Thanks Marcel! We've been a bit busy lately but doing just great! Right now we are writing songs for our debut album, which will be hopefully released in the beginning of 2007. We have a lot of work to do before that and even some major issues still to solve - like who is going to release the album etc.

 

We wanted to have an original name that sounded good. In the beginning our style was more industrialish and we were just wrote some media critic songs, so we thought it was a good idea to have this kind of media related, technical term as a name for our band. Nowaday it's pretty much "just a name", but it's also abstract enough to fit to our present concept.

 

Widescreen Mode was formed in 2003, but the same guys had a band called Fairlane already in the early 90's. We've been doing a lot of music before this band, but because of our jobs in the past 10 years, we haven't had a chance to really focus on music before. Now the situation is much better.

 

Widescreen Mode has produced two EPs for now. The "Hello World" EP was released in 2004 and the "Another Day" EP just a few months a go. We have won some great band competitions and got some good reviews, but we are not one of the biggest Finnish bands yet. On the underground level, among other unsigned Finnish bands, we are pretty well recognized. On the other hand, we've got some thousands of fans all over the world through the internet, so we are not that small either.

 

Because we are metalheads born in the 70's, Metallica has obviously been a very important band for us. Still I think WSM has got more influences from newer bands like Paradise Lost, Pantera, Soilwork etc. We also like to cherish certain kind of Finnish melancholy in our music.

 

         

 

I guess we've been a bit of a difficult band for record companies to sign. Record companies have said many times that we don't need a record company, because we have too much knowledge to make it without them. We don't think that's completely true, but we are now pretty much ready to take that advice.

 

We are no longer actively looking for a record company, but an international distributor. We have already found the money for the album and also some good people to work with on it. Anyway we are still open minded for many kind of discussions.

 

It was the biggest competition we have participated so far. The competition was arranged by MTV Nordic and it was run on the MTVE.com website during the Summer of 2005. We contributed with the song "Another Day", which was already mixed and mastered at the time.

 

Most of the best unsigned Scandinavian bands participated in the competition and we thought we didn't have a chance to make it to the finals. Being finally voted number eight was a great deal for us mentally, but of course we got also some good recognition and a lot of new fans.

 

I wouldn't say we are really that well-know yet in Finland either. Of course music professionals have noticed us, but avarage Finns don't know us yet. And I even think we have more fans outside Finland because of our success on the MySpace.com website etc. At the MySpace there's already more than 11.000 registered WSM fans and most of them are from the US, UK, Australia, Canada and Japan.

 

Most of the non-Finnish press has thought we are doing a great job, but of course there has been all kinds of opinions about it. Some reviewers don't like that our music is not targeted to a small marginal group, but mostly feedback has been really positive and it has been great to see how well our music has been received.

 

 

                                          

 

 

The EP was simply named for a song called "Another Day". The song is a story about losing everything you've got. The lyrics are based on some personal experiences and thoughts we had during the tsunami disaster and the floods. The songs "We Don't Need Your War" and "Everlasting Bomb" are about war and politics. Both include strong personal ideas about the human tragedy in many countries around the world today. "Won't Believe You" was written about people who know how to manipulate others with nothing but words. This is also a very personal song for us.

 

I've been working as a graphic designer for over ten years and for me it's a matter of honour to have something else than an average crappy package. We think it's a good way to show how we would like to be presented also in the future. It hopefully helps us avoiding the situation where some business people tell us what we should wear and what's the only way to make it look good.

 

The script was written pretty much based on the lyrics. It's a story about a guy who loses everything to the water. We wanted to show also some Finnish lake landscape and emphasize the melancholy of the song with the dark appearance.

 

My brother, Markus Aaltonen had been working as a video assistant for well-known Finnish music video directors Miikka Lommi and Finn Andersson last year. Markus wanted to have some references as a video director and at the same time we had an idea to include a music video for our promo package. The budget was only a few hundred euros, so financially there was no obstacles. After all, it was a great exercise for shooting a "real video" in the future.

 

We are aiming for a situation where we could play music every day. Only way to do it is to become successful enough to make a living out of it and get rid of the day job. We are ready to work hard for it - harder than most of the bands.

 

Right now our main focus is on the debut album. We have a lot of songs written already and still a huge amount of work to do. The goal is to have the debut released some time in the beginning of 2007. If it works out well I would guess we have a lot gigs and some international recognition during the year 2007.

 

Thank you Marcel! Hopefully Vampire's readers check out also our website at www.widescreenmode.com and join the Street Team if they like what they hear! We wish you have a great Spring and stay true to yourselves! Rock on!