SILENTIUM // Announce New Record ‘Motiva’

Aug 17, 2020 / WORDS Chanel Issa / PHOTOS Johan 'Staffan' Turbanov / Big News out of the Silentium Camp

Finland’s stalwart melodic metallers Silentium have announced the release of Motiva, their first record in over 10 years.

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Set to drop on 28th August, it will be their sixth full-length and their first with new guitarist, Aapeli Kivimäki. (Points to those who can actually pronounce that.)

“We have grown both as individuals and as a band”, says frontwoman Riina Rinkinen. “We have maintained our complexity, but we have more control and made the songs appear more straight forward by taking deliberate musical choices …We now have two guitarists contributing solos, they both have their own style that opened doors to new dimensions regarding our string-work.”

Silentium formed in 1995. Despite some success, the band has struggled to keep a stable line-up. Tiina Lehvonen fronted the band in their earliest days and was present on both their debut Infinita Plango Vulnera (1999) and follow-up Altum (2001). Following her departure, Lullacry singer Tanya “W. Lilith” Kemppainen featured on Sufferion – Hamartia of Prudence (2003), produced by Nightwish’s Tuomas Holopainen. Current frontwoman Riina Rinkinen joined in 2004. The band was last active in 2008 when they released Amortean. They followed this with a decade long hiatus, which they say created a different attitude towards songwriting.

“Many of the songs chronicle my battles with depression or are in some way derived from that state”, says Rinkinen. “The song Truth for example deals with that nagging feeling of guilt when you are aware that you should not have these dark emotions that torment you but that won’t go away either – and that stagnation causes more pain.”