his movies. Just like many other filmmakers, he arrived in
Hollywood as a screenwriter. He wrote many unaccredited stories, but
soon he started thinking about filming too, but his plans were
interrupted by the war. The United States entered World War II and
Fuller decided to enlist in the infantry. He admits that he did it
because he wanted to cover the war from the front line, even when he
was offered a less risky position in the news department.
As
a soldier, Fuller had an outstanding role in the campaigns in North
Africa and Sicily, and he also participated in the Normandy invasion.
His wartime memories are vivid, realistic and raw, like his movies.
There is no room for useless metaphors or distractions. In his
recollection, war is not a time for heroes and soldiers had only two
options: being killed or going nuts. A blood taste prevails in his
writing.
The Big Red One
is probably Fuller’s most ambitious film. It was his lifetime project.
Made in 1980, it is an epic tale about his experiences during the war.
It features Lee Marvin, Mark “Luke Skywalker” Hamill and a group of
unknown young actors. It reconstructs the fears and the camaraderie of
the soldiers and the stories, and it is far more realistic than other
spectacular films, such as Saving Private Ryan.
Unfortunately,
producers cut the movie by 40 minutes, so at the time of its release it
didn’t have the impact it deserved and Fuller was unhappy with the
result. His first cut of the movie ran to four and a half hours. In
2004 the film was re-edited and reconstructed to be more faithful to
Fuller’s original vision. The new cut clocks in at 160-minutes and it’s
the version currently released on DVD.
Almost
ten years after his death, Samuel Fuller remains a cult filmmaker. His
films were never blockbusters, they didn’t receive many awards or have
a high budget – he didn’t need them. Nowadays his work is praised by
contemporary directors like Martin Scorsese (who wrote the foreword of
the autobiography), Jim Jarmusch, Quentin Tarantino and, Finland’s
finest, Aki and Mika Kaurismäki, who, incidentally, counted upon the
participation of Fuller in a little role on a couple of his films.
Other
trivia for the Finnish reader is that Samuel Fuller was a guest at the
first edition of Midnight Sun Film Festival in Sodankylä in 1986. In
the center of the town, a street was renamed in his honour: Samuel
Fullerin katu (Samuel Fuller’s street).
Do
yourself a favour and watch Samuel Fuller’s films and, if you have the
time, read his autobiography. It is the tale of a genuine storyteller.
{mosimage}For all those who still don’t know, José González is not from Spain or South America and he’s music is nothing similar to the typical Latin pop star. As a matter of fact, José Gonzalez is an intimate singer and songwriter from Sweden.
Born in Gothenburg to Argentine parents, González has slowly built international popularity with his first album, Veneer, released in 2003 in Sweden, but which didn’t make it to the UK and US markets until 2005. Since then, his career has been a success with his songs reaching the top of the charts and even getting into the popular television series The O.C.
This success can be considered quite unexpected for a collection of acoustic folk songs. But José González seems to ride on the same wave that is taking to popularity to other singer songwriters like Devendra Banhart. Hippie folk is hype again.
After this success, it could be expected that the follow up to Veneer could compromise the songwriting of the young Swedish singer and force him to be more commercial. But little has changed and In Our Nature shows the same characteristics: a minimalistic intimate sound built around the acoustic guitar and vocal melody, with the occasional addition of mild percussion and synthesizer.
The sound will remember classic folk singers like Crosby, Still and Nash, Tim Buckley or Leonard Cohen while the lyrics tend to refer to nature, love and certain doctrine that seems to denounce the selfish nature of human being “How long are you willing to go before you reach all your selfish goals”, the singer asks in the first verse of the album.
Surprisingly, José González decided to include in this album a cover of Massive Attack’s hit Teardrop. That seems to be a wise choice because the song really fits in the context of the album.
With In Our Nature, José González will overcome the always-difficult second album. But it will not be groundbreaking because of its many similarities to the first album. In the future, he will need to expand to sounds to avoid repeating himself. Before that happens, In Our Nature is a very enjoyable album and people will love it as it shows the already sold out show at Tavastia next December.
Rating 3/5
{mosimage}In his long career, Steve Earle has never played safe. Every new album adds a risky and unexpected element, either if that is the punk rock of the Supersuckers, the bluegrass of the Del McCoury band or the political protest of his previous albums Jerusalem (2002) and The Revolution Starts Now (2004).
This trend is not different with his latest release, Washington Square Serenade. Earle invited Dust Brother John King to produce the album. Yes, one of the producers behind Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique and Beck’s Odelay.
With John King behind the controls, Washington Square Serenade presents an array of contemporary sounds that collide with Earle’s traditional songwriting. Many hardcore fans might get annoyed by the samples and drum loops on top of Steve’s folkie guitar and harmonica, or the mandolins and the dobros.
But this production should not scare anyone. It’s the same old Steve Earle, anyway, and he offers a bunch of good songs whether he stays behind traditional sounds like Jericho Road or he raps on top of drum loops like in Satellite Radio.
As usual, there is a duet with a female voice. After Lucinda Williams, Emmylou Harris and Stacey Earle, it was the time for Steve’s new wife, singer Allison Moorer, to be featured in the traditional duet that Earle includes in his albums.
Closing this new album is the cover that the singer did of Tom Waits’ Way Down in the Hole as the theme song of the last season of the series The Wire, where Steve Earle did a little acting too. This version fully embraces hip hop and it feels more like a bonus track that part of the beautiful poem to New York that is Washington Square Serenade as a whole.
Rating 4/5
{mosimage}Neil Young releases the follow up of an album
that never saw the light. In 1976 in a fire at his house, the Canadian
songwriter lost the tapes of his project Chromes Dreams, an album that was
intended to include classics like Powderfinger, Like a Hurricane or Too Far
Gone. That project was lost and all those songs popped up later on in different
albums.
Chromes Dreams II does not have much to do with that project, and it
presents Neil's music wandering in different forms like acoustic ballads or
long guitar-driving epic songs.
This new album is built around an old song.
Young opens his archives and brings back Ordinary People, an 18-minute song,
recorded during the sessions of the This Note's for You in 1988. It was only
played live a dozen times at the time and since then it has been a favourite
among hardcore fans. It includes very good narrative lyrics and horns. It
reminds some of those long Dylan songs.
That’s not
the only unusually long song. No Hidden Path goes beyond 14 minutes. Not with
Crazy Horse this time, but it brings back the atmosphere of the underrated
album Sleep With Angels (1994).
But Chromes
Dreams II is an album of many different sounds, that evoke all the signatures of
the Canadian. There’s a bit of country (Beautiful Bluebird is a sweet opening),
pop (The Believer), rock (Dirty Old Man) and a surprise waltz tune with a
children’s chorus to end the album (This Way).
Even though
it might lack the wildness and the energy of a younger Young (no pun intended),
Chromes Dreams II will satisfy all the fans as it presents the most surprising
and diverse Neil Young album in many years.
Rating 4/5
Categories
Teenage sensation
{mosimage}
They
are young, they are pretty, they rock. Stalingrad
Cowgirls are the new teenage sensation. These three young ladies from Salla, a small town 60
km North of the Artic Circle
might not be allowed to enter the night clubs yet but they have already
released their first album, opened for Iggy Pop and The Stooges and
been on the cover of the most popular music magazines. Bassist Henna
tells FREE! about it.
Stalingrad Cowgirls practice some basic and fun music: Ramones oriented punk rock like other young girl groups like The Donnas or Swedish Sahara Hotnights. While still being in high school, they keep on touring across Finland and being rock stars.
How was opening for Iggy Pop? He could be your grandfather!
As young rocker
girls we felt very humble! Iggy is very old but he has also an
amazing amount of energy. It makes you realize how long he had been
doing his thing and how well he can do it. We have very much respect
for him. Two of us met Iggy after the gig. Unfortunately our drummer
went already home by train. We got good comments and feedback from
him. He watched our performance. We put the advice behind the ear.
Why did you decide to start a band?
We live in a small
village in the North. There are about 5000 inhabitants in Salla.
There the possibility to do things is very limited, you can do only
sports or music. We are not that sporty, and we have classical
background of music, so it felt natural to start a band.
How did you come up with such a name for the band?
This is a long
story! We were going to one of our first gigs in the Youth Culture
Train event. There were performing people from Sweden, Norway, Russia
and Finland. One performance was in Russia, in Murmansk, and this was
the biggest reason for choosing the name Stalingrad Cowgirls. Indeed,
we didn’t invent the name, it was proposed by one friend of ours.
Two of you are not even twenty, isn't everything going very fast?
No. We could have
sit and wait in the training place for that for 10 years! But we
wanted to save the feeling of this moment and this huge energy what
comes out of us to the record, and it has nothing to do with the age.
We have so much time to do this for so long time!!
How was the recording of Somewhere High?
Making of our first
record was very interesting. Fortunately we had a very relaxed
producer with who we came along very well. It wasn’t anything about
“ok, now I press this red button and you play the bass”. We
learned so much all different kinds of thing and next time when we go
to the studio, we might not be so lost and stupid.
If you wouldn't have recorded an album already, would you dare to go to Idols?
Not at all, in any
point! In Idols, the people go there, who
want to sing, we want to play and be a band.
What are your favourite bands?
Everybody has their
own, but we also share some favourites. Like Sahara Hotnights,
Backyard Babies, Hardcore Superstar, The Donnas and also some older
bands like Rainbow, Whitesnake and Thin Lizzy.
www.stalingradcowgirls.com
www.myspace.com/stalingradcowgirls
{sidebar id=38}{mosimage}The new and hilarious comedy from Will Ferrell will not let his fans down. This time, he sets the ice rink on fire as the ultimate sex bomb on skates.
I must admit that I am getting more and more hooked with Will Ferrell’s movies. When it is about time to see comedies with not much farther aims than just spending a couple of hours relaxed and having some healthy good laughs, his movies are great. I liked a lot when I watched Talladega Nights for a second time and I enjoyed Anchorman too. In Blades of Glory, Ferrell, as the wild Chazz Michael Michaels (I really love that name!) is back together with Jon Heder (you may remember him from Napoleon Dynamite, one of the nicest surprises from 2004) and both work as a great duo of actors, everyone with a personality that frontally collides with the other. Their dialogues and interaction are hilarious with an excellent chemistry.
Special mention for the scriptwriters that were able to twist once more the comedy genre and take advantage of a sport that had not been enough exploded in the big screen, although some scandals in real life were pretty notorious, like the Nancy Kerrigan’s case (who, by the way, makes a cameo during the film, as many other real skaters).
A movie that knows perfectly how to take advantage of the jealousy and personal competitions that happen in real life, but at the same time resolves exquisitely the non-easy task of putting two heterosexual men skating together. For the detail lovers, you must know that both actors had to learn how to skate almost as professionals with many hard hours of training. Jon Heder broke one rib while shooting the film and the moment when he answers in perfect Japanese a question from a journalist comes from the real Japanese knowledge that he has, after having lived a couple of years in the Asian country while being a Mormon missionary.
If you do not like Will Ferrell’s previous films, forget to watch this DVD, since it goes pretty much in the same line. But if you enjoyed their special gestures and sketches, you will not feel disappointed with this movie.
Rating 4/5