Cemetery Skyline

In the organizer's words:

Guests: Royal Sorrow

CEMETERY SKYLINE is a new dark band from Finland. On May 20, the group, which is made up of members of other renowned acts, will be performing at Im Wizemann in Stuttgart.

In CEMETERY SKYLINE, guitarist Markus Vanhala, known from Insomnium and Omonium Getherum, is accompanied by keyboardist Santeri Kallio, drummer Vesa Ranta, bassist Victor Brandt and singer Mikael Stanne. All of them are musicians who play or have played in famous bands such as Sentenced, Amorphis, Dimmu Borgir or Dark Tranquillity. "In the past, my bands have often toured with Amorphis and Dark Tranquillity, so I've gotten to know Santeri and Mikael well - and vice versa, of course. And if you want to form a goth-influenced band, it's not a long way to Vesa or Victor - and they're longtime friends too!" says Vanhala.

"With CEMETERY SKYLINE , we are treading previously unknown musical paths - those dark alleys that are close to our hearts but that we haven't really explored yet. And we are all very excited about it! We all share a deep love for goth rock from the 80s and 90s - whether it's more synth-heavy or heavier, guitar-dominated stuff. You know, the best bands from The Sisters of Mercy to Type O Negative," describes Santeri Kallio, who shares the songwriting duties with Vanhala.

But is CEMETERY SKYLINE a goth band? Maybe to a certain extent, but that's certainly not the whole story. There's one thing you can't argue about, though: The content of the band's lyrics is deeply rooted in the dark gothic atmosphere. The lyrical concept penned by Stanne - for the first time in his remarkable career, Mikael sings in a clear and elegant style throughout the album - irresistibly delves into the paradoxical world of "northern loneliness". "The lyrics are deeply rooted in the self-imposed solitary life of the Nordic peoples, their unsociable behavior and their dark sense of humor... When writing the lyrics, I used this characteristic of ours, which could be described as a Scandinavian gothic lifestyle," says Stanne.