ABOUT
From left
Tomi Hassinen – Bass
Stephen Baker – Vocals
Marianne Heikkinen – Drums
Mici Ehnqvist – Guitar
Frozen Factory in short..
Sounds Of An Unsound Society
Open eyes in this world will find a dark place where a few powerful people strike fear, breed ignorance and abuse natural resources. This evil divides and weakens our communities. As people who dream of a fair society we are often left wondering if the human race will ever truly stand for humanity and be united? Like us you’re not perfect but you’re cheering for justice and you want to see more positive progress.
Every life story brings hope. When we describe to each other how we really see our lives, both the good and bad aspects, we find things in common despite our differences. Stories are a force for change, spreading ideas and creating action, that’s why powerful people control the media but we can also use this power and there are now more places to listen and be heard than ever before.
Frozen Factory grew up listening to artists such as Alice In Chains, Rage Against The Machine, Iron Maiden, Depeche Mode, Muse and Pink Floyd. We are also influenced by many great voices of today such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Patrisse Cullors and Greta Thunberg. We bring our own stories to life through our personal style of alternative rock. Expect vivid mental imagery as the musical moods shift with the dramatic words about experiences of a troubled world.
Biography..
Frozen Factory starts from a moment of spontaneity in December 2018 as four men and a sound engineer (yes ok he’s a man too) convened in central Finland to celebrate the splendour of a free weekend in a studio. There was no real plan and no expectations laid out on the table, only the rumours of good music penned by Tomi Hassinen, a composer, bass hero and multi-instrumentalist.
Tomi and drummer Eetu Pesu, already bandmates in another project, had enlisted the help of Tomi’s old pal Asa Nyman and online treasure Ozzy Slant to respectively lay down guitars and vocals. With engineer Oskari Viljanen ready to capture the action the guys set about tracking as much as possible and shooting three music videos over the two days with videographer Lauri ‘Läpä’ Koivusalo.
Days past after returning to their homes in the south of Finland and the four weren’t completely sure what they’d created in that enclosure several hours drive up north. Ultimately however, as the results formed into a 3 track single entitled ‘Frozen Factory’, the heart of the project in Tomi and Eetu was energised and they were convinced that their future was as a band. Asa and Ozzy had not been available to continue from this point, so whilst the record was readied for release in March 2019 the two founding
members of Frozen Factory searched for their new bandmates. The release of singles ‘Ruthless’ and ‘Stay Forever’ on YouTube coincided with an online search for a singer which was almost immediately answered by British singer Stephen Baker who heard the tracks and felt inspired.
After a brief meeting at Stephen’s Helsinki home in early April 2019, he and Tomi realised quickly that they were destined to team up. In the following hours and days, waves of productivity flowed between the two and the first demos of new material began to take shape. As a new sound formed, the trio of Tomi, Eetu and Stephen forged plans to make Frozen Factory’s debut album and started recording drums in the late spring. Guitarist Mici, a long time friend of Tomi and motivating character, was added to the picture during the summer.
The band spent the rest of the summer, autumn and winter of 2019 recording tracks for what would become the band’s debut album whilst filming music videos with Läpä when possible. After completing almost all of the tracking for the album, Frozen Factory took to the stage for the first time as a band at Vernissa in Vantaa Finland. That gig was filmed in full and is available to watch here. Two more gigs followed whilst the album tracks were in the hands of a mixing engineer.
The idea was to continue along the same road as the first 3 track release by having the album mixed by someone outside the band, however schedules soon proved difficult. A confident decision was made to hand the album’s tracks over to bassist Tomi and mixing started in earnest in Spring 2020. After the singles ‘Tiresome Times’ and ‘Hammer’ hit streaming services in March and May respectively, the full album ‘Planted Feet’ was released on June 12th 2020.
The album’s release during the Covid-19 pandemic meant that live plans had to wait. Focus had shifted onto longer term plans and writing more music. During the summer it became clear that Eetu was no longer able to continue in the band. Remaining good friends we agreed to look for a new drummer. The band soon found Marianne Heikkinen from a video she had posted online and it was immediately clear that we needed to team up. Marianne was officially announced into the band in July and work began on arranging live dates and starting pre-production for album two.
To be continued…