Various Artists – Bonus CD 9 (1998)

In the 90's when CD was the leading format in music sales, there were many promotion CDs around. If I remember correctly, in Finland, if you bought two or more CDs at the same time, you got a Bonus CD, a compilation of big Finnish hits from that time. At the time, this was actually quite a significant thing, because music wasn't available freely online and the only way you really owned music was if you yourself owned it in physical form, or you had copied music from one of your friends who owned the music. Therefore, getting a whole CD of new music for free was a big thing. CDs were quite expensive to me as a child, so I couldn't afford to buy them that often, which is why I only have this one Bonus CD. The selection of songs on this album is very varied. Some of these songs I really liked, whereas some I simply couldn't understand at all.



Of course, for the record companies, these Bonus CDs were a great way to promote their other albums with the aim of selling more copies. As a teenager, however, I was just excited to get more music to my collection. Although, I actually ended up owning a couple of albums with songs from this album, so maybe their marketing technique was successful. 90's was largely the high point of so-called 'Suomi-rock' (Finnish-rock). That was the time when Finnish bands started experimenting with different styles and started sounding more and more international. Many of the big Finnish bands were headlining music festivals over international superstars. This hasn't really happened since. For some reason the momentum for Finnish music was really short. After that, Finnish music has definitely grown and nowadays Finnish artists even get some recognition in certain circles abroad, but there have been fewer Finnish superstars that would connect so many people in Finland.

The album kicks off with an upbeat song Stop by Jonna Tervomaa. She had been a winner of a children's singing competition about a decade earlier and finally as an adult, she had reached the mainstream with a couple of big hits. This is followed by Läpinäkyvää by Jiri Nikkinen, who is somewhat known for having made multiple cover songs of The Beatles. This song represents a style of Finnish soul that was quite popular at the time. It's not really soul as the genre is understood internationally, but there are some rhythmic similarities. The next song, Ainomieli '97 by CMX is an important song for me historically. CMX was one of the most popular bands for my generation at the time. The band combined dark post-punk styles with catchy melodies. Map to the Stars by 3some is a catchy pop tune, but as was popular at the time, even pop hits were played with some heavier guitar riffs. Waldo's People was Finland's answer to Swedish pop band Ace of Base. Their song Let's Get Busy is a very typical example of radio hit from the era. The next song, Boardroom Walk by 22-Pistepirkko is by far my favourite song from this album. It's a great indie song with amazing melodies. I'm writing quite a few posts about 22-Pistepirkko in this blog. This album also had an early hit song The Heartless, by one of Finland's biggest successes, HIM. Around this time I saw this love metal band perform live at a music festival to only few tens of people. Their big break came a little bit later. Pulu is a song by Ismo Alanko Säätiö. Ismo Alanko has had a long career with various different musical styles. This band of his featured traditional folk instruments from Finland played in dark rock music. Todella Kaunis by Zen Cafe is one of the biggest radio hits of the time. Their popularity was broadly based on their lyrics. Niko Ahvonen is another representative of Finnish soul movement. His song Äiti tuu ikkunaan has some soulful latin beats. Syncout by Sinamour was a massive hit that even played on MTV Nordic for international audiences. It has some RnB and hip hop influences. Stomp to My Beat by Js16 is a groovy techno song with fast tempo. Cash Is Our God by Hybrid Children represents the more popular side of Finland's metal scene of the late 90's. That's when metal music made it to the mainstream in Finland. Anybody by Waltari is a song that mixes electronic beats with kind of dark metal aesthetics. Sinä teit sen taas Marjaana by Kauko Röyhkä is a bossanova with some Argentinian style sounds. Antaudun (kuin hullu rakkauteen) by Agents and Jorma Kääriäinen is a great example of Finnish schlager music with rockabilly guitars. Varkaat ja valehtelijat by Valtava Kääpiö is a very typical song of the time. The heavy guitars in a rock pop song sound very very 90's in the style of UK-based shoegaze bands like Ride. Ville Pusa became hugely poular in Finland after appearing in the musical Hype in the 90's. He sings in Swedish. On this album there's a song called En Ängel fallen här. The album ends with Jerusalemin suutari by Kolmas Nainen, one of the most popular Suomi rock bands of all times.

I really don't listen to this album anymore, but it was nice returning to these songs from my youth. It's quite nostalgic to listen to this kind of time capsule from Finland of 1998.

Listen to the album on Spotify.