Hello Wilska. First of all, let’s try to describe your music, which is not that easy ! I think we can’t really introduce SETHIAN as a gothic metal band. How would you personally classify your music ?
Wilska:

To tell the truth, I think there is a strong 80’s touch essentially in the backing vocals and keyboards parts of the most part of the songs from Into The Silence. I would even say that those particular parts sometimes look like AOR music. Am I totally wrong or is it something you’re doing consciously ?
Hmmm...well the 80's thing comes to us very naturally, as at least I am very much into music from that era. AOR...dunno, there are some bands that I like that could be labeled as AOR but I don't see them as a big influence. Maybe the comparison comes from the vocal harmonies that we use a lot. You could say that some of 'em are similar to maybe some of the AOR bands. But this is metal and not very "adult-oriented-rock", dammit.

By the way, I think your music is very emotional, but really less melancholic than what we usually hear from Finland. Do you agree with that ?
Well I try to incorporate a wider range of feelings into music than just melancholy. With some bands that pure melancholic attitude works but I think rolling around in just one aspect makes it a bit boring for at least for me.

You started to work on SETHIAN back in 1998. Why did it took so long before releasing your first album ?
We are perfectionists....we wanted a truly good line-up, the best songs possible, a good deal. Of course some other band projects took up time but mostly we just wanted to get this band to be as good as we could before releasing anything.

I suppose you wrote many songs during this long period. Does Sethian sounds like what we know through Into The Silence since the beginning ?
There were some different influences going around but the basic sound was always there. There were for example faster songs but we found that at the moment they didn't work as well as others so we put them on the backshelf.

Have you used some of your very first songs on Into The Silence ?
Oh yes. Blood Calling was the very first song ever written for this band, back in '98. There are a load of songs from that period that I still find very good, and we may use 'em in the future in some form or another. For example there is a song called "Night Unto Night" that I still think is one of the best we've ever done.

There’s many great bands emerging from Finland these times. I suppose that a lot of them can’t find a record deal even if their music is good enough. Do you believe that the presence of Tuomas and Jukka from NIGHTWISH was determining to get signed on Spinefarm Records ?
No, we got the deal offer before either one was confirmed to play in the band. But I agree that a lot of good bands never get the attention they deserve.

Will Tuomas and Jukka feature on the next Sethian album ?
At least I hope so. It depends a lot on when we will start doing the album. At least Jukka has told me he definately wants to do it.

Are you currently working on the next cd ? When can we expect its release ?
We are writing songs right now and have A LOT of new material ready, but no studio booked yet. We are most likely also changing record companies so nothing definite about the whole thing yet.

Stop me if I’m wrong, but as far as I know you didn’t tour that much in support of Into The Silence. Is it due to the lack of opportunities or to your individual plans (particularly you with Finntroll) ?
Of course Finntroll takes up a lot of my time, but if we decide to tour more with Sethian, that is definitely not an obstacle. We are a bunch of perfectionists when it comes to Sethian so we want the live situation to be good. So we do not play smaller clubs and a band this size and with busy scheduals for Jukka, me and the rest, we are a bit expensive and not easy to get in with a short notice.

Can we expect to see you live outside of your country soon ? Any plans in negotiation ?
Scheduals, scheduals, scheduals...we have been getting some offers but I don't want to say anything prematurely...as that only brings up bad karma if you release things too early (as we have seen with Finntroll...) and cannot for one reason or another do them.

Would you like to tell something else to our readers ?
Well, I just like to say greets to all my friends in France (you know who you are, dudes...), hope to meet ya soon to share some time and one or ten bottles of pastis...to all the others, keep supporting the international metal scene and keep underground music alive...

More informations about SETHIAN

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