Lists

The second day of Tuska 2024 will get at least as exciting as the day before, we highly recommend you don’t sit out on the shows of Ankor, VOLA, Solence, St. Aurora, Make Them Suffer, I Am Your God, Bring Me The Horizon and The Abbey!

While it’s a given that as a metalfan you’ll want to catch shows of Dimmu Borgir and Kerry King today at the first day of Tuska, we think that there are a couple more bands that deserve some of your attention, or that we think will be even more epic to see live than you might suspect with editorial picks Lord of the Lost’s festival opening show, I Am The Night, Infected Rain, Krypta, Suburban Tribe, Assemble The Chariots, Zeal & Ardor and Pendulum!

Tomorrow it’s again that time of the year: Tuska weekend is upon us! If somehow you weren’t convinced yet that you need to go, here are 10 reasons we believe should be enough motivation to still get a ticket if any are available still! Going from a great line-up, to Tuska KVLT, Tuska Expo expanding further and simply an amazing atmosphere! See you there!

In Helsinki and still looking for something to do this weekend? Don’t hesitate and start your festival season early by going to Desert Hel 2024 that has a stellar line-up with Finnish bands Heezer, Orbiter, Polymoon, Kairon; IRSE!, Dome Runner, Skyjoggers, Mansion and Maan Tomu and excellent visitors from abroad with Italian doom rockers on the rise Messa and stoner rock legends Truckfighters! If that doesn’t convince you enough, be sure to read more details on why we think you should go!

Only a bit over a week until Tuska weekend is upon us! If you weren’t convinced yet you needed to go, here are 9 reasons we believe should be enough motivation! Going from a great line-up, to Tuska KVLT, and the biggest Tuska Expo ever, this is one for the books!

If you are still looking for a great summer destination, here are 10 festivals that might make Finland the ideal place to go for you with #Horizon23, Rockfest, Tuhdimmat Tahdit, Nummirock, Tuska, John Smith Festival, SaariHelvetti, Dark River Festival, Hellsinki Metal Festival and Flow Festival!

If you’re in the neighborhood of Helsinki, you like some proper hard beats and you don’t know what to do yet… in case you missed this completely and need convincing still, check out why we think you should go to Hellsinki Industrial Festival this weekend!

Helsinki’s renown metal festival Tuska is back and approaching fast! Let us tell you why you should be there with 7 reasons we’re pretty excited about the event…

Photo Reports

In the beginning of last week, a sold out On The Rocks in Helsinki truly got warmed up for the upcoming Tuska Festival when the legendary Suburban Tribe played their first show in over 13 years! If you’re at Tuska today, they are a must-see… see you at the Radio City Stage by 19:15!

Back in March, we found the popular Danish black metal outfit Afsky teaming up with the just as popular Finns of Havukruunu for a co-headline tour in Finland with the support of Qwälen, bringing one of the most progressively welcoming black metal shows to On The Rocks in Helsinki!

In the beginning of March, we caught the Finnish melodeath band As The Sun Falls playing a show at On The Rocks in Helsinki with the support of Innersphere! We’ll get to welcome As The Sun Falls at our very own Asgaard venue in a couple of weeks, so go have a look what you can expect!

Sami Yaffa has worn multiple hats in various different bands such as Hanoi Rocks, Pelle Miljoona OY, New York Dolls, The Hellacopters, just to name a few but now in his 60s he is still going stronger than ever! This legendary bassist just released his second solo album in his illustrious career titled “Satan’s Helpers, Warlazer Eyes & The Money Pig Circus” and brought the album in its entirety to a packed Tavastia in Helsinki!

At the beginning of March, Amaranthe, Dragonforce and Infected Rain brought quite the spectacle to thousands of fans gathered in Helsinki’s Black Box Jäähalli venue!

Back in February on a cold Sunday evening, things in Tavastia got quite hot when a massive horror show took over with Wednesday 13 playing old Murderdolls tunes in the memory of Joey Jordison, culminating in with the headliner act, British extreme metal legends Cradle Of Filth.

The UK progressive metallers Tesseract were touring around Europe to present their latest release ‘War of Being’, bringing a visual and musical delight to a packed Tavastia in Helsinki! With them, they brought the German proggers of Unprocessed and US mathcore up-and-comers of The Callous Daoboys!

Avatar dropped by the legendary Helsinki venue Tavastia on their “The Great Metal Circus 2024” tour, bringing their visual spectacle and theatrics properly to Finland. With them they brought the US metallers of Æther Realm, really blowing up the night!

Pictures of yet another excellent show by the legendary Finnish metal band Amorphis at the gorgeous Kulttuuritalo venue in Helsinki!

Welcoming events that try to bring something different and out of the norm to Finland, we went to the second night of the club festival Hellsinki Techfest with Sirkuit Preiker, Khroma, Balance Breach and Hacktivist back in September for some killer music and high energy!

Gig Reports

With 3 bands being shining lights for (the future of) metal, and all 3 of them having a brand-new album in their pocket, Amaranthe, Dragonforce and Infected Rain turned Black Box Helsinki into a true celebration of heavy music about a month ago!

Tesseract came, saw, and absolutely conquered with a mesmerizing and mindblowing set of music at Tavastia in Helsinki, and with them they brought Unprocessed and The Callous Daoboys for a night of proggy delights!

“The Great Metal Circus 2024” landed in Helsinki, where Avatar turned being at Tavastia that night into something absolutely spectacular and memorable! And the support Æther Realm came all the way from the US to Finland for the very first time, doing a great job at warming up the crowd!

2023 was the year when you could say that Demolition 23. are back, and they are here to show what a true punk rock ‘n’ roll show is. This unit only released one album in 1994 with a lot of critical acclaim, achieving legendary status that still stays almost 30 years later, and they destroyed Tavastia in Helsinki back in October!

A report of the captivating performance piece that was the theatrical black metal show of Witch Club Satan!

Last month, we got to go to the very last stop of the Polish black metal collective Batushka “Black Pilgrimage tour 2023” at Vanha Ylioppilastalo in Helsinki, with the good company of Arkona, Aeternam and Varang Nord!

Earlier this year, Hexvessel released their new album ‘Polar Veil’ via Svart Records, taking the psychedelic folk rock towards the black metal origins of their leader Mat “Khvost” McNerney. And to celebrate the release, they did a few release shows in Finland, of which we got to enjoy the captivating Helsinki show in Kuudes Linja, with support from Unfyros.

Ice Nine Kills finally made it to Finland for 2 sold out shows, and we were at the Helsinki show in Vanha Ylioppilastalo back in May with support from special guests SKYND and openers Lansdowne! They quite literally killed it!

HIDE is easily the most oppressive, yet mesmerizing live performance I’ve had the pleasure of experiencing, and a couple of months ago at Kuudes Linja in Helsinki I got another chance of being blown away by them. Support came from the gloomy metalpunk locals of Keretik.

Grave Pleasures came to Korjaamo in Helsinki at the end of April to celebrate the release of their latest album ‘Plagueboys’, and with the band we danced our way into the weekend. But not before we first got an intense show from the industrial metal support act Dome Runner.