Interview with Sami Hinkka of Ensiferum, Part One

When the Paganfest America Part IV tour came to Chicago on April 13, I interviewed the lyricists for the three main bands. After speaking with Heri Joensen of Týr and Joris Boghtdrincker of Heidevolk, I had a long talk with Sami Hinkka of Ensiferum. So long a talk, in fact, that I missed Heidevolk’s entire set and Týr’s first few songs. This is the danger when two bass players obsessed with mythology get together without supervision.

Sami Hinkka during our interview on the Ensiferum tour bus

Since 2001, Finland’s Ensiferum has released five full-length recordings that incorporate traditional folk instruments into contemporary metal music. Founding member Markus Toivonen has called the group’s music “heroic folk metal.” Much of Ensiferum’s lyrical content is related to the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic, but some material also incorporates imagery from Norse mythology. I’ve seen the band three times in Chicago, and each show has been more energetic than the last. These are some wild kilt-wearing dudes (and one dudette)!

Sami joined the band in 2004 and has appeared on the albums Victory Songs, From Afar and Unsung Heroes. In addition to playing bass, he’s the band’s primary lyricist and co-writes much of the music. He’s also a grand raconteur. The official interview lasted nearly an hour, but we continued talking long after I switched off the audio recorder. I’ve edited the interview down to a manageable length and cut out much of our talk about performing and recording with electric bass. This would likely be fascinating for other bass players, but it doesn’t fit so well with the Norse myth theme of this blog.

After I introduced myself to Sami and told him about my dual career as a Norse mythologist and professional musician, he told me about his experiences playing the string bass.

SH – I just bought my first upright bass a little over a year ago.

KS – Was that the blue thing you played on the new DVD?

SH – Yeah, yeah, yeah. Ha! I had a weird project with Henri from Finntroll and Moonsorrow – keyboard player, accordion player and whatever – and, actually, the ex-bass player of Ensiferum, Jukki. We are all good friends. It’s a small country, small genre. Everybody is friends together. There was this Spinefarm [Records] by Sea. It was like a cruise outside Finland, and a bunch of bands played there.

Dapper Sami Hinkka plays electric upright
bass for dancers on a cruise ship in 2012

I got this crazy idea. Maybe we should do like a lounge jazz version of classical metal songs with tuxedos on. I knew Henri’s a genius. I can call him and ask him, “Can you come here within an hour?” and he can do anything, because he’s master of his instrument. Jukki’s a great singer and always up to all crazy stuff. We did a few rehearsals, and I had this electric upright bass. It was pretty cool, but Henri has a real upright bass, because they use that on Finntroll stuff. I was like, “Ay! I have to get one.”

KS – Isn’t his upright made out of bones and leather?

SH – Ha! Actually, I think it’s just wood. Sorry to break the illusion. Ha!

The cover of Ensiferum's Victory Songs

KS – On Victory Songs, your first album with the band, most of the songs are basically on heroic fantasy subjects. However, you wrote “Ahti” about the Finnish water-god, and in “One More Magic Potion,” you refer to Väinämöinen without naming him – simply asking “Who can shape a kantele from a pike’s jaw?” Was it you personally who brought Finnish mythology to the group?

SH – Yeah. That was me. Hmm. I really would like to know where it all came from.

KS – Was that something you were interested in before you joined the band?

SH – Yes, and – to be honest – the band got me more into it. I was a big fan of old Amorphis, Tales from the Thousand Lakes. That got me interested in Kalevala and Nordic heritage. When I joined the band, there was – I don’t want to say obligation, but that made me more interested about stuff. I started reading more.

I was reading some – it wasn’t Kalevala, but it was about characters of Kalevala. I thought it would be so obvious to take Väinämöinen as a character of that song. We had this song ready, “Ahti,” and this really energetic thing. Somehow, I got the idea of a really raging sea, and I was like, “Of course! It has to be a god of the sea in this song.” That’s where it came from.

I have to say thank you to the guys, because they are always being really open-minded to my lyrics. I don’t think they ever said anything like, “No, we can’t do that.” Maybe some words, like in “Wanderer.” I asked Mahi, because there’s a… How the #*@% do the lyrics go? Ha! “He will ride across land and time.” Yeah. I asked Mahi, “Can I put ‘he will ride ten thousand miles’ or something?” He was like, “No, we can’t use a real measurement. That sounds too modern.” I was like, “Yeah, that’s true.” So we couldn’t even argue about that.

I always consult others on lyrics. For “[One More] Magic Potion,” it refers also to “with nature, trolls and the spirits” and so forth. That’s also a tribute to Finntroll, because they’re our dear friends. The drinks that they are drinking are absinthe and this thing called Fisu. The gray thing is actually referring to Fisu. That’s something that Finntroll and us used to drink a lot. You take Fisherman’s Friend [menthol lozenges], put it in a bottle of vodka, and tutu tutu tu! Let it melt and so…

Cough Drops + Vodka = Delicious!

KS – For those of us who aren’t native Finnish speakers, can you explain the lyrics to “Pohjola”?

SH – It’s a really old poem, over a hundred years old. This again depends on what you think is old. It’s actually an old song. We had the first demo of that back in 2006. We already had a real raw version of the song for Victory Songs.

I was reading a book of different poems at home, and I saw this poem. The guy is longing for his homeland. It’s so beautiful nature, the nation is so strong – stuff like that. You have to understand also the historical context when it has been written. That’s pretty much the time when the idea of independence started to rise. At that time, people wrote a lot of that kind of stuff, and all the music that they wrote was really pompous.

KS – So it’s more nationalist Romantic than mythological.

SH – Yes. I was reading poems, and I was like, “Oh, this is so good. I want to use something out of this.” Then I remembered, we have that one song – that weird song. I listened to it, and I was reading the lyrics. I was like, “This fits the song perfectly, everything. This can’t be true!” I took a microphone. I was at home, living in an apartment, shouting. The neighbors were banging the ceiling. And I was like, “Shut up! I’m doing art, here!” Ha!

"Pohjola" poet Yrjö Koskinen (1830-1903)

I took the demo to the rehearsal room, and I played it for the guys. They were like, “Yeah, okay. Harsh vocals. This sounds good.” Then the chorus started. They were like, “Is this Finnish?” I said, “Yeah, here are the lyrics.” They said, “What the &#$%? This is a great idea!” They all liked the lyrics, pretty much. National Romantic is really something that fits Ensiferum’s theme. But the song wasn’t ready. That’s why it wasn’t on Victory Songs or From Afar. There were small details that just weren’t ready.

KS – There are texts from the Kalevala on From Afar and Unsung Heroes, but “Twilight Tavern” mentions Valhalla, valkyries and the Rainbow Bridge from Norse mythology. How do you relate to the Norse tradition as a Finlander? Do you feel that it’s part of your culture, or do you feel that it’s a foreign thing that you adopt?

SH – I think there are a lot of similarities. All the folklore around the world has certain stereotyped heroes and anti-heroes. You’re wearing Thor’s hammer. We have our main god called Ukko. That leads to ukkonen, which is thunder. He also has a hammer.

Ukko, Finnish god of thunder

Finland has been under Sweden. We were part of Sweden at some point. Vikings, on the coast of Finland, were merchants and exchanged stuff. I think everything got kind of mixed up. That’s the way cultures do evolve. They get influences. In that way, I can relate to all the Nordic mythology. I think it’s so close to our national book.

That’s something I always wondered. I think it’s perfectly fine, and people should do – especially art – if you feel like something comes up naturally, just do it. I always find it really funny when there are people from totally different cultures, and they can relate to our stuff – what we write from our heritage. It’s totally fine for me. There are Viking metal bands from South America. I think that’s just awesome. There are also reggae bands from Finland, so it’s all the same. Ha!

The cover of Ensiferum's Unsung Heroes

KS – Iron Maiden has Eddie, Motörhead has the creature, and you have this bearded guy. Is he supposed to be Väinämöinen? On the new album, he has the kantele made from the jaw – but he’s also wearing a hammer. Is that supposed to be Thor’s hammer or Ukko’s hammer?

SH – I think it’s Ukko’s hammer. That’s our Ensiferum guy. You might have noticed on Iron and Victory Songs, you can see he has cowboy boots. Ha! He’s like a heroic guy.

KS – So he’s not a Kalevala character.

SH – No, no. He’s Ensiferum Dude. Ha! We just flirt with the things.

KS – I always thought the band name was pronounced en-SIF-erum, but you’re actually pronouncing it EN-sif-erum.

SH – I think that only comes from the difference of English and Finnish. In Finnish language, when you say a word, the weight is in the beginning – the accent. You have en-SIF-erum, and we would have EN-sif-erum. It’s Latin. Even though I studied Latin when I was in high school, I can’t remember all the pronunciation stuff. Ha!

To be continued in Part Two.

The Meaning of Thor's Hammer

"Global perspectives for an American audience"

Last week, Public Radio International ran what appears to be their first story on Ásatrú (“Æsir Faith,” the modern iteration of Old Germanic religion). Unfortunately, their reporting left a lot to be desired.

The item was broadcast on “The World,” a nightly show hosted by Marco Werman. It was ostensibly a news item on the addition of Thor’s hammer to the official list of “available emblems of belief for placement on government headstones and markers” by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs – an event that was widely reported by the pagan media back in May, but completely ignored by mainstream news media and religion reporters.

The new government-approved Thor's hammer grave marker

The only source for the radio feature was an article that had appeared in an online magazine that covers “business + innovation + design.” The magazine article is a confusing mish-mash of Wicca and comic books that makes it seem like Ásatrúar are witches that worship a superhero. The only source for the author of the design magazine article was our friend Jason Pitzl-Waters, who writes the wonderful blog The Wild Hunt. Jason has been covering this story for a while, and he does great work. However, he’s not Ásatrú and wasn’t involved in the campaign to get Thor’s hammer accepted. His own story was largely based on press releases written by various heathen organizations in response to the decision by the Department of Veterans Affairs. So, the connection between PRI and actual sources looks like this:

PRI ➵ design mag ➵ blog ➵ press releases ➵ actual involved heathens

Clearly, the producers at PRI (Public Radio International) googled “thor’s hammer va decision” and contacted the author of the first result. I discussed this issue with Jason. He said, “I agree that it's problematic when you get too many degrees of journalistic separation between the story and its source. I would never hold myself up as the sole source on a story like this – only for additional context or background. I was uncomfortable with being the only source and would have gladly handed over my role to a heathen directly involved in the process.”

“The World” website post about the story was even worse. It featured a photo of an overweight fanboy dressed in a Thor costume based on the Marvel Comics movie. The write-up on the website clearly stated that the side of Thor’s hammer is inscribed with the words, “Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of… THOR.” Unfortunately, this is a quote from the 1962 first appearance of Marvel’s superhero version of Thor in the comics created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, not from the actual mythology or religion. Epic fail. Seriously.

Memo to PRI: Marvel Comics ≠ Religious Texts

On Monday of this week, I started a letter-writing campaign via my Norse Mythology Online sites on Facebook, Google+, Pinterest and Twitter. I called upon heathens and the heathen-friendly to “send a polite letter [to Public Radio International] expressing your great disappointment in their complete and utter disrespect for minority religions.” I asked why PRI had not contacted Josh Heath, an army veteran who was at the center of the quest to have Thor’s hammer approved as a grave marker. I spoke at length to Josh and his wife Cat about their work in my three-part feature on “Heathens in the Military” for The Norse Mythology Blog earlier this year. Their efforts on behalf of Ásatrú military via their Open Halls Project should have been at the core of PRI’s piece, but were not even mentioned.

The response was amazing. PRI’s Marco Werman said “we heard from many, many heathens.” On Tuesday, producer Nina Porzucki (who wrote the article for the show’s website) called me and apologized for the disrespectful story. She asked me about Ásatrú for over 90 minutes. I went into great detail about the ancient roots of Norse religion in northern Europe (all the way back to 2000 BCE), the development of the religion through the Viking Age, the era of Christian conversion, Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson's founding of the Ásatrúarfélagið (Iceland’s “Æsir Faith Fellowship”), the subsequent worldwide revival/reconstruction and much more.

Sveinbjörn Beinteinsson's 1992 autobiography

On Wednesday, Porzucki recorded a twenty-minute interview with me on the nature of Ásatrú and the meaning of Thor’s hammer. She also interviewed Josh Heath. As with me, she first had a very long background conversation with him, then recorded an interview for broadcast. I put her in contact with Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson and Jóhanna G. Harðardóttir – leaders of the Ásatrúarfélagið – but she never spoke to them.

On Thursday, “The World” aired a short follow-up story. Between the two of us, Josh and I had spent nearly three hours on the phone with Porzucki. In multiple emails, we had sent her background information, contacts, sources and images. The final piece was two-and-a-half minutes, with a few seconds from each of us. There was no apology given on-air or on the website. The online story has been “updated,” but still features the chubby guy in the movie costume – and no apology for the disrespectful original story.

Porzucki specifically asked me to talk on the recording about the symbolism of Thor’s hammer, which was the crux of what the original PRI item purported to be about. I didn’t expect that there would be an extended feature on “The World” about this, but she only used one sentence of a twenty-minute discussion. She didn’t use any of the images or source material that she asked me to send her for the website.

Marco Werman: No Apologies

I’m not surprised by any of this. I’ve written before about public radio’s poor coverage of minority religions (as part of an article on “Obama and Ostara”). What did surprise me was the amazing response to my call for a letter-writing campaign. There are a lot more HOPI (heathens of positive intent) out there than even I thought, and they are ready to call out the media when their religion is misrepresented. This is a wonderful thing.

What follows is the complete text of my answer to PRI about the meaning of Thor’s hammer. I understand that the media edits interviews down to fit time and space constraints, but I also feel that this case was bit extreme – especially given the questionable nature of the original piece and the massive criticism it received. I hope that readers will find my summary of symbolism interesting, and I offer it as a thank you to everyone who stood up for Ásatrú and wrote a heartfelt letter to public radio.

PROTECTION

In the myths, Thor’s hammer is the most valued treasure of the gods because Thor uses it to defend both gods and humans from the giants, who represent the destructive forces of nature. This protective function is reflected in religious objects, like an eleventh-century Swedish amulet that says “may the lightning hold all evil away” and “may Thor protect him with that hammer.” Written in ancient runes, the text from the small copper pendant calls upon Thor to protect Bofi, the wearer, as he travels over sea.

Here I carved for you help, Bofi.
Help me! Knowledge is certain for you.
And may the lightning hold all evil away from Bofi.
May Thor protect him with that hammer which came from out of the sea.
Flee from evil! It gets nothing from Bofi.
The gods are under him and over him.

11th-century runic inscription to Thor
from Runic Amulets and Magic Objects
by Mindy MacLeod & Bernard Mees

There is a fish inscribed on the amulet, and the reference to the gods being “under him and over him" suggests Bofi is on the water. The line about Thor’s hammer coming “from out of the sea” refers to the famous myth of Thor’s fishing trip, when the god struggles to pull the destructive World Serpent up from the sea's bottom and throws his hammer into the water after the monster. This is clear example showing that the hammer is a representation of Thor’s sacred function – a symbol of his protective role.

BLESSING

The protecting function shades into a blessing function. One of Thor’s many secondary names has been interpreted as “Blessing-Thor.” In the Icelandic sagas, there is record of people making the sign of the hammer over food as a symbol of blessing. In the myths, Thor uses his hammer to bless both a marriage and a funeral pyre.

Back in the Bronze Age, we can see reverse echoes of what later developed into what we think of as “Norse religion.” There are carvings from this early period of godlike figures with axes or hammers that suggest a blessing role, and there are actual axe heads that seem to have been votive offerings. There’s also a famous Bronze Age carving of a large figure raising an axe or hammer over a man and woman in a gesture of blessing.

Swedish Bronze Age carving of godlike figure
blessing couple with large axe or hammer

The blessing ritual seems to have been a practice that lasted in some form for over 2,000 years, from the Bronze Age through the Viking Age. The later literary sources suggest that the hammer was used to bless the bride, probably as a fertility symbol – a practice that is clearly related to the practice of blessing newborns with the hammer to welcome them into the community.

GRAVE MARKERS

There is a lot of evidence for the funeral function. Even around 1300 BCE, there are images of axe heads in northern European funeral sites, so there is already an association between the axe or hammer and the grave. Although the hammer is the most common image in later representations, the axe still shows up as a parallel sacred symbol in much later archeological and literary sources.

Swedish memorial rune stone with Thor's hammer

Images of the Thor’s hammer appear on Viking Age memorial stones in Sweden and Denmark, many with direct written appeals to Thor to bless the monument and burial site. The texts generally follow a formula and say “May Thor hallow these runes,” “May Thor hallow this memorial” or simply “May Thor hallow,” but one Norwegian inscription actually says “take to yourself the body lying beneath this stone.” Many Thor’s hammer amulets have been found in burials over a wide range of time and place, and their inclusion again suggests a protective function. In one myth, Thor brings his dead goats back to life with his hammer, with suggests a connection to resurrection or welcoming into an afterlife that may be related to the funeral imagery.

COMMUNITY

Taken together, the historical evidence suggests that the hammer blessed major life events – birth, marriage, death – but it was also used in feasting, claiming land and marking boundaries. In other words, it blessed all the ways that members of a community relate to each other. So, wearing the sign of the hammer is an expression of belonging to a community – in both life and death.

THOR’S HAMMER PENDANTS

Small hammer amulets worn as necklace pendants existed centuries before the Viking Era, but they had a surge in popularity when Christianity came to northern Europe. Converts to Christianity (the “New Way”) wore small crucifixes to mark their new faith. Those who chose not to abandon the religion of Odin, Thor and Freya (the “Old Way”) wore hammer amulets to express loyalty to the faith of their forefathers. Again, the hammer is used as a symbol of Thor’s protection – in this case, protecting his followers from the invasion of the new religion. In addition, it is again a symbol of community.

10th-century Swedish Thor's hammer pendants

HEATHENS TODAY

Today, heathens who wear Thor’s hammer amulets or place it on their grave markers are consciously continuing the ancient usage. The symbolic thread that runs strongest through all eras and places and people is a sense of community. By wearing Thor’s hammer, you are declaring that you are part of a specific community.

Community might mean just your family. It might mean a small group in your area that meets up. It might mean a regional network or national organization. It might mean an expanded group of people around the world who share your worldview. By wearing the hammer today, you are also connecting yourself to the community that wore it over a thousand years ago – a community across time and space.

Ritual Thor's hammer crafted by Josh Heath

In that sense, the hammer of Thor has done what the ancient people believed it could – it has preserved the community and enabled it to survive across the boundaries of life and death. That’s pretty amazing.

Norse Mythology and Musical Creativity

After The Norse Mythology Blog won "Best Religion Weblog" in March, I was contacted by Strings Magazine editor Greg Cahill about my work in music and mythology. The August issue includes his article on my dual career, "Where Music Meets Magic."

I've played first bass a few times for Lara. Circle of Life.

While preparing the feature, Greg asked me a question that I have asked myself many times:

How do Norse mythology and religion inform or inspire your work as a bassist?

What follows is the complete text of my answer to Greg. I have attempted to explain my thoughts on the complex interaction of mythology, religion, science and creativity in my own life. I'd like to thank Greg for featuring me in the magazine, and I'd like to thank my mentor Jimmy Cheatham (1924-2007) for being the first person to open my eyes to the mystery of the Creative Spirit.

My answer:

The root of Odin's name means "frenzy" and "poetry." In the ancient mythology and religion, he brings creative frenzy to the poet; he is the god who inspires creativity.

Here is Odin gaining the Mead of Poetry that will inspire creative
artists. Strangely enough, this illustration shows him sporting the
same exact hairstyle that I rocked in high school. Circle of Life.

For several years, I hosted the Avant-Garde Jazz Jam Session in Chicago with saxophonist David Boykin and drummer Mike Reed. I vividly recall a time that we were performing a very fast, very intense improvised trio piece. I had my eyes closed while I was playing, and I remember this strange experience. Everything seemed to go red, and I felt like I was floating in an ocean of sound. I had no conscious control of my hands, but this wild music was happening on its own all around me.

Do I think that a mystical Norse god appeared at Café Mestizo and took over my body? Of course not. I believe in science. What this experience taught me, however, is how a concept of Odin as the god who possesses his followers could have developed. In the worldview of the ancient Germanic peoples, this out-of-body experience could easily have been explained as Odin "unbinding" the mind of the creative artist – a power of his that is attested repeatedly in ancient poetry and mythology.

Here is another view of Odin gaining the Mead of Poetry.
I can't really grow a beard this glorious. Circle of Life?

I think that this gets to the heart of a great misunderstanding of religion in today's world – the idea that, if you follow a certain faith tradition, you must literally believe in the "magic" of that tradition, to the exclusion of science. Being attracted to the beauty and richness of a worldview that stretches back thousands of years is not incompatible with a rational acceptance of scientific principles. A few years ago, I wrote an article for The Norse Mythology Blog showing how the Norse creation myth works just fine with the work of physicist Stephen Hawking.

The question for me as a modern artist is this: how do we understand these creative experiences? In other words: is it more deeply meaningful to read a scientific article explaining brain functions or to read poetry that describes the workings of Odin? For musicians, the deep meanings in the myths help us to grasp the realities of the creative process in a way that is, ultimately, more "real" than the purely scientific explanation.

One of my musical mentors was Jimmy Cheatham, the great jazz artist and educator. Literally from the first moment that I met him at the University of California, he talked to me about the Creative Spirit. I mean, in our very first conversation! At the time, I was really too young and inexperienced to understand what he was talking about, and I remember thinking he was some sort of jazz mystic.

The late, great Jimmy Cheatham (1924-2007)

Twenty years later, I finally understand what he meant – that there is something about making music that is not reducible to a simple mathematical equation. There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our science. To really understand our lives in a fundamentally meaningful way, we need mythology.