This one is a real blast from our past. We first talked to Shrapnel Storm back in 2013 and they got in touch recently to offer us an update. Who would we be to refuse? So we didn’t…
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We’re from Tampere, Finland. Tampere is a nice little town in Finland supporting a lot of underground acts, just like us.
How did you meet?
More or less, everything in the beginning has been started via university studies. A bunch of odd studying people having same music taste met in strange circumstances. Actually our first rehearsal room was in the school air-raid shelter! That maybe affected to our name somehow also, who knows?
How long have you been playing as a band?
We had our ten-year anniversary 2018. We celebrated it playing live in places we’ve never been before. For example Russia, that was a crazy place! The scene is small, but really intense! So 12 years as Shrapnel Storm now and we hope it will be at least the same time in front of us.
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Before you get sick of being asked… where does the band name come from?
Our guitarist Aki is the one to blame. At one point in the beginning (guess it was 2010 or something) we had a pressure to come up with a name before entering the studio to record our first demo!
So… We decided to make it democratically: one weekend, and everybody needs to come up with a name proposal. As our songs were mostly dealing with war, the only rule was that the proposal should be dealing somehow with war or glossary dealing with war. There was some ideas, good ones and also bad ones (like “war tribe” or something, haha!) but when Aki threw his one to the table we accepted it unanimously. Guess everybody can imagine the name “Shrapnel Storm”…. It happens in war when you lie in a foxhole, grenades are falling out from the sky and all your best buddies nearby are screaming in pain and horror.
What are your influences?
More or less the bands we’ve been mostly listening are the golden 90’s era Florida death bands. We’ve not been trying to copycat any of those acts, but surely they have been affecting to our style. To list some names, we’d lift up Obituary, Six Feet Under, and definitely Bolt Thrower!
Describe your music. What makes you unique?
Riffs. To be honest, there is no great musicianship in our ranks. We do not want to make music as a competitive sport and the songs and song-flows are quite simple. But… Somehow we have succeeded to make our songs catchy and groovy, and that’s not self-evident in today’s death metal business.
What’s your live show like? How many shows have you played?
We’ve been in the scene for a while, so we’ve played live a lot. Guess nobody is counting the number of shows anymore. Our usual show is between 30-45 mins and we always “try to empty our batteries” on stage. Heavy and intense… I guess those are the right words to describe our shows.
What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done at a live show?
The weirdest is definitely the first gig ever as Shrapnel Storm. It happened about ten years ago, when we played in a small summer festival in Finland. It was raining cats and and the weather had been literally shit all the day. Everybody were upset due to the bad weather: the festival crew and the spectators.. But not us! We had been rehearsing like hell for the event, we even had our own road crew to help us and we got onto stage as the last act for the evening. We were super excited, and when we hit the stage, there was about three people watching the gig with umbrellas, haha! We played as maniacs, gave everything we got onstage and after 15 minutes the festival promoter came up to stop the gig due to bad weather. Well, we did not do it, they needed to cut the electricity to stop us playing!
What kit do you use / guitars do you play / etc.?
Pearl Drums, Randall and Marshall amps and Jackson guitars.
What, if anything, are you plugging/promoting at the moment?
We have a new album coming out… It is being released via Great Dane Records on August 21st, definitely worth checking out! [We just missed the release date, sorry! – Mosh]
What are your plans for the next 6 months or so?
We’ve been doing tremendous amount of work for the last two years to get the long-awaited second album out. It would be nice, but now it is definitely no time to lie in rocking chair… More or less from now on it is promoting the new album and play live as many places as possible and as loud as hell!
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If you were second on a three-band bill, which band would you love to be supporting and which band would you choose to open for you? A chance to plug someone you’ve toured with, or a mate’s band we’ve not heard of before!
This is a tough one. For not-so-popular acts we’d choose Torture Killer. They are from Finland like us and make also groovy old school death metal. As a specialty, they have collaborated quite successfully with Six Feet Under vocalist Chris Barnes, actually their guitarist has been composing songs for SFU also. If you’re not heard them , check out the album Swarm! and you’ll be hooked!
