Since there are no festivals this year at all, there are some creative ideas by festival organizers to give us at least a bit of a festival feeling. Tuska offers three concert streams within three weeks on three different locations with Finnish bands only.
You can watch clips of the show and full interviews at Tuska Festival’s YouTube channel.

Tuska Utopia – Episode 3: APOCALYPTICA

Steffi: The third episode of Tuska Utopia features APOCALYPTICA. It takes place in the ruins of the Church of St. Michael in Pälkäne; a village close to Tampere. And once again, the venue fits perfectly to the band’s music and Tuska Utopia has created a high-quality alternative for a physical live concert. The light show, sound, and cinematography are very professional and creative.

With roundabout 300 other music fans, we watch the four Finns playing their cellos and drums in the old church. The sightseeing-tour with Samy Elbanna (singer of LOST SOCIETY) and a short interview with Eicca Toppinen and Perttu Kivilaakso complete the concept of Tuska Utopia.

The show felt a bit short with 45 minutes and the ending came quick and hard for me and others, as I read in the live chat. The virtual Meet-and-Greet with Eicca Toppinen after the show was a very good add-on to close the event.

Tuska Utopia – Episode 2: BATTLE BEAST

Kiki: For the second episode of Tuska Utopia, we (virtually) visit a stone castle in a Finnish forest. The castle is a monument to the tenacity of one woman, who single-handedly built this hermitage for herself. The “venue” is beautifully illuminated and sets the scene for Power Metal band BATTLE BEAST.

I must say that watching the live premiere of this episode truly made a difference. Watching concerts on demand isn’t as special as the feeling of community knowing that 370 more people from all around the world are sharing this experience with you. The chat on the streaming platform really celebrated the band and interacted with each other – and that was only one of the possibilities viewers had to interact with one another.

The travel part of the show shows alluring forest landscapes and the short interview with the band both leaves me wanting to watch more – and to finally be able to travel again. The band’s performance is impressive and at some point, I notice I’m not only headbanging along but sitting down to watch isn’t too comfortable – the concert feeling was real!

Tuska Utopia – Episode 1: TURMION KÄTILÖT

Pia: The first band – the opener so to speak – is TURMION KÄTILÖT and they play at Suvilahti in Helsinki, the venue where the festival normally takes place. But there is no stage built up; at Suvilahti there are former gas tanks and TURMION KÄTILÖT play in one of them, which doesn’t have walls anymore.

And that’s good because, in addition to the show, there is a lot of pyrotechnics involved! Several cameras film the gig; at least one of them is a drone. So viewers get a lot of interesting perspectives. The band itself performs something that is in between a video shoot and a real concert. There is interaction with … someone, but not very often.

“Imagine everybody would have an orgasm at the same time”

Unfortunately, the gig is interrupted by short videos about the Tuska Utopia project with nice views from Helsinki and an interview with the band. It’s cool to have this, but it would have been better either at the beginning or the end of the whole show so that the “concert” feeling isn’t interrupted.

But one thing in the interview makes it really worth watching it: when asked what would be a utopia for him, vocalist MC Raaka Pee answers “Imagine everybody in the world would have an orgasm at the same time” – nice thought!

More anticipation than real festival feeling

Because of the venue and all the pictures of Helsinki, you get a Tuska feeling and I was immediately looking up the date for 2021! Also, the recommendations of bars for metalheads in the city is a cool gimmick and now I want to go there and have a beer with nice music in the background.

All in all, it felt more like watching a live DVD, especially because of the interruptions with the extra videos. The gig itself was really cool with a nice show and musicians who were really happy to play again, performing great. But I missed interaction and – as I said – I’d prefer to watch the whole gig in one piece.

Nevertheless, it’s all we can get at the moment and I’m more than happy that organizers do something to bring live music to us!

Tuska Utopia season 1 continues with BATTLE BEAST and APOCALYPTICA

The Finnish Metal and travel show continues with two more episodes: BATTLE BEAST on November 20th and APOCALYPTICA on November 27th. Find all information and get your tickets for Tuska Utopia at Semilive. And check back here for the full report after every stream.