Tarja Turunen kicked out of Nightwish!

http://www.bravewords.com/news/34376

In a shocking revelation posted at the band's website, NIGHTWISH have parted ways with singer Tarja Turunen. However, the band started today's news post as follows:


"Nightwish recorded their End Of An Era - live release yesterday evening in Hartwall Arena in Helsinki. As you can imagine, the atmosphere in the Arena was wild but also quite blue. This was the ending for a one and a half year lasting Once -World Tour. Nightwish wishes to thank everybody for an unbelievable tour. Unfortunately the title End Of An Era also holds a deeper meaning. The open letter, which was given to Tarja after the show, tells it all. You can read it as follows:


"Dear Tarja,


It`s time to choose whether the story of Nightwish ends here or whether it will still continue an undetermined period of time. We've been working with this creation for 9 years and we are not ready to give up yet. Nightwish is a way of life, something to live for, and we're certain we can`t let it go.


Equally certain is the fact that we cannot go on with you and Marcelo any longer. During the last year something sad happened, which I`ve been going over in my head every single day, morning and night. Your attitude and behavior don`t go with Nightwish anymore. There are characteristics I would never have believed to see in my old dear friend.

People who don`t talk with each other for a year do not belong in the same band.


We are involved in an industry where the business-side of things is a necessary evil and something to worry about all the time. We are also a band which has always done music from the heart, because of friendship and the music itself. The mental satisfaction should always be more important than money! Nightwish is a band, it`s an emotion.


To you, unfortunately, business, money, and things that have nothing to do with those emotions have become much more important. You feel that you have sacrificed yourself and your musical career for Nightwish, rather than thinking what it has given to you. This attitude was clearly shown to me in the two things you said to me in an airplane in Toronto: 'I don`t need Nightwish anymore.' and 'Remember, Tuomas, that I could leave this band at any time, giving you only one day`s warning in advance.' I can`t simply write any more songs for you to sing.


You have said yourself that you are merely a ”guest musician” in Nightwish. Now that visit ends and we will continue Nightwish with a new female vocalist. We're sure this is an equally big relief to you as it is for us. We have all been feeling bad long enough.


You told us that no matter what, the next Nightwish album will be your last one. However, the rest of us want to continue as long as the fire burns. So there's no sense in doing that next album with you, either. The four of us have been going over this situation countless times and we have realized that this is the thing we want to do in life. It´s all we can do. In December 2004, in Germany, you said that you will never tour again for more than two weeks at a time. You also said that we can forget about U.S. and Australia because the fees and the sizes of venues are too small.


In interviews I've mentioned that if Tarja leaves, that would be the end of the band. I understand that people will think this way. Nightwish is, however, a scenery of my soul and I'm not ready to let go because of one person. A person who wants to focus her creativity to somewhere else, a person whose values don`t match mine.


We were never bothered by the fact that you didn`t participate in writing/arranging songs, you never in 9 years came to rehearse the songs with us before going to the studio. Not the fact that while on tour you always wanted to fly, separately from us with your husband. Not the fact that you are an undisputable front image of the band. We accepted and felt OK about everything except greed, underestimating the fans, and breaking promises. It was agreed by the five of us that Nightwish would be the priority in everything that we do during 2004-2005. Still so many things were more important to you. The ultimate example being the already sold-out show in Oslo, which you wanted to cancel because you needed to rehearse for your solo concerts, meet frieds and go to the movies. Those were the words Marcelo used in an e-mail explaining the cancellation. This being just one example of so many. I couldn`t think of a worse way of being selfish and dismissing our fans.


Nightwish is a way of life and a job with many obligations. To each other and to the fans. With you we can`t take care of those duties anymore.


Deep within we don`t know which one of you drove us to this point. Somehow Marcelo has changed you from the lovely girl you were into a diva, who doesn`t think or act the way she used to. You are too sure of your irreplaceableness and status.


It`s obvious that you blame your stress and misery on us four. And you think we don`t respect or listen to you. Belive us; We have always had the uppermost respect towards you as a wonderful vocalist and as a friend. And very often during the past couple of years the plans were made according to your decisions only. You were always the only one who wanted more money from the shows.

This ”compensation and more money from everything” –attitude is the fact that we are most disappointed of!


We wish that from now on you will listen to your heart instead of Marcelo. Cultural differences combined with greed, opportunism and love is a dangerous combination. Do not wither yourself.


This decision is not something we are especially proud of but you gave us no choice. The gap between us is too wide. And the decision is made by us four unanimously. We are beyond the point where things could be settled by talking.


All the best for your life and career,

Tuomas, Emppu, Jukka, Marco

PS. This is an open letter for everybody."

I thought this might be interesting for a lot of people, since Nightwish seems to be a very popular band around these parts.

Yay, now all they need to do is start writing good music.

Originally Posted by CrushedHope

Yay, now all they need to do is start writing good music.

You, sir, are 3v0l!

If you ask me, Oceanborn and Wishmaster are great albums, but they kind of went downhill since then.

Bye bye Nightwish.
They'll have a hard time finding a new singer, even if they find a qualified one, they will go through hell to get him/her accepted by the fans.

And they can't go on with only Marco as singer, he doesn't have what it takes.

Not 3v0l. n3kr0Kvlt.

I don't like their whole ... way of doing the symphonic thing. Therion does it much better.

Nightwish are great, but they're not amazing. They've done some great stuff and some pretty mediocre stuff...the newest album was probably the one with the widest ratio of good to bad songs, and it may be because of the band's difficulties. Let's hope that with a couple of new members, they can regroup and produce something as good as their first few albums.

I'm a sucker for symphonic metal. Heh.

Apparently, she has good creds on the symphonic part of the little merge. At least, that's what I heard. I don't think this is too great of a shame anyway. But I haven't listened to them extensively enough anyways, I suppose. I don't dislike her voice, but I'm not too fond of it either. But if she dosen't reflect their creative direction, which is really the anti-sell direction out that everybody seems to adore, so be it. This should be intresting with a new vocalist though and I'm glad they're going to recruit a female. That sort of lineup is interesting to me for some reason.

Even though I'm not a huge fan of Nightwish, I respect them and I like one or two songs they've made. Sad to see that singer leave, as it will probably make Nightwish less popular.

Well, that's certainly a shocker. So long as their new vocalist has a voice just as gorgeous, I won't mind too much, I guess. As great a singer as Tarja is, I always liked Nightwish for the instrumentation more, anyhow. Marco's got an awesome voice when he gets the chance to chowcase it, too. But that's besides the point.

So long as they keep rockin', I'll remain a fan and keep on lisntening.

The biggest problem now will be finding a singer with as great a voice as Tarja. Sure their music is great too but its her voice that made their songs so much better. It was becuase of her voice that the song "Dead Boy's Poem" is one of my top five favorite songs.

The band played heavier then the singer sung. So this may be for the best, and when someone does it for money and not the art, somethings screwed up and must go.

I love Nightwish and was shocked and sad when I heard this. But, it can't be helped. Let's just wait and see who they'll get to replace her. I'm sure there's a lot of great singers out there who could and want to join the band. (I'd want to, but I can't sing like that. ) Nightwish will live through this. Hope for the best.

I never liked them much but ... they should totally like screw finding a female vocalist, and get Neal Morse in the band so he can make them an amazing progressive metal band =)

Originally Posted by CrushedHope

I never liked them much but ... they should totally like screw finding a female vocalist, and get Neal Morse in the band so he can make them an amazing progressive metal band =)

Or they could go totally Tarot, and just stick with Marco.

... or Nightwish can just break up and Tarot can just kick ass, and the rest of Nightwish can like ... fade away.

Meanwhile, Morse can do a Transatlantic reunion >____< Not that he has anything to do with Nightwish haha.

Originally Posted by CrushedHope

... or Nightwish can just break up and Tarot can just kick ass, and the rest of Nightwish can like ... fade away.

I would have no problem with that. I've been dying to see Tarot at a live show since I got their "Suffer Our Pleasures" album. Marco - Nightwish = Marco + Tarot.

This makes me sad... but they have a damn good reason to do it. It's ironic though, that she's the reason they never toured the US but she's also the reason why I'd want to see them. = (... I hope they find someone just as good or even better. I'm interested to see what will happen next.

Finding someone better than her will be easy, finding someone as good as her ... no problem at all. She was never really a great vocalist.