Poets of the Fall

Poets of the Fall (POTF) is a rock band from Finland. It consists of Marko Saaresto (lead vocals), Olli Tukiainen (lead guitar) and Markus "Captain" Kaarlonen (keyboards, production). . On tour the band is supported by Jani Snellman (bass guitar), Jaska Mäkinen (rhythm guitar, backing vocals) and Jari Salminen (drums, percussion). The band has sold over 100,000 albums in Finland.

Early years (2003–2004)
The band was founded in 2003 with the collaboration of Saaresto and Tukiainen who had written multiple songs for Saaresto's previous band Playground and performed with Finnish jazzband Pohjoinen Syke previously.

In 2003, Saaresto's friend Sami Järvi, a script-writer working at Remedy Entertainment handed Saaresto a poem he had written, asking him to turn it into a song to use in Remedy's upcoming video game Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne. The song, entitled Late Goodbye, was used as the ending-theme of the game as well as a recurring motif, being sung and whistled by multiple characters. It was produced by Markus "Captain" Kaarlonen, who joined the band shortly after due to Saaresto and Tukiainen liking his work.

Kaarlonen being a former employee of benchmark-developer Futuremark, POTF were offered to have their song Lift included in the 2005-literation of Futuremark's benchmarking software 3DMark, which exposed the band to a wider audience than Max Payne 2 had done.

In order to keep complete control and freedom over the band, the members founded their own independent record label, Insomniac, on which they have released all their CDs as of now.

On 30 June 2004, the Poets released their debut single Late Goodbye in Finland which was followed by Lift on 9 September 2004. The songs charted #14 and #8 on the Finnish single charts and reached #2 and #7 in YleX's 2004-voting for "Best Finnish song". POTF were also voted "Fresh Newcomer of 2004" by YleX. The videos for both songs were directed by Tuomas "Stobe" Harju. POTF performed at Popkomm 2005 in Berlin.

On 18 December 2004, the Poets released a free download single on their website Maybe Tomorrow is a Better Day to market the release of their debut album Signs of Life. After having been taken offline, it was remastered and reissued on the band's second album Carnival of Rust.

Signs of Life (2005–2006)
The band's debut album Signs of Life was released in Finland on 19 January 2005, followed by iTunes on 25 May 2005. It entered the Finnish Top 40 album chart at number one and has been certified platinum by the Finnish IFPI. The album was awarded the Emma Award for the "Best Debut Album of the Year 2005" and the band received the "Best Newcomer of the Year"-Award.

Accompanying the album, the band released a video for the song Lift, directed by Tuomas "Stobe" Harju, and used the songs Stay and Illusion and Dream as promotional radio singles. The album contains a password granting access to a secret page on poetsofthefall.com that hosts a remix of the song Lift, entitled "Dramadance Remix" as well as wallpapers made from the Lift-video and the album-artwork.

Carnival of Rust (2006-2007)
Having won the "Best Finnish Breakthrough"-Award at the NRJ Radio Awards, POTF released their third single, entitled Carnival of Rust in Finland on 22 March 2006 with a release in Germany following on 1 December 2006. The single, which entered the Finnish charts at No. 2, features a radio- and an album-edit as well as a live-recording of Don't Mess With Me, the fourth track on Signs of Life, from the band's performance at Rockperry Festival, Vaasa, Finland on 15 July 2005.

On 30 March 2006, the band released the video to Carnival of Rust which shows a gas-masked woman visiting an old carnival, and also references every song from the band's second album of the same name, became hugely popular in Finland, winning two Muuvi Awards as well as the YLE Audience Choice Award as "Best Finnish Music Video of All Time". It was also voted "Best Music Video 2006" by The Voice. In 2009, the video was remastered by Elmeri Raitanen as his bachelor-thesis in visual and media arts at Lahti Institute of Design and reissued in high definition.

The Poets' second album Carnival of Rust was released in Finland on 12 April 2006 and has since been released in Sweden, Australia, Ukraine, Russia, Germany and on iTunes. It includes 11 new songs, a remastered version of Maybe Tomorrow is a Better Day, as well as the music video to the title track. The cover, which sees the return of the lollipop from the first album, was designed by Tuomas Harju.

Carnival of Rust also went straight to No. 1 on the Finnish charts. It has been certified platinum. It was selected as one of the best albums 2006 by Finland's largest newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, and was nominated for "Best Finnish Album" at the NRJ Radio Awards as well as "Best Rock Album" at the Emma Awards in 2007.

Revolution Roulette (2008–2009)
In 2008, POTF redesigned their moth-logo and also changed the font used to display their bandname. They also participated in the Voice's CD compilation Livenä Vieraissa, with a cover version of Chris Cornell's song "You Know My Name (cover)", and their own song "Diamonds for Tears". In the same year, POTF signed Phoenix Effect, the band of former Sunrise Avenue-guitarist Janne Kärkkäinen to their Insomniac-label and produced their debut album Cyanide Skies with Saaresto / Tukiainen performing additional vocals / guitar work. The album was released on 18 February 2009 in Finland and entered the Finnish album charts at #22. POTF also make a cameo-appearance in the video to Phoenix Effect's song "King See No Evil".

Poets of the Fall released their next single called The Ultimate Fling in Finland on 6 February 2008. The single features three variations of the title track (a radio-edit, an album-edit and an impromptu-version) as well as a live recording of Fire, the opening track of the band's second album Carnival of Rust which was recorded during the Poets' performance at Ankkarock Festival 2007 on 5 August. The single charted at No. 2 in the Finnish singles charts. Months after the release of the single, the band published the accompanying video which consists of fan-recorded footage of the band performing at various gigs.

The third POTF-album, entitled Revolution Roulette, was released in Finland and on iTunes on 26 March 2008. Its cover was designed by Tuomas Harju and features a giant padlock with a built-in roulette, abandoning the lolipop used on the previous album-covers. The record marks the first POTF-album not produced in Markus Kaarlonen's living-room, but the band's own professional studio. It went straight to the top of the Finnish charts and was certified gold two weeks after being released. The band also released the title track of the album as a promotional radio-single. Revolution Roulette is currently the only POTF album that has not been released physically outside Finland. While on tour with the album, the band played their first gig in the United States at Musexpo 2008 in Los Angeles on 29 April 2008.

On 18 September 2009, the band released a "Best of"-compilation in India.

The name of the band

 * About the name of the band Marko said in an interview that the fall represents "the 'fall' as in the biblical term, when Adam and Eve in the paradise took a bite of the apple", and it means that "we’re the architects of our own demise". He also stated that "if it was fall as in autumn, it would be Poets of Fall, without 'the'."
 * The name was just an idea of Marko out of thin air when they wrote down a few possible names for their new band. "We looked at the name and thought-yeah it's true it is kind of descriptive of the way we do and feel about things" said Marko in an interview.

Source

 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poets_of_the_Fall