UN: With Eclipse and now Silent Waters, the band has gone back to a heavier style while still retaining melody. Did anything in particular motivate the change back to a heavier style?

Tomi/guitar: When Pasi left, it was obviously an end of one era, so for the first time we looked at our history from a certain distance. Also when Tomi Joutsen joined the band, we had tour coming, and Tomi wanted to also do older and heavier stuff live. He has been band's fan since beginning, so he kind of knew what he'd like to hear from Amorphis. And on that tour we realized how much fun it was to play some of old stuff. So that may have affected the material we started to work with.

UN: Tomi Joutsen seems to have, in part, helped relight a fire in the band. Did you know immediately that he was the perfect vocalist for the band? What stood out about him that made him seem perfect for the band?

Tomi: Definitely! He brought so much energy with him to the band, as also he was very motivated, so that effected to us same way. First time he came to the rehearsing place, we knew immediately that he is the perfect guy for us. Not just his voice and talents, but also his personality, fits to ours. When you tour a lot it is very important that you have good chemistry in a band, otherwise it can be a disaster. Not to mention his live performance.

UN: With Eclipse getting such a great reception, did you feel like you had to outdo the record with Silent Waters? At this point in time in your career do you still feel that pressure to top your previous albums?

Tomi: Silent Waters came very easily and fast after Eclipse, I think because of good spirits inside the band. We never take any pressure about album, but of course we always are trying to top previous albums, but not necessarily mean sales, there are many levels which way we are thinking about it, musically. If we're one day doing albums just to put something out, then it'd be better to quit. We still feel like we haven't done our best album yet.

UN: While each album from the band has ventured down different paths, was it important to make sure the album sounded like an Amoprhis album? Do you think hat some of the albums might have strayed a bit too far from the Amorphis sound?

Tomi: It is very difficult for me to say, all albums have been marks of that time, and standing out what we wanted to do at the time. It has always been very natural changes musically, we have never sat down and thought what kind of stuff we should do next, or what people are expecting from us. Of course I understand that record companies must have been desperate with us, when the band is changing all the time, it makes it hard to think who's gonna buy this album, if the last one sold very good and then guys are starting to play with hippie stuff :). Way I see it, is that it has been power to keep motivation inside the band, that we haven't stuck to one style and got bored after a while, but we still feel that we have space for fresh ideas, after all these years. It is very important that making music is fun, not a job.

UN: Travis Smith did an amazing job with the artwork for Silent Waters. Did you guys first give him a rough idea of what you wanted or did he come up with his own ideas from scratch?

Tomi: Yes he did, again! We both, band and Travis had some ideas about cover, and we changed ideas during whole process. I think there was something like over 100 e-mails with rough ideas and pictures. It is great to work with Travis, as he's having amazing ideas by himself, and also wants to hear bands opinions and ideas; it is not like that with everyone. Some artists can say like take it or leave it, co-operation might be almost impossible. But not with him. Travis is also doing whole package as one piece of art, not "just" the cover.

UN: Do you consider the music of Amorphis to be progressive? While most people think that progressive usually means technically excessive music, in the case of a band like Amorphis it might mean more about the originality than the number of notes on display.
TomiK: Yes I think it is progressive in way of trying to go ahead musically, as you said, not about doing very difficult parts. I don't know what that word means today in music genres, when I think of progressive bands, bands like Pink Floyd come to my mind. Not bands like Dream Theater for example. I think those band more as power metal bands or whatever.

UN: The band has been together for 17 years now. Did you ever expect the band to last this long? Do you think the eagerness to progress and try new things has kept the spark alive this long?

Tomi: I never thought when we started, and being 16-17 years old, that we would still keep doing this after 17 years! No way. That time we were thinking that when you're 25 years old you are..old. Keeping this fresh musically to ourselves has of course been one of the main reasons that we still love to make music with Amorphis. And we probably will till we can do it without having diapers on stage.

UN: While Amorphis was one of the first Finnish metal bands to make a name for yourselves, the scene has grown tremendously over the years. Do you guys feel that you, to a certain degree, paved the way for a lot of these bands? Do you check out any of the newer bands?

Tomi: I' like to think that way, that we have may be opened some doors among with few other bands in a past. There are very good and original sounding bands coming from Finland these days, I don't know why, might be that bands have more confidence to create their own original ideas, and not just trying to sound like their favorite bands have sounded. Of course there are influences from somewhere with every band, but it is the way you put all the pieces together, I think.

UN: Does it amaze you how much death metal has changed since the early days? It seems that bands nowadays care much about being as fast and heavy as humanly possible and forget to write actual songs in the process.

Tomi: It is hard to find bands these days which are sounding organic. It doesn't matter anymore how tight you play, you can fix it with ProTools anyway. And when every band is doing that, without actual songs it is very hard to stand out from the mass. Anyway small "mistakes" are just keeping music interesting, otherwise it is same that if it is made by machines. That is of course only my opinion. But can't find that easily anymore bands like Slayer.

UN: 17 years and still going strong and in three years it will be the 20th anniversary for the band. Cane we expect anything special from the band to commemorate the event or is it still too far off to know what you guys will have in store for the fans?
TomiK: We haven't been thinking about that so far at all, but we have to fix something for sure!

UN: Amorphis has played in the US numerous times. Do you notice a difference between the North American Amorphis fans and the European Amorphis fans? Are there different vibes at the concerts?

Tomi: I don't know if there is that markable differences between audiences nowadays, the main difference might be that the US audience is maybe more social, coming to talk with us easier than European fans. It depends on the country on Europe as well, if you play in Holland for example, audience is much more relaxed, for some reason :), and listening music with their eyes closed, then on some like east-euro pen countries audience is may be more fanatic.

UN: Being into and playing metal for so long, do you still listen to a lot of metal these days? Im assuming you guys listen to a lot of music outside of the metal genre. What do you put on if you want to relax after a gig?

Tomi: We are very open-minded to every good music, metal or not. Sometimes on tour we're listening for example bands like Mastodon, Opeth, Porcupine tree, Slayer, Muse, Abba, Pink Floyd, 70's disco, Black Sabbath, System of a Down, Entombed, Amy Winehouse, Fantomas, Kate Bush, Shpongle, Tool etc. Depends on the mood. Thanks for the interview, hopefully see you on fall!

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