In the bleak autumn of 1996 EVEMASTER was formed by T. Mykkänen (music) and J. Taskula (vocals). Since T. Mykkänen had some songs ready already, the band recorded their first demo In Thine Majesty not later than at the end of the year. "I had some riffs and half songs around for a while but they really didn"t fit for the bands I was in at the time", Tomi, man behind the music says and continues, "so I needed a new band to channel my ideas". The demo was heavily promoted by the band itself and after negotiations with some labels Finnish KTOK Records released their first CD Lacrimae Mundi in mid 1998. The band also negotiated later another deal for the album with Polish AMP Records. AMP started well with the promotion (2 live shows in Poland) of the album but they couldn"t do that for anywhere else than in their home country so the deal was disbanded. "After that it was hard to motivate ourselves to continue. We didn"t have a label to release our next album", Jarno says and continues, "so we decided to start our own label, Vortex Motions Records, and release EVEMASTER MCD through it."

The MCD was recorded in summer 2001. To get better distribution the band decided to work with another label, Emerald Factory. Fortunately, now it seems, Emerald Factory didn"t have money to release the MCD so the band started to look for other labels again. A multi-album deal with Low frequency Records was signed. LFR wanted a full album instead of a MCD so the band entered Astia studios again during December 2002 and recorded 5 more songs. The album is called Wither.

Music-wise Wither is more aggressive, yet more melodic than it"s predecessor Lacrimae Mundi. "Somehow my death metal past showed its ugly head when I was making the new songs for Wither", Tomi explains and continues, "I think there is very clear difference between the MCD songs and the new songs. I"m sure not many people can see it as clearly as I do but as the music maker I know there was a big difference in composing the songs and arranging the guitars. There"s now constant rhythm guitar background whereas in the MCD songs there"re many places where there are only melodic guitars. This thing alone makes the new songs much heavier and darker."

On Wither there"s cover version of TAROT"s Wings Of Darkness as a bonus track. "I have always wanted to pay homage to these Finnish heavy metal masters and now was a good time to do it", says Jarno and continues, "Wings Of Darkness is a classic and the fact that we got Marco Hietala to sing the backing vocals. It is just amazing!" "Marco"s vocals complement Jarno"s very well and I think that our arrangement sounds excellent. The solo part of the song is a bit different from the original though... ", Tomi grins.

"I think that Wither is pretty much the album I wanted to make", says Tomi and continues, "it"s dark and heavy, yet very melodic. There are also some very interesting drum and synth parts that make the album different from the rest. I"ve included some not-so-metal things in the songs which hopefully makes Wither stand out from the huge mass of upcoming metal albums." "Of course the time was short in the studio but there"s nothing half baked in the album", Tomi explains and says, "well, of course there are things that could have been done better and with more time but maybe some authenticity could have been lost in the process."

"Jarno"s vocals are amazing throughout the album. There"s so much variation in his vocals even though he sings with his metal voice all the time. I"m very glad to have a vocalist of his caliber in EVEMASTER. I think he"s one of the best of metal genre", Tomi says and continues, "we also used Lindberg"s clean voice and Penttilä"s grim voice on the album to give it more depth." "I haven"t sung since the recordings of the MCD so I"m very pleased, even amazed, by the result", Jarno says and continues, "I always sing according to the song so now when we had such a strong and heavy material it was easier to find the right atmosphere and attitude for the vocals."

All in all Wither will stir the genre with it"s versatility. The fact that the album will take more than one or two listens to sink in the listener makes it a long-lasting and hopefully forever opening to the awaiting, and becoming, fans of EVEMASTER.

(Source: Official Site)