It’s nearly mid-day here in Seattle, but it’s after 9 p.m. on Saturday night in Finland, which means the seventh annual FINNISH METAL AWARDS (for 2011) have just been announced — which we learned through a timely e-mail from our friend fireangel at the Finland-centric Night Elves blog. Lots of countries host annual music awards of various kinds, but since Finland is arguably the most metal country on Earth, these annual metal awards definitely merit an announcement here at NCS.
The awards were presented at a gala event as part of this weekend’s Helsinki Metal Meeting at a place called The Cable Factory. Voting was open to the public through the Imperiumi.net web site, and more than 20,000 votes were cast. There were no nominees, which meant that the voting was open to whoever voters wished to honor. The big winner was Turisas, which is why their comely visages are at the top of this post. Without further ado, here are all the results (continuing after the jump):
BAND OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Turisas
02. Insomnium
03. Nightwish
04. Amorphis
05. Amoral
06. Turmion Kätilöt
07. Before The Dawn
08. Stratovarius
09. Omnium Gatherum
10. Medeia
ALBUM OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Turisas – Stand Up And Fight
02. Insomnium – One For Sorrow
03. Nightwish – Imaginaerum
04. Amoral – Beneath
05. Amorphis – The Beginning Of Times
06. Turmion Kätilöt – Perstechnique
07. Omnium Gatherum – New World Shadows
08. Before The Dawn – Deathstar Rising
09. Medeia – Abandon All
10. Stratovarius – Elysium
VOCALIST OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Mathias “Warlord” Nygård (Turisas)
02. Tomi Joutsen (Amorphis)
03. Niilo Sevänen(Insomnium)
04. Ari Koivunen (Amoral)
05. Marco Hietala (Tarot, Nightwish)
06. Timo Kotipelto (Stratovarius)
07. Tuomas Saukkonen (Before The Dawn, Black Sun Aeon, RoutaSielu)
08. Jules Näveri (Profane Omen)
09. Tarja Turunen (Harus, solo)
10. Keijo Niinimaa (Medeia, Rotten Sound, Nasum)
MUSICIAN OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Tuomas Saukkonen (guitar/drums/keys, Before The Dawn, Black Sun Aeon, RoutaSielu)
02. Olli Vänskä (violin, Turisas)
03. Alexi Laiho (guitar, Children Of Bodom)
04. Tuomas Holopainen (keyboards, Nightwish)
05. Ben Varon (guitar, Amoral, Tornado)
06. Markus Vanhala (guitar, Omnium Gatherum, Insomnium, Malpractice)
07. Ville Friman (guitar, Insomnium)
08. Esa Holopainen (guitar, Amorphis)
09. Matias Kupiainen (guitar, Stratovarius)
10. Vesa Pännäri (bass, Wankers Of The Zoo Crew)
NEWCOMER OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Constantine
02. Routasielu
03. Battle Beast
04. Ghoul Patrol
05. Bob Malmström
06. Disease Of The Nation
07. Brymir
08. For The Imperium
09. Mors Subita
10. Rage My Bitch
DEMO / SELF-RELEASE OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Artificial Heart – Broken Bones & Buried Dreams
02. Nerve End – Axis
03. Standing Ovation – Scars Suit Me
04. Wankers Of The Zoo Crew – Modulated Launderings
05. Mekanism – Cicatrized
06. Unborn Generation – Culture Of Violence
07. Unhoped – Die Harder
08. Dreadful – It’s Killing Me Inside
09. Lost Society – Lost Society
10. Human Sculpture – Our World – Torn Down
ALBUM ARTWORK OF THE YEAR 2011:
01. Turisas – Stand Up And Fight
02. Insomnium – One For Sorrow
03. Nightwish – Imaginaerum
04. Amorphis – The Beginning Of Times
05. Amoral – Beneath
06. Stratovarius – Elysium
07. Before The Dawn – Deathstar Rising
08. Ghost Brigade – Until Fear No Longer Defines Us
09. Children Of Bodom – Relentless Reckless Forever
10. Wankers Of The Zoo Crew – Modulated Launderings
Seems only fitting that we should end this post with some music from . . . Turisas. Here’s the official vid for the title track to their 2011 album:
15 Responses to “THE 2011 FINNISH METAL AWARDS — JUST ANNOUNCED”
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Turisas = Image of tough guys. Music for pussies. 🙂
Well, on a more positive note, it was great to see Tuomas Saukkonen get Musician of the Year and also nice to see these bands we featured at NCS last year place in the top 10 in the Newcomer of the Year category:
Routasielu
Battle Beast
Bob Malmström
Brymir
Mors Subita
Battle Beast? Really?
Since when do Turisas have a tough guy image? Weird comment…
Still, they are Finland’s main mistake. They’re not very good.
I want to like Turisas but I’m not over fond of power metal.
i can never ever get into them now: some drug-addled-&-tone-deaf reviewer suggested in his review of “surtur rising” that turisas was a “better” ‘viking metal’ band than amon amarth…… and being a fan of (90s) gamma ray and a lot of other power metal, went on to check them out. ‘bitter pill’ doesn’t even begin to describe what i felt at their dragonforce+manowar-level corned-cheesiness….. at least gamma ray seems even better now
and then again, amorphis’s ‘the beginning of times’ has a lot in it for the power metal fan. and i think it’s bloody brilliant (bite me, i hadn’t listened to any of their albums yet and decided to check them out in reverse order ;P)
You guys are crazy, Turisas rules! Okay, well, maybe I can understand why may not like them….. either way, happy to see Olli Vanska so high up on that Musician of the Year list.
Rotten Sound (or any grindcore, really) on some kind on Awards list? Only in Finland…..
Also, I don’t see how that Turisas album cover was so great… looked pretty average to me…
Seems clear to me that the album art awards were driven by band popularity in the voting rather than an independent assessment of the artwork. The one weird appearance in those awards was the cover art for Wankers of the Zoo Crew, but they’ve clearly got a fan following, too, though the music is barely metal.
Seeing Ari Koivunen as number four on the “Vocalist of the year” AND beating someone like Tuomas Saukkonen makes me want to escape humanity and curl into a fetal position.
Also, what’s up with Turisas everywhere. Sooo didn’t see this coming.
I think Ari is an exceptional vocalist; there are many excellent vocalists especially in Finland but even among so great company, he is still outstanding. He is extremely versatile, too.
However, these lists don’t_really decide on who is the best, of course that is a factor, but mainly they show how much “moving power” a band has, how much following and whether they are able to make them vote. Album artwork lists often correspond roughly with “best albums” musically, for example, since just those are albums that many people saw and thus remember for the votings.
Additionally, the top spots on these lists seem to kinda shuffle. In previous years, Insomnium and Amorphis were higher, and Tuomas traditionally is in the top half of the musician’s list 😉
None of that is set in stone and of course everyone has a different personal opinion on the outcome 🙂 I find most interesting the newcomer list and the demobands, because they change a lot each year; (also because newcomer only includes those that released a debut album in the said year, so naturally each year it are different bands).
Yeah, the fact that it’s name could better be THE FINNISH TURISAS AWARDS just discredits it as a whole. A lot of their stuff isn’t even that heavy. And Brymir should be higher up the newcomers list as well.
Turisas kicks ass, though Stand Up and Fight wasn’t as good as their last.. Should have included a link to their Rasputin video, always good for some laughs.
Turisas is the band that brought me to “new” Metal. 😉 Usually I’m more of a Sabbath & Helloween kinda girl, but Turisas is just epic, and extremely beautiful music. Thumbs up!
‘one for sorrow’ better than ‘new world shadows’?
all them arguments are invalid