This Time Around: An Interview with Zachary Hietala

Guitarist

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The career of Finnish classic heavy metal outfit Tarot has been one of two halves. Starting out in 1982 the band was formed by the Hietala brothers Marco and Zachary under the name Purgatory, changing their name at the request of their first label to Tarot in 1986. They achieved success at home in Finland, but this was limited elsewhere, and eventually went on hiatus in 1998 after four albums.

Then Marco, vocalist and bassist, joined Nightwish. Nightwish’s explosion of popularity gave Tarot a second wind. They’d tried again to break international ground just a year after he joined, in 2003, but it was too early and the Suffer Our Pleasures album was barely noticed outside Finland. Another hiatus followed until 2006 when both they and Nightwish signed to Nuclear Blast. The Crows Fly Black album was an international success, even as far afield as North America, and was followed up quickly with the live CD/DVD Live Undead Indeed in 2008 and Gravity of Light in 2010.

Guitarist Zachary Hietala, who has been there since the beginning, is still reticent to concede their success is quite so widespread though. “We’ve been playing in big festivals since the beginning, but the success of the album in Europe was a surprise; the US market is still not conquered. Actually we didn’t know what to expect, so everything’s been great and still is.”

In Europe the success of the two most recent albums has led to fans wanting to chase down the older albums, finally discovering just how good they really were and wondering why they’d never heard of this band before, but they’re hitting a stumbling block. The first four albums are only in-print in Finland. “Our European deal is with Nuclear Blast and they are not very interested in doing a re-issue of all the old albums. Now the newer fans can enjoy the ‘TSOI MMXI’ album and in my opinion it’s much better than the original.”

What Zachary refers to here is Tarot’s latest release, a 25th anniversary re-recording of their debut album The Spell of Iron, dubbed The Spell of Iron MMXI, updating the sound of the original with Tarot’s current line-up; since 1996 they have included in their ranks Tommi Salmela as a second vocalist and keyboard player, and adding new artwork replacing the original tarot card with a credit card. “It’s an inside joke, now we are so filthy rich, we changed the Tarot card to credit card. Don’t take this seriously, we are not rich really, we just get along. We wanted to bring the album into the ways of today’s Tarot. Like it’s going to be the continuum of our latest albums, soundwise, composing, arrangements, as well as its atmosphere. We changed tempos, tunes, keys, simplified some parts to be more raw, added the keyboards in every song and split the lead vocals with Marco and Tommi. So now it has all we are made of.”

“ We did some vocals for ‘GOL’ (Gravity of Light) album in Marco’s clothes closet! ”
- Zachary Hietala

The re-recording successfully brings the old songs to the new fanbase, but otherwise, Zachary has a surprising, and rare view of how digital music technology, which has shaken the music industry hard in the last few years, has made it unnecessary/illogical to try to re-issue the other albums. “It’s not very economical to release all the older albums worldwide and most of the newer fans can rip them from the ‘net, if needed. I don’t recommend this, but it’s the fact now. Digital tech is a really great tool for professional bands and the internet is great as well. You don’t need time as much in studio anymore and you can record the albums almost in any quiet place. We did some vocals for ‘GOL’ (Gravity of Light) album in Marco’s clothes closet! Facebook, MySpace, etc. are great forums to do promotion and step stones for new bands. Piracy is something you cannot fight against or you lose. We saw that with Metallica. Worldwide record sales have gone down, but still it’s worth it to make new music, because money is not everything. You can still please fans by releasing real CDs or DVDs.”

“There is retro markets and I have more than 500 LPs at home and if I find something rare for second hand shop, I’ll buy it. Normally I listen CDs, but sometimes, with a few beers and the mood is nostalgic, then… Ok, our ‘MMXI’ vinyl is more expensive than the CD and turntables are not easy to come by, or normal amps doesn’t have even phono inputs, [but] we still liked the Nuclear Blast idea to release ‘MMXI’ as a vinyl.”

Where money does talk however is live shows. Tours and festivals cost everyone involved a lot of money to make happen in transport, licenses, wages, equipment etc. and Tarot are another band with notoriety and success behind them who still find it difficult to get economically viable offers sometimes. “To tell the truth, we haven’t play on many European festivals, on just few. We have done lots of touring, but somehow it’s been really difficult to get decent money from organizers and by that we haven’t play on cool festivals. Our expenses go quite high when we need to fly somewhere from here [Finland] with tech guys, hotel costs, taxes, etc. You cannot do everything for promotion only, you have to pay the bills still. Surely we have a good following here and there and hopefully some day festival organizers will understand our value for their happenings and gives us a decent contract? We don’t have that kinda problem in Finland.”

Sometimes though music can be played purely for the thrill, and Zachary experienced such a night in July 2010 when he, brother Marco and Tommi Salmela, after playing an afternoon set at the Tuska Open-Air festival in Helsinki, joined a group of local Finnish musicians led by guitarist Erkka Korhonen for a Finnish all-star tribute night to Ronnie James Dio. “It was really great night and both our singers sung like Ronnie didn’t have to be shamed in heaven. It was great to me play on Kill The King, which is my all the time favourite. Me and Marco have been Dio fans since Rainbow did their first and his meaning to bro’s singing is huge. I remember when we were teenagers, every day when bro came home from school, he put some Rainbow vinyl on and started to sing (scream) on it. First it was like hell, but later he started to get better and evolved a lot in the short period. I have always dug high note hitters, so all the bands Dio has been in are my kinda music, especially Black Sabbath. When I write the songs you can hear my roots.”

But when music is your profession, these occurances are getting rarer and rarer as the only way to make money is increasingly through touring and merchandise at shows. And a growing number of notable artists have to supplement their income with “regular” work (“Tommi and I have dayjobs as well, we work for Kuopio City as youth workers in youth houses and we do lots of work with teenagers who have problems in their personal life”). Ireland’s Primordial are another band in a similar situation and with promoters/event organisers seemingly tightening their purse strings at the same time, sensible offers to play are harder to come by outside of the sure markets. Taking risks is no longer the way.

“ You cannot do everything for promotion only, you have to pay the bills still ”
- Zachary Hietala

A new Tarot album might be a little way off with Nightwish gearing up for their next album, but first Tarot will support Pain on their October tour (which sadly does not include a UK date). They do come to the UK in August however, to appear at the Bloodstock Festival, their only non-Finnish festival appearance this Summer. “Our Autumn plans are still bit open, but if there would be opportunity to play more gigs in UK, we’d really go for it!” They are long overdue a visit to London, and it is their 25th anniversary since Purgatory became Tarot, so hopefully the chance can come soon.

Written by Andy Lye
More: Interviews, Tarot