Nuclear Blast Responds to Wintersun’s Jari Mäenpää

Well, I think it’s safe to say that relations between Wintersun and their label, Nuclear Blast, are now, um, strained.

Yesterday, Wintersun founder/multi-instrumentalist Jari Mäenpää ostensibly blamed NB for the ongoing delay of the release of Time II, the band’s heavily-anticipated third album, which was supposed to be released in 2013, and which, alas, is still incomplete. In short: Mäenpää feels that he needs his own studio to complete the record, and while fans have offered to help pay for said studio via crowdfunding, Mäenpää claims that Nuclear Blast won’t allow him to go that route: “[Nuclear Blast] see the crowd funding as a threat to their business,” Mäenpää wrote on Facebook, “and they would rather see Wintersun dead, than me doing a crowd funding [campaign].”

This, in turn, led some fans to band together and launch a petition demanding that Nuclear Blast “Properly support Wintersun in allowing them to complete Time II.” As of this writing, the petition has more than 1,300 supporters, which I guess was enough to get NB’s attention and make them feel like they needed to respond to this whole brouhaha. ‘Cause the label’s European branch posted this response on Facebook earlier this morning:

Hey everyone,

We are aware of Jari’s recent statement on his current situation and business experiences with Nuclear Blast regarding the most anticipated “TIME II” album. We highly appreciate the strong reactions this statement has caused in the metal community as it once more shows how much people care about their fellow metal heads and especially the musicians that go through many hardships to give us what we all enjoy the most: A good blast of METAL

We also have always been metal fans at heart and we still strive for the same goal we have since the formation of Nuclear Blast 27 years ago: To support our artists in the best way possible and to get the music everybody deserves out to our fans worldwide.

This being said the business side of music can often be rough and especially with a project as extensive as the TIME series compromises have to be found to make an album both beautiful and feasible to all parties involved – the musicians, the fans and the label. This process includes many things that should not be discussed in public as debates sometimes get heated and misunderstandings occur, but we take great pride in the relationship with our artists until this day.

So be assured that we all love Wintersun as much as you do – nobody at Nuclear Blast wants to see them gone and we are working together with Jari and his management to find the optimal solution for his concerns.

Stay true,
Nuclear Blast

So I guess we’ll see what happens next. I seriously doubt Time II is coming out in 2014… fingers crossed, maybe 2015? Technically speaking, as long as it comes out before 2020, the band will have beaten their own previous record for time lapses between releases. So, they’ve got that going for them, which is nice.

Thanks: Daniel H.