It sounds like it actually is crowdfunding through their wording. They stressed that the DIGITAL package is 100% done, which to me implies the physical versions are not done. Which is probably what the crowdfunding campaign is for, for funding the "finishing" of the CDs and vinyl productions. This makes sense also since the pre-orders for the physical versions are months later than the digital version(s).
I think Nuclear Blast still pays for the production of the physical release, and I’m guessing they get a bigger cut of those profits in exchange for Jari doing a digital pre-order.
Indiegogo, the platform best known for "flexible funding" targets. Hmmmm....
_________________
metaldiscussor666 wrote:
American isn't a nationality
Riffs wrote:
It's been scientifically proven that appreciating Black Sabbath helps increase life expectancy, improves happiness, bumps your salary by 11 thousand dollars annually, helps fight cavities and increases penis size.
Joined: Wed Jun 01, 2011 8:55 am Posts: 764 Location: United States
Posted: Fri Feb 02, 2024 1:00 pm
The last "Wintersun" record was a Jari one-man-band with Wintersun slapped on it to sell it. The band hasn't put a record out together since 2012. It sounds like the drums and God knows what else was from 18 years ago.
I don't know what this really is. It's 100% done now. I suspect it was 80% done when some of you weren't even born.
It seems like this album will be a blend between "The Forest Seasons" and "Time I". To be honest, I enjoyed "Time I", but "The Forest Seasons" was boring and mediocre. Let's hope it will be more like "Time I" than "The Forest Seasons"... I have no high expectations, but it would be nice to be pleasantly surprised.
_________________ "Don't buy music that you grow tired of quickly and don't steal music from musicians who make music you like."
pressingtoplead13 wrote:
Songs like "Meathook Sodomy" and "Addicted To Vaginal Skin" are some of my favorite songs all time to karoake [...]
Lost all the hype for this album ages ago. However, would be looking forward to finally hearing the studio version of "The Way of the Fire" which is a solid song. "Silver Leaves" was hyped as the most beautiful song by whoever heard it, so that would be intriguing as well. I think MA rating for this album will be in the 60-70% range.
Joined: Thu Jan 21, 2010 9:46 am Posts: 1399 Location: Switzerland
Posted: Sat Feb 10, 2024 12:42 pm
Regarding the cover art: Why arrange mountains in such an unrealistic manner? That way, what was likely supposed to be "epic" takes on the shape of a failed photoshop job and makes for a rather bad first impression.
_________________ ______In Marble Halls Of Falling Snow______
WINTERSUN HEADQUARTERS CROWDFUNDING SURVEY RESULTS We are very honored with all the support you guys would be willing to give us! Thanks for all the likes and shares. This has been our biggest Facebook post to date! We hope all the “likes" were sincere and you would really support us when the push comes to shove. There´s some doubts and questions about this project, which is understandable, but all questions would be answered when we would launch the campaign. We are planning to do many videos, which would explain all the perks in detail, the motivation for this funding and our goals and plans.
SURVEY RESULTS:
First 24-hours: 6522 likes, 269 696 people reached Day 2: 7216 likes, 303 744 people reached Day 3: 7618 likes, 315,264 people reached After a week: 8150 likes, 325,760 people reached. And just wow! Over a thousand comments. Right now we are on the fence and a bit worried whether we would succeed. It´s very close, but this is a very ambitious project and the goal is set very high. We are still figuring out all the costs and the budget for this project, but thanks to all of you guys we are starting to get a clearer picture what could be possible. This will require a lot of planning and work from us and a lot of support from you guys. We can only make this happen together! We were hoping to get at least 10000-12000 likes, because that is the minimum of how many supporters we would need behind this project for us to reach the goal and succeed! So we just need around 2000-4000 supporters more and we´re good! Easier said than done, right? 8000 supporters would not be enough, but it´s a very good start! But we believe reaching these remaining supporters is very much possible based on these numbers: - Our over 300000 Wintersun Facebook followers - My personal Facebook almost 5000 friends + over 13000 followers - All the shows and tours we´ve played and how many people have come to see us (many shows sold out) - Millions of Youtube views - Wintersun ST sales which are now over 50000 world wide - TIME I sales, which are now over 40000 world wide (CDs, digital & vinyl) Finland alone bought over 5000 TIME I CDs. Thank you Finns! Germany and US were our next biggest supporters. Thank you to everyone all over the world who bought TIME I!!! But as you know, this album cost a hell of a lot of effort&time&money to make and we make very little from the CD sales. We barely even made even. But even if only 1/4 who bought TIME I would support us now, this dream would become a reality. So we know you´re out there! We just need to get all your attention!
ABOUT CDs
We saw some people asking for CDs. This was expected. After carefully thinking about whether to include CDs and vinyls into the campaign we have decided to include them, but we would have to include them only along with our digital “Killer Package”. Let me elaborate… We can buy CDs from Nuclear Blast for a fair price and sell them to you by ourselves, but only a limited amount. That´s fine though, because we wouldn´t be able to handle big amounts of CDs by ourselves anyways. And we would still make very little selling CDs even by ourselves. The shipping and handling costs are just crazy. We simply don´t have the proper resources. So it would take a lot work and time, which we´d rather spend on making music. I´m sure you guys want that too, right? We think it´s better to let big boys at Nuclear Blast to sell the CDs. They have proper resources and the years of expertise. If this campaign would succeed we would buy the limited amount of CDs from Nuclear Blast is offering us. We would sign them all and we would offer them in the campaign along with digital package. If we would include the CDs on this campaign as separate items, we would never be able to reach our goal, because the CD perks would eat our “Killer Package" sales and then no one would get the album, because the campaign would fail. And we don´t want that, right? We appreciate it a lot, if you buy our CDs, but we make very little profit with them.
PERSONAL OPINION
Here´s my personal opinion about CDs. Although this might not be wise of me to state publicly as it probably will hurt our own CD sales, but I wanna be blunt and transparent here with you guys. I don´t believe in CDs anymore, but this is just my personal opinion. They are still nice and I understand how some people still like them. Nuclear Blast makes really beautiful CD packages, especially the Mediabooks, but everyone has their own preferences. Personally I like my music listening all digitally nowadays. Straight from the computer or from my phone with quality headphones, my mixing monitors or with my mini Genelecs, which I love. But I don´t like mp3 quality. It´s ok for casual listening and mobile phones (if it´s at least 320kbps), but otherwise I would rather listen to high quality downloadable files (wavs) exactly how the album was mixed, mastered and recorded. And I think bands should offer this option instead of CDs or at least along with the CDs and mp3s. I don´t even own a CD player anymore, haven´t owned one in years. Non of my computers don´t even have a CD player. Well I have the external Apple USB CD/DVD player, but I only use it maybe once a year because of the necessity for some rare software installations, like East West sample libraries and such... But even those are now shipping with hard drives and lot of the software companies are only selling downloadable versions nowadays. Times are changing...
For example, I just actually bought Devin Townsend´s new Z2 CD, but I would have rather bought a high quality digital download straight to my computer. When the Z2 CD drops from my mailbox, I´m going to rip it into my computer immediately and on my phone and then I´m going to put the CD away into my CD drawer to rot forever. Kinda pointless process. Just waste of materials and energy. And I would rather watch a digital booklet on my display and read the lyrics in full screen while listening to the music rather than from a small printed booklet, which doesn´t look as beautiful and sharp as full screen graphics/photos. Even vinyl covers doesn´t look as good & sharp. But this is just my personal opinion and preference, which has changed over the last years. I use to love CDs. I´ve bought many CDs, but CDs are dead to me in my personal music listening. My vision for digital listening experience doesn´t just stop there. I´m visioning interactive animated graphics digital booklets and seeing the artwork coming alive (like the parallax effect). Maybe even some sort of lyrical videos or beautiful photo slideshows along with the lyrics for every song, while listening from your computers, iPads and phones... These sort of booklets and a digital packages is what I want to make in the future. And I think labels and artists should take a note! But in the end it´s the music that matters.
THE PACKAGE
This digital package we have planned for you would be unique. It contains a lot of exclusive materials. This would be your chance of a lifetime to support us directly for the first time and make the Wintersun Headquarters dream come true and really free us to make music without boundaries and step up our game. I´ve been working my whole life towards this goal, ´cause I know I can make some pretty good albums, if I get the chance... Who am I kidding, some of the best albums there ever has been! I have insanely good material already for many albums, that I´m really excited about, but I just can´t do them with my current resources. Sorry, but I have my limits. I need a proper studio of my own to make these big albums a reality. So we need you guys to really get behind our “Killer Package”. We promise you the package is insane and you would love it! Let´s just say it would tie up all the loose ends and make the circle complete!
SAUNAGATE
We saw some complaints about “luxury items”. Like how the fans would be buying us TVs, couches, fridges and saunas... The fact of the matter is that no one would be buying us anything. The fans would buy (pre-order) a product for themselves, a killer TIME II package with insane goodies + the other perks we would offer. But in this case the fans would be supporting the band directly for a change and they would know where their money is going. This is a win win situation for the fans and the band. It´s a rare opportunity for all of us! We need to make the best out of this chance that we have!
I´m not a “bling bling” guy, I don´t need much, except maybe when it comes to music. I don´t even need a sauna. My skin is a bit sensitive, because of the cold and dry air of Finnish winters, but in Finland saunas are pretty much a default in every house (even in every apartment in apartment buildings) and they don´t cost much. They are part of the culture. It would be more for the band guys after hard day of rehearsals anyways. It was funny how some people who aren´t even fans were so pissed off about it. Some people sadly still don´t seem to understand what crowdfunding is. It is not a charity, there is no donations. In Finland that would be actually illegal. Also I would be spending all my money for this studio as well and not just the crowdfunded money and the band guys would be investing in the studio as well.
I´m very passionate about music and I have to admit that I want the best gear to make the best productions, I´m sure you all want that too, right? Or do you really want mediocre or just simply bad Wintersun productions? I know you don´t. Also with better gear I get much faster results. With mediocre/bad gear I keep working for as long as I need to push the results that I need. This was the case recording the TIME albums. I didn´t have good enough gear, computers and the studios I needed, so I had push everything from the gear I had and that took a lot of extra time and effort to get the best results, years in fact. And in many cases I still had to compromise a lot. Do you really want your Wintersun albums compromised or do you want them with the best production possible?
Now I pretty much have some of the best studio gear already. I´m really happy with my studio monitors, Mac Pro and my software (when Cubase isn´t crashing ). I´m pretty much set already, except for the studio space. It´s actually kinda stupid that I have this great studio gear, but not a studio for them. A place where they were ment to be and shine. And besides, I own a TV, a fridge, a bed and other stuff already and I live comfortably in Helsinki. This house+studio wouldn´t even improve my standard of living. For starters I would have to move in the middle of the forest away from Helsinki and I would have to do a lot of house work on my own in and outside, like plow the snow in winters etc… and be responsible for everything. But this would improve my “standards of recording and making albums” conditions immensely and that´s the whole point! So all these complaints were a bit hilarious.
CONCLUSION
This crowdfunding is a tricky thing, but I like it, because it´s all or nothing. It´s risky, but if it works, it´ll be epic! You have a vision, a dream and you need to reach a certain goal to be able to make the dream a reality. It´s up to the fans and supporters to decide if we are worth it. If we don´t reach our goal, we won´t be able finish TIME II and any of our other future massive album projects, which are just waiting to be recorded. We just can´t make big albums like this without our own studio. If we would set the goal too low on this funding we would make lots of money for sure, but it would be pointless, because without enough money we wouldn´t be able to build the studio and fulfill all the perks for you guys. That would be even more devastating. So it´s all or nothing.
We still believe that this campaign could be succesful when done right. We believe 100% in our “Killer Package" perk and that all of you would go crazy about it! There are many exclusive items in this package you cannot get from anywhere else. And of course this digital package would not be the only perk we have to offer. There would be many other cool perks too, but we need to put our focus on this main perk and get everyone´s support behind it.
Also we need to figure out some other back up options as well to and ensure the success of this campaign. For starters we have already booked several shows for next year to be able to lower the crowdfunding goal a little bit to minimize the risk. But when and if we launch this campaign, we are going to need all your support. Not just buying a perk, but sharing and spreading the news all over and getting your friends and families to support us as well. This is important! We need our own "Wintersun army" to make this thing happen. We are not giving up on this dream, but we need more supporters! We´ll make this happen somehow and we want to make these big album projects a reality! Without you guys it´s not possible! Thanks everyone for the interest, we are living in interesting times! There are still some things and obstacles we need to figure out, before we can rush into this heads first, but we´ll keep working hard and keep you updated about our next steps! Thanks for the attention! Stay tuned!
Jari & the Wintersun boys
p.s. And one of the perks will definitely be a TIME II pre-listening session at the finished studio and a sauna party! Who´s coming?
2015 - nothing noteworthy relating to the crowdfunding, new records or anything. Lots of shows.
27 July 2016 through 27 September 2016 - news of negotiations with record label Nuclear Blast on the release of The Forest Seasons - via Facebook 27/7, 11/9, 13/9, 27/9
When I announced last week that "it is done", I did not mean that IT is done. I meant that IT is done!
But seriously, after almost two years of insane amount of work (not to mention a lifetime of practicing and developing music composing, lyric writing, playing, singing, production and engineering skills etc.), something big and amazing that will blow your mind has finally been completely finished, 100%! We thought (and I'm sure you did too) that this day would never come, but it's finally here. I feel I did the impossible! Feeling very proud and happy!
The question now though is, will it ever be released? Well it will be sooner or later, but that is yet to be determined. I have sent a long email to Nuclear Blast and we are now in negotiations with them. That's all I can tell you right now. Keep your fingers crossed!
Apparently tomorrow on Monday the 12th we are going to get some kind of an answer from Nuclear Blast, whether we can release IT or not. Only been waiting since July...
Very productive phone meeting with Nuclear Blast just now. Everything might still work after all... Still need to confirm the details "on paper".
9 January 2017 - on the recording and mixing of Time II (recorded at same time as Time I, but impossible to mix), and the announcement of the "easier to make" The Forest Seasons" - via Facebook
Little addendum to clear some confusion about TIME II...
TIME II was already recorded the same time as TIME I, but the mixing of TIME II came to a halt in 2014 when I realised that I could not finish the album with my resources. The album is just too big and I will not compromise and release it prematurely like I had to do with TIME I. TIME I and TIME II are huge and just insane projects. They are big budget albums that I should have not probably even started working on at that point in my career. But at that time, I had a vision for those albums and that was the only music I wanted to make. So despite the lack of funding, I wanted to challenge myself and I started working on those albums with what I had...
There were lots of technical problems and other obstacles along the way and those problems could have been solved or avoided with proper resources. Somehow I still managed to pull off at least something close to my vision for TIME I. I had to "use time" to compensate for the lack of funding and overcome the technical issues. You can literally buy money with time and buy time with money. Money = time = money. I wasn´t 100% happy with the result, but the pressure was just too high to release TIME I and get the ball rolling. That won´t happen again. TIME II will not be finished until I have the proper resources for it, but hopefully soon that's about to change!
HERE`S THE GOOD NEWS
Instead I´ve been working on... wait for it.... you know it already... a new album!!! That´s right, not a single or an EP... a full blown album with over 53 minutes of killer material and no separate intro tracks! It will be the Wintersun's 3rd full length album. And like we stated last week it´s 100% done and ready to be released! This album was something a bit "easier to make" than the TIME albums and something that was possible to do with my current resources, but as you might have guessed it turned out to be much bigger production, like it always happens with my work! Apparently I just can´t do anything "easy". I guess it´s against my nature! My motto has actually always been "if you can´t do something properly, don´t do it at all" although I´ve had to break that motto and compromise a lot, but no more I say!
I did one song first and was really happy how the song and the production came together perfectly! Then I came up with some other killer ideas for other songs and before I knew it, I had a concept of a full album and I wanted to create it fully and here we are finally! IT IS DONE!
This stuff turned out to be just as good, if not even better in some ways! I'm 100% proud and happy about this album and the production! It's actually the first album in my lifetime that I'm 100% happy with! It is something new and different, but still totally Wintersun!
Stay tuned for more big updates soon! Jari
25 January 2017 - The Forest Seasons crowdfunding is announced - via Facebook
THERE WILL BE A WINTERSUN CROWDFUNDING, STARTING March 1st
During last autumn we had long and productive negotiations with our record label Nuclear Blast and we finalized it in November 2016. We came to a good solution, a win-win deal that will benefit everyone - Wintersun, Nuclear Blast and especially the fans! This means that we will do the crowdfunding and it will include our NEW album THE FOREST SEASONS!
The purpose of this crowdfunding is to build the WINTERSUN HEADQUARTERS studio. As some of you may know this has been in the plans for a long time. It is our long time goal and dream. Building the studio is absolutely essential in order to finish TIME II and produce our future albums as fast as possible and with the best production. All the money we raise will go directly to Wintersun 100%, which we will use for building the Wintersun Headquarters.
This will be the biggest crowdfunding you've ever seen in the metal scene! It will be a different kind of crowdfunding than usually. We are not going to offer dozens of different items from guitar picks to used socks for a thousand bucks. We're gonna cut all the crap and only going to offer one very valuable perk! That's right! It will be a massive Wintersun Crowdfunding Package called the FOREST PACKAGE and it will have lots of great Wintersun content including our new album THE FOREST SEASONS. You will be blown away!
The FOREST PACKAGE is huge and otherwise it would be very expensive, but we are going to offer it with a very affordable price in our crowdfunding. So you guys will get great value for your money and enjoy the new album like it should be experienced, with the absolutely BEST quality! The best thing is that all of the content is 100% done, so you don't have to wait for many months. It will be basically a pre-order for our new album.
This way you get the NEW Wintersun album the easiest way, with the best quality and with the best price and you'll help us get to the next level, so we can produce albums for YOU guys faster and with the best production! So this is a WIN-WIN for everyone!
The crowdfunding will take place on INDIEGOGO between March 1st - 31st. It will last only ONE MONTH, so you guys need to be prepared! Get those credit cards and PayPal accounts ready!
Thank you!
- Jari, Jukka, Kai, Teemu
7 February 2017 - "crowdfunding, a dirty word?": the crowdfunding is framed as a pre-order - via Facebook
What is “crowdfunding” actually all about? In general, many of the crowdfunding campaigns are for seeking funding for some unfinished project, and some even asking for donations. We don't see anything wrong with this, but this is actually NOT THE CASE with our crowdfunding!
In our case, we have already invested our time and money to COMPLETE the products. These products in the FOREST PACKAGE, including our NEW ALBUM 'The Forest Seasons' and many other valuable items, are 100% DONE and ready to be enjoyed by our fans! In essence we are selling our PRODUCTS directly to our fans! So this will be basically a pre-order for the FOREST PACKAGE. That's what makes our crowdfunding DIFFERENT from the others and also the fact that we are not going to be selling bunch of overpriced accessories like signed drumsticks to semi-used underwear for a thousand bucks. (But maybe in the future if there is demand?)
We want to be transparent and let everyone know that the funding raised in our campaign will go for a good cause. We will use the money to get better recording and production possibilities for the future Wintersun albums - by building our own studio.
Buying the FOREST PACKAGE from our campaign people will get amazing Wintersun content including our NEW ALBUM 'The Forest Seasons’, with money going 100% directly to the band for making our future albums productions better and FASTER!
Thank you!
21 February 2017 - no TFS on Spotify for at least a year - via Facebook
The Forest Seasons album won't be on Spotify or any other streaming services. At least not for a year of its release date. If you want the new album you can pre-order it directly from us via INDIEGOGO and enjoy the true highest quality experience, which you will not get from anywhere else! And by supporting us you'll help us to deliver our future albums faster to you guys!
Wintersun needs a massive change in order to survive and to make our planned future albums a reality as fast as possible, with the best production and with our true vision! We really need your help now more than ever! We think Spotify is nice for the consumer, but unfortunately not so much for the artist. We also want our fans to experience the new album with the highest quality possible that Spotify does not offer. If we succeed really well with our crowdfunding, we might put it on Spotify sooner. But first we'll have to see how the crowdfunding goes...
Thanks for understanding guys!
The crowdfunding will launch on March 1st, so be ready!
To raise all this funding we are planning to do three massive crowdfunding campaigns like this first one. Each one with a different massive 50 € package. We hope to reach 5000 loyal Wintersun fans per each campaign, which is the ideal goal. (The future campaigns will be planned and scheduled according to the result of this first campaign).
5000 funders x 50 € = 250.000 € IDEAL GOAL!!! (Reached in 9 days!)
But we are setting a safe goal to 3000 funders to secure the album release and get started even if we don't reach the ideal goal: 3000 funders x 50 € = 150.000 € SAFE GOAL FOR ALBUM RELEASE!
(Reached in 20 hours!)
21 July 2017 - The Forest Seasons releases worldwide via Nuclear Blast
In the years after this, little was said about new music, the studio and all that.
6 August 2020 - working on four new albums - via Facebook
There's been many requests for updates on what's been happening. We have been updating and answering questions, but apparently people are not seeing these updates because of the Facebook algorithms. We hope that this update would reach as many people as possible, so there would be less confusion about what's going on with Wintersun. In order to reach many people, please do share this post, comment and like! This will kick the algorithms ass!
Since the release of The Forest Seasons we have been dealing with the aftermath of our crowdfunding and we've been on touring mode for almost 3 years. The touring period was also quite the challenge with lot of big changes going on in the band: Introducing a new guitar player to the band (Asim), Jari dropping the live guitar, finding a new live crew, new live gear setups, rehearsing with new members, creating and dealing with new merch, all the tour arrangements and logistics etc.
Also we had to find session players to cover for Kai, since he has been very busy with Nightwish. We were very lucky to have such great drummers like Timo, Rolf and Heikki to help us out! Also we were lucky to find amazing people for our live crew. So with a lot of "moving parts" the three years were a big challenge and the busiest we've ever been, but luckily in the end everything went quite smoothly, so we are very thankful! I've been dealing with a lot of big life changes too. One of them has been moving to a new place where I am currently building a temporary "semi studio" and also building a whole new DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) setup from scratch in order to make albums more efficiently. The "semi studio" and the new DAW are almost finished and hopefully won't take too much time anymore. There will be more updates on this when everything is finished.
ABOUT NEW MUSIC AND TIME II
You want the good news or the bad news first? Ok, let's go with the bad first...
So right now the music making is just starting after the long and intensive touring period. I have still worked on music every chance I've gotten (which hasn't been a lot unfortunately). Right now I'm working on four new albums. Yes, one of the four albums is TIME II. I've tried to work on it with the new Mac Pro and I was really hoping that the new Mac Pro would solve the issue of lack of CPU power, but even the new 16-core Mac Pro can't really handle these huge projects very well. Which was a huge disappointment. The projects open with 90% CPU usage without even plugins in the projects yet. So the projects already are very slow and once I start to add plugins in order to mix the CPU starts to spike, so I don't know what to tell you. I don't want to compromise to mix it only with couple of light plugins, like I had to mix TIME I. Also I haven't found a proper kick, snare and rhythm guitar sound for this album yet and I've been looking like crazy! So I'm not really excited at all to start mixing TIME II until I find these essential sounds and have more CPU to mix. And without a proper studio (a proper mixing room with proper acoustic treatment) it is incredible difficult to mix this kinda heavily layered stuff anyways.
Here's the good news...
There are also three other new albums that I'm working on and I'm very excited about these projects. One is the "space metal" project that I've already talked about a little bit. One is a more "traditional Wintersun" style album, kinda mix between the debut and TIME albums, but also with lots of new dimensions and some of the best melodies I've ever written! The third album style I want to keep a secret for now, gotta have some mystery! But it's probably the one that I'm the most excited about currently and the one that has been progressing the fastest. I've got a whole concept for it (a whole new "Wintersun world") and I've already written a lot of lyrics for it as well, but I don't know yet if it will be the next one. I'm working on all these albums in turns, because I get bored and "foggy" if I work on the same project / same songs for too long. But right now this project already has a killer mix going, it has the RIGHT sounds. Which is great, because that's always the hardest part for me making an album (especially finding a good kick, snare and the rhythm guitar sound).
Now, I don't know when any of these albums will be finished or released, THERE IS NO PROMISES! I'm just starting out after a long chaotic period. A new Wintersun album might come sooner or later or it might not ever come! You'll never know the future! I want to make these albums without too much pressure and enjoy the process, so there won't be compromises like there always have been in the past, which have left me in huge disappointments and taken away some of the enthusiasm to make music.
I can say this though... Thanks to our crowdfunding and the amazing support from you guys, things have been progressing much more nicely than ever before. I'm really having goosebumps again and chills working on new music and having fun with it! Being able to build this "semi studio" is helping me and the process a lot! It's not a full on studio yet, but parts of this "semi studio" is already a dream come true for me! So thank you! You guys are the best!
Once any of these albums is finished, we will start updating more about the release and the new crowdfunding. So please stay patient for now. There will be more updates here and there about the progress. So stay EverTuned!
Thanks! -Jari
30 March 2021 - update on new music - via Facebook
WINTERSUN PATREON CHANGES AND NEW ALBUM UPDATE - YOU WILL LOVE THIS!
Hi guys!
We have decided to make some big changes to our Patreon effort, which we think you will appreciate greatly! We will start putting our new Patreon videos out on the internet for free for everyone to watch! There's been some negativity for us putting our content behind a paywall (aka Netflix style subscription) and offering exclusive VIP services and attention to our Patreon supporters. We still don't think that there is anything wrong if any band or any artist wants to do this and put their hard work behind a paywall, but we want to make all our fans happy so we are doing these changes and we are going to see how this goes forward! Hopefully in a more positive direction.
Wintersun Patreon page will stay up and running, so it will be your choice alone if you appreciate our work putting out videos and whether you choose to support us through Patreon. The videos will come out more irregularly, sometimes less, sometimes more due to us needing also for some flexibility in our personal schedules.
Our Patrons will have an exclusive Early Access to all the future Wintersun videos on Patreon and will get to enjoy them like before without ads and with slightly better Vimeo quality. After the Early Access the videos will be released also on Youtube for free for everyone to watch. Some videos and updates still from time to time can be released exclusively in our Patreon.
The Wintersun Forum will continue to be in Patreon exclusively. So if you want to come hang out, talk, get advice, ask questions for our Wintersun Podcast and just have fun with us, we'll continue to be there for our Patrons!
The Wintersun Podcast will be free and public for everyone as well, but we will still take questions and topics to discuss mainly from our Patrons in our Wintersun Forum. In addition we will also take a few extra random questions from our Facebook/Youtube/Instagram page comment sections to spice things up! The year worth of content that we have made already to our Patreon page will stay in our Patreon exclusively and you can sign up anytime with 10 euros to watch it all.
We hope everyone appreciates these changes and things will be more positive going forward! Here's our Youtube channel links where the videos will be released after the Patreon Early Access:
These changes will take place starting from April 2021.
NEW ALBUM UPDATE
Since the summer of 2020 Jari finished building his new semi-studio and DAW setup and he has been working tirelessly on new music. On the last update Jari mentioned that he has four new albums in the works and he is working on all of them at the same time until one of them will start taking the lead. Well one of them has... Jari has been focusing on one of these albums and it looks strongly that this album will be the next one! The album structure, the riffs, melodies, basic drums beats... the "skeleton" so to speak is about 75% done. Also the lyrics are about 75% done. All the songs have names and the album has a really cool title and a concept. There's a Wision also for the album cover! In other words the album already has a very strong identity. In general we might say that the whole album is about 50% done or close to it. The album is massive as well, so there will be a LOT of new music released at once. This will be the biggest Wintersun album launch ever!
There is still a lot to be done though... Finishing drum arrangements, vocal arrangements, solos etc. and then recording it all. And of course mixing and mastering, although it is very close being already mixed and mastered and it sounds huge! Best sounding Wintersun album easily! Composing and arranging the synths and orchestrations are always the hardest part, especially dealing with the lack of computer power. The songs have been built now to a point that the computer's CPU screams and spikes 99% all the time in all the song projects (with the highest buffer). So working on the album will get more difficult going forward. Jari can't work freely in realtime anymore and cannot add any more instruments without having to bounce or freeze tracks back and forth repeatedly, which makes the process much slower.
In the meantime please stay patient, it's been only just roughly 9 months of album making and very good progress has been made in that time. Which wouldn't have been even possible without our great crowdfunders and everyone who has supported Wintersun in any way throughout the years, which has enabled Jari to build his new "semi-studio" to speed up the process. The Forest Seasons album was actually made in just 9 months from start to finish, but this new album is a whole different BEAST! It is once again way more bigger project. It's not as big and insane as the TIME albums are, but it's very close up there. We will continue to fight this battle so throw some encouragement and positivity in our direction!
We hope you guys appreciate this news as we appreciate you! Let's make things more positive as there are a lot of good things to look forward to! Have a nice week and stay tuned for the videos coming shortly! And remember to subscribe to our Youtube channels! Thank you. - Wintersun boys
The phrase "insane goodies" somehow feels a bit gross to read. And I'm all for this band officially changing its name to Jari & the Wintersun Boys.
It's easy to get lost in the minutiae of all this, but to zoom out to a more macro scale question here: Why are thousands of other bands able to release "quality" music all the time and Wintersun isn't? Honest question. What are they doing or what resources do they have in order to achieve that? Very few bands have their own $1M home studio to create in, yet they manage to produce and publish several albums each decade that sound excellent. How is this possible?
Jari just uploaded an update video that claims to be "setting the record straight". It's too early in the morning for me to comment on this right now, but I'll drop it for everyone else to view. I look forward to the hilarious shitstorm that this is going to cause.
Joined: Fri Oct 01, 2004 3:55 pm Posts: 1015 Location: Austria
Posted: Fri Feb 16, 2024 3:56 pm
Oh well. To me, it sounds like a new chapter on the hunt for money has been opened. The studio blabbering just seems ridiculous. I mean, people have done way better production jobs with smaller budgets.
_________________ Adder's Fork - Heavy/Gothic Metal with RIFFS:
Joined: Sat Jul 29, 2017 4:37 pm Posts: 104 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Fri Feb 16, 2024 4:32 pm
Having watched the video all I could think was if you buy a 325,000 euro professional music studio and it's still not the "optimal solution", you're doing something very very wrong.
Hell the 200,000 euros he got from the crowdfunding should have been enough.
Oh well, he's shot himself in the foot in my opinion, because if he's managed to complete Time II after banging on for years about how it wouldn't be possible to do it without the "Wintersun Headquarters", he's now got no leg to stand on if/when he complains about not being able to finish any more music.
Joined: Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:42 pm Posts: 5265 Location: Neo-Allegheny City
Posted: Sat Feb 17, 2024 12:32 am
assuming everything in the video is true (big favor), why wait like seven years to explain all this? are pre-orders lower than expected? is nuclear blast making him do this?
_________________ “If it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth.” - Neil Breen
I think it's possible that Jari himself got tired of waiting for Time II to be released? But does that mean he's done grifting his fans for money? Oh no. He's just going to straight up admit that his claims that he needed the "Wintersun HQ" were false by finishing/releasing Time II without it. Then he's going to continue to do $50+ "digital pre-orders" for single digital albums combined with other miscellaneous digital stuff in order to fund a "big studio" that he just admitted to not needing (of course he didn't).
On real Kickstarters they'll at least tell you what the product is that you're paying for. This is some mysterious surprise grab bag that you pre-buy on blind trust and then pray that it's something remotely appealing or useful. It's all digital, so clearly it can't be a shirt, poster, hat, patch, pajamas, incense, frisbee, action figures, Pogs, condoms, or vape juice like you would get in a typical deluxe box set. My best guess is Trump-style NFT trading cards, worthless cryptocurrency and desktop wallpaper graphics.
And from the looks of the artwork, this album's gonna tap the entire Sounds of the Far East sample bank in whatever software he's using. Probably all at once.
Time II has been held hostage for over a decade because apparently no studio in the world can handle it. The initial crowdfunding was to build a super fancy studio that could handle his music. Sure, you got an album too with the crowdfunding, but the money was for the studio. He didn't meet that goal and built a smaller studio. So how did he finish Time II? How can a smaller studio suddenly handle Time II? So basically, nothing stopped him from releasing it. He just held the album hostage until he got what he wanted (a studio). He didn't actually need it for the album, he just wanted one and knew he probably wouldn't get it otherwise. And now with all the hype surrounding the album, he's expecting it to print money.
On real Kickstarters they'll at least tell you what the product is that you're paying for. This is some mysterious surprise grab bag that you pre-buy on blind trust and then pray that it's something remotely appealing or useful.
That’s not entirely fair. Jari said it would be revealed on 1 March, and last time the contents were also known during the campaign. If they’re useful is another story: the first campaign had a high-resolution digital booklet, live recordings and isolated tracks. (link)
I think this new preorder "crownfunding" is going to fail spectacularly. The hype around Wintersun has almost entirely died. If he announced 10 years ago that Time 2 was releasing the metal community would have exploded, but now the reaction is very tepid and he's mostly seen as a joke rather than a genius musician.
I think this new preorder "crownfunding" is going to fail spectacularly. The hype around Wintersun has almost entirely died. If he announced 10 years ago that Time 2 was releasing the metal community would have exploded, but now the reaction is very tepid and he's mostly seen as a joke rather than a genius musician.
Seems likely. Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
_________________ There's way too much black And there's too little metal Dealing with this had me breaking my shackles!
I think this new preorder "crownfunding" is going to fail spectacularly. The hype around Wintersun has almost entirely died. If he announced 10 years ago that Time 2 was releasing the metal community would have exploded, but now the reaction is very tepid and he's mostly seen as a joke rather than a genius musician.
Seems likely. Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
There's also the fact that Jari finally admitted that he never needed the "Wintersun HQ" to begin with. Anyone with any sense knew this from the beginning, but now even his acolytes have finally realized this.
Joined: Sat Nov 09, 2002 11:54 am Posts: 1125 Location: Finland
Posted: Sun Feb 18, 2024 3:43 pm
CreepingDeath16 wrote:
Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
Remember to pick up that dartboard when you get this package and you wonder where all the money went. You can print the pics and...
_________________ "We don't play for you, we play for us." - Lemmy Kilmister
Joined: Sat Jul 29, 2017 4:37 pm Posts: 104 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2024 8:31 am
Quote:
Seems likely. Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
After all the grifting, money begging and general fucking around that's surrounded this album I would imagine most people who are remotely interested in hearing Time 2 will probably just torrent it at this point.
Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
Remember to pick up that dartboard when you get this package and you wonder where all the money went. You can print the pics and...
You seem to labour under the misconception that I have any interest in funding Jari's delusions of grandeur, or am I missing something?
_________________ There's way too much black And there's too little metal Dealing with this had me breaking my shackles!
Joined: Tue Jul 23, 2013 10:40 pm Posts: 598 Location: United States
Posted: Mon Feb 19, 2024 12:26 pm
SirianRune wrote:
CreepingDeath16 wrote:
funeralravens wrote:
I think this new preorder "crownfunding" is going to fail spectacularly. The hype around Wintersun has almost entirely died. If he announced 10 years ago that Time 2 was releasing the metal community would have exploded, but now the reaction is very tepid and he's mostly seen as a joke rather than a genius musician.
Seems likely. Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
There's also the fact that Jari finally admitted that he never needed the "Wintersun HQ" to begin with. Anyone with any sense knew this from the beginning, but now even his acolytes have finally realized this.
You would think, but I thought that they would struggle for the first crowdfunding round and they blew the goal out of the water. Times (ha!) and the situation have changed drastically in this situation, but that's amongst us who are already skeptical. They clearly had a large number of devotees last round so I wouldn't be surprised if they still succeed this time. Maybe it won't be the massive success the first round was, but now, I'd be more surprised if they flop.
EDIT: I've watched the video and read some of the comments there and on a recent Facebook post and it definitely seems like they have overwhelming support still so they'll likely get a lot of Time II support, whether that's good or bad. It is quite frustrating how much people are just still blindly supporting them. It's not blatant contradictions, but there are enough fishy things in there in my opinion. Like how he talks about how unfortunately, they didn't make enough from their first pre-order campaign to make the full studio (seemingly making the fans feel bad for not being supportive enough?), before mentioning that the plan was to do three campaigns with three albums, and then vaguely saying "plans had to change." That just seemed odd to me - how can it be unfortunate that you blew past your initial goal, so much so that you were able to build a "semi-studio" that finally had enough power to finish your mindblowing masterpiece? And sure, he's right that what they do with the money is up to them, but he definitely presented a full plan that I can understand why fans felt like they were giving their money to building a full studio and why they'd feel betrayed if their money wasn't used that way. He also complains about taking out a paying back a loan - yeah man, people do that all the time for business ventures. That's one of the risks of starting a business, which Jari clearly wants Wintersun to be (and bands very easily can and do become after a certain point). There's nothing egregious there or nothing we haven't heard before. It's just odd to see how much rope people are willing to give him.
CreepingDeath16 wrote:
Lane wrote:
CreepingDeath16 wrote:
Most of those who are even interested in Wintersun's music will probably wait for the regular release instead of investing in THE PACKAGE which will most likely be just isolated tracks, some live recordings and very high resolution photos of Jari grimacing.
Remember to pick up that dartboard when you get this package and you wonder where all the money went. You can print the pics and...
You seem to labour under the misconception that I have any interest in funding Jari's delusions of grandeur, or am I missing something?
No, I think they were just continuing the joke based on your comment.
I've never been a fan so what I'm about to say should be taken with salt grains, I watched that video where he explains stuff and it began to dawn on me that I don't actually think that he is a malicious con-man. Is he a bad businessman? Yes he is, and he doesn't know how to properly communicate with his fans and supporters but that is one thing, and being an actual con-man is something else entirely. I felt that he was genuine in his explanations and I honestly can see that he doesn't actually realize how shady it looks from the outside. He is pretentious and very self absorbed, but I don't for a minute believe that he woke up one morning and said "you know what, im gonna take my fans for a ride and tip them off."
You'll never see me donating any money to this band but that's my personal taste. O don't think that he set out with malicious intentions
On real Kickstarters they'll at least tell you what the product is that you're paying for. This is some mysterious surprise grab bag that you pre-buy on blind trust and then pray that it's something remotely appealing or useful. It's all digital, so clearly it can't be a shirt, poster, hat, patch, pajamas, incense, frisbee, action figures, Pogs, condoms, or vape juice like you would get in a typical deluxe box set. My best guess is Trump-style NFT trading cards, worthless cryptocurrency and desktop wallpaper graphics.
"Hey Bart, remember Jari? He's back! In Pog Form!"
By_Inheritance wrote:
Time II has been held hostage for over a decade because apparently no studio in the world can handle it. The initial crowdfunding was to build a super fancy studio that could handle his music. Sure, you got an album too with the crowdfunding, but the money was for the studio. He didn't meet that goal and built a smaller studio. So how did he finish Time II? How can a smaller studio suddenly handle Time II? So basically, nothing stopped him from releasing it. He just held the album hostage until he got what he wanted (a studio). He didn't actually need it for the album, he just wanted one and knew he probably wouldn't get it otherwise. And now with all the hype surrounding the album, he's expecting it to print money.
Joined: Sun Jul 22, 2007 3:33 am Posts: 141 Location: Canada
Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2024 5:03 pm
Ukrajijajajana wrote:
I've never been a fan so what I'm about to say should be taken with salt grains, I watched that video where he explains stuff and it began to dawn on me that I don't actually think that he is a malicious con-man. Is he a bad businessman? Yes he is, and he doesn't know how to properly communicate with his fans and supporters but that is one thing, and being an actual con-man is something else entirely. I felt that he was genuine in his explanations and I honestly can see that he doesn't actually realize how shady it looks from the outside. He is pretentious and very self absorbed, but I don't for a minute believe that he woke up one morning and said "you know what, im gonna take my fans for a ride and tip them off."
You'll never see me donating any money to this band but that's my personal taste. O don't think that he set out with malicious intentions
No, 100%. I think he's self-absorbed and completely oblivious but I don't think he's malicious. It likely doesn't help that he's got a rabid fanbase that keeps telling him he can do no wrong. He probably genuinely believes that fans want Time themed phone desktop wallpaper and shitty Metallica cover videos on Patreon.
People here like to bang on some narrative about him keeping the Time album hostage to grift fans, but I think the Chinese Democratization of Time boils down to untreated neuroses/mental illness. He can't finish things. He's overly particular to a fault and gets lost in things that literally nobody but him can notice in a mix. I always saw the band moving on (but not outright cutting ties) as a reaction akin to giving up on a friend who can't get their act together. You can only try to help them so much, but if they don't want to get better and keep ranting about their 12000 VSTs or whatever it becomes apparent that nothing's going to change. Kai saying he never thought this album would come out speaks to this theory. Marcus from Ensiferum also mentioned once in an interview that it became easier to put albums out once Jari left because he was always overly particular and a bit of a perfectionist. An artist that doesn't finish projects is pretty common. Jari was just unlucky (or lucky, if you think financially) in that he happened to drop one of the most popular metal albums of the mid-2000s before going into a death spiral.
Not saying he deserves sympathy or anything. He's seemingly refused to self-reflect and burned so much goodwill at this point that if his fanbase collapsed on him he would be deserving of it. But I don't think he ever set out to intentionally be a conman.
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