Korpiklaani is a folk metal band from Lahti, Finland formed in 2003. Korpiklaani is the new name of the band previously called Shaman, that was formed by Jonne Järvelä who still remains the mastermind of Korpiklaani. Whilst Shaman recorded songs in the original Saami language, Korpiklaani recorded most songs in English at first, and mostly Finnish lyrics on their most recent albums. The music of Korpiklaani ranges from the violin-and-guitar paean to the Finnish god of fermentation Pellonpekko, to the "typical" themed metal Wooden Pints, to Crows Bring The Spring, which is strongly reminiscent of "Ride the Lightning" era Metallica. There has been some collaboration between Korpiklaani and other bands from the folk metal scene, such as Finntroll, for which Järvelä provided the yoiking for the title track of their album Jaktens Tid, and Skiltron, for which Järvelä provided vocals on the track 'Praying is Nothing' from their second full-lenght album. In the year 2007 Korpiklaani left Napalm Records to sign with Nuclear Blast Records. They released their new album "Korven Kuningas" in 2008, touring Europe and playing some festivals shortly afterwards. In 2009, they toured the United States and Canada as the headliners for Paganfest II. Lineup: Jonne Järvelä - vocals / guitar Kalle "Cane" Savijärvi - guitar Jarkko Aaltonen - bass Jaakko "Hittavainen" Lemmetty - violin Juho "JuhoKusti" Kauppinen - accordion Matti "Matson" Johansson - drums Official Website

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Turisas is a Finnish folk metal band from Hämeenlinna. They were founded in 1997 by Mathias Nygård and Jussi Wickström and named after an ancient Finnish god of war. Turisas combine elements of folk metal and power metal, with strong influences from symphonic metal as well. The album title Battle Metal has given rise to the term "battle metal" being used as a description of folk metal (as stated by Metal Hammer magazine) but it may not be a canonical metal subgenre. On October 28, 2005, the guitarist Georg Laakso was badly injured in a car accident and due to the extent of his spinal cord injuries, on July 12, 2006 issued a statement of his permanent resignation from the band on the official website. Nevertheless, the band continued to work on their second album, titled The Varangian Way, which was released in early 2007. Jussi Wickström recorded all guitars on the album. Mathias Nygård revealed in the January 2007 edition of Terrorizer magazine that the touring musicians Hannes Horma, Olli Vänskä, Janne Mäkinen and Antti Laurila had been added to the band as full-time members, taking them up to an 8-piece act. It later turned out that of the two accordion players, only Mäkinen had become an official member. Laurila is no longer a touring musician for the band. On February 19, 2007, keyboard player Antti Ventola posted a message on the Turisas discussion forum announcing that he and the band had parted ways. This was later confirmed by the rest of the band. Mathias Nygård performed the keyboards on The Varangian Way and Turisas are presently using backing tracks to replicate them on stage. In January 2008 accordion player Janne "Lisko" Mäkinen disappeared mysteriously in Amsterdam. For the upcoming tour dates in spring 2008 Turisas announced Netta Skog as a step-in accordionist. She had already helped the band on the European tour in October-November 2007. Netta was soon after added to the band on a full-time base. After a string of festivals in the Summer of 2008, in September the band started a long tour through the United States and Europe in support of DragonForce. This tour ended in March 2009, and the band then took part in a new European tour with Cradle of Filth and Moonspell, dubbed the "Filthfest Tour 2009", in April and May 2009. The band played at Wacken Open Air in early August 2009 and also played at Bloodstock Open Air in Mid August 2009. The band took time off at the end of 2009 to make a new album and then planned to return as fully-fledged band no longer supporting others. In 2010 the band concentrated on finishing the recordings of the upcoming third album. Still, the band did a short tour in Asia and Australia in May 2010, including headline concerts in Sydney and Melbourne, two gigs in China, a gig in Shanghai World Expo 2010 and a gig in Japan. As of March 2010, Turisas announced they were in the studio working on a new album; at that time, the band documented the recording process in a series of studio diary videos on YouTube. The title for the latest album, Stand Up and Fight, was revealed on November 11, 2010: the album was released through Century Media on February 28 in Europe and March 8 in North America. A new song off that album: "The March of the Varangian Guard" was performed at the band's Finnish gigs in October 2010. On 17 December 2010, the title track "Stand Up And Fight" was released as a free download on the band's website. The band took part in tours in Mexico and North America with Cradle of Filth, the other supporting bands being Nachtmystium and Daniel Lioneye beginning in January 2011 and in Europe with Die Apokalyptischen Reiter from March through April 2011. Their England tour came with Crimfall as the supporting band, as well as other local supporting bands. 2012 saw them headline the North American "Paganfest: America Part III" tour with Alestorm, Arkona and Huntress in tow. In November 2012, the band announced that drummer Tuomas "Tude" Lehtonen and bassist Jukka-Pekka Miettinen had both left the band. They were replaced by Jaakko Jakku and Jesper Anastasiadis, respectively. They also announced that they had started work on their 4th album, and that the album would be released in May 2013. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

With a line up that includes musicians from bands as varied as URGEHAL, PANTHEON I, UNTIME, MELCH, HALLUCINATIONS, POWERSWORD and SARKOM, TROLLFEST’s members bring with them not only a wealth of experience and the skill to make use of instruments like the accordion, the banjo and the saxophone, but also a sense of diversity that allows the band to create a sound that is distinctly its own. Whilst “True Norwegian Balkan Metal” goes some way towards describing the TROLLFEST sound - hinting as it does at the extreme end of metal, with a good pinch of local traditional folk - it doesn’t really go the whole way towards capturing the sense of fun and sheer exuberance with which the band tackles everything it does, whether it involves playing in the studio or performing live. Formed in 2004, in Oslo, Norway, when a bunch of musicians became bored with the selection of party music that was available to them, and, helped along by the consumption of large quantities of alcohol, the soon-to-be members of TrollfesT decided to take matters into their own hands. One website and six songs later, a German label, which at the time was called Solistium, recognised the potential in the madness and got in touch. With the immortal words “what the heck, let’s give it a go” TrollfesT agreed to a deal and started writing new material. By 2005 “Willkommen Folk tell Drekka Fest!!” hit the streets. And life as we know it was never the same again. Containing a selection of sounds and comments, many of which you would not necessarily come across if you only frequented polite parties, “Willkommen…” displayed some unique qualities that caught people’s attention and consequently sold rather a lot of copies, so a deal for a second album was signed and in 2006 the story of Brakebein the Troll was released. “Brakebein” (not a bad choice for a title really given its subject matter), appeared in two versions - one that included a cartoon illustrating Brakebein’s voyage, and the other that included the lyrics. During the first years, TrollfesT never actually played live, but nevertheless the two albums succeeded in making the band a sought after addition to festivals, and the first foray beyond the planning stage occurred in 2007 as one of the headlining bands at the Ninth Barther Metal Open Air Festival. TrollfesT then went on to headline and play various festivals and concerts around Europe during 2007/08 including the Ragnarök and Riedfest festivals. January 2009 saw the release of TrollfesT’s third studio album “Villanden”. A much-anticipated underground album according to feedback from the fans, “Villanden” was quickly acknowledged as one of the craziest albums to have been released in a very long time, mixing, as it did, European Balkan music with extreme metal, and spread rapidly through the viral networks like YouTube, MySpace and Facebook. 2011 saw TrollfesT sign with NoiseArt Records for the release of the new album “En Kvest For Den Hellige Gral” and with Rock The Nation for world-wide booking. Tours and festival appearancs quickly followed demonstrting that as a live force TrollfesT is hard to beat. 2012 will see the release of ”Brumlebassen”, the band’s fifth full-length album, and extensive tours have already been set. So how would anyone, in their right mind, or otherwise, dare to define TrollfesT? The closest you would come is probably True Norwegian Balkan Metal, but even then you would need to include influences from lots more genres. The best way to put it is that this band is all about alcohol, joy and music, three subjects that draw in fans from all ages and genres, eager to listen to TrollfesT’s records and witness the exuberant and skilled live performances. Web Site: http://www.trollfest.com Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/trollfestofficial MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/trollfest SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/trollfest ReverbNation: http://www.reverbnation.com/trollfest Band Contact: trollfest_@hotmail.com Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.