Finnish folksters Korpiklaani have been prolific since their formation, releasing about an album a year. Their sixth full-length and latest CD is Karkelo. The band made their first journey to North America earlier this year for Paganfest, and are set to return in the spring of 2010 for another round of U.S. shows. I spoke with bassist Jarkko Aaltonen about the new album, their touring experience in America, how he came to join Korpiklaani a few years ago and several other topics.


Chad Bowar: This time there are only two songs in English. Was that a conscious effort, or just how the songwriting turned out?
Jarkko Aaltonen: We never plan things ahead that way. We don’t plan anything, basically. The album comes from the songs we have at the time, and this time there were only two songs in English, the rest in Finnish or instrumentals. Next time it may be different.

Do you have the same guy (Juha Jyrkäs from the band Poropetra) writing the Finnish lyrics as on the past few albums?
Yes, he is still doing it for us and we are quite happy with his lyrics. He did some different stuff on the new album, which won’t be noticed by non-Finnish speaking people! There are some differences in the lyrics. On the previous albums he used only this old poetic style that is used in the Finnish national epic Kalevala. But now he has started to use more modern Finnish styles as well.

Tell me about the video shoot for the song “Vodka.”
We went to a studio, played in front of a green screen, and the rest was done later.

It was done quite quickly. I hate doing videos, so that was quite easy.

Are there any other videos planned from this CD?
Yes. The band is not in the next video. It’s going to be "Uniaika.” I think we should do them all like this! It’s the same guy and same crew that did the "Metsämies" video from the previous album, and that video I like. I’m sure this one will be quite good.

Karkelo has already been released in Europe. What has the response been so far?
It’s been a bit mixed, the same way as the previous album. People seem to think we are moving to a darker direction, away from happy little drinking songs. But then again we are gaining fans who like the other stuff more. The reviews that I have seen have been okay. It ended up on the Finnish and German charts, then dropped off after one week, which is the same as the previous album. It would be really cool if the album started selling in North America. That would do us some good, I think.

Are your expectations for North America higher since you’ve now toured here and got a positive response?
I’m pessimistic by nature. If you don’t expect much, you don’t get disappointed so easily. I’m slightly hoping that something will happen. I’m not expecting it to sell a million copies in a week, but a few thousand copies in a week would be nice.

You switched record labels for your previous album. How did you decide on Nuclear Blast?
We were about to release the last album on Napalm, and we were somewhere in Europe on a tour bus. We were drunk and sitting around a table. We started to talk about possible labels, because we had already received offers from some labels at that time. None of them were that interesting to us. So we talked about hypothetically what would be the best label to be on. There was a Nuclear Blast magazine on the table, and everybody said it’s a brilliant label, but they would never take us. We are too small of a band and they have nothing like our style there. Then three weeks after that we got a telephone call from Nuclear Blast. We started negotiations with them.

Korpiklaani has been releasing a CD every year and doing a lot of touring. Is there a concern of burning out being so active and not having much down time?
This summer has been quite heavy. It’s been physically quite demanding since we’ve been playing four shows a week, flying to Europe. We’ve been spending an awful lot of time at the airport and on planes. We’re constantly traveling from one place to another. The tour starts in September, where we’ll be on the same bus for three or four weeks. That is relaxing time. I’m looking forward to that, because all you have to worry about is getting on the bus at the right time. You don’t have to worry about flight schedules or getting drunk band members on a plane.

What were the most memorable moments on your U.S. Paganfest tour this year?
That was definitely the second to last show we played at the House of Blues in Los Angeles. Everything that we read about when we were teenagers in the 1980s was there: The Rainbow, the Whiskey A Go-Go. Then these little kids from a small village in the middle of nowhere in Finland are finally playing there. First of all it was a brilliant show with the audience and an excellent venue. Then the location added even more. That was really cool.

I personally enjoyed the traveling part. I didn’t sleep that much, so I would always wake up at 7 or 8 in the morning. We passed some really magnificent looking places while I was sitting on the bus, reading a book. I really enjoyed those moments.

A lot of Europeans bands touring the U.S. for the first time have trouble adjusting to the food here. Did you have that problem?
We ate an awful lot of pizza, that’s for sure. But Finland is a fast food country anyway. We didn’t have any problems with that.