Review Fix Exclusive: Erkka Korhonen Talks ‘Ragnarok Juletide’

Review Fix chats with guitarist and Ragnarok Juletide founder Erkka Korhonen who discusses the ten-year anniversary of the symphonic metal christmas project, it’s first year in English and its goals for the future. Although often compared to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Ragnarok Juletide is a different animal entirely.

Review Fix: How has the Trans-Siberian Orchestra influenced you?

Erkka Korhonen: TSO was the main influence when I started creating Ragnarok Juletide, or “Raskasta Joulua” as we’re known in Finland. This was 10 years ago. I got a homemade christmas “mix tape” cd from a friend of mine and it had “Sarajevo 12/24” and “Mad Russian’s Christmas” from TSO. I instantly liked the mix of classical Christmas tradition and hard rock that they were doing. This led to the idea of doing something similar with Finnish metal vocalists, doing both domestic and international material.

Review Fix: Is it difficult to get acts to join a project like this? Explain?

Korhonen: It has been surprisingly easy. Marco Hietala from Nightwish was the first guy we called and he jumped at the opportunity right away. With a guy of that magnitude on board it was a lot easier to get other people along as well. The vocalist line-up has grown over the years and at the moment we don’t really have room for new vocalists even though there are a lot of people who’d like to join us. Also, some people we’ve asked earlier turned the offer down, not feeling that the band would be something that they’d enjoy.

I’m glad that we’ve basically had the same backing band since 2008 now. It really makes everything work and sound a lot better since we know the core material very well. Another great thing is that we’ve now been able to re-record a lot of our back catalogue with this band since the versions have really evolved throughout the years.

Review Fix: Considering that, what do you think of this year’s lineup?

Korhonen: This year’s lineup is definitely one of the strongest ones we’ve ever had. Of course we miss Ilja Jalkanen who decided to pursue other musical interests after 6 years with us.

Review Fix: How is this album different from other symphonic christmas works?

Korhonen: Firstly, I don’t think that there are that many symphonic Christmas projects in rock or hard rock music. Or if there are, I’m not aware of them… If you compare us to TSO, they have a lot more original material than us, and it’s mostly very gospel- or musical theater -oriented. We come more from different genres of heavy rock and metal and our songs are mostly classic, traditional christmas songs both from Finland and other countries. That said, we actually released our first original songs in Finland this year!

Review Fix: Have you done anything special for the ten year anniversary?

Korhonen: We have released Ragnarok Juletide, our first ever album in English language. It was the first time ever that many of the most loved Finnish Christmas classics were recerded in English language with brand new texts. We have the biggest tour we’ve ever done with shows in theaters and even a few hockey arenas, it’s our own production with lots of lights and pyrotechniques.

Review Fix: How do you want this album to be remembered?

Korhonen: I want it to be remembered as an album that showed the people outside Finland what we do and what we are, and create a base on which we will be able to tour in other countries as well.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Korhonen: We are looking forward to continuing our saga with Ragnarok Juletide and also to do shows in at least some European countries next year. We already have plans with some great people who can work with us to make those things a reality. But first, we have to get over this Christmas. May it be merry and rocking for everyone!

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13821 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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