Distained – Biography
Distained is a metal band which was originally founded in 1999 by Joni, Anssi and Jukka. The band has been through a lot from the early days to the point where it is today. The detailed story about Distained’s phases is written in the history section down below.
Distained’s music is based on melodic and emotional songs which are however played with rough attitude and heavy sounds. Through many changes in line-up the band is nowadays stronger and more impressive than before with its members – the Dutch/Finnish Niklas Sluyter on vocals and Tony Helaakoski on the guitar.
History
Distained´s journey begun in late fall 1999 under the name Endymion. At that time the band was a group of three young guys who formed the following line-up: Joni Ali-Kippari (drums/vocals), Anssi Tyrni (guitar) and Jukka Lehtojoki (bass). Even before Endymion Joni and Anssi had a couple of band projects together.
A real change for the band happened in June 2000 when a Joni’s classmate Kaisa Kallio was invited to sing backing vocals for the Endymion’s upcoming demo. However, Kaisa’s voice was so impressive that she became the band’s lead singer. The demo project was put on hold and the band spent the next summer and fall playing gigs. Endymion released it’s first demo called Oblivion in late fall 2001.
Next summer Endymion played few gigs but after one gig in August Rock (Luopioinen) Kaisa decided to quit the band. Endymion was again a group of three guys.
Endymion searched for a new singer to fill the empty post without much of a success, so Jukka took the microphone and started as a vocalist, a singing bassist. Soon after this Endymion got a new reinforcement – a second guitarist Jamppa Sinkkonen. At this point the band’s musical line was a bit lost. After all, these recent changes were quite radical. So Endymion dumped nearly all the old material and started to search new directions through cover songs. It turned out that Jukka’s rugged voice was ideal for hard rock so Endymion started to play covers. Almost everything from Billy Idol to Misfits. This cover-period lasted almost two years but during this period Endymion made also some new songs of their own. After all, creating own music has always been the band’s first priority.
After playing together in this line-up for over two years and having enough new material it was time to do a next demo. The recordings started at the local Lehmostudio in September 2004 and Endymion’s second demo Illusionist was released in April 2005.
A real turning point for the band happened in early summer of 2006 when a friend of the band said that he knows one guy who would like to try singing in a band. Endymion’s guys thought that hell, let’s give him a try! So one day this new guy called Jami Heikkala appeared to the rehearsals and when he started to sing and play the guitar, the rest of the guys were quite impressed. The band had found its new vocalist/guitarist and was ready to get seriously into business with a new name – Distained.
Distained started to write new songs with Jami who brought new dimensions to the band’s music with his guitar work. Soon the band had plenty of new songs so it was logical to start to record a promo-cd. The recordings started at Lehmostudio in the beginning of 2007 and after a few weeks the band had recorded 9 songs. Eventually, only 4 of them ended up on the Inhuman-promo which was released in May 2007. After this the band’s guitarist Jamppa Sinkkonen quit due to a lack of motivation.
With this new promo recording Distained started to book gigs for themselves. Putting a lot of effort in hunting gigs payed off and by the late summer 2008 Distained had played gigs around Finland from Vihti to Oulu. After the summer’s gigs and gaining valuable stage experience the band started a new song-writing process. Soon it turned out that Jami’s musical ambitions were somewhere else so he decided to quit Distained and concentrate on his death metal band.
The remaining trio – Joni, Jukka and Anssi started immediately to search for a replacement (or replacements) for Jami. They knew that it would be hard but not at all impossible. First priority was to find a great singer who could take them again on a new level – guitar playing was secondary at that point. It was only a day after Jami’s decision when the band responded on a wanted-advertisement of this guy called Niklas Sluyter. After hearing the first samples of Niklas’ voice it was clear that this would be the right guy for Distained.
Now that Distained had found it’s new singer they had to find a second guitarist because Niklas said that he would rather focus purely on singing. Finally the band found a guitar player closer than they could have imagined. A good friend of the band and Distained’s trusted gig technician Jani Holttinen was recruited to handle the rhythm guitar duties. Now the band was whole again and ready to rock!
Distained with dirt and blood, as relic of the prey.
— Edmund Spenser
