One Morning Left: Life Is A Game
There must be something in the water in Finland. HIM, LORDI and CHILDREN OF BODOM are but a minute sample of the Baltic’s outrageous musical exports. Perhaps it’s the vast wilderness or its placement in the boreal zone, but the last 30 years have been spectacular for the Nordic stronghold. Although traditionally versed in black metal and hair etal, one youthful Finnish supergroup are spreading their wings further than previously imaginable. “One comment really got to me – I didn’t know that you guys could get any crazier.” Meet atypical Finnish metal-heads ONE MORNING LEFT.
Having long departed from convention within the metalcore realm, their party-core spin on modern metal has given new life to a sometimes stagnant genre. Epitomising this movement is their latest release, Hyperactive, a smörgåsbord of pumping dance anthems, underpinned with spiralling riffs, intoxicating synth leads and a selection of lyrics from two vocalists at the peaks of their careers.
The album itself works to exaggerate ONE MORNING LEFT‘s career-spanning self-pastiche (see debut album The Bree-Teenz for clarification). The ‘party til you pass out’ mentality stoked with a side of lyricism dedicated to booze, havoc and nefarious activity paints a picture of ONE MORNING LEFT that may at first distract listeners. Their garish image, now heavily amplified by a novel retro-futuristic twist echoes the bands that brought metalcore out of the woodwork in the late 2000s, but the genre spanning Hyperactive not only acts as a conduit to relive these glory days, but as statement that these days never ended.
“We wanted the songs to sound like what we were doing on stage. And up here in northern Europe, we’re kind of known for it.” Reflecting on their latest release is singer-guitarist Leevi Luoto, a man who has been invested in ONE MORNING LEFT since 2014, and is itching to take these songs to his people. “If you’re coming to a ONE MORNING LEFT show, you’re going to see some sweat, tears, blood, accidents, a lot of things that are not scripted, jumping on walls and doing backflips. It’s crazy, we wanted to give the listener the amount of adrenaline and energy that we feel when we walk onto a stage performing.”
Notorious for their eccentric image and chaotic live shows, Hyperactive lays the perfect foundation for them to hone their live show, access bigger crowds and spread their music further. This most recent album has given the band the ability to ‘gamify’ their existence. By turning tracks into levels, and breakdowns into power ups, they curate a journey all too familiar with game enthusiasts. “We wanted to create a world. We love 80s action films. We love old school video games like SNES, Nintendo 64, PlayStation One. We love old school sci-fi films and we wanted to create a soundscape that’s a whole other fantasy world.”
The album itself boasts catchy choruses in Sinners are Winners and CREATVRES with the 80s synth coming out in full colour on Neon Highway, ducking away from their brutal party anthems into more technically fluent love songs, all played ridiculously fast with an intense urgency. Live, Laugh, Love points the finger at meaningless slogans failing to tackle mental health problems at the core, and album closer Hyperactive indexes the entire album. Combining Luoto‘s soaring highs with the frenetic pace of ONE MORNING LEFT, this finale acts as a final level to the RPG, devolving into an anthemic synth-wave outro, as the figurative credits roll past your eyes.
Behind the veil of amplified personalities, flashy wardrobes and dance-floor anthems lies an introspective track, hidden amongst the flurry of mayhem, touching on Luoto‘s experience as a young boy. “Drowned God is about being bullied as a kid. It’s straight from my experiences, being a different kind of dude in a small town. I think a lot of people have experienced similar stuff. [The song] is a power fantasy, putting myself into that position of the drowned God. That’s how I felt. I want to fucking destroy everything.” Despite wearing his heart on his sleeve, Luoto adds, “I’m really looking forward for people to hear Drowned God – it’s the darkest song on the album.”
Returning from the cast of 2016’s Metalcore Superstars are both frontmen Mika Lahti and Leevi Luoto, accompanied by drummer Niko Hyttinen. But with the addition of Tuukka Ojansivu on guitar and Miska Sipiläinen on bass guitar, as well as keyboard player Touko Keippilä, ONE MORNING LEFT have become a different monster altogether. “They came in the middle of the writing and recording process. We were kind of struggling at that moment, when the older members decided to leave the band.” Undeterred by the shake up in roster, the band actually became far more cohesive than they had ever been before. “It’s like six perfect puzzle pieces.”
Unashamedly eccentric and proud of their history as metalcore’s party kids, ONE MORNING LEFT‘s Hyperactive expresses a unique maturity that reinforces respect for a band that can often be divisive. If this isn’t your regular wheelhouse, this album will surprise you with its technical prowess and delicate song-writing. Luoto even offers his stamp of approval. “I just can’t think of a way that it would have sounded better. I’m really proud of this product.”
ONE MORNING LEFT‘s simplest desire is to leave the world a more exciting place. Hyperactive enlightens the listener in its softer shades whilst delivering empowering notions at its heaviest. Life is a game, it’s your responsibility to make it as enjoyable as possible.
Hyperactive is out now via Arising Empire.
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