HEAVY MUSIC HISTORY: Oceanborn – Nightwish

Artists, when asked to rank their own albums, tend to have recency bias. That’s what happened when NIGHTWISH band leader Tuomas Holopainen did just that, putting 2020’s Human. :II: Nature. in the top spot. In second place, predictably, its preceding record Endless Forms Most Beautiful.

But in third, he put Oceanborn. He put it ahead of albums that have sold more copies and albums that launched them into world-conquering arena headliners. In many ways, 25 years since its release, Oceanborn no longer resembles NIGHTWISH as we know them now. It is faster, more fantastical, not to mention that it features Tarja Turunen announcing herself to the world in a way that has some fans of the band longing for her return to this day.

Holopainen’s love for the record comes down to it being when NIGHTWISH got serious. It was a sliding doors moment for everyone in the band, who at the time either had day jobs or were focusing on their studies. Their debut, Angels Fall First, is charming to look back on, but contains little of the ambition or talent on display ever since. Notably, it was never meant to be released, but the label took a punt on it – the band had submitted it as a demo. If they were to turn music into a career, it had to be better than the lo-fi campfire songs on Angels – and Holopainen probably shouldn’t sing again.

With the likes of WITHIN TEMPTATION now capable of filling Wembley and EPICA performing with orchestras, it is easy to forget how niche and odd symphonic metal was in the 1990s. Now universally accepted as part of metal’s rich tapestry, back then NIGHTWISH had far fewer peers, instead looking to the power metal of bands like STRATOVARIUS for reference points. Which is why Oceanborn is guitarist Emppu Vuorinen’s finest hour, who is responsible for the record’s memorable aggression and its emotionally resonant melodies, years before orchestras would take over much of the latter.

Devil & The Deep Dark Ocean hits the ground running with one of his most elaborate riffs, far removed from the mostly power chord-based supporting role he plays these days. Revisiting the record 25 years later, it’s the lack of Vuorinen’s presence in modern NIGHTWISH that is most stark, rather than their changes in vocalist or shift towards the natural world for lyrical inspiration. Much of what fans found to obsess over in the early days can be heard in Vuorinen’s lead work on opener Stargazers, which sounds like the clear night’s sky, a perfect canvas for dreamers to project their imaginations on to.

Long before the band had the resources to recruit world-renowned musical ensembles, they relied on Holopainen’s keys for Hans Zimmer-like heft and Turunen’s unrivalled voice. An immense operatic talent, she brought a sense of prodigious gravitas to these story book songs, slipping into Mozart’s The Magic Flute halfway through Passion And The Opera like it was no big thing. She combined the delicacy of her higher register with sheer power, crafting some of the catchiest operatic hooks ever recorded on songs like Sacrament Of Wilderness and The Riddler. And then there’s the double-whammy finale of Walking In The Air and Sleeping Sun (the latter added on the following year’s reissue), two ballads that came to define the first half of the band’s career, acting as gentle entry points to this still burgeoning genre that NIGHTWISH were helping to build. Both contain their signature magic and majesty, one a cover which evokes childlike nostalgia in everyone who hears it, and the other acting as nature’s lullaby.

Turunen’s vocals would go on to complement Marco Hietala’s gruff melodies when he joined the band ahead of Century Child, but Tapio Wilska was on hand at this time to give NIGHTWISH the most intimidating voice in their arsenal. There can be no accusations of ‘Disney metal’ thrown at The Pharaoh Sails To Orion with his deep bass delivery, and his presence is another marker of how far the band have come from their more rugged origins. His voice, Emppu’s guitars, the power metal pace, all contribute to Oceanborn’s distinct personality among the NIGHTWISH library. Indeed, a lack of personality is what led Holopainen to put Wishmaster bottom of the pile of his own albums – perhaps unfairly – since it merely continued what Oceanborn started.

It is curious to consider Holopainen’s love for a record which has little in common with what his band looks like in 2023. On Oceanborn, the sense of scale they were reaching for is clear as day, but come the time they were able to realise that ambition on Once, the tempo had slowed and the aggression was tempered. That record’s most out-there moments like Dead Gardens, the only song off Once they have not performed live, are glossed over for the radio-friendly Nemo and Wish I Had An Angel. Vuorinen would be thrown a bone on songs like Romanticide and Whoever Brings The Night, not songs that stand tall in the NIGHTWISH canon, but which stand out for being built around guitar work instead of massive string sections. Oceanborn’s strengths, like those under-appreciated cuts, often come from the limitations it was created under, where Holopainen was forced to make something grandiose with limited tools. It was, after all, as he told Kerrang!, recorded in a school.

Oceanborn is their darkest album, their heaviest album, and to a lot of purists, their best album. It goes some way towards explaining why the band’s fiercely devoted fanbase spend so much time arguing among one another, because each NIGHTWISH era is so different from the last. Their sound continued to get bigger, but arguably it has rarely been more intricate than on Oceanborn, with its wild fret work and each member’s determination to be seen as legitimate after a wobbly debut. The world knows Holopainen is a masterful composer in 2023, but in 1998, he and his troupe had something to prove. Some rotten luck over the years since has made for a bumpy road, but despite all that, they are certified superstars, and the fire in their bellies when piecing together Oceanborn is the reason why.

Oceanborn was originally released on December 7th, 1998 via Spinefarm Records.

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