Tuomas-saukkonenJust right after it came to our knowledge that Wolfheart will join the Sofia Metal Fest 2016’s line-up, we managed to contact the band’s omnipresent leader and creative engine, Tuomas Saukkonen. It turned out you don’t have to get through an army of managers to reach him – on the opposite side there was an extremely responsive person, whose busy schedule was, as we wish to believe, the only reason for this interview to happen a bit later. Here it is:

Hey, Tuomas! A few days ago Wolfheart have been announced as part of the Sofia Metal Fest 2016! What memories do you have from the last time in Bulgaria with Before The Dawn, six years ago?

It was a long time ago indeed. It was a great evening with an awesome audience. We did not have any time to go and see the city so all my memories are based on the venue and show. This time we arranged more time and will arrive already on the 8th and leave on 10th so there is time to visit the city also.

On the 9th of April you will be sharing stage with Paradise Lost, Tiamat, Finntroll… Kreator will be headlining the second evening. I guess you met all these bands at some point, what’s your opinion on them?

When you play long enough and specially work as a stage manager as I have done for over a decade you pretty much get to see / play with / work with all the bands in the scene. We toured together with Finntroll a year ago and it is always cool to play with them. Paradise Lost is one of my all time favorites and both Tiamat and Kreator are also really cool so overall a really cool event coming!

Club gigs vs. outdoor festivals? What do you prefer?

It depends. Festivals can work really well too if you play in a tent stage and get certain amount of darkness to make the light work. 100% daylight is not my cup of tea and if I would have to choose I would pick club gigs.

As far as we know, Wolfheart’s third record is on the way. Where’s this one taking you, musically and lyrically?

Lyrically the direction is more into “winter warrior” scenes than on Shadow World which was a lot more varied than debut album was so one might call it going back to the roots. Musically the direction is towards heavier stuff but still keeping the strong melodies in the songs. Blood, sweat and tears for our drummer in the studio that is for sure 🙂

Is Wolfheart the child that remained closest to your heart through all these years? Or were all your projects equally important, with each of them being a reflection of a certain period of your life?

Each of the indeed reflected strongly their own time with each album released. Each of them were important on their own but I have combined all elements dear to from those projects to Wolfheart. Wolfheart started when I decided to bury all the other bands so it continues where others left.

Wolfheart-band

You’ve probably been asked this a lot but… Before The Dawn, Black Aeon Sun, Dawn Of Solace… Are they a page, closed forever? I believe the fans would like to know (be reminded)…

BTD=closed forever, BSA=closed forever but we will play one special gig 1.10.2016 in Switzerland at Metal Storm even with Moonspell, Wolfheart etc. DOS=this is actually a bit tricky since this year it is 10years anniversary from the debut and I have songs written for that album but not 100% sure what to do with those songs. That remains to be seen.

What happens between 4:16 – 4:19 a.m. ?

Secrets 🙂

What’s the story behind the two parts of “Routa”? Have they been released by two separate bands on purpose?

I wanted to carry the legacy of BSA literally so that is why I named the Wolfheart song as “Routa pt.2”. To me as a song writer there is a strong connection between the songs and I was in a way writing a sequel for the original “Routa” but under the name of Wolfheart since there was no BSA anymore. Also the whole winter theme on the “Winterborn” is sort of an homage for the whole winter theme on “Routa” double album.

What happened to the idea of putting out a compilation with some live acoustic and previously unreleased material from all your projects?

They whole idea was to release a box including live DVD from the last BTD show, 2 best of discs including songs from my all previous bands and one acoustic disc with unplugged versions of certain songs from all of the bands. All of those have been mastered and print ready files for over 6 months but I have no idea what the label is planning to do with that.

If not music, what other form of art you would devote yourself to? And is there an artist (a musician, a painter, a writer, a poet, etc.) you truly admire and get inspired of?

I would definitely write and make movies. Been planning for a short movie and wrote the music for it for some time now but haven´t got the time for that yet. My sources of inspiration are pretty personal and I don´t follow much what others are doing. I do watch a lot of movies!

What was the first instrument you ever learned to play? And what instrument you’ve always wanted to master, but never had the time, or the chance to do so?

I started with guitar when I was 8 years old. I never have enough time to rehearse with drums and that is something I would like to put a lot more focus into. Learning to play cello would be great but that is definitely out of the question at least for now since simply no time.

Where’s the point of no return? The moment, when pleasure completely turns into a business?

Making music is always 100% pleasure from the first ideas to first demos and finally the final recordings, mixing and mastering. When the album is released then it becomes a business with promotion, management, gig booking, merchandise etc, etc, but still between that business you get to walk to the stage and again only thing that exists is 100% pleasure from the music. I do listen to a lot of my music still so the business does not take that pleasure away no matter how much you work for the release itself or how many failures there is on your way. It is always those 2 opposites living together.

Aren’t getting tired of journalists (including ourselves) asking you the same questions over and over again? What question you are most frequently asked but hate the most?

Haha :). It is part of your job as it is mine to answer them :). “Introduce your band to the readers” is something I have honestly answered hundreds of times :). I don´t hate any questions but sometimes you can see from the questions that the reporter is not motivated at all and probably is doing the intie only because the editor told him/her so and those inties are always a bit boring to do. But still you do your part since the readers care anyway more about the answers that the questions.

If music had a human form, what would it be to you? A mother? A child? A lover? A best friend?

A brother.

Thank you for your time! See you in April !

Sofia-Metal-Fest