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Coming from Heinola, Finland, Pressure Points is a band that has a lot to show. With two releases (Remorses to Remember and False Lights) the band achieved a great level with the compositions and we can clearly listen this in both releases. If you love good metal music, well written and with a progressive touch you have to listen to them. We talked a bit with them and you can check this below.
GroundCast: To warm up, tell us, how everything started?
JANNE: The band was founded in Heinola, Finland in 2004. Kari and Vili met at a concert they were both attending, and knew each other already more or less. They started chatting and soon noticed they have lots of similar influences and favorite bands. Kari asked Vili to go jam with him some ideas he had composed at the time. After a while I joined in. It was also on a concert we all were at. Soon we were jamming the riffs and ideas by the three of us, and decided we need a name for this project. And so was Pressure Points born.
GroundCast: What are your influences?
From mellow pop to the most harsh metal – and everything in between. Lots of old progressive bands from the 70’s, accompanied by many legendary 80’s groups to modern extreme and progressive metal. Such bands as Rush, ELP, Kansas, Queensrÿche, King Crimson, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, Camel, Porcupine Tree, Dream Theater, Anathema, Devin Townsend, Strapping Young Lad, Muse and Tool among many others have had an impact in our music through some or many of the members in our band.
GroundCast: You have two Full-Length releases, Remorses to Remember (from 2010) and False Lights (from 2015), why did it take so much time to be released and what changed in the band from there to now?
JANNE: There are many reasons for our lengthy break. The resignation of our former guitarist Juho in 2011 was probably a catalyst of some sort. We had toured a lot and wanted slow down a little, concentrating on new material. Constantly seeking for the right guy to fill his boots, it wasn’t until 2013 when Jaakko contacted us and wanted to join in. After a little test drive, ie. playing together, we were quite certain we have our man. Jaakko came along right in the middle of our album recordings, and had a huge role in the process. Not only did he compose and arrange plenty of new stuff on the go, but he has a lead clean singer position in the first two songs of the album. Also, he was a co-producer and audio engineer. That’s quite alright for a new guy I suppose?
Shortly put, we didn’t plan a break this long, but it just happened so. Many incidents occurred along the way, and we didn’t want to be distracted from the album recording process. I believe it was the right move, because we are very pleased in the result.
GroundCast: Talk a bit about the new release, lyrical concept, how was to record this and the
acceptance of the material.
VILI: Debut album is usually a kind of a “hit collection” of the band’s catalog, and our case was no exception. False Lights was almost entirely written from scratch.
Other than that, the biggest difference was the time and effort used for arranging and producing the tracks. We have chosen our craft and know the difficulties that come with it. The greatest challenge for us is to keep the compositions compact and intertwined while retaining our experimental and explorative way of expression. Some songs went through drastic changes, and now in retrospect, it was all worth it, although some sacrifices had to be made in the creative process.
The original inspiration for the theme and lyrics came from legends saying that ships were lured into danger by the display of false lights. That thought nicely encapsulates the zeitgeist of the modern world. The ones with power are leading (or luring?) us somewhere, while the less powerful struggle to stay on board. The themes on the album are quite universal, including approaches to topics like power and inequality. These subjects are tackled from a global and an individual perspective. The album has a strong lyrical coherency, so some might even consider it a concept album.
The album was recorded in a very modern way. Almost all the instruments were recorded in different places.
The album has been received extremely well in different medias all over the globe.
GroundCast: I am a fan of the band since Remorses to Remember, how is the composition process, do you have a main composer?
JANNE: Most of the material on Remorses to Remember was written by Kari. In the early years of our band Kari would bring a bunch of riffs put together to the rehearsals and we accepted it as is. Since then, we have learned lots about composing and going by the terms of the song. Nothing is written and included to the song if doesn’t serve a purpose. On RtR we had many old songs, which were from the era when Kari mainly composed the songs. I’m not to say there are anything wrong in the songs, but they are composed and arranged very much differently than False Lights. Along the years we’ve learned to criticize our own material more, and have dumped lots of killer riffs, just to make the song a more whole entity. Nowadays, I’d say we don’t a main composer anymore, or at the role is not that apparent anymore. False Lights has plenty of material written by our keyboardist Wellu, along with our new guitarist Jaakko. As a curiosity, some of the material is even written by two our former guitarists, Juho and Timo.
GroundCast: Talk a bit about the cover art from False Lights, what is the representative of it to the album and how it ties together with the songs?
VILI: I talked a bit about the lyrical concept earlier. There’s a bit of a hopeless message in the imagery but we are not merely messengers of apocalypse. The undertone of the album is rather dark; we should be worried but not fall into despair. There are some optimistic glimpses and moments of hope here and there. After all, optimism is a great weapon against misery.
The cover art shows you the wrecked state of the world. But as in every wreckage, there’s a possibility to be saved from it!
The themes on the album are quite universal, including approaches to topics like power and inequality. These subjects are tackled from a global and an individual perspective.
GroundCast: One thing that maybe many don’t know, how is “to have” a metal band in Finland, how is the metal scene in Finland?
JANNE: My opinion is, Finland has one of the most active and enthusiast metal scenes in the world. If my memory serves me correctly, I think I’ve seen a statistic of some sort which indicates Finland has most metal bands per capita in the world, heh. That’s a good start to understand what it’s like to have metal band in Finland. There’s just so any of them, it’s hard to stand out. I think that is an area where we have played our cards right. Well, of course we didn’t choose a particular style of metal to be different from others, but we just happened to come up with something which is close to our own hearts, and as it seems there are many others who share the same passion. Which I think is absolutely heart-warming and greatly motivating.
All in all, if you’re a metalhead, I’d say the Finnish metal scene most probably has your cup of tea. Something for everyone, and most of it extremely high quality both in composition and production vise, not to mention the sheer amount of virtuosity even the youngest of today’s players possess!
GroundCast: From where come the name Pressure Points and what it means to the band and songs you play?
It was originally inspired by Camel’s live album. In addition there’s a deeper meaning too. The name encapsulates how music makes you feel different emotions through the pressure points in your body. And as we all know, listening to music can trigger memories and feelings.
GroundCast: We are in the internet era, where people can download everything. What do you think about it?
JANNE: Our band was born in the edge of Internet bursting out to everyone’s desktop and pocket. So we’re quite comfortable with that. We believe that our music is more than just a few mp3-files downloaded from p2p-network. So, we don’t care much from which origin people get our music and to which format they are listening to, as long as they give our music a try. I think there are many responsible, yet conscious music consumers out there, who only buy the stuff they like the most. And I think there’s nothing bad at that. If one like sour music, he/she probably won’t think “not bad” or “okay”. Our music is the type which one either dislikes or loves. If one loves something, why wouldn’t he/she get the physical copy and enjoy it in best quality and with full artwork, even with autographs if one asks for them? I’m a vinyl enthusiast myself, but only buy the stuff that excites me the most. Today, there are many legal streaming and downloading platforms that bring the whole range of music into a pocket with just couple of coins a month.
GroundCast: What are the future plans of the band?
JANNE: At the moment, we just go with the flow. We have great expectations on our new album False Lights, and hope it will reach many listeners who haven’t necessarily heard of us before. Hopefully we’ll have the opportunity to tour abroad as much as possible, because that is where our main audience and biggest potential of growth awaits. Also, we are about to start composing new material as soon as possible, which I sincerely hope will see the light of day sooner than five years from now…
GroundCast: Thanks for the interview, now the space is yours to say something to our readers.
Hope to you see soon on stage somewhere! And we are already drafting new material so we can promise that the gap between the second and third album won’t be nearly as long as it was now.
VILI VOI HEITTÄÄ TÄHÄN JOTAIN LÄPYSKÄÄ