(to Wellu): How well do you speak Chinese?Wellu: (speaks fluent Chinese for 30 sec)
Miika: He speaks fluent Chinese but he doesn’t know what he is saying!
(laugh)
Wellu: But the thing is that you have to come and see how I’m dealing with the people. It’s one of the key points: you have to learn the Chinese and they will be more open.
In every country it’s better to know the local language.
Miika: It’s easier in Nordic countries.
Wellu: I can say it’s better here than in China. It’s quite important in business. And if you go to countryside you can easily get into troubles if you have no idea how to speak. At least you will loose a lot of money because the business is like that is fool who pays.
(to Wellu) As I know, you’ve been to China and found out that Finnish metal music is pretty popular there?
Wellu: Actually, before we thought that Finnish metal music generally is not so well-known in China. I think this year first time ever many-many-many Finnish metal bands have been touring around China. Shanghai and Beijing have been places for gigs. Actually right now there is the festival called Hellfest, at the same time as World Expo. And when I went there I have been interviewing people, meeting people, having connections and dinners and all kinds of ways to meet people and ask and hear things. I got the idea that actually they know more about Finnish metal music than we have suspected. And I was very surprised about that. They even have websites for Finnish metal music, like a fan-clubs made by Chinese people. We had no idea it existed before. And the bands they know… Sometimes I walked along the street in Shanghai and normally I just suspect that I will see and hear them playing their own kind of music, something traditional or some pop or Korean or Japanese, this kind of music that has nothing to do with the metal. But I have many times heard like Nightwish coming out from just single supermarket speakers… yeah, I was astonished.
Are you studying there in China?
Wellu: I’ve been studying the language for a year, but now I have airplane techniques in progress, I’m trying to finish my studies. And actually that way the idea of PMN was born, when first I studied Chinese, I’ve been studying music, I play violin. We wanted to connect everything – our jobs and hobbies. All of us, also Teemu and others aim to do that.
What is going on in China with the Project now?
Wellu: I’ve been contacting these bands and there has been also astonishment. We suspected that _there_is_ something going on with metal music, but it’s on the stage of evolving like Finland has been around 70ies, 80ies, when it has been a punk and it has started to transform towards the metal stage that it is now. And I thought it might be on the same level.
Miika: It’s underground.
Wellu: Yes. And it’s true, it’s _very_ underground. Nobody knows that there are thousands and thousands of metal bands and most of them are even better quality than others over the world. Just the only thing is that nobody knows they exist. And they have no idea how they can get out of there. Because of the Chinese government that has been blocking before very much the whole thing, but past years it has been opening more and more. And last thing I’ve experienced watching this Chinese biggest music festival called MIDI – it took place in Beijing – there most of the bands played around metal style, more or less. Punk metal rock, rock punk, rock pop, all kinds of metal. And a week before I went to this music festival, I found out that there’s another festival going o around the same topic, but it’s more like on a Chinese metal and rock, it’s called Strawberry and it was the first time this year. So, as I see, it is evolving here faster than I thought. This MIDI festival will take place _again_ this year.
Onni: The same year?!
Wellu: Yes. Well, there are a lot of people even though the metal scene is not so popular comparing to the whole population, but comparing to Finnish population… already the metal heads in China is more than we have people here in Finland, I think! (laugh)
Are you going to bring some Chinese bands to Finland, to promote them?
Miika: Yes, we have thought about it. I am not quite sure when it’s going to happen, but we have a strong will to cross the cultures’ lines: take Finnish bands to China and bring Chinese bands to Finland. And also, why not to other Nordic countries… Or around the world, if we will just get the group pf bands and if it will be welcomed in China… Because in China it’s very important to deal with the government. They decide whether you are allowed to bring some band or not. One good example: Lamb Of God had a gig about two months ago, and they were supposed to go to Shanghai and Beijing, but they played only in Shanghai because they lacked some papers and authorities, police denied their access to Shanghai. So you see, it’s very crucial and it’s up to very small things if you will have an access and have a gig or you will be kicked out.
Wellu: You have to be very careful and have very good relationships with the government and higher authorities. That is one key point we have to deal with, but it’s on our timetable, we want to make everything perfect. We will make it happen, way or another, sooner or later. And that means that we will make a friendship and we will deal and cooperate with the government and authorities. First we have just to make a base around big people because if they realise that people like it, not just people but so huge amount of people enjoy it and cheer it, then they won’t have a choice to deny it.
So, now you’re building the relationships and finding the right people and later you’ll search for the place for your club?
Wellu: Yes. And the other thing we are doing is making this information as clear and good package as we can that we could contact and give this idea to investors and companies to get the money and make it happen.
Miika: And also we are currently building a fan-base in Finland and all over Europe. We are interviewing lots of bands and let them know about our Project…
What is the purpose of that? How bands can help you?
Miika: Well, bands are that ones who play metal and if they’ll get familiar with the Project, they can promote it for all the fans. Like Myspace is a huge connecting place for the bands and their fans, so if the bands know about the Project they can tell about it everybody. And that will take us a little bit forward.
Wellu: Maybe you can also tell a little bit about our own music product which we are going to make also with the bands on stage.
Miika: Yeah. We are recording this Metal Nation Anthem…
I thought that it’s going to be just one song.
Miika: Well, at this point it’s just one song. But we are thinking about making some kind of project.
Lucky: Like a band?
Miika: Probably. But right now we are doing that one song for the film of the Project. Maybe we’ll put up a band because this Project is about metal and the metal lifestyle. Music is a pretty big part of the whole metal thing. It’s not everything, there’s much more. Of course we want to promote metal. The best way is to put some metal together. We are lucky that we have band connections to Finnish metal scene and experience. I’ve been bartending in Finnish club Hellä for 3 years. And also Heavy Metal TAMK – it was society for students in TAMK University at first place. Wellu actually was the one who got the idea. He took over first and like 6 months later I charged in. I was the next chairman after Wellu.
Wellu: It was actually the owner of the old Hellä who introduced Miika to our team and then he got enthusiastic about the idea and joined in. Then we have been going step by step further to this point with the Metal Nation.
Miika: We thought about such a huge global Project already then but it didn’t work out with that crew. It was in 2007-2008.
Wellu: And that idea with Heavy Metal TAMK was like in 2005. Now its name is Heavy Metal Tampere.
Miika: We are not included in that club anymore. But we got the whole thing started and we started to make some student heavy metal stuff in Tampere. I gu
ess it was a bit too little what we were doing, we were not satisfied. Wellu: Our wishes were beyond the borders. And I think at that point this aspiration wasn’t prepared and we didn’t have enough power, forces and resources to make it happen.
Miika: Yeah, but we had a lot of fun, we did put up some gigs and we did some cooperation with Sauna Open Air and NummiRock and other metal festivals in Finland. That was also one big thing to gather connections to the metal scene in Finland. I think that the strong influence also might had have my job in Hellä. I’ve arranged some gigs, played some records and served beer. And I’ve seen a lot of Finnish metal scene. It got me more into that whole world of metal. From that point it has been just growing and growing.
How do you help in making concerts nowadays? For example that club festival NKM fest in Tampere at the same time as Sauna Open Air 2010.
Miika: My friend called me at the beginning of this year. He got this idea of a small festival at the same time as SOA because that time the city is full of metalheads but there’s only one good metal bar and one bar that takes care of an after-party. So we thought that it would be a good idea to put up our own small festival as an after-party. Then he said that he has bands for the Saturday and I had ideas for two other days. Then we have contacted all our friends, called some agencies to bring these bands and made this happening. And I’m glad that most of those bands are our friends in some way and we cooperate with them. So, the situation is good and I think this is not going to be the last one; we’ll probably make some bigger gigs in autumn.
All that MySpace and Facebooks must take a lot of time…
Miika: Yeah, that social media do.
Wellu: It’s just a beginning.
Lucky: But you have also your jobs and trips to China, so on. How can you find a time for everything? And in the future the amount of the work will only grow…
Miika: That’s why we want to make people believe…
But how all that people can help you?
Miika: We will just tell people more about the idea, some will join us and do some works. If you are a fan and you wanna join us, we have lots of tasks. We recruit people to write blogposts, to translate materials into other languages, to help us to build up concerts.
Wellu: And the translating will be the big issue: it’s not only about China, we are translating currently our blog-website and other materials into Chinese and later also I could say it will be Russian, obviously we have to deal with Russia.
Miika: Yeah, so we need people because I’m pretty sure that we can’t do everything by ourselves. We want to put our time on the things that are primary, like dealing with the financiers, companies and assossiations. We need people to work on the field, like making the gigs and spreading the word. We will need flash-designers, web-designers, graphic designers, architectures for the bar of course…
Wellu: Everything! And also people to go to festivals and concerts to interview the bands for ideas and minds about the Project, and what they are doing right now and what ideas they have for the time, also different kinds of background information, audio and visual recordings which we could use on the website.
Miika: And we have some ideas of putting up some like compilation CDs of Finnish Metal, so of course we need bands for that. Just anyone who is into metal scene or into metal in general is welcome to our Project. And he can tell us what he can do so we can think something to do for him.
Wellu: It’s also up to applicant’s abilities, what he or she is capable of.
But not everybody can design or translate. There are a lot of usual people with usual jobs who are also into metal. Can they take part in Project?
Miika: Of course they can. Everyone can help. It’s already helpful to speak about the Project. They can just tell us that they live in Seinäjoki, or Moscow, or Madrid, Tallinn, somehwhere else… and say if they have for example a little group that knows about Project: Metal Nation and would like to do something with the Project. We could arrange like a gig with them there and spread the word in different countries that way.
Do you have already any investments?
Miika: No, actually we are currently making that Project plan that we need to approach all the financiers.
Is the Project: Metal Nation an official company?
Miika: It’s under Tuoni Studios now, but we are thinking about making a separate company for it because when you get some financial income you have to get some international company behind it. We have to make all the necessary deals with the Chinese bands and money transfers could be a problem if it would be under our own company. But right now it’s still a Project. It doesn’t matter what company is behind it. We are the guys who are doing this.
What are going to do when you have a club in China?
Miika: Then we will move the concept to other cities around the Earth!
W: It’s not just an idea to make a club. We want to create a place for culture and music and through that the place for people with common interests – the place to play for musicians, for audience to watch and listen.
Do you have concrete plans toward Russia?
Wellu: First of all, I think we will travel from Finland to China and one of the best and easiest ways might be making the Project plan so huge that Russians will get enthusiastic about it so we would fly in the Russian airspace from Finland to China. That means when we are flying there we are making multiple stops and landings because a small plane can fly maybe 500 km and then you have to fill the tank with the fuel again. So a flight from here to China can take like 3 months. It’s not that simple! (laugh) I think this already should sound so huge that there shouldn’t be a problem when we’ll make all the lands. But the point is that it needs a lot of time because of some country’s aspects and lots of landings and if we’ll do it only in the Russian airspace then we don’t have to deal with other countries. Also Russia has so huge availability and interest for the metal among the people and they have realised the process of the market with this so it will be good to start discussing this.
Miika: We also thought about doing some shows in the cities where we will stop. Like to bring bands and play a concert and also to present and tell about our Project. Then we’d fly to the next city and do the show again. And another thing that came up… In the middle of May I was meeting this guy Toni-Matti Karjalainen from the project BogFires, they are doing an academic research over the Finnish Metal Music. We have discussed with him about this matter that we could actually rent a train from Finland to China across the Russian railways. And of course there in the train could go bands…
Wellu: So it would be something like metal festival on the rails! Going at the same time as playing and stopping everywhere where the airplanes lands! At the same time maybe like the repair and maintance crew on the wheels.
Miika: We have thought about it and we have lots of other ideas. We just have to pick up the ones we want to make true.
Lucky: Well, the train sounds good…
Miika: Yeah, it’s possible and that’s why we wanna use airplane because the train is easier!
(laugh)
Lucky: You can also use a ship!
Wellu: Yes, to make it as huge as possible! And maybe even fans could join the trip.
Could you please comment you name, Project: Metal Nation? Why exactly this name? Who came up with it? Have you had any other ideas?
Miika: Well… I came up with this name. It actually was only a tentative name. When Wellu introduced this idea to us we didn’t have a name and we were putting stuff on the paper al the time. Finally I had a lot of papers so I just started writing “Project: Metal Nation” as our little metal idea. Then we had a brainstorming about the Project’s name. We had like 4 or 5 sheets of paper with different variants. We went through them pondering over how it is going to sound and is it a good name for such a project. Then it somehow got stuck, that my very first version. The Project: Metal Nation. And we t
hought it gives a picture about this whole plan. This is a project, it’s all about metal and we plan to build a society around the globe. That’s a nation idea.Wellu: Connect people around the world no matter where they are.
As I know you have already some people who help you.
Miika: Yes. First of all I’d like to mention Ville Nepal from the band Ironica. He composes the Metal Nation Anthem and he did a huge help to us. Then Jussi. Jussi is the guy who lives in China in Nancy, he is a student of international marketing, I think. He just approached me and told that he has heard about the Project and he is interested in this, so we cooperate with him. He has a lot of contacts…
Wellu: We has met several times and I was actually with him at Beijing MIDI Festival. And another Finnish guy who live in China, he is originally Jussi’s friend – Arto, he is studying Chinese translation, Chinese-Finnish-English.
Miika: Those guys help us in translating materials and contacting bands, companies and different authorities. Then, there’s Obscure Entertainment. Of course all of our friends and families are helping us. When we first told them about this Project they were like “Do you really mean it?! No!!!” But now when we’ve been doing it for 6 months they are supporting us in many ways. We have also bands that help us: Ironica, Blackstar Halo, and Scar Symmetry (Swedish band and a lot of fun!), they are great guys.
Wellu: Then, we have a creative society in Tampere and we’ve been contacting them, telling about our Project and they gave help like in making different papers… I’ve just came from China in May and I have a lot of information about companies there. I’ve met people from record companies, bar owners and other businessmen who are already interested in supporting our Project. Then, there is the Chinese woman that lives here in Finland, You Zhou, she wants to help us.
Miika: She knows a lot about marketing in China and how people react there.
Wellu: And there’s also the band in Shanghai which I would put under the name of metal, but they have created their own kind of trend. Their bass-player, Seppo, is from Finland. He is about 60 years old – a man who has seen the whole world and now makes music for his band. He got to know about this Project and asked what he could do. And actually he with his wife, they are the main members in the band, they asked me to join them to play violin there and I’ve already got some notes to practice. I’ll take my violin with me when I’ll go back there. They have lots and lots of life experience. Seppo has been living there for 20 years, maybe more, and his wife Lindy is Chinese.
Miika: Of course we would like to see many more names on this list.
Do you get a lot of messages?
Miika: I’ve got already a lot of emails. It doesn’t come every day. But 2 or 3 people contacts us in a week time. We have new members on the Facebook page every day. But the most interesting thing was that guy from Egypt who contacted me in April. He said he runs a blog about metal and he just ran across this Project. He is willing to do anything he can that they would be on the map. He supports very much the idea about metal becoming global and people talking the same language in the sense of metal.
So, this is your main idea?
Miika: Yeah! Building an airplane, flying to China, setting up a metal club is just the first step. We won’t stop then, we’ll go on and on. We’ll bring it to all of the continents, to Africa also. Can be some bar for penguins… (they laugh)
Wellu: It will be more like ice-bar. And talking about interesting people, just a few weeks ago I’ve met people from Israel who got interested in our Project. They were travelling in China. And at MIDI festival there was one rock band from Israel. We’ve got also contacts from Turkey, that people have already proposed that we should take the next target from China to Turkey. Turkey has lots of metalheads also.
I see you have got a lot of contacts during these 6 months.
Miika: Yeah, but actually we have launched this Project in March. So it has been public just for 3 months.
Are you satisfied at this point with what you have?
Miika: (laughs) We have to be! The whole idea is so absurd that it takes a lot of time to adjust the whole concept. But I think it has been pretty welcomed.
Wellu: Chinese people were really crazy about this Project. They have been searching and asking and meeting…
By the way, don’t they have enough metal clubs there in China?
Wellu: Beijing is well-developed. Shanghai is the city that has a lot of metal but lacks real good metal places. What I have seen there now, is one really good bigger place with the good audio system which is able to maintain and give a good opportunity for a quality band and a big show. Of course there are also big stadiums and this kind of stuff.
Do you already have any idea in what city you will set up your club?
Wellu: It’s Shanghai, so far. We are more and more coming to the idea that it will be a good place for us to make it happen. Beijing has a lot of things, there are record companies and stuff like that but when we go to Shanghai, it’s in the middle between the North and the South, there’s a good distance from everywhere, there is a number of big cities around it. And Shanghai doesn’t have a good place for metal. In Beijing we can cooperate with big festivals. And Shanghai is more open and more international. And another thing is that there are a lot of bands and companies who support this idea.
Do you already have any possible name for your club?
(laugh)
Miika: Actually not… I think it’s going to be something connected with Finnish mythology. It’s one of our big interests.
Wellu: It’s not a big issue yet at this point.
Miika: But I can tell you one thing. When you will step into the club it will be an experience itself, because it will be so huge and mind-blowing!
Do you already have any ideas about the design?
Miika: Yeah! It’s going to be a mixture of Chinese and Finnish cultures.
What is the most difficult for you now and how do you think what’s going to be difficult in the future?
Miika: Well, the hardest thing is to get the right financiers because we don’t want to work with companies who think it’s all the same what we are doing as long as we get a good profit. We have to get such companies that will support the idea and help us to build it. We’ve got to make a name before we’ll start searching for partners so we need lots of fans and big statistics. Everybody should know about us.
Wellu: And also we need to make something real like these videos and songs, etc.
Miika: One of the biggest issues is the work with the Chinese government, I think.
Do you have anything to add?
Wellu: I think there are things to discuss for a week! (they laugh)
Miika: Well, we are building the Metal project. Most of people think that metal is all about music and aggression and stage performance and that kind of stuff. For us metal is more like lifestyle. It’s everything. It’s clothing, eating, drinking, living with the family – we have strong family values and we try to promote them and bring them into metal. 99,9 % of metalheads are not church-burners as some think. We try to build positive values to metal scene.
Wellu: We want to give people more detail picture of metal and its idea.
How?
Miika: Metal is all about meeting people, crossing the borders, having good time together. Maybe we could arrange some big international meetings in out club.
Wellu: To connect people better. Maybe they’ll get the idea better when we show ourselves in the frontline of the Project. Most of the companies in the world sell something but nobody knows who is behind it. We want to do it the opposite way.
Miika: We live 110% metal and we have normal jobs and families.
Wellu: And we want to show people that if you really want something and if you do all the efforts for it and work hard enough you will make all the dreams come true.
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Interview done by Onni
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