NIGHTWISH Mainman TUOMAS HOLOPAINEN: 'My Head Is Exploding With New Ideas'

Ruth Harrison of FemaleFirst recently conducted an interview with keyboardist/mainman Tuomas Holopainen of the Finnish/Swedish symhonic metal band NIGHTWISH. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

FemaleFirst: Hey Tuomas, how are things in the world of NIGHTWISH at the moment?

Tuomas: Well, actually, we are on a three-month break at the moment after the first leg of the tour finished last November in South America. The story continues on the 11 of March in London, from where we start our European tour and it goes right up until the end of September; so there are still five of six more months to go.

FemaleFirst: Wow, what a busy life... so what made you decide to record the latest DVD, "Made In Hong Kong (And Various Other Places)"?

Tuomas: It was actually an idea that came from the label, and to be honest, I wasn't the most happy person when I heard this idea, but it's going to be a long break between full-length albums so they thought we needed something new, and also to promote the European tour with a new release and since we don't have anything new in our hands, we decided to do this live EP which would have some additional stuff on. So that's why it ended up being "Made In Hong Kong (And Various Other Places)", because there is probably one song that's recorded in Hong Kong and the rest of the live songs are from around the world.

FemaleFirst: So how have the past two years been since Anette [Olzon, vocals] joined the band?

Tuomas: Interesting! Very rewarding and very exhausting as well. It has been the longest tour we have ever done, and it's been fantastic for most times, but there has been some bad times as well, as always. I think the only mistake we have done so far is the tour schedule last year was a bit too hard because when I was following the group at the end of the summer I could sense that the people were ready to go to a mental hospital so that is why this three-month break that we're on now is very well needed.

FemaleFirst: Are you just relaxing?

Tuomas: Pretty much, I went to Florida for two weeks to see Donald and Goofy and I've been doing some side projects just here and there, and have just been, you know, hanging around.

FemaleFirst: And is there any new material in the pipeline?

Tuomas: Not any time soon, I'm afraid, but I'm working on new material all the time and I actually feel like my head is exploding with new ideas. I pretty much have the concept of the new album in my head already but it's going to take a year before we start working on it full-time because we are not the type of band who can concentrate on two things at the same time. Right now we need to get this tour over with, then maybe take a little break and then start work on the new album.

FemaleFirst: Is there a particular process you go through when writing songs?

Tuomas: Well, I can only speak for myself but for me the process is almost the same every time; at first I always need to have the idea of what the song is about, for example a story or idea, I cannot just start jamming with the keyboard or the guitar to see what comes out. After I have a storyline in my head I have to think how to make the story come to life; "Is it a ballad?" or "is it a rock song?" Should I use a piano or acoustic guitar. When I get the song done, it is after that I write the final lyrics and then I recite the song to the rest of the band and we start writing.

Read the entire interview from FemaleFirst.