Being an analyst by profession I did a little research before going down the latest Nightwish rabbit hole, the album ‘Yesterwynde’, which was released to the usual level of huge anticipation and expectation on 20th September. Sometimes a little discography can be revealing.
The gap between the release of their 10 studio albums was only one year when they first began in 1997-8, thereafter becoming two from ‘Oceanborn’ (1998) until ‘Once’ (2004), then three years (‘Dark Passion Play’), becoming four (‘Imaginaerum’) then five (‘Human. :II: Nature’ although the 20th anniversary compilation ‘Decades’ album intervened in 2018), then back to four again (actually four and a half) for ‘Yesterwynde’.
There have of course been numerous other live, compilation and video albums along the way but it is on studio albums that bands are judged.
Statistics can be juggled to imply anything but output has decreased and Nightwish has for the moment at least abandoned touring too (it’s rare for a band not to tour a new album at all) with no indication if and when it will resume.
There have been personnel changes along the way including one, the exit of bassist/vocalist Marco Hietala in 2021, which almost finished them off. Anyone who viewed the remastered HD version of the seminal Wacken live performance in 2013, which has mysteriously been taken down from You Tube in the last few days having been there for a few years, will know from that alone what a difference he made to live shows.
Meanwhile, it has been rumoured that Floor Jansen’s increasing solo work might be causing concern within the band while I heard on the grapevine that she is unhappy about their low key publicity approach which renders them invisible beyond the metal fraternity. Have you ever heard Nightwish on the radio? Or seen them on television? Please tell me if you have.
All the speculation above might amount to nothing but one thing is certain. Nightwish is probably under greater scrutiny than it ever has been right now amongst its own supporters and that is evident from some of the comments being made online on its own social pages.
Two examples which are live right now, on the afternoon of Sunday 22nd September:
“Not as good as your older music; seemed to have lost your way.”
“When did Nightwish become so BORING? Nightwish used to be magic, now it feels like science and experiment. The new album is a 3/10 at most for me. In a week I won’t be listening to it anymore.”
We ran the rule over two of the three singles that were pre-released tracks from ‘Yesterwynde’ and the overall opinion was that the first one, ‘Perfume of the timeless’ was somewhat meh by their standards and the second, ‘The Day Of…’, was better – “big, brash, bombastic and melodic” but overly and convolutedly wordy. I was tempted to say they’d taken the day off, but refrained out of respect.
Moreover they appeared to have mislaid their ability to concoct a memorable hook (as opposed to a melody) – something they hitherto did par excellence – and the songs seemed merely to have taken over where ‘Human. :II: Nature’ left off.
On the other handwe acknowledged that Nightwish albums are conceptual affairs and that within the full album individual tracks might take on greater significance and value.
That raises the question of what the album is actually about. We know that it is the third and final one in a trilogy that began with ‘Endless forms most beautiful’ almost a decade ago and that those albums ranged over the human condition in how it relates to science and nature.
‘The Day of…’ concerns excessive angst about the world around us and how we should ignore it and just get on with our lives (taking some of the messages in ‘Noise’, the opening trackon ‘Human. :II: Nature’, a stage further perhaps) and offering a clue to the essence of ‘Yesterwynde’. That winding backwards to less frenetic times might just be to our benefit.
But then as the video track to ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’ on the ‘Endless forms most beautiful’ album showed when played live, when exactly were those less frenetic times?
Keyboardist and main songwriter Tuomas Holopainen has spoken about “gratitude for the uniqueness of our existence” which also plays on some of the many emotions generated by ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’.
‘Yesterwynde’ is a monster 23-track album but 11 of them are orchestral versions of the originals with the exception of the partly acoustic ‘Hiraeth’. It’s the second time recently they’ve effectively offered a double album, the difference on ‘Human. :II: Nature’ being that the second half was original orchestral works.
The album title is the opening track. It actually starts with the sound of a cinematic tape, running backwards I’d guess, which would ‘set the scene’ for what follows and plays to no more than acoustic guitar, pipes and a choir.
Its quietness and reverence is palpable, almost as if you’ve inadvertently entered a private service in a chapel as an ethereal male choir sings of cementing ties between generations, latterly described by Floor Jansen once she puts in an appearance as “an island of a shipless crew”.
No man is an island is, I guess, the message,
It’s unusual for Nightwish to commence an album with what is close to a medieval ballad but it is effective.
I’m reminded of the Decades tour in 2018 when they opened with the solo, Troy Donockley-delivered, ‘Swanheart’ before lurching into ‘Dark Chest of Wonders’. The contrast here is greater still with the almost 10-minute long ‘An Ocean of Strange Islands’ next up, which offers the full panoply of Nightwish’s talents in the form of a driving beat with frequent double kick bass passages, powerful orchestral effects, ripping guitar chords (and the obligatory, perfectly apt short solo), subtle key changes, majestic vocals from Jansen and a complex arrangement that throws in three bridges, each different from the others, the first one being straight out of ‘Music’ on the previous album.
The seas and oceans have long been a common theme in Nightwish songs and this one seems to concern a seafarer on a journey across mystical waters encountering multiple adventures along the way, each of them relatable to those your average Joe’s experiences in his own life expedition.
I’m tempted to call it an opus but thus far I can’t justifiably compare it to the likes of ‘Ghost Love Score’, ‘The Poet & the Pendulum’ and ‘The Greatest Show…’, partly because I can’t come to terms with the fully 2 1/4 minute long pipes outro, which, beautiful as it is (clear hints of ‘The Poet & the Pendulum’), frankly, kills it stone cold dead. It sounds like it should be a separate song, (again, like ‘Swanheart’).
‘The Antikythera Mechanism’ sounds like an update to the Heimlich Maneuver to help victims of choking, or perhaps an advanced sexual position from the Karma Sutra.
In fact it is an ancient Greek device that was used to predict astronomical events and is considered the world’s first analogue computer. Eat your heart out Manchester University.
Nightwish are masters at finding obscure subjects like this to write songs about and believe it or not there’s already a song with a similar title that was released by one Bear McCreary earlier this year. If analogue synthesisers are back in fashion, why not?
It’s fairly routine early on, Troy Donockley gets a chance to contribute a few lines (not entirely convincingly), and it channels the previous album (a touch of ‘Tribal’ here, a dose of ‘Endlessness’ there) but is pepped up by an almost rap-like staccato chorus from Jansen and then an almighty, frenetic instrumental bridge that could have been lifted from the soundtrack to The Omen.
Lyrically there are all sorts of allusions and allegories that you’ve heard numerous times before – avatars, libraries, stars, tides and Lucy (the early hominin, the one that’s out of Africa and which turns up in ‘The Greatest Show…’), this time with her prints transported to the moon by the early astronauts (2001 – A Space Odyssey?)
It’s all a bit convoluted, something of a word salad, but it works and I reckon it will go down very well live.
Those two singles I mentioned earlier follow as tracks #4 and #5.
To summarise the earlier reviews, ‘Perfume of the Timeless’(track 5) – “ I can’t help but feel, and it pains me, that on this song they sound more like an aspiring, ambitious Nightwish wannabe band than Nightwish itself; one that’s knocking on the door of promotion from the Championship rather than the 28 times Premier League title holders.”
Meanwhile, ‘The Day of…’(track 4) review says “It’s big, it’s brash, powerful, bombastic, and impressive, with the pleasing return of the schoolboy choir and a mid-section combined keys/guitar bridge that will probably blow your head off in concert. But all this is de rigueur. That’s what you expect from Nightwish. They are renowned for it. It’s melodic for sure and it has a great little key change of the kind they excel at but what it doesn’t have is a memorable hook (or two, or three), something they used to churn out with the same regularity as reports of another stabbing on the 9 o’clock news bulletin.”
(Please feel free to read those reviews in full, they are much more detailed).
‘Sway’ reintroduces Donockley, this time combining with Floor Jansen in a similar fashion to how they did on ‘Harvest’ and especially ‘How’s the heart’ on the previous album.
Again, these songs are so different from traditional Nightwish fare that they could be another artist or band altogether or at least offshoots from Tuomas Holopainen’s other projects.
Examined as a standalone song it is actually quite delightful; Jansen’s sweet soprano, Donockley’s English North Country tenor, the expertly plucked acoustic guitar and the pipes combining perfectly and underscored by a sophisticated piano melody.
In isolation you’d never know it was a metal band at the heart of this.
I don’t know who the “Child of Mankind” is who is solicited to “sway away (our) woe and discontent” and “Adorn your garden with a perfect day”. Jesus? Has Holopainen suddenly gone all religious?
Neither do I know what “the big reveal” that “awaits us all” is in the bridge but it is so sombre I assume it must be the Grim Reaper.
Ergo the message is, again, get on with your life. It’s later than you think. Or something like that.
‘The Children Of ‘Ata’ tells the true story of six Tongan teenage castaways who were shipwrecked on the uninhabited island of ʻAta in 1965 and lived there for 15 months until their rescue. Long thought dead they adapted ingeniously to their circumstances and were eventually discovered and rescued.
Again this is the sort of thing Tuomas Holopainen loves (and I’d love him to have a crack at a song about the Australian Rabbit Proof Fence and the three child runaways who escaped aboriginal detention along its thousands of kilometres, even if Peter Gabriel produced an excellent soundtrack for the 2002 film).
With a contribution from native singers from Tonga, again there are strong elements of ‘Human. :II: Nature’’ songs in it, mixed, unusually, with a techno riff and a poppy vibe before it becomes an absolute stonker of an anthem with the ultimate conclusion, not unusual for Nightwish, that “We are all the Children of ‘Ata” and (yes), that “We were there”.
‘Something whispered follow me’ has the attributes of a horror movie title. It’s actually quite the opposite. A song of self-realisation, of the sort of motivation that drove Florence Nightingale to nurse in war zones, or Rosa Perks to resist apartheid, or Malala Yousafzai to withstand the Taliban, or Noel Chavasse to win two Victoria Crosses as a medic rather than a warrior, carrying injured soldiers to safety under withering enemy fire without even a gun to shoot back with as he refused to carry one. (A possible future storyline there, Tuomas?).
“Then one day something whispered follow me/One life, one strike to follow something real/Once there was something hidden within me (Within me)/Stardust to dust, a tapestry in between.”
And that final line is fabulous. Seven words that mean ‘life.’ A tapestry that is for us and us alone to paint. Carpe Diem or die trying.
Musically it is notable for guitarist Emppu Vuorinen taking the lead, a rare event, with Holopainen syncopating the rhythm section, some great piano work from the keyboardist too, and for an utterly beautiful vocal contribution from Jansen, especially in the outro together with Donockley.
This is one hell of a song. An outstanding track I’m sure I’ll play over and over again and one that will inevitably join the pantheon of Nightwish’s greatest works.
One can’t know for sure what the lyrics to ‘Spider Silk’testify but there is the possibility that they reference someone or something that has “tied up” and used the band, or the writer, who presumably is Tuomas Holopainen.
Whoever it is carries a cross on their back so they can’t be in great shape either.
It is the sort of song that might be associated with the way Marco Hietala saw the impact of the music business on him when he decided to quit three years ago.
For the first 60 seconds you wouldn’t know this is a Nightwish song; a long drawn out piano intro (another one, the piano gets a good look in on this album), punctuated by unusual guitar sounds and with an earthy, slightly tinny production quality.
It’s an unremarkable song until Jansen enters after which it is a belt fest, especially in the bridge where she is multi-tracked impressively , then the instruments take over the repeating melody before Jansen returns, this time with Donockley in tow, to join with them for a final bash and the bells are striking goose bump o’clock.
‘Hiraeth’ could be something out of The Bible but turns out to be a Welsh word expressing feelings of longing and nostalgia.
If Troy Donockley, who introduces the song with the same tone Richard Burton used on ‘War of the Worlds’ and later goes on to mimic Lee Marvin on ‘Wanderin’ Star’, has played a relatively minor role so far it’s a case of all change here.
He combines beautifully with Floor Jansen on a song which again reprises the style of ‘How’s the heart’ until the arrival of two separate instrumental/vocal breaks that are so dramatic they at first seem totally incongruous. The second one reminds me of the wholly unexpected one at the conclusion of Arcade Fire’s ‘Suburban War’.
It’s an acoustic ballad – rock banger – and back again several times over.
Only Nightwish could pull off something like that, and they do.
I’ve read the lyrics to ‘The Weave’ until there are spots before my eyes and still can’t fathom it out. Death seems to be calling again (it’s never far away from a metal song) and the Reaper is back in the house.
The key line appears to be “Old ghosts dancing to a new birth” but again I’m none the wiser. The best I can manage is that it refers to the propensity of the bad guys – dictators, warmongers, narcissistic types (are you listening Starmer?) – to reproduce themselves. Hitler – Mao – Pol Pot – Putin – you get the idea.
“Knit from souls vanished long gone/Into one, a Reaper’s sideshow.”
The heaviest track on the album, it isn’t the best but it is enlivened by some intricate weaving (pardon the pun) of very rapidly played guitar, bass and drum notes and even a little classical section that is thrown in midway to say hello.
Incidentally, I haven’t mentioned the contribution of the rhythm section in any depth so far. I don’t really need to. Everyone knows by now that the human metronome, Kai Hahto, will do everything asked of him to perfection while bassist Jukka Koskinen, playing on his first studio album, demonstrates that he is more than merely up to the task of filling big boots.
And so to the final track, (apart from the orchestrated versions which I won’t be covering here as this review is too long already).
It is traditional for Nightwish albums to conclude with an opus or at least an epic track but this time they opted to finish with the delicate ‘Lanternlight’, which goes round on a loop to reflect the gentle opener, the title track, and ends with that same flickering, unraveling tape, which cuts out and dies as the ‘Yesterwynde’ unravels.
It’s an absolutely stunning piece to finish off with. Listeners will put their own interpretation on the lyrics but what stood out to me is the similarity to the final section of ‘The Poet & the Pendulum’ (‘Mother and Father’) in which, inter alia, Tuomas Holopainen finds the unconditional love of his parents and comes to terms with what he/they did to founder member and vocalist Tarja Turunen.
That song is one of both closure and reawakening and I suspect that it might be a message coming out of this one, too.
How that develops remains to be seen.
In conclusion, if Nightwish was a new band they would be hailed as the Second Coming for this album.
But for one that is 26 years old and has thrilled audiences around the world throughout that time it will be under intense scrutiny as all such bands are with each new release.
For my money this album signifies their ultimate transition, a quarter century after their foundation, from metal band to philosophising, real ale drinking, storytelling beard strokers. Or to put it another way, more prog than metal.
It will assuredly win them new fans amongst the musical cognoscenti (assuming they actually want them) but equally will probably lose some of the hordes of gyrating head bangers they had accrued along their journey, the length and breadth of the planet.
8/10
Find them on:
Website: https://www.nightwish.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nightwish
Twitter: https://twitter.com/NightwishBand
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nightwish/
