The 60’s inspired Alt Pop Rock of the Impersonators duo Tommi Tikka and Antti Autio, supported by producer Janne Saksa, write tunes that will remind you of Chad & Jeremy infused with the Beatles … but with a that current twist. The Retro sound is hot and they add fodder to the fire~!
You’ll want an Effigy with The Impersonators it’s a captivating four minutes of music filled with dark and menacing subtext. Throughout the new single, The Impersonators will navigate you through an unnerving concoction of moody sound effects and unholy instrumentation to craft a song that will crawl beneath your skin and stay there for weeks.
We managed to catch up with the band as they talk about their latest track and more!
So how has the release of Effigy gone down with fans so far?
”Effigy” has done well on all fronts and quite surprisingly so. It was never intended to be a song that gets a lot of attention. In fact, the whole tune was written almost accidentally. It came about last July when The Impersonators’ publicist Al Geiner asked me if we were ever going to release a Christmas song and I said, “probably not.” I know artists do this a lot, they release holiday songs and I actually like some of them but writing one for The Impersonators had never really even crossed my mind – until that afternoon.
However, to prove to myself I could write one if I wanted to, I gave it a shot. I tried to write a Christmas tune but nothing came out of it. I caught myself thinking how much easier the writing process would be if Christmas had a tad more street credibility, if it were a little more like Halloween. Then it came to me, why not write a Halloween song instead? Well, a song that would cater for Halloween in terms of its feel and atmosphere but a tune that could also stand alone. As it happened, my bandmate Antti Autio had sent me a lyric a while back that perfectly seemed to capture the right mood. I added a few lines and “Effigy” soon became a rock song about killing your ego, a topic that’s been of great interest to me lately.
The lyrics of the song are rather esoteric I suppose, hard to understand. They’re not to be taken literally though. I’ve actually received a few messages, people telling me that they also enjoy hanging effigies and one suggested that I should burn my next one. I didn’t know what to say except to thank the person for the tip. But to anyone reading this, the song’s about setting yourself free from your fears and self-doubt; not about destroying dummies.
Can you tell us something about the single no one else knows?
When we were shooting that part of the video where I put a tie and a hat on the guitar and hang it, we ran into a bit of a problem. In the first ten or so takes, I used a tie that had a picture of The Beatles on it. I did this because they are my favorite band in the world. What I didn’t realize was that it would come across on video as me hanging The Beatles, or in this particular case, as me hanging Paul McCartney because his was the only face that was visible when the guitar was hanging from the tree, spinning around. Somebody said, ”Guys, we’ve got to start over, you need to get another tie. I asked why. ”Because you’ve just hung Sir Paul,” was the answer.
Well, luckily my wife, whose brainchild the video more or less was, reached for her handbag and pulled out a spare tie. She had taken a few with her in case I wasn’t happy with the Beatles one after all. She’s always prepared for everything and once again, saved my bacon. It was wonderful not having to drive back home to get a new tie. We could just start over immediately.
Will you be releasing an album or EP this year?
Probably neither. Our next single will come out on March 22. It’s called ”Magic Touch” and our producer Janne Saksa and I have already started to work on it. I’m looking forward to shooting the video for the track. My wife and I will go to California for a few weeks in March, so we’ll film some sections there. The bits that take place in snowy Finland are in the can already.
We’d love to plan in the form of EPs and albums but of course, the music industry doesn’t work like that anymore. Nowadays, the emphasis is solely on the singles. A friend of mine compared the current situation to how the music business worked in the fifties. His point was that back then, just like now, only singles mattered. I told my friend’s epiphany to my father, who started laughing and said, ”The situation was better in the fifties. Back then, when we bought a single, we got two songs; now, people get one.” I hadn’t thought of it like that but you know, he is right.
If you could work with any band on a new song, who would it be and why?
Well, I would love to work with Paul McCartney or Brian Wilson as I think they are the two most talented writers/producers in the history of pop music. That’s a pipe dream though. In real life, I’d like to record a duet with a female singer. I actually have the song as well as the artist figured out but I don’t want to jinx it by saying too much about it. It’ll happen or it won’t. I’m not sure yet. It’s a song I wrote for someone else that didn’t get used. I think, although a bit different from what The Impersonators are usually releasing, it’d be a nice addition to our catalog.
It’s funny, I just started thinking about all the songwriters I admire. There are so many of them. It’d be awesome to write with Robert Forster of The Go-Betweens or Sam Corry and Dan O’Neil of The River Detectives. Then there are the dead ones, Merle Haggard was such an incredibly gifted guy and Gene Clark of The Byrds. Really, the list is endless and I haven’t even mentioned John Lennon yet.
Having said all this, I love working with my bandmate Antti and our producer Janne Saksa. We have a great synergy. Between the three of us, we can create songs and arrangements that sound like The Impersonators. What more could I possibly want. To me that’s always been the ultimate goal.
Will you be touring at all in 2019?
Well, ours is a studio project. It’s a group of two songwriters, so going out on the road is a tad difficult. I’d have to assemble a group, who’d copy the songs just as they were recorded. And that wouldn’t make any sense, really. I would still want to arrange and play the future records with Janne. It wouldn’t seem fair to use musicians only as hired hands like that.
Every once in a while I play around with the idea of performing by myself, just on an acoustic guitar at a pub somewhere but to what end? I don’t dislike performing live; I’ve done it a fair amount. However, my heart is in crafting songs in the studio, not necessarily playing live. But this is not just about me being reluctant to play live, it goes a bit deeper than that. You see the funny thing here is I don’t own any live albums – none. And I have roughly two thousand CDs. That, I suppose, really says it all. Live music just isn’t that much to my liking.
Of course, if The Impersonators truly took off and there’d be a need to play live here and there, that would be a horse of a different color. We’d definitely have to rethink everything. However, until that moment arrives we’ll remain a studio act.
What do you get up to in your spare time when not working on music?
I play with my children and hang out with my wife. I have six kids, all boys, so you can imagine that the house is never quiet. Somebody is always upset or there are two who are fighting, beating the living daylights out of each other. People often ask me if it’s tiring and it is. However, I love a big family and a full house. It’s not everybody’s cup of tea but I enjoy the hullaballoo. We also have a large enough house to accommodate everybody, which makes things easier.
Aside from the kids, I’m also part of a music blog community called Music to. Music’s never been just something I do. I’m also consuming it many hours a day. When the opportunity presented itself, I joined Music to and started Music to Celebrate Life, which is the blog I write. I’ve been doing that a little over a year now and have loved every moment of it. It’s a great community to be part of. I’ve made many new friends including the CEO Andrew McCluskey, who is a riot, a great guy and an amazing leader, managing to always stay on the ball with everything. I don’t know how he does it but I’m grateful for all the help and guidance he continuously gives all of us.
What is your musical background, have you been in bands before?
Well, the most notable involvement I’ve had with any band has to be my stint with Carmen Gray, whose entire catalogue was written by me and my brother Lappe Holopainen, the undisputed leader of the group. Carmen Gray recorded for large labels, such as Sony and Warner. Compared to that, The Impersonators are a lot less ambitious project. Having said that, I’m very pleasantly surprised with all the attention we’ve gotten with our songs. The fact that ”Burning Blue” made it to #7 on the Swedish iTunes charts took everyone by complete surprise, including our label head Dennis Weitzel, who’s always hard at work, trying to make things happen for us.
When people ask about my previous bands or projects, Carmen Gray comes up regularly but of course, there’s so much more than just one band. I’ve been blessed with an opportunity to work with very talented people all my life, for instance, my first songwriting partner Jani Taskinen, who taught me the value and importance of staying true to yourself artistically. I once told him of a song that we were writing, ”I don’t think it’s trendy enough.” Jani’s response was, ”That’s only because the current trends suck and our song doesn’t.” I thought it was a brilliant answer.
However, my first introduction to music came from my parents. They had music on constantly. My dad especially turned me onto all the great bands and artists of the sixties, such as CCR, The Rolling Stones, The Animals, The Beach Boys and The Beatles. This music became a soundtrack to my youth. That’s the music that inspired me to write, play and sing. I’ve spent my entire life trying to write something as good as the music played by these artists. I’m not saying I’ve succeeded in this, I probably haven’t even come close, but that’s been the goal all along.