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Nothing To Say Stratovarius Timo
Tolkki - guitars
1982 : Stratovarius is founded by drummer Tuomo Lassila in Helsinki, playing Heavy Rock influenced by Black Sabbath, doing the usual gigs and demos. 1983-1986 : Guitarist Steffan Strählman leaves Stratovarius and Tuomo convinces Timo Tolkki, who so far has played guitar with Roadblock, to join in and John Vilhervä is substituted by Jyrki Lentonen on bass. Due to the new line-up the musical style changes dramatically. Particularly Timo Tolkki adds influences all the way from classical music to Rainbow. 1987 : Stratovarius realize that Tuomo has problems singing their new style of music and from here on Timo Tolkki is singing. Once again demos are demos are being recorded (including the songs "Fright Night", "Future Shock" and "Fire Dance Suite", which will be released later on Timo Tolkki´s solo album). 1988 : CBS Finland signs the band and releases their first single "Future Shock". 1989 : The debut album "Fright Night" is released and the band extensively tours Finland. While in the middle of preparing for their second album they get dropped by CBS because the new A&R doesn't see any future for Stratovarius. 1989-1992 : Stratovarius keeps working at new songs and have to get a loan to record their new album "Stratovarius". Jyrki Lentonen leaves the band to be replaced by Antti Ikonen at keyboards. Timo Tolkki plays bass even though the record credits Jari Behm. The album is released by the small Finish independent label Bluelight Records and is now a collector's item, as only 1000 copies were pressed. The album is sent to lots of European companies and finally the band is signed to Shark Records, who re-released the album with a new cover and the title "Twilight Time". In 1992 "Twilight Time" turns out to be the best selling import album in Japan (second place: AC/DC-Live). 1993 : The band records the songs for their new album in various studios and towards the end of the recording Jari Kainulainen joins Stratovarius on bass and records the last 5 songs of the album. All other bass parts are played by Timo Tolkki. 1994 : "Dreamspace" is released by T&T Records and for the first time Stratovarius tours Japan. After the tour Timo Tolkki decides that they need a new vocalist. They run advertisements in Finnish newspapers and come across Timo Kotipelto. At that time the songs for the next album "Fourth Dimension" have already been written. 1995 : "Fourth Dimension" is released and proves to be a great step in the right direction. Stratovarius tours Europe and once again Japan. During this tour they discover, however, that the chemistry within the band isn't right any more. Stratovarius are split into two opposing fractions. Consequently, both drummer Tuomo Lassila and keyboarder Antti Ikonen leave the band right after the tour and Timo Tolkki decides to ask Jens Johansson (Dio and Yngwie Malmsteen) and Jörg Michael (Running Wild) to join the band. After having heard the demos for the upcoming album "Episode" both of them agree and the band signed a new world wide record deal with Modern Music, Germany.
1996 : After four month in the studio "Episode" is released and for the first time choirs and a symphonic orchestra is introduced to Stratovarius music. The album is a great success for the band with a place in the Finnish top 20 for 8 weeks and in Japan it reaches number 12 on the Orikon Charts. Once again Stratovarius tours Europe and Japan and then starts recording their 6th album "Visions".
1997 : "Visions" was released in April and is the continuation of their "Episode" album with the title song (10 minutes playing time) being the culmination. "Visions" has reached chart entries in five European countries, in Japan and brought the band up to gold status level in Finland. Stratovarius toured Europe, South America, Japan, and was booked on the biggest metal festivals all around. Finally it sums it up to more than 100 shows promoting the "Visions" album . The singles "Black Diamond" and "Kiss of Judas" both promoted with video clips became biggest hits of the band so far and will be part of their live performances for a long time. The band, and the members individually, reliably win readers and listeners polls did it all over the world again. In Korea, a ballad of the "Episode" album ("Forever") became a huge countrywide hit after being used in a very popular Korean daytime soap opera.
1998 : The double live album "Visions of Europe-Live" recorded in Milan / Italy and Athens / Greece were released and could convince the audience by the ecstatic mood, which got caught during the live shows. The album entered the Finnish charts for 8 weeks with peaking on position no. 6. Immediately after that Timo Tolkki and his band mates went to start the recordings of the new single while the "Visions" album reached gold status in Finland. In summer 1998 the single "SOS" was released. The title track "Save Our Souls" as well as the speed metal killer "No Turning Back" show an impressive power as well as an unbelievably dynamical and the emotional ballad "Years Go By" brings you straight into the right mood. Covering the Scorpions track "Blackout" they also show up with the experimental side of their creativity. And they ruled. A real sweety for each fan as that track did not appear on the forthcoming album, which was released in October 1998. The album called "Destiny" hit the charts all over Europe and Japan right after the release. But also the success in South America lifts the band in the charts in Brazil and Argentina. Highest chart entry was reached in Finland where the band ranked on Nr.1 for 4 weeks and stayed in the Top Ten for six month. The following tour started November and brought the band through Finland and Japan already before Christmas.
1999 : The "Destiny World Tour" continued until the beginning of April through more than 20 countries ended in Helsinki / Finland where the band celebrated their second gold achievement with a legendary club show in "Tavastia Clubbi". The tour gave the band a chance to discover new countries like Portugal, Sweden, Norway or Chile and they found sold out shows all round up to 5000 people. During the summer the band played selected festivals mainly in Finland, Spain and Italy and ended up performing their "Destiny tour" in front of more than 250.000 people. After signing to the Continental Concerts management in 1998 the band signed a brand new record deal with JVC in Japan, Nothing to Say (N.T.S) in France and Nuclear Blast (Germany) for the rest of the world. This years fall brought the band back to the rehearsal room where they start working on they upcoming album. Release is planned for the 25th of February . The world tour in support of the record is expected to start on March 24, 2000 and is at present planned to go through Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, the UK, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Japan, Korea, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Mexico, USA and is already booked until October 2000.
The band has had its own "fan" web site (at http://www.stratovarius.com) since 1996 with over 360.000 hits.
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