Friday, May 14th, 2010 at 2:15pm by Metal'O Phil Interview
Come on, be honest: who ever really paid attention to Tarot before Marco Hietala and his two-headed beard joined Nightwish? And yet Tarot has been knocking about unpretentiously for over 25 years. Very quickly, the Finns traumatized the Metallica roadies with their inordinately heavy and cumbersome amps. Their new album, "Gravity Of Light", is about religious oppression on non-believers. On the occasion of this imminent release, Metal'O Phil got to talk to Marco.
The good little snoopers that were are couldn't help trying to glean a few information on the new Nightwish album, which won't be released before 2011. Speaking of which, we asked Marco about his recruitment in the band – which was not all that easy...
« Look at Osama Bin Laden and George Bush, for instance. When they send people to kill other people, they say that god is on their side. And I don't think that it has anything to do with religious enlightenment: I think it's all bullshit.»
1.So, first of all, when and why did you start learning music? Was it Your parents’ initiative or your own decision, like, e.g., back at the age of 5 you already knew You’re going to become a musician and tour the world? And if it was Your decision solely, did Your parents support this passion and sense of purpose?
Yes, I have wonderful parents who have always supported my need to be a musician. I grew up surrounded and immersed in music. But it was my Dad in particular who shaped my destiny. He encouraged me from a very young age to pursue my passion. He is still a serious music lover and we play music together whenever we are together.
1. Metallica - The day that never comes 2. Lamb Of God - Walk with me in hell 3. Machine Head - Now I lay thee down 4. System Of A Down - Chop Suey 5. Slipknot - Duality 6. Tool - Schism 7. Nightwish - Nemo 8. Rammstein - Mein teil 9. Iron Maiden - The wicker man 10.The Devin Townsend - Band Vampira
I have held a little secret for you all for some time now, but today I feel I want to share it with you all. As you all know, I am very private and dont want to share to much about my personal life, but due to some speculations and since I am so happy I have decided to tell my secret:
Last autumn in the middle of my demo recordings of my solo album, I started to feel very, very tired and also nauseated. I took a pregnancy test and guess if me and my bf was really surprised to see that I had gotten pregnant. Since I had decided to not have any more children than my son, it was totally not planned, but after the very first shock, it felt really, really good;=)
Now I have almost done half the pregnancy and I am feeling extremely good, but its due to this I decided to not do the solo this year. I am sure you all can understand this decision better now and I do promise to release the songs at another time;=)
If you want to read an exclusive interview about this in finnish, go to www.rytmi.com
For those of you who are not finnish, here are the same interview but shorter version.
Since you sometimes ask me about our coming NW album and when it will be released etc, I have some news for you;=) The plans are rough and it might be changed but as for now:
- Tuomas has 9 songs ready already;=)
- We all will meet this summer for rehearsals and arranging the songs and getting a demo ready.
- We enter the studio next fall and the album will be released EARLIEST in the fall 2011.