Goth ‘n’ Roll pioneers THE 69 EYES have been haunting stages all over the world for 33 years and have become a truly immortal part of the dark rock/metal scene. Widely known as the Helsinki Vampires, the quintet gained several platinum albums with ‘Blessed Be’ and ‘Paris Kills’ and, as well as reaching #1 on both the album and singles charts in their home country, also plunged the world into a sinful cosmos of love, death and melancholy, while outliving any other band emerging from the goth hype of the early 2000s.
By developing their sound further into sleaze rock on ‘Devils’ (2004) and ‘Angels’ (2007) and not shying away from pitch black Elvis allusions in singer Jyrki 69’s dark voice and unique onstage dance moves, the band has established a worldwide following. Over the course of over three decades, the band has toured relentlessly throughout Europe, America, Asia and Australia and released 12 full-length studio albums.

Today, THE 69 EYES announce their signing to Atomic Fire Records (worldwide excluding Finland). Get your vampire teeth sharpened as news songs and tours are in the horizon!

Singer Jyrki 69 comments this unholy new alliance:
”We are back in a full swing!! Our paths here in Helsinki crossed with our old A&R guy Gabi Hakanen who was with us when we released our highest selling albums “Devils” (2005) and “Angels” (2007), so as he heard our new demos, we sort of just continued like right after last time. So he got us on his label’s studio right away now at Vallila Music House (Hanoi Rocks’ Sami Yaffa, Ville Valo & The Agents etc). Simultaneously we also hooked up with the brand new Atomic Fire Records label which has our classic former Nuclear Blast dream team there, so this ”new” and fresh beginning for THE 69 EYES sounds like a dream, really! New big-time ROCKING music comes out very soon!”

CEO and A&R Markus Wosgien adds:
„We are more than happy to welcome our beloved Helsinki Vampires, the most unique and by far coolest Gothic band in hell and on earth. We worked together for more than ten years and their latest four studio albums, and will continue now, reunited under the Atomic Fire banner. This feels like coming home to all of us and we are honored to continue our long term relationship.“

Not letting the grass grow. Hands off Gretel are about to release a new EP.  Heres the new video for ‘Milk’.

second out round two.  Our favourite Black metal legends Midnight. ‘Fucking Speed And Darkness’. Ave it!

The brand new 69 Eyes video folks? of course.

As an extra treat, this cold and damp morning here’s the brand new video from those mysterious garage punks Dboy. now on yer way

If you were to cross members of Nekromantix, The Brains, Stellar Corpses, and Rezurex! You’d get a batty mix of Psychobilly punk rock and roll so it’s a bit of luck that just that has waled into the ether and dropped onto RPM HQ. With special guest slots form the likes of Jyrki 69 of The 69 Eyes and Danny B. Harvey! It’s fair to say I was sitting up waiting for the air to be filled with the sound of some pretty heady rock and roll. It’s fair to say I wasn’t disappointed.

As I scan the cover I notice a few surprises in the choice of covers ranging from The Damned and some pretty famouse pop tunes given a good seeing to. With fifteen original tracks and five psychobilly-infused covers including their renditions of Danzig (“Mother”), the king of surf Dick Dale (“Misirlou”), The Damned (“Love Song”), Gloria Jones (“Tainted Love”), Portugal. The Man (“Feel It Still”), and Panic! At The Disco “Say Amen” (Saturday Night). To be fair ‘Tainted Love’ has previously been given the Psychobilly treatment from Living End and this is a very similar version. also doing Danzig isn’t too much of a stretch either seeing as both vocals are very similar.  The one that really intrigued me was them taking on the mighty Damned and ‘Love Song’ and to be fair it’s such a monumental tune its never going to touch the original but as far as interpretations go this is decent.  Great crunchy guitar with the drums rolling through like a steam train and whilst they remain fairly faithful its a great attempt and Damned fan needn’t look away. As far as ‘Mother’ goes this is cool as I’m not a huge Danzig fan and I guess it would have been too easy to pick a Misfits tune so this is good and once it breaks open I love it.

 

As for the original tunes I love the groove they get into on ‘Graveyard Girl’ and the guest vocalist work of Jyrki is suitably Gothic and dark How cool would it be if he took a bit of this direction back to 69 Eyes? to be fair twenty tracks is a lot of music to work your way through and whilst the heart is always Rockabilly there is enough variety here and with the inclusion of the covers breaks up the record.  Saying that it could have been two albums six months apart but hey what do I know?

If you want a bunch of songs to pick through to try before you buy then look no further than ’50s inspired ‘She Wolf’ or the melodic ‘We Own The Night’ which is like one of the best songs the Misfits never got hold of. ‘Getaway Car’ is poptastic from the acoustic guitars it’s like a modern ‘Leader Of The Pack’ and could easily sell huge in the American alternative market and crossover. ‘The Man’ follows suit I love the dripping reverb on that guitar lick an interesting cover, to say the least.

Fans of the other bands these guys are in will be interested in checking this out as will rockabilly rebels and fans of quality Rock and Roll out looking for a whole lot of music for your money and excellent tunes they are too.  Pick it up!

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Author: Dom Daley