I first discovered them in the Wishmaster era. And, funnily enough, I didn't like them much back then, or I did, but not in terribly large quantities. I considered them "acquired taste" which I then only half-acquired.
They were part of that group of bands my father brought home, along with other power metal bands like HammerFall, Rhapsody (not yet "of Fire" as of then), Sonata Arctica, as it was the power boom at the turn of the millennium - and yes, I insist that Nightwish back then still did mostly power metal, or at least they were really close to the genre - and I found their particular atmosphere too "heavy", too sombre and serious, the sound and the emotional aspect too monotonous (mainly because of Tarja) and they felt much more a "gimmick" band than the rest to me. Well, in so many words, I was about ten, I guess.
Yet I returned to them from time to time, made fun of the famous mondegreens
"Hamster! A Dentist!
Hardcore! Steven Segal!
Halibut! This rifle!"
and I followed the band. In fact I'm almost inclined to say that apart from Maiden and Aerosmith there might not be a band I would come across earlier and still would be listening to today (at least from time to time), just them and the rest of the power metal brethren.
They never were the top band, I wasn't ever inclined to include them in my list of favourite bands. Especially later, when my taste formed more and with their progression through the years, I felt like they were almost too simplistic to be among my favourite bands. I mean, yes, the melodies always were nice and likeable, but at times they felt almost kind of superficial; their "epics" are more in the way of Maiden epics than actual prog-structured works, they are decidedly unheavy and their attempts at hardening up are very hit or miss - in fact, there's not even much guitar and while they have kick-ass riffs, these are few and far between. In general, their proficiency with their instruments is ... fine, but pretty much any given person in Epica would blow their respective counterpart off stage, with the possible exception of Coen Janssen, as Tuomas as a keyboardist is probably better than him - probably.
In that regard, honestly, the other one trick pony Rhapsody were probably closer to my heart, with them often drawing inspiration from the Baroque and Medieval music, with some of the weirder scales, with the pulsating energy and bombastic choirs and with Turilli being in my book one of the most underrated guitarist in metal.
But I don't mind that all that much and I don't mean this as an internet hot take asking for rage and grief - despite the aforementioned stuff, I always respected the band for having a lot of personality, for being able to find their niche and even for the fact that a band that so often could be taken as barely metal has its prominence and prestige among the notoriously fickle and elitist metal crowds.
And for something else I'll come back to further on.
And although there was no love yet, there was at least respect and I tended to return to them on different occasions, slowly building a relationship with them without even realising it. To put it succintly, back in the day when you could hear both on rock radio, I immediately understood the uncrossable chasm between them and Evanescence... or many other "heavy, female-fronted" bands that followed in their wake, with the possible exceptions of Epica and After Forever.
Only now, many years later, I realise that the relationship was there and that despite its on and off nature, it is more than I have had with many other bands, even some who were once much higher in my personal ranking of bands, metal or otherwise. There was a time when Pink Floyd were my "number 1 band of all time"... yet it was obviously hardly "of all time", because I haven't listened to anything by them for several years now, yet usually I get a Nightwish mood and I need to put them on at least several times a year.
What is weird is that despite my relationship to them being this second-rate, I remember all the drama around Tarja's departure and Anette coming over, I remember the excitement and expectations regarding Dark Passion Play - these stories and background info and general bits of fandom have moved me rather deeply and in hindsight, I realise that this is much more than I have with 99.9 % of other bands. And it's definitely not curiosity or tabloid fascination or any type of gratuitous exploitation you might expect from such origin, no, it was a personal story. It was... for lack of a better word, "big". Or maybe even "great".
Yes, despite my resistance, I understand now that I was being pulled in by a band that - despite all their flaws and shortcomings - was "great".
And that is my current concern, my biggest problem now. Because despite them being technically greater than ever - in some ways - they are also smaller than ever. At least for me. But I get ahead of myself.
Anette came and with her a new era. An era of both streamlining and experiments, much as these words might seem to make no sense together. Tuomas as a writer matured and released two albums that managed to sell the strengths of the band, to work around its weaknesses, and to experiment - we got much stronger and integrally implemented folk motives, including Marco's first solo spot, we got lounge music, we got increased amounts of orchestration and cinematic approach. Yet despite the colourful kaleidoscope, it all felt natural, because with Tuomas getting more proficient with his songwriting pen, it made sense, it felt coherent, somehow.
Already then I felt - despite genuinely loving DPP - that something was different.
You see, I never realised until recently, that there was another strength of the band that put them head and shoulders above their peers.
I cordially dislike the word "magic" being used without a very good reason and it would be clichéd and cheap to do so, so I'll use another term instead. Only recently I re-read Tolkien's essay "On Fairy Stories", which is of course brilliant and important and surprisingly spiritual, but I mention it here so that I might borrow the term "Faerie" therefrom.
And I'm going to cripple the term by trying to define it and to define it simplistically, utilitarianistically, for what I desire to express here.
Let's do such terrible thing and define it merely as "the touch of the otherworldly". There is a solid amount of such thing in Nightwish discography and in fact I'd say that their talent, not simple one talent among many others, but the primary talent is to seek and find and translate to their listener something that is larger than him, in fact larger than them. A sense of wonder, a nostalgia for a place we've never been to, wanderlust and mystique.
Why, the original Nightwish fandom, which I was only tangentially connected with, and even their story, with the undignified "open letters" and so on, it also had a certain amount of mystique. Thanks to their artistic qualities, it turned into a myth of sorts.
Metal music in general is much abler to produce myths than other genres of music - it is only natural. For metal is one of the last genres that still tackles the metaphysical, that still strives for transcendence, for something larger than life. In fact, metal is the last, vestigial remnant of the empire of the Spirit, of the old art as it was known - art searching for transcendence... well, even divinity. And yes, the irony of so many metalheads being outspokenly irreligious and anti-theistic is not lost on me; but it is only natural - they search for the Truth and, in fact, speak of it, yet they often don't realise they do so.
Sure, in the end, it might also result in naivety or stupidity or simplistic shallowness or something else, but in my book, metal is one of the last genres of music - and art in general - that still to this day genuinely tries. (and therefore often fails as well)
To put it briefly, metal is among the last things that can still bring you dragons. Even if they do so from their garage with bad quality keyboards, I assure you, give them time and the dragons will come.
Now, when I listen to Wishmaster, which eventually became my favourite Nightwish album, I hear that. I hear the Faerie. I hear the other world. I am not quite sure how they managed to capture it and present it so vividly and strongly, but I hear it there. And I have a suspicion that there is some connection with the passion and conviction that won't be repeated with "broadening of scope" and perfecting your artistic vision.
And to digress into the purely personal, I admit that nostalgia also plays a role. In fact with all the power metal bands, when I listen to them and it works, I admit it kinda brings me back into my late-childhood, into the time of power metal and the whole fantasy boom (with the LOTR movies being fairly huge back then), with all the idealism sunshine it entails. But I strenuously insist that it is not just that.
As of then, with Anette, the Faerie was not gone and maybe not even diminished, but it was transformed, it was of a different make. Instead of winter storms, you got springtime springs. Instead of elves you got sprites. Anette was different. Her airy, high, sleigh bell-like vocals... I couldn't help but to be immediately attracted to them - not in the low, bodily way, but intellectually, emotionally.
And then Floor came.
And let me stress this - Floor is absolutely amazing as a singer, as a dominating presence on stage, probably even as a person (I wouldn't know enough). She is versatile, powerful, she has great range, she is very playful, vocally, she has a very nice timbre.
In short, her coming into Nightwish would be a dream come true.
Indeed, her performance on Ghost Love Score (live) is trasformational - it takes the song and reforges it anew, into a form more applicable to this new era with Floor. It is - dare I say - more captivating. It feels greater.
Now, Floor already is probably a better singer in her style than Tarja is in hers, I mean, Tarja as an operatic voice (classical solo, with projection, appropriate colour and stuff) has a tougher competition in general, because she is compared to others on a completely different level. In this regard, Floor is much more immediately captivating, because she is stronger in what she's doing compared to Tarja in what Tarja's doing ... although, in general, I'd still pick Tarja over Floor, that is, an average solo-type voice against an excellent choir-type voice (it's not exactly that, but this is already way too long for such nitpicking).
And yet, even then, there are songs that Floor just can't do justice live, I realised this recently when listening to the Showtime, Storytime album.
For example - her Ever Dream, while very solid, even greatly done, just doesn't work for me at all. Even though it almost feels as if she sang higher in the end than Tarja did (I'm not sure if it is so and I'm lazy to check now) and though it is technically flawless, something is missing.
Just like with Amaranth - Anette is a much weaker vocalist any time of the day, no contest there, yet - at least in my book - the Amaranth chorus requires this light, staccato, flexible movement - Floor with her heavier voice and with foregoing the staccato and trying to ... syncopate instead? - just completely misses the appeal of the song. Well, IMHO.
And I agree that on the studio albums, Floor is terribly underutilised.
But my main problem is that she feels to me like a hired gun. I'll refrain from trying to speak about the relationships of people I know nothing about (my only comment in this regard ever would be that I was definitely on the side of Tarja - even when I didn't like her yet - and that I have always suspected that Tuomas is a kind of a dick and I don't feel I'd like him as a person. But then again, I think similarly of Bruce, so nothing new under the sun) and maybe they all feel really friendly and compact and how everyone is a member and how "she fits much better than the previous singers" and all that PR bollocks... but emotionally, in general, it feels like they don't have a band member, but a really excellent session player.
I didn't realise that at first - I actually fell in love rather quick with EFMB, I admit, I didn't mind all the self-plagiarism (like I already wrote in this thread, just listen to the intro of Alpenglow and Ever Dream back to back - it's the same friggin' notes!) - it was often like this. I don't even recall how many times they've redone Dark Chest of Wonders, with this time both Shudder Before Beautiful and the title track being more or less the same song. It was fine, it was fun.
But I fell out of love again and rather fast. Yes, Floor still feels like a stranger, a decade later. But also other blokes left, new ones came, Troy coming, Jukka leaving, it just feels... weird. With even Marco now gone, it feels much more like a "project" than a band to me, honestly.
And - and I know that I tread in controversial waters here, even more than in the rest of the post - I also kinda can't help but feel like Floor, stellar as she is technically... doesn't have enough personality for me. Or at least she doesn't let it shine here. To me she fits perfectly into Ayreon... and honestly, that's kinda what Nightwish became in the meantime. Tuomas' project featuring Floor Jansen on vocals and Troy on pipes. The difference is, that Ayreon actually managed to put out its best album relatively recently in The Source, which just isn't true for Nightwish.
H H (\__/) NN N
HHH (='.'=) N N N
H H (")_(") N NN was a bit of a disappointment. True, it's much more experimental than EFMB and I guess I understand the Tuomas fans being all crazy about how he does his shtick now - and honestly, some tracks are indeed awesome and there is a lot to discover. But still, emotionally it falls flat - apart from certain exceptions - and where The Greatest Show on Earth, with its Dawkins and 40 % of animal noises and the song butchering its own momentum every time it starts getting something going on was already jumping the shark, All the Works of Nature Which Adorn the World is making love to the shark, killing it, making shark sandwiches, feeding them to you party guests, butchering the party guests, going to jail, doing the time, being released early on parole and trying to dig up the party guests in order to butcher them, take out the shark sandwiches from their stomach and putting those on the ground so that you could jump over that particular shark again.
When I saw the tracklist already, I groaned, both because the title and because the idea. And it's not about me not liking classical music - on the contrary, because I love classical music, I cringe at this. I'm not even a classical snob - I personally really love and study and gush about Shore's LOTR soundtrack, which is still a movie music, much more simplistic and user-friendly, than most classical, but I just don't know why should I entertain the self-indulgence of a metal musician.
In the end, ATWONWATW (gee, what a title indeed) is not itself terrible, it's mostly fine background music and at times it's even almost interesting, but it is terrible as an idea, it is terrible in practice and I really hope this trend will not continue.
And I don't mean just the instrumental orchestral music idea, I mean its title as well.
Because the other problem I see is that beginning with EFMB, Nightwish started to preach. Now, I am not against preaching in general, as a rather devout Catholic I must agree with the idea in general, obviously, but what you preach must be of some substance, it must be well done and it must be done from a position of authority.
I haven't read all the lyrics to the last two albums, nor am I really inclined to, but from what I gather, Tuomas is trying to spread the "good news" about nature and that we should value it (and that we momentarily don't), about the secular humanist fascination about mankind and the strangely empty universe it came from, about big people he is inspired by, about the faults and flaws of our modern society...
And yes, against religion. Personal digression again, but only Floor's captivating performance helps Weak Fantasy to be listenable to me at all. I don't know what it is, but even intelligent, cultured bands turn into a primary school level of argumentation and a late-hour pub level of stupidity when they decide to tackle religion. I mean, you try to be poetic, logical, erudite... and yet when you are confronted with a belief system whose tenets have been developed and shaped and perfected for actual friggin' millennia, THEN you don't feel the need to try all that much. Just, you know, some shallow arguments, some strawmen misunderstanding, I mean, the hoi polloi already know who is right and who is wrong, so we don't even need to try, to care. We're preaching to the already converted, leaning on the strength of their already-present prejudice. You know how this is called anywere else? Propaganda. And I mean that.
But like I said, I digress and believe me - for better or worse, though I might be grumpy about that and find that particularly annoying, in the end I am mostly fine with that in general. I can take Mark Jansen's anti-religious drivel in Epica any time of the day. I take it as a necessary evil, I accept it like chickenpox, whatever.
It's the combination with the rest of the "message".
Yes, I do love nature, thank you very much, and I am doing what I can to preserve it. Unlike you, mates, who are flying tons of equipment and your asses across the whole planet. Yes, I do know what I admire and cherish about humankind and the universe, even better, my thoughts and admiration exceeds what I read in a fucking Richard Dawkins book.
I mean, you, a metal band, release a song complaining about "Noise" (I know it's meant mostly as a metaphor, but .. you get what I mean).
(funnily enough, Epica's Essence of Silence is also loud as f*** - the difference is that with Epica, it's much easier to ignore the lyrics altogether)
And yet you try to command me, to teach me, to preach to me. Who asked you? You are not an authority to me. Some of your opinions are downright idiotic. Even when I agree with you, you make it feel contrived, strained, forced. I like the tiktaalik and the fact you used the word, but the lyrics are just... often inept, mechanical, they lack finesse, they are inherently inelegant. Sorry, but you know it's true.
And even when they talk about the transcendent - they talk about how they feel wonder, but it doesn't come across. I won't even comment on the cringeworthy spoken sections of TGSOE - although that's actually one of the few moments where I'd say I even agree with Dawkins and where I don't think he's an utter moron for once - but with Tarja albums, I actually saw the Alpenglow even as they sang about hamsters and dentists and L'Oreal and I shed a tear for it, now they namedrop it, but I don't see it anywhere, it's just clinical, cold.
I actually do believe they themselves care about their "message", flawed as it might be sometimes, but I don't see any reason why I should.
They just talk and talk and talk... and it's ... well, noise.
And for what it's worth, not only do I not see these fun mondegreens being mentioned anymore, in writing or in videos, it also somehow doesn't lend itself to it. They take themselves way too seriously now. I know it sounds absurd, when compared with the "heavy", pathetic atmosphere with Tarja, but like many things paradoxical, it is ultimately true. Quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi and while a band of teenagers who aren't even able to grow a beard with their cheap instruments can afford to scream about the power of the dragonflame, a "professional" band can't. Because that's one thing it is not really able to do. Because they already grew up and they think they know that dragons don't exist. But they do.
In the end, I want my hamster dentist, I realise.
The ringmaster became a televangelist and I'd like the ringmaster back, please.
So, yes for the next album, if Tuomas could just stop waxing about nature and scientists and stop bossing me around (about what should I feel and realise and so on), that'd be fucking sweet.
They probably don't realise it, because I'm sure they're bigger than ever - they have transformed themselves into the "elderly statesmen", celebrating milestones, putting on a professional show, having more fans than ever in history, now, I guess. But the story is in a rut, at least for me. There's a lot of empty calories there now.
Because they are professional, sure, but for example I don't really care to see Kiss live now. And you know what? Even if Gene and Paul did an experimental proggish album next year, I still wouldn't think differently about them.
No, I'm not seriously comparing Nightwish to Kiss. They still have a certain amount of magic, they genuinely aren't just a cash grab, they obviously care for the work they produce. But somewhere along the way, they lost the ability to entrance and they are currently doing music (and lyrics) for which it is absolutely essential to entrance the listener, otherwise it tends to be often insufferable.
Oh, well, I should stop. I don't know what possessed me. Nobody's going to read this anyway.
