ALL THESE THINGS I DO FOR YOU AND GET NOTHING IN RETURN!!
Interviewer: Welcome to Tampere, again. Must be a familiar place to the whole band already since you've been playing here a lot of times.
Timo: I can't even remember the first time we played here, i guess 1996 or 1995, actually we were in Tulliklubi in 95' during the times of my first album.
I've propably played here 25 times or something.
Interviewer: As we all know Finland is Stratovarius' homeland, what is it like to play in Finland compared to other countries?
Timo: Well, the first thing that comes to mind especially during winter is that you get warm water from the shower, in England you may not.
A really good country and especially in Tampere there's always a fucking good crowd, i'm looking forward to this gig aswell.
Interviewer: How does a foreign fan differ from a finnish one?
Timo: South America is the loudest crowd for this kind of music, japanese crowds pay the most attention. Finland is somewhere in the middlegrounds
Good people, and finnish people have certain manners, they wait in line for autographs. They know the songs and sing along, good crowd.
Interviewer: You've played in small clubs and on big stages, how do they differ from each other?
Timo: Plenty of differences. One thing to remember is that no matter where you play you should take it the same way. Doesn't matter if there's 5 people or 5000 people, you just need to try and give a good show.
If you're not headlining sometimes you might not get such a good sound in
big festivals. In terms of singing it's propably better to play in rock clubs.
And the warmer and moister it is it's better for the voice.
Interviewer: South America has got that covered.
Timo: That's true. If there's a lot of people in a small place the mood is great.
When talking about live shows we are not robots, there's good and bad days. Sometimes someone can say ''Damn, what a good gig!'' and the other ''It was pretty shit.'', but sometimes we all agree that it was great. it depends on so many things .
Interviewer: Can you tell beforehand that a gig is good, if people are standing in line 5 hours before the show?
Timo: Well yeah! It's nice to see people waiting for your gig drinking a little, warming up their voices i mean..That's what i meant.
Interviewer: Helloween is such a big name in power metal like Stratovarius, what's your opinion on the band?
Timo: In 89' i went to see Dio and before him there was some pumpkin band playing and i though ''What is this, i can't listen to this.. Dio! Dio! Dio!'' nothing else mattered at that time. I didn't really pay attention at the gig. The next weekend a friend of mine came up to me and asked if i knew of Helloween and played me some and i though ''Fuck..Why didn't i listen to this?'' It was odd because Kiske was at the band and he sings with the same style as i and i had never heard of this guy. I've seen these guys around, it's a good package and it's nice to play with them. It's fun to drink with them after the show.
Interviewer: Who's idea was it to arrange the 7 Sinners tour and ask Stratovarius to join in?
Timo: Helloween's new album came out in the beginning of autumn and they booked their tour last spring, they thought of someone to play with them so they called us if we're interested. We liked the idea.
To be honest there isn't really all that many bands of this type touring nowdays. Only problem was we were still making our own album and we really worked hard on it to get it out on time. And then there was the situation with Jörg..
Suddenly we didn't have a drummer and we didn't even know if he would make it alive. Jörg said that we have to go to do the tour and we found a great replacement.
Interviewer: You mentioned that there isn't many power metal bands touring anymore, you could say that the best are left.
Timo: Hopefully! I think the bands that were pulling the genre forward like Helloween and we following that, we were propably the biggest bands back then.
Interviewer: Was Jörg already in the studio at the time when he was diagnosed?
Timo: Yeah, it all came so suddenly, he just noticed a bump on his neck and went to a checkup before the tour. A week before the tour he emailed us that he still needs to see the doctor without telling what was wrong, and one weekend he emailed that he has a tumor in his neck. We googled all the worst situations, now he seems fine and went to chemo.
He lost a lot of blood on that wich drained him but now he is already playing drums again.
Interviewer: There's one thing in common with Finnish and German bands that there's a big market in japan, why do you think that is?
Timo: Well yeah, back in 93' before i was in the band the guys got a record label there because melodic metal was big there. When i joined the band melodic metal was so untrendy elsewhere. We keep Japan so exotic and through music a lot of japanese people come visit Finland. I've visited Japan a few times, it looks a bit like scandinavia..There's some similarity.
Interviewer: Stratovarius has toured for a long time and you've seen a lot of places. In places you've visited a lot is it already like a routine that you know everything about the places.
Timo: There's not many places where we have been that many times, that's one of the good things about a so called international band as opposed to a band which sings in Finnish, you get to visit different places.
If there's a gig in New York i become sort of a tourist and want to see the famous spots.
Interviewer: What kind of music do you listen to yourself, if you do?
Timo: Well, i listen to some stuff and i have to listen to our stuff. In sauna i listen to some relaxing music and if a friends band makes a new album that i'll have to listen to. But there isn't such an excitement like back in the day if a band releases a new album. You start to analyze music..
Interviewer: What's the best Stratovarius song in your opinion?
Timo: Huh..Let's see if there's something on the new album..Can't name any to be honest.
Interviewer: There has to be a few favourites
Timo: Well there's some have to play songs like Hunting high and low and Black Diamond and they sort of start to wear out.
Interviewer: In my opinion Legions, paradise and Black Diamond are great but you'll sort of already know that Black Diamond is going to be on the set list and some people get mad if you don't play it.
Timo: Well we are the audience's servants, we try to have some variation.
Interviewer: Any new songs from the new album?
Timo: One song.
Interviewer: Are you going to play any festivals this summer?
Timo: Well yeah some, we have some plans to play a few gigs in Finland this easter.
Interviewer: What's Helloween's best song?
Timo: I like Im Alive, future world, eagle fly free and dr.stein. A lot of good songs.
Interviewer: There's good songs on the new album, it's nice that after all these years they can still make good songs.
Timo: The more albums you make, you sort of have to please older fans and at the same time have something new. Our new album does that i think.
I hope even one of you read this...
Thx for the interview.
.
