Interview: Rodsogarden, June 2008, Finland

I recently came across another Finnish band (no surprise there I guess), on the verge of releasing their debut album, that was very interested in sharing more about them and their music. So as the guys met up for a rehearsal over the weekend, they took some time to answer a few of my questions. Here is what they had to say:

Romana: Ok, so I won’t start with the obvious question – about your name – that much can be found about you on the net. But apart from few other facts there really isn’t much written about you. So here is your chance to tell us something about the band.
Well at least this is not told on the net: we have all studied at the same school, Kaustinen College of music. The band has been around from 1993, but this lineup has stayed since 2000 and it will never change again. We had a non-active period from 2003 to 2006 mostly due to the fact that Tony was reluctant to finish our latest demo tape, fearing it would end the band. Maybe it sounds a bit stupid now, but then it was reality. In 2006 after installing the latest version of Skype we had a conference where we agreed to have a jam session the following month. The session turned out to be a success (we made 5 new songs) and we agreed to have more sessions soon. We also needed a goal to keep things going so then in summer 2006 we finally played a gig after 8 years (yes, we were actually quite active in playing gigs between 1993 and 1998). After the gig we realized we were once again without a plan. There was some talk about a record and as it happened our friend started a record company. So there we had a new two year plan. The record company and other regarding stuff later changed to something more serious than just something fun with the friends, but that was the initial push to do something with the material we had made over the years.

Romana: Your MySpace site says you are (after going through a lot as a band in one form or another over the years already) about to release your debut album. Anything more you can share about it already?
We started to record the album in February 2007. We ‘rented’ an old house and stayed there for 10 days laying down the basic tracks for 5 songs (and drinking...). Rest of the recordings have been done in several shorter studio sessions all around Finland. Our quality control resulted in the fact we had to record some songs 3 times. One reason it’s taken so long must be because there was no official deadline. Now we’ve got a really strong drive to make some new music and the only way to do it is finish this record. While writing this there is one vocal track to do which is going to happen in next week. Then there is mixing and mastering ahead. There’s some talk still which record company will release our album, but if everything goes as planned our first single is out in the autumn and the album in early 2009.

Romana: I noticed you’ve just recently (in May) started touring more seriously, how was it playing in Helsinki at a place like Semifinal for the first time?
Well it was the first time with this line-up. In fact it was our third gig after the new start. The gig went quite well all things considered. We only had 15 minutes for the sound check! We hope more gigs will follow soon as we just agreed to sign with a big booking agency which also operates abroad where our hearts are.

Romana: I read somewhere that you are often (and were already when you were still playing under a different name) compared to U2. After a bit more listening I can say I noticed that too. But my first association was Kent, one of my favorite Swedish bands. You know them?
Yes, that’s a silly question :) We all love their music very, very much!

Romana: What are your other influences besides U2? What kind of music did you listen to growing up?
We all come from very different kind of musical backgrounds. Turo started to play the fiddle when he was 4 years old and listened to nothing else than folk music. In college he became interested in popular music (mainly The Beatles and U2). Then one day Tony asked Turo to join the group and basically gave the bass guitar to him and said “PLAY!”.

Tony grew up in the small city Kokkola which had an active punk/grunge scene and was commonly called ‘Seattle of Finland’. Bored with grunge, he got in trouble when caught listening to U2 – as you can imagine, it’s not very acceptable in that scene. Luckily he found musical soul mates in the college.

While having similarities with Turo’s career Aku always had Rock ’n’ Roll on the side and drums in the basement. From Sex Pistols to a short sidestep to rap music (using the alias MC AXL) finally finding a home with Brit rock.

Antti started listening to music seriously when he was about 14 years old. With guitar playing came CCR, The Beatles, Elvis and other old school rock. He was a lead singer/guitarist of several cover bands. In the college his musical world got wider. Sadly only discovering U2 two weeks after the Pop-Mart tour had visited Helsinki (btw the only appearance of U2 ever in Finland, except for the 1982 in Ruisrock). And still to this day he can’t forgive himself. Naturally Turo, Tony and Aku were at the show.

Romana: What are your plans with the band? I guess loads of touring to promote the album in Finland first, maybe ambitions to go abroad eventually too?
Our primary goal is definitely to go abroad, but it’s probably necessary to promote and tour here in Finland too. We are currently waiting for instructions from the management.

Romana: Any particular venue/festival, Finnish or other you would most like to play at in the future?
Provinssirock here in Finland and Roskilde festival in Denmark would be very nice and of course Glastonbury festival in the UK. Hurricane festival in Germany would be very nice too. Realistically speaking we would be more than happy to do any kind of tour in Europe. But any gig is a good gig!

Romana: And what bands would you most like to share the stage with?
There’s so many, but here’s to name a few: Radiohead, Sigur Rós, Coldplay, Kent, U2, 22-Pistepirkko and Oasis. And Tony shouts from behind: “Natasha Bedingfield!”

Romana: I guess that would be all for now, thank you for taking the time to do this interview! Any final words, messages to for the readers of The Bullet Reviews?
Thank for reading, see you soon. We hope you have patience to wait for the record. Follow us to the edge of the desert!

You can find Rodsogarden on myspace!

Romana