New and upcoming albums for fall and winter 2024
The last quarter of 2024 is swarming with great new Finnish music. So sit back and keep reading, as we uncover the newest in Finnish pop, rock, indie, electronic, metal, jazz, and folk this fall and winter season – a whopping 35 albums! Scroll down to find a Spotify playlist of choice cuts and advance singles from these albums, embedded below the article!
Is the list missing an important album? Let us know and we’ll add it!
August
Crimson Peak: Music About Feelings (Out in Aug 22nd on Saint in the City)
Newcomers on the Finnish indie scene, Crimson Peak are already making waves internationally with blog posts and playlist placements around the world. If you’re into “big melodic choruses that nestle amongst driving rock guitars and widescreen, atmospheric indie-folk soundscapes,” (quote taken from the band’s bio) look no further!
Listen to Music About Feelings on Apple Music or Spotify.
Endless Chain: Agony (Out in Aug 23rd, self-released)
Progressive gothic metal band Endless Chain’s second full-length album Agony is packed with doomy atmosphere, melancholy, and sorrow, with aggressive riffs and growls to balance everything out. The album’s guests include Sami Yli-Sirniö (Kreator) and Samuli Mikkonen (Korpiklaani).
Listen to Agony on Apple Music or Spotify.
Wintersun: Time II (Out in Aug 28th on Nuclear Blast)
Rumored to have been in limbo for a whopping 18 years, Wintersun’s fourth album Time II finally sees the light of day! The melodic death metallers were originally going to release the double album Time in 2010, but destiny had other plans. Instead, we got the first part, Time I, in 2012 and have been waiting for the sequel since – until now.
Listen to Time II on Apple Music or Spotify.
Stinako: Body (Out in Aug 30th on Soliti)
In April Stinako (Stina Koistinen) opened her EP trilogy with Mind, a collaboration with Timo Kaukolampi. The 2nd installment, Body, made together with Tapio Viitasaari, has already drawn comparisons from Fiona Apple to Ibiza dance music and Keith Emerson to Carly Rae Jepsen. The 3rd and final EP Spirit, will also surely be something to look forward to!
Listen to Body on Apple Music or Spotify.
September
Ainon: Within (Out in Sep 6th on We Jazz)
Ainon (stylized in all caps, AINON), a Helsinki-based four-piece, founded by cellist-composer Aino Juutilainen, plays music influenced by jazz, contemporary music, and classical music. According to the We Jazz label, the music of Ainon might be best described as "avant-garde chamber jazz", with original compositions and the individual voices of the four band members both playing an integral part in the music.
Listen to Within on Apple Music or Spotify.
Mortality: Volume II (Out in Sep 6th on Eclipse)
On their 2nd album, the all-star cast of musicians from the vibrant Helsinki jazz scene (including Verneri Pohjola on trumpet, Pauli Lyytinen on saxophones, Aki Rissanen on keys, and Teemu Viinikainen on guitar – among others!), supergroup Mortality combines the conceptual aesthetics of progressive rock with the harmonic and tonal soundscapes of jazz and jazz improvisation.
Listen to Volume II on Apple Music or Spotify.
Wolfheart: Draconian Darkness (Out in Sep 6th on Reigning Phoenix Music)
Masters of melancholic brutality, Wolfheart, released their seventh studio album Draconian Darkness via Reigning Phoenix Music. The album's first singles showcased Wolfheart's taste for blending vicious riffing with an icy atmosphere and impactful melodies. The frontman of the band, Tuomas Saukkonen, is also known from bands such as Black Sun Aeon, Before the Dawn, and Dawn of Solace.
Listen to Draconian Darkness on Apple Music or Spotify.
Mutant Blast: Soulsteeler (Out in Sep 6th on Rockshots)
Metal thrashing death‘n’roll from Southern Finland, Mutant Blast strives to create a harsh and distinctive sound with influences ranging from classic metal to 90s more extreme crunching. Mutant Blast was founded in 2020, but the band members have a long history within the Finnish metal scene having been part of such bands as Chaos Creation, Witheria and Waltari. The foursome, signed to Rockshots Records, released their full-length debut Soulsteeler in September.
Listen to Soulsteeler on Apple Music or Spotify.
Blues Bizarre: Blues Bizarre (Out in Sep 13th on Bluelight)
Get ready for contemporary blues that breaks down the genre’s boundaries. Blues Bizarre’s debut album has innovative slide guitar playing, deep emotion and influences from bands such as the Allman Brothers and Tedeshi Trucks Band. The music is written by band's main characters, Sylvi Saarekas, a personable singer and guitarist, and Marko Karppi, on slide guitar.
Listen to Blues Bizarre on Apple Music or Spotify.
Iron Country Sisters: Grace (Out in Sep 13th on Soit Se Silti)
Iron Country Sisters is a band formed in 2014 by three sisters Silja, Julia and Paula Rautamaa. The basis for the Sisters' music is americana, country and folk, with catchy melodies as well as sensitivity and beautiful three-part vocal harmonies. Grace, the successor to their debut album The Blue Hidden In (2019) is now out on Soit Se Silti Records.
Listen to Grace on Apple Music or Spotify.
Enemies Everywhere: Endless Discord (Out in Sep 13th on Ranka)
Extreme metal group Enemies Everywhere’s debut EP Endless Discord is a four-track specimen of the band’s vision of modern deathcore. The heart of the songs lies in groovy riffs, grandiose choruses, heavy breakdowns, and inhuman extreme vocals that have already been witnessed in the previously released singles "God of Pain" and "Cursed".
Listen to Endless Discord on Apple Music or Spotify.
Janne Halonen: Music from the Zone (Out in Sep 13th, self-released)
Janne Halonen is a versatile guitarist, composer, arranger, and producer, as well as the founder of the Finnish-African band Helsinki-Cotonou Ensemble. On his debut solo record, Halonen presents a sound that is based on jazz, but also contains various spices from the global south, especially West Africa, as well as electronic instrumentation.
Listen to Music from the Zone on Apple Music or Spotify.
D.O.P.A.: Vivid Dreams (Out in Sep 20th on Soit Se Silti)
Finland’s go-to guitar wizard Timo Kämäräinen (Toot Toot, Ellipsi, Ismo Alanko Säätiö etc) founded a new band with two jazz musicians, pianist Alexi Tuomarila and drummer Tuomas Timonen. D.O.P.A.’s open-minded, multi-dimensional, and genre-bending style includes rock, jazz, prog, and electropop, which makes Vivid Dreams one of the most interesting debut albums of the fall.
Listen to Vivid Dreams on Apple Music or Spotify.
Venla Ilona Blom: NEVRAK (Out in Sep 20th on Bafe’s Factory)
Award-winning vocalist, composer and beatboxer Venla llona Blom has toured around the world with her internationally acclaimed band Tuuletar and worked as a soloist in various projects with big bands, symphony orchestras, and choirs. Specialised in extended vocal techniques, vocal percussions, and traditional singing styles deriving from Scandinavian and Slavic folk music and also trained as a classical singer, Venla Ilona Blom’s solo debut Nevrak flows from ambient soundscapes to cinematic folktronica.
Listen to NEVRAK on Apple Music or Spotify.
Jaakko Aukusti: Vanishing Act (Out in Sep 20th on VILD Music)
The long-awaited sequel to Jaakko Aukusti's debut, Mountain (2017), Vanishing Act plunges deeper into the electronic and sampled sound world, gathering inspiration from modern influences like house music, hyperpop, and the endless void of the internet. Lyrically, the album tries to open up and solve the artist's inner world: anxiety, loneliness, and relationships perceived as a small dot in a constant flood of information.
Listen to Vanishing Act on Apple Music or Spotify.
Crimson Sun: Sorrowbreaker (Out in Sep 20th, self-released)
Fronted by singer Sini Seppälä, modern metal quintet Crimson Sun combines elements from traditional heavy metal, power metal and symphonic metal – and even djent – but flourishes the songs with big, catchy and melodic choruses, as well as synthesizer patterns reminiscent of EDM music. Their 3rd album, led by singles like “Sailing Home” and “Neon Lights”, is a collaboration between the band, producer Saku Moilanen, vocal producer Christoffer Stjerne, and mixing and mastering engineer Jacob Hansen.
Listen to Vanishing Act on Apple Music or Spotify.
Nightwish: Yesterwynde (Out in Sep 20th on Nuclear Blast)
During their over two-decade existence, Nightwish has risen to become one of the biggest symphonic metal bands in the world. In April 2020 – in the midst of a worldwide pandemic – Nightwish released their ninth studio album Human. :II: Nature. Its follow-up, Yesterwynde, is an album with a slightly renewed style – Nightwish even fearlessly experiments on sounds reminiscent of 80s synth pop!
Listen to Yesterwynde on Apple Music or Spotify.
Lampen: Halogen (Out in Sep 20th on We Jazz)
Lampen, the duo of guitarist Kalle Kalima and percussionist Tatu Rönkkö, makes unique music, which draws from the stylistic language of jazz. From that starting point, it heads in surprising directions beyond genre boundaries, with the term "post-jazz" thrown in. Halogen is Lampen’s second album, after their eponymous debut released in 2022.
Listen to Halogen on Apple Music or Spotify.
Jukka Orma, Pepa Päivinen & Ville Rauhala: Albert Ayler Reawakened (Out in Sep 20th on Eclipse)
Guitarist Jukka Orma and saxophonist Pepa Päivinen lead their line-up into the musical world of sixties free-jazz legend, Albert Ayler, through new arrangements and original compositions inspired by Ayler. The two-disc release includes studio material as well as a concert recording.
Listen to Albert Ayler Reawakened on Apple Music or Spotify.
Moshimoshi / Alas: Split EP (Out in Sep 27th on All That Plazz)
Who remembers split EP’s? Anyone who survived the 90s punk scene, that’s who – at least! This one combines two of Finland’s finest in emo and screamo. Helsinki four-piece moshimoshi draws their biggest influences from the US emo scene, counting bands such as Cap’n Jazz and At The Drive In as their main paragons, while screamo band Alas’ 2022 debut album "Uusi vuosi" garnered great reviews in i.e. Stereogum, where the band was compared to Fucked Up.
Listen to Split EP on Apple Music or Spotify.
Pekka Laine & The Enchanted: In Slumberland (Out in Sep 27th on Svart)
Pekka Laine is a Helsinki-based musician, songwriter, DJ and journalist. As a driving force of cult-band The Hypnomen, Laine has explored the world of instrumental music since the 1990s. In his intrepid journeys from primitive noise art to the spheres of soulful psychedelia, he now creates music with an electric guitar, the cosmic echoes tying together the primal 1960's space sounds, dub music and weird film soundtracks to form one futuristic continuum.
Listen to In Slumberland on Apple Music or Spotify.
Jesse Markin: PUMP (Out in Sep 27th on VILD Music)
Liberian-born singer-songwriter Jesse Markin is a veteran of the Finnish hip hop scene as a rapper and producer with his group The Megaphone State since 2004, but his real rise from the margins happened with his first solo album, Folk, combining electronic pop, soul and psychedelic rock. Markin returned in 2021 with Noir, which is now followed by his 3rd solo outing, the versatile and wonderful PUMP.
Listen to PUMP on Apple Music or Spotify.
Jaakko Laitinen & Väärä Raha: Äyskäri (Out in Sep 29th on Playground Music)
The Lapland-Balkan band Jaakko Laitinen & Väära Raha’s seventh full-length album Äyskäri (named after the tool that you use to clean your rowboat of rainwater!) is a production throwback to acoustic sounds of the band's first albums, but equipped with the playing skills and self-confidence accumulated over fifteen years. The songs on the album have been composed by all the members of the group, and they reflect the diverse influences filtered through each musician’s persona.
Listen to Äyskäri on Apple Music or Spotify.
Airi’s: Sea of Your Thoughts (Out in Sep 27th on V.R. Label)
Espoo-based foursome Airi’s have been building expectations for their second album with a whopping four advance singles. Airi’s is an indie rock band with a classic 80s/90s tinged indie sound, who have already been picked up on the airwaves of choice UK and US radio stations, with the single “The Sky” even played by legendary DJ Rodney Bingenheimer on Sirius XM.
Listen to Sea of Your Thoughts on Apple Music or Spotify.
October
Samu Haber: Me Free My Way (Out in Oct 4th on Universal Music)
Sunrise Avenue frontman Samu Haber started his solo career right after coming home from the stadium rockers’ farewell tour with his first solo single in 2022. Two years later, all this has finally led up to Samu’s full-length solo album Me Free My Way being released, made together with producer Ilkka Wirtanen.
Listen to Me Free My Way on Apple Music or Spotify.
Amnesia Scanner: HOAX (Out in Oct 4th on PAN Records)
Amnesia Scanner is one of the most highly regarded electronic acts to come out of Finland, founded by now Berlin-based duo of Ville Haimala and Martti Kalliala. Amnesia Scanner's art relies on their unique perspective on technology and the way it mediates contemporary experience. Their 5th album HOAX follows the duo's original concept of coupling pop song structures with avant-EDM productions.
Listen to HOAX on Apple Music or Spotify.
Cemetery Skyline: Nordic Gothic (Out in Oct 11th on Century Media)
The lineup of Swedish-Finnish goth rock/metal ensemble Cemetery Skyline is made up of quite well-known musicians: singer Mikael Stanne (Dark Tranquillity, The Halo Effect), guitarist Markus Vanhala (Insomnium, Omnium Gatherum), keyboardist Santeri Kallio (Amorphis), bass player Victor Brandt (Dimmu Borgir, Witchery, Entombed) and drummer Vesa Ranta (Sentenced, The Abbey). The self-described "Nordic Gothic" quintet should be recommended to anyone with i.e. Type O Negative, The Cult, or Sisters of Mercy albums in their collection.
Listen to Nordic Gothic on Apple Music or Spotify.
Oranssi Pazuzu: Muuntautuja (Out in Oct 11th on Nuclear Blast)
Oranssi Pazuzu, formed in 2007, is one of the most idiosyncratic Finnish metal bands and has gained a substantial international following. With their albums such Värähtelijä (2016) and Mestarin kynsi (2020), Oranssi Pazuzu's combination of quirky progressive psychedelia, space rock and Nordic black metal has been met with praise from both fans and critics alike, with praise in media outlets such as Pitchfork, The Quietus, Kerrang and The Needle Drop. Muuntautuja is Oranssi Pazuzu’s 6th album altogether, and second for the Nuclear Blast label.
Listen to Muuntautuja on Apple Music or Spotify.
Swallow the Sun: Shining (Out in Oct 18th on Century Media)
One of the biggest Finnish metal exports of the past decades, Swallow the Sun was formed in 2000 in Jyväskylä, Central Finland. Their death-doom style emphasizes melody and atmosphere and occasionally steps into gothic and black metal territory. Swallow the Sun released their eighth album "Moonflowers" on Century Media Records in 2021, and it will be followed with a long-play named "Shining" in October 2024.
Listen to Shining on Apple Music or Spotify.
Salamakannel: IV (Out in Oct 18th on Bafe’s Factory)
Salamakannel made three albums in the late 1980s and early 1990s, which were at the forefront of Finnish contemporary folk music at the time. Salamakannel's personal sound is created by a chorus of various stringed instruments. The fourth album ranges from heart-wrenchingly beautiful melodies to church bells, Chicago waltz, polska, and Finnish popular dance music oompah, humppa.
Listen to IV on Apple Music or Spotify.
Turmion Kätilöt: Reset (Out in Oct 25th on Nuclear Blast Records)
Industrial metal favorites Turmion Kätilöt return with their 12th album and 3rd for Nuclear Blast Records – the last one being 2023’s Omen X. This time the band is enforced with guests like Kasperi Heikkinen (Beast in Black) on guitar. Having toured across Europe with bands like Nightwish, Turmion Kätilöt promises fierce musical and lyrical perspectives on their upcoming record.
Listen to Reset on Apple Music or Spotify.
Von Hertzen Brothers: In Murmuration (Out in Oct 25th on DoingBeing Music)
The awarded, chart-topping rock act Von Hertzen Brothers plays progressive guitar-driven rock with rich vocal harmonies. The band was formed in 2000 by three brothers Mikko, Jonne and Kie Von Hertzen. With eight studio albums under their belt, Von Hertzen Brothers have been prominent in UK media such as Prog Magazine and Loudersound. October 2024 sees the brothers uniting their forces again with a new studio offering, In Murmuration.
Listen to In Murmuration on Apple Music or Spotify.
One Morning Left: Neon Inferno (Out in Oct 25th on Arising Empire)
Founded in 2008 in Vaasa, Finland, One Morning Left is well known for their unique blend of electro, hardcore, metalcore, and straight-up pop influences as well as its entertaining and energetic live shows where absolutely anything can happen. The band is now getting ready to release its 6th album, after Panda Loves Penguin (2009), The Bree-TeenZ (2011), Our Sceneration (2013), Metalcore Superstars (2016), and Hyperactive (2021).
Listen to Neon Inferno on Apple Music or Spotify.
November
Jonsjooel: Voices Of A First Day EP (Out in Nov 1st on Kieku Records)
Jonsjooel's new EP Voices of a First Day reflects the artist’s ideas of the world which our eyes cannot reach. Jonsjooel is a Finnish artist, composer, and multi-instrumentalist based in Berlin. formerly known as the frontman of Lake Jons. His debut solo album, Lullabies for Younger Self, was released in October 2023. The EP will be released by Kieku Records on 1 November 2024.
Listen to Voices of a First Day on Apple Music or Spotify.
Arctis: Arctis (Out in Nov 1st on Napalm Records)
We proudly present Arctis, the next in line on Finnish catchy and arena-ready modern metal! Fronted by vocalist Alva, ”the eternal Ice Queen Rebel Leader,” Arctis have had quite the start for their career, getting signed to Napalm Records and playing their first shows in Southern Europe with Apocalyptica. On the strength of the two singles, “I’ll Give You Hell” and the Lambretta cover “Bimbo”, Arctis’ eponymous debut album is something to look forward to.
Listen to Arctis on Apple Music or Spotify.
Arttu Silvast: Isthmus (Out Nov 15th, self-released)
Composer Arttu Silvast's album, Isthmus, features the timeless sounds of a 1952 Finnish-made Fazer upright piano, the ancient tones of the Finnish jouhikko (bowed lyre), and the rich textures of a Moog synthesizer - all wrapped around soothing ambient soundscapes. The album is inspired by Northern European landscapes and the Faroe Islands.
Listen to Isthmus on Apple Music or Spotify.
December and beyond
Ollie T: Lost Within the Fire (Out in Dec 17th on Insomniac)
Lost Within the Fire is the debut solo album of Ollie T (née Olli Tukiainen) from Poets of the Fall. Ollie T started his solo career in 2017 with the single "Firefly", and has been building it, finally leading up to the debut full-lentgh. The record is promised to feature a wide variety of moods, ranging from gentle ballads and soft tunes to extravagant, sizzling guitar mayhem. The album features all the members of Poets of the Fall, including vocal parts by their singer, Marko Saaresto.
Flaming Sideburns: Rocket Science (Original Artyfacts from The Psychedelic Era 1996–1999) (Out in Jan 17th 2025 on Svart Records)
In the turn of the millennium, Helsinki-based action rockers The Flaming Sideburns were all the rage for the people who were queuing for rare Hellacopters 7-inches. As some of you know, the Sideburns came back in 2021 with a new album Silver Flames. For those eagerly waiting for the follow-up, Svart Records will put out a carefully curated collection of 13 studio recordings from 1996–1999, three of which are previously unreleased, while the rest appeared on sold-out limited releases. [Note: the release has been delayed until January 17th, 2025)