LORDI
Nosturi, Helsinki, Finland
7.12.2002

The first show of Lordi! Come and see the freaks and get scared to the bone! One of the most expected shows in Helsinki must've been just this one, at least for people like me, the enormous fan of all things connected with horror. When was the last time we were treated with real horror? I could easily say it was when Evil Dead-1 came out. That's what I call true horror ! And of course you can't forget Alice Cooper, who's shows have always raised emotions, good and bad. But he has found a winner in the finnish Lordi. They have put so much effort in the costumes, sets and everything, that watching them on stage might get a weaker person pee in their pants. The band's look is so convincing, that the characters could as well be taken from the best horror films of all-time. Just think of something like Hellraiser and Pin Head, Lordi is just as creepy and gorgeous! Thanks go out to the man who brought the horror to us, the main monster in the band, Lordi aka Tomi.

But what about the music? You might think it's all about the image. Sure you can compare them to the funny 80'ies band Gwar with their looks, but Lordi is much better in both the music and the costumes. Since they only have one album out, the show was really short, somewhere along 50 minutes. As I expected, the show started with "Get Heavy", the titletrack of the album. The band teased the crowd for a while before appearing in front of them, you could watch their shadows behind the curtain and listen to the intro moans, raising a horror feeling among the crowd. When the curtain fell everyone was in exstacy and trying to get glimpses of the monsters from the sold-out show. The band kept little pauses between the songs and probably gave the audience some time to get amazed by their looks a little longer, apart from some small incidents that happened in the beginning when the breaks were a bit too long. But since a band goes through so much effort in the costumes and looking so great, they could've given the audience more horror between the songs. Say in the style of Alice Cooper, where he gets dragged into the guillotine and loses his head and things like this. But in Lordi style, with more blood and guts. Like they say in the song "Devil Is A Loser (and he's my bitch)" this would fit their show really well. But maybe they don't want to scare the youngest fans too much and this would cost more too. But it would've made a "nice" addition to the short show to have something really gross, "real" splatter in there.

But there were some small things here and there, not scary really, but for instance Lordi changing masks, swinging a huge circular saw in front of the first row, surprising everyone with huge, black wings that took half of the space on stage, wearing a bloody butcher's apron, the guitar spreading fire, the roadies running around in pantomime costumes or something and securing the stage with "Police line do not cross" tape, some freaks on stage and half courpses hanging from the ceiling with guts showing. In "Dynamite Tonite" Lordi was walking around with dynamite in his hand, not real of course. And no speaches were heard between the songs. They would only ruin the show.

All this horror might attract the religious groups or the worried parents, who don't understand that horror is part of the imaginary world, something that for many horror fans is the same as watching The Simpsons for instance, but without the scary kicks. But no groups were seen before or after the show, like in so many other metal shows.

Before the "hit song" tunes such as "Hellbender Turbulence", "Not The Nicest Guy", "Icon Of Dominance"', "Monster Monster", "Biomechanic Man", "Last Kiss Goodbye" and "Rock The Hell Outta You" were heard. The hit song "Would You Love A Monsterman" was the song that worked the best for the crowd. But the fans were also singing along to the other tunes as well and with dedication. But there were those too, that just came to see the show and didn't know about the music or weren't into metal at all. A lot of tickets were given out through radio contests and unfortunately a lot of real fans didn't have a chance to see the band. And unfortunately those who weren't interested in the music were spoiling the mood from the rest by just entertaining themselves in the bar, associating and putting the music down.

Lordi played the show through very convincingly, the sounds were great and nothing negative was sticking to the ear. Some people were expecting to hear covers from bands such as Kiss, but none were played. This was a night to remember for sure, everything new and peculiar is always welcome, horror especially!

Review: Satu Reunanen, , photos by Kari Helenius
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