ULTIMATIUM – interview

Introduce your band, and describe your latest release:
We’re Ultimatium, progpower band from Finland. We’ve been founded by keyboardist Matti Pulkkinen, 2001, in small town called Suomussalmi.

Our latest release is progpower opera, Virtuality, featuring five lead vocalists in story about virtual world gaming in near future setting.

What’s the hardest part about being a band in this day and age?

That you’d have to constantly post something on social medias. That does not really not fit our style. We rarely see each others live and when we do, we’re busy doing something else than documenting us on social media

When did you realise that your project had the potential to be much more than just a fun idea?

It was our second demo, at that time the band still was my personal solo project, but thanks to killer vocals by Jarkko Ahola, one of the songs, although poorly produced and mixed, by me, started gaining a lot of listeners on mp3.com etc. On third demo, which was sang by JT Partanen, the success resulted us gaining record deal proposals, and that was in 2003, only two ears after founding this band, so quite a speedy start…

Tell us about your latest release, why should we check it out?

It’s unique combination of Finnish power metal, symphonic and operatic elements and progressive metal. If you’re into Ayreon and Avantasia and such or in general like a story based theme albums, this is definitely worth checking out.

How does a song typically come together for you?

I usually start playing keyboards, to see if some riffs would come out and if so, I’ll then start working on them on computer, composing the song using midi & virtual instruments. Sometimes I might have idea already in my mind and skip the keyboard-part completely

How would you describe your sound to an unfamiliar reader?

We have rich and natural sound, we try not to overproduce ourselves and try to sound unique. Keyboard sounds on last and future albums take take influence on retro gaming, especially c64 and stuff.

What do you want listeners to take away from listening to your band?

I hope they feel excited, happy and calm. Also, hopeful for the future.

Where would you really like to tour that you haven’t done so yet, and why?

We’re not doing live shows anymore, so we can focus on creating absolutely epic albums without worrying how it’s gonna sound live

How would you say that the sound of your band has progressed over the years?

I think we have definitely found our style during the years, evolved from carbon-copy-stratovarius to something more complex and unique.

How excited are you for 2024, and what can fans expect from you?

I hope they can expect new album from us. Can’t promise for sure, though. At least they can expect new video coming out around mid-February