Valse Triste – Tervemenoa EP

Valse Triste, named after Finnish late Romantic composer Jean Sibelius’s short orchestral masterpiece, formed in 1983 in the small town of Kauhajoki, right as bands like Kaaos, Terveet Kädet, and Riistetyt were cementing the country’s hardcore myth and lore. Unlike many contemporaries, the group didn’t release anything until cassette recordings appeared in 1988-’89. Their first vinyl didn’t surface until 1990, yet through the 1990s they steadily carved a schedule of live shows, touring and releases.

When Valse Triste sent me their latest record for review in the beginning of 2025 I tried to recall my own first contact with the band. Then it clicked. It was a late-’90s cassette from the Bulgarian label AON compiling Valse Triste’s early recordings, with a xeroxed sleeve showing a Finnish guy holding a portrait of Stalin. Later, I caught up with the group’s more recent work, particularly 2006’s furious Madon Luku, whose twenty tracks scorched through half an hour of intense hardcore punk attack.

Valse Triste’s history, however, has been rough all along. According to what I’ve read about them, frontman Wasky broke his neck on stage in 2001. The prognosis was grim, but he recovered. Several former members, however, have since passed away, yet Valse Triste keep honoring their legacy, pushing what they wryly refer to as agricore.

Today Valse Triste pairs long-time vocalists Wasky and Mikko with guitarist Koiramäki and two Abnormi members Antti (bass) and Ville (drums). Their latest EP, Tervemenoa, probably the fifteenth seven-inch in their catalogue, is another DIY masterpiece from a band who simply refuse to give up.

The first four cuts alternate between explosive, high-speed thrashing and mid-tempo USHC flair, with a dual-vocal attack that’s all over the place. Side B opens with the EP’s most accessible tune, a track whose catchy, almost California-punk melody snakes through twisted guitar lines, and ends with “Hävitys”, a slower, horror-infused post-hardcore/post-punk track that actually serves as the pinnacle of the entire record. Croaking frogs, rising mist, and an owl’s stare thicken dread.

This eerie imagery isn’t limited to the music either, as each song unravels its own cryptic anti-hero narrative. And though the insert is solely in Finnish, the band has kindly emailed me the English translations.

I’ll try to summarize what I think are some of the highlights:

• “Olen Neurokirurgi” (I Am a Neurosurgeon) follows a brain surgeon who loses his own cerebral cortex, trading “mystical insight” like cheap merchandise.
• “Tervetuloa (Ole kuin kotonasi)” (Welcome, Make Yourself Comfortable) turns Finnish small-town politeness and hospitality lethal; the cyanide’s mixed before the guest arrives.
• “Ajantappaja” (Time Killer) escalates from seconds to eternity in eight hammer-blows, hinting that even total rebellion against time is merely “killing time.”
• “Kivi, Paperi, Sakset” (Rock Paper Scissors) reframes the hand-game as a catalogue of self-harm, each verse mirroring the last to underline the mechanical futility.
• “Maailmanloppu toistaa itseään” (The End of the World Repeats Itself) is a tongue-in-cheek apocalypse endlessly rescheduled by bureaucrats that brings to mind the Hitchhiker’s Guide’s absurdism.
• “Hävitys” (Disposal) drags us into Nordic folk-horror: a lone figure drags a sack through swampy dusk until bog and burden consume one another. The song can be read as guilt literalized: what you try to bury pulls you down.

Six songs, six absurdist tragedies: dense, bleak, and laced with that infamous Finnish irony. Though these Finns have developed their own style over the years, they remind me of Rudimentary Peni in both their sonic explorations and lyrical macabre. I’m sure Tervemenoa won’t charm everyone the same way, but for those attuned to sick and twisted tunes, it’s another underground gem—and proof that their agricore still ploughs fertile soil.