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Jasmina Schreck investigates Oulu’s Metal Music Karaoke Scene . . . 
Karaoke is more popular in Finland than in almost any other country in the world. Japan might win overall but at least in Europe no other nation seems to find singing their favourite songs in bars as appealing as the Finns. Finland is also an exceptional case concerning metal music. While this style of music carves out a miserable existence in many countries, it has become sort of the mainstream in Finland, with metal bands from this country like Sonata Arctica, Nightwish or Amorphis regularly managing to reach the Top Ten in the Finnish Music Charts. Now, these two very different Finnish passions have been combined and ‘Hevikaraoke’ has been born . . . to be experienced in Oulu every Thursday at the metal bar Hevimesta on Torikatu.
The Hevikaraoke evenings usually start at 10pm, at a rather empty location and with beer prices of one euro. The red-coloured room is furnished with wooden tables and decorative chairs and couches. On the walls there are old-looking framed paintings and several chandeliers. But this old-fashioned atmosphere soon changes. Within an hour the place is heaving, and lists of hundreds of rock and metal karaoke songs are distributed along with pens and paper to fill in your name and the number of the song you’re going to perform.
Regular Singers And it’s not just drunks singing any song that takes their fancy. There are regular visitors that sing the same song each week, honing it to perfection. For instance Hanna, her hair in coloured braids and wearing a wide skirt, interprets Maj Karma’s “Ukkonen”. She doesn’t have a clear explanation why she chose this song but states that she always sings it, simply because ‘it is a good one.’ Also Joanna, like the usual karaoke enthusiast, doesn’t have any deeper reason she chooses a certain song.
“There are just no other ones to choose so I pick one of them”, she explains after having gone for a song from the Finnish power metallers Thunderstone.
The reason for the decision for taking part in karaoke usually isn’t a very profound. It’s all about the fun, not about coming as close to the original as possible. However, Christoffer from Norway partly disagrees. Pouring down a rather adventurous mixture of tequila, grenadine, milk and salmiakki koskenkorva, he tells me that it’s ‘not solely the fun’ that matters to him. He also strives after a good performance when “killing himself” singing songs by the Oulu-based band Sentenced. And indeed, you will understand his suicidal thoughts if you hear him singing karaoke just once.
‘Shy-When-Sober’ Ville hosts the evening, announces the singers and gives out the microphones. According to him, ‘Hevikaraoke has been taking place at Hevimesta for two years already.’
He also comes up with an explanation for why karaoke is so popular in Finland:
“I think that because in Finland people are so shy when they are sober. The karaoke is a good way to express, perform and do things that you wouldn’t do when you are sober.”
I suppose this comment isn’t too far from reality in some cases, as I can count myself amongst this “shy-when-sober” group as well and occasionally I found myself somewhat unexpectedly joining the game in the course of the later evening.
Certainly it’s easy to overdo things, and even if I haven’t seen this scenario yet, Ville adds that there have been some situations where “people have been so drunk that it was totally useless to give them a microphone”.
That’s surely the point when the song which finishes off every Thursday should be dug out. “Rumat ihmiset, menkää kotiinne” (ugly people, go home) is at least a clear request…
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