I don't need to be the singer of Nightwish 24/7 when I'm not touring or when I want to go to the supermarket in my comfy pants.
— Floor Jansen
Now, when you've been in the band for three years, you get used to the position, in a sense. I don't think about it every day like, 'Oh my God, I'm the singer of Nightwish!'
I wasn't personally that familiar with the Classic Rock bands. That is where Jorn Viggo came in: he played me tons of that stuff - Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, plus a lot of bands with cool songs, riffs, vocals, etc. We really listened to tons of music.
When a pregnancy begins, those cells begin their mitosis, and during the first three months, everything from limbs to organs to the brain and neurological system is being developed, and I never realized that would consume so much energy: it drains every bit of energy you have, and your hormonal status is changed dramatically!
There's only so much planning you can do when it comes to pregnancies, y'know.
Everybody meets a lot of idiots in their line of work, not just in music.
No... I don't like Slayer.
But not to have music would be unnatural to me.
When I have the opportunity to meet fans that support me, I always try to do so.
I joined a metal band with only guys when I was 17.
I agree that it's a macho world, metal, but it's also a very, very social world, where people are loving music in respect for one another, female or male.
I never really thought of myself as somebody to move abroad. It just came on my path.
I have creative energy in me that needs to come out one way or another, but that's where Revamp comes in.
You always speak the language you hear most.
It's good to reflect on life and take a step back and sit and relax and do something else.
I'm very happy with what I can bring into Nightwish, but I will probably want to keep on writing things. And that can take many forms as well.
The most metal? Some would say Slayer, but I think they're a dreadful band. Unbelievably boring. Terrible. Apparently it's not metal to say that, but it's a personal opinion.
Living in Finland as a singer of Nightwish, I'm used to having people around me all the time that know who I am. In the Netherlands, people never really knew or cared or whatever.
Not everyone is as equally as adventurous as me. I get that.
If you are waiting for this thing that might happen tomorrow, it probably will never happen. You need to activate it now! No one else is going to do it for you, and ten years are going to go by before you even know it.
I didn't think of my pregnancy as a handicap for one minute, but having said that, I think the only big challenge was being so tired all the time.
People think that when they come up to me, screaming things into my ear, that I will respond according to what they want. I'll turn around and smile and take the photo. But I'm not somebody's marionette.
I do know I will enjoy family life. What I've seen from moms, or heard stories from people who became a parent, it's such a consuming thing; it's such a wonderful thing. I consider it an extreme luxury to have that time and to not have to do anything else, and just be with my kid.
We are all entitled to our own opinion.
Unfortunately, life unfolds as it does, and you can't do everything at the same time, and you can't do some things if you can't spend the time.
I am a humble person.
For me, I'm way more at home in heavy metal than I am in classical music.
My Finnish, it never really happened, but I'm good in Swedish.
Sometimes, I would love to record a super-quiet album, but for some reason, I never really got to that because my heart lies with the heavy stuff.
When you used to be able to express yourself as an adult in your own language, or as I can do in English, for instance, it's sometimes hard to switch back to very simple talking, like I am forced to do in Finnish. So a real conversation, when I really wanna tell something, I can't do it in Finnish.
I might move to Finland, at least for a while, to learn the language a bit better, 'cause you don't learn any language better than in the country itself.
I think every physiotherapist will tell you that it's not a very good idea, and there are many musicians in the metal scene who have suffered severe damage - like, the guitar player from Iced Earth, Jon Schaffer, had severe neck problems due to headbanging.
The success of Revamp is clear. We've sold a lot of albums, we've done very good tours, and wherever we play, we get a very positive response, and that's something that would be very nice to keep.
There is a project that I did back in 2008 with a Norwegian guitar player, Jorn Viggo Lofstad, who plays in Pagan's Mind. We wrote a rock album, and we never released it.
I find the opera part in 'The Greatest Show on Earth' challenging.
Making an album is always a puzzle: you start by seeing a lot of different pieces, and they all need to come together into one picture.
To be honest, I deliberately tend not to post things like 'I'm having a relationship' or where I live. I'm a bit reluctant to keep this kind of information up to date because people are inclined to see things like that as statements, and I rather keep a little bit of privacy, if possible at all.
I have been fortunate enough to see many places of this earth and most certainly a lot of art, but I would be more interested to see more of the natural wonders of the world.
The whole social media thing is ridiculous. Everybody gets to say what they want all the time. That's fine in theory, but it's not civilised. Imagine going into a bar, and everybody in that bar is talking like people do online. They'd just get their teeth punched in.
Why should we bother making a super high-quality, expensive album if nobody is going to pay for it anyway and will just download it for free as an MP3 that has no depth whatsoever because of the small file size?
Thinking Slayer's music is not my thing doesn't mean I don't respect the band for what they are and what they've done. I just won't play it. As I can imagine they won't listen to mine either, for that matter.
Meeting fans and taking pictures is an extra I would like to offer when time and energy allow it. It's not something a fan can presume to have.
I had a general burnout: I got extremely tired; I couldn't do anything anymore. I canceled tours; I cancelled everything in my life. For a year and a half, I was completely sick; I couldn't do anything. So yeah, I wanted to write about it in my lyrics. 'Anatomy Of A Nervous Breakdown' is really about that, the inspiration behind it.
I've studied classical singing, but not to a great extent.
I tried to learn the Finnish language, which is really, really, really hard, and I realized that if I want to really learn it, I need to move to Finland.
Both the guys in Nightwish and I have experiences with previous band breakups and all emotions that come with it. It's almost like dating.
My Finnish is... I'm sounding like a three-year-old, at my best. It's super hard to really have a conversation, unfortunately. I know a lot of words, and so reading signs and stuff is becoming better, or going to a supermarket. But some specific words, of course, you don't get in your first year.
I'm studying Finnish, and it's one of the five most difficult languages in the world. And the more I learn, the more I realize that's definitely true.
When After Forever stopped, I didn't want to first find a band, then see if I could write with them, figure that whole thing out, then record an album. Instead, I worked with people I knew would be good songwriters out of an idea how I thought it would sound like.
I cannot work on a Revamp album when I tour with Nightwish. And I cannot do any Nightwish stuff when I'm touring with Revamp.
