Vera Groningen, Friday november 2th 2007.

Some later in the evening after a couple of beers in a quiet room in Vera…. Kivimetsän Druidi supporting Korpiklaani's tour and got it's first experience with the Groningen crowd this evening. Let's see if they would give us some more information so we get to know this Finnish band a bit  more……


1. What does the name Kivimetsän Druidi mean?
In English it means druid of the stoneforest. I started to write a novel about the fantasy world and when we created the first song, this name came suddenly into my mind. Everybody was laughing about it but we couldn't find another name and decided to change it later.

2. Would you introduce yourselfs?
Yes, I am Joni, the male singer and guitarist. And I am Antti, keyboardist.

3. How was the gig in Vera tonight?
Joni: It was great!! It's probably one of the best gigs on the this tour and some band members said it might be the best gig so far.

4. How did the first concept of the band start and how did you find each other?
Antti: We were playing together in our garage and  played some melodies. We listened to Moonsorrow's Voimasta Ja Kunniasta- album very much back then and were very inspired by that one. Then made the first song at home on the pc. Drumcomputer and stuff you know… We've put it on internet and got good responses. Our bandname is very weird and people we're like "what the fuck is this….aha..it's good". Because people liked it, we decided to keep going with this kind of music and soon we took part in a band competition, which we actually won.

5. Did you made the choice from the start to make this style in symphony folk or was that developed during the way?
Joni: In the beginning we were very 'troll-like' you know, like Finntroll and other bands like that. Some later on we also began to use celtic melodies and it developed the way it is now and the style is symphony folk, not folk-metal, which is different from what we do.
Antti: It's  hard to describe our music because we also have a bit black-metal influences. We ourselves call it fantasy-metal. There are so many styles in metal. We like to keep it a bit 'underground', which means a not too commercial sound.

6. Any serious message in the lyrics?
Joni: Nope. We don't want to be involved in for example politics. Just a medieval thing and fantasy.

7. I checked your agenda; you're touring around Europe now. For the first time? What is the experience from the band so far?
Antti: Yes, this is the first tour and we support Korpiklaani now in 14 countries. Just two more gigs and then we go home again. In the beginning we thought it could be tough to travel and sleep together in a tour bus for such a long time and maybe could have problems or argue with each other, but it has been fine so far. We have our own tour bus but sometimes during the tour we also were together with Korpiklaani in their bus.

(Now comes a story about Korpiklaani being exited in Amsterdam and liked to drink and party … the Druidi-guys explained it was funny the next mourning. heheh)

Antti: The first gig abroad for us was in Sweden, which we didn't like so much because no one really knew we had the gig; they just didn't had enough time for proper advertising and we were a new band of course. Just like in Finland it's hard to get people in when they don't know the band. But second gig was in Germany and there everything was much more cooler.

7. You changed a lot in band members. Is this a solid line-up now?
Joni: We hope so, it seems solid now, more than it was. We changed our first singer because she needed more time for her study. We've had two drummers who wanted to do their own thing. The bass player we kicked out because he was lazy, but we are still friends which is a good thing.

8. What's your opinion about the silly Dutch crowd? Compare to other countries?
Antti: The Dutch crowd is fucking awesome. I don't know if they're on weed but they're so nice. In Amsterdam we started and that was great but tonight was even better then that. Netherlands and Germany are our favorite crowds. Tonight people even did crowd surfing and there was a mosh pit. We didn't experienced that too often on this tour. But Chech Republic was also very nice. We heard that local bands get no more then 5 people there but bands coming from abroad get a bigger audience.

9. Were does most of the inspiration come from besides Moonsorrow?
Antti: Influenced by Moonsorrow, Turisas, Ensiferum and more 'most important bands in this scene in Finland'. Turisas is probably the most close one.

11. A fan asks your opinion about Within Temptation.
Together: Well, in the beginning it was good. The first two albums I liked very much.
Joni: I listened to Mother Earth for a long time when it was released!!
Antti: But nowadays they sounds so commercial, I wonder if they still do what they like to do in music. It's not that original like the beginning anymore so I prefer other bands to listen to who does their own thing. Joni agrees.   (Lonneke: and I totally agree).

Kiitos!! Keep up the good work and enjoy the rest of the two gigs. Hopefully we see you around again. Cheers/Kippis!

foto's: Mira/Metalshots.