The Appeal of Seventeenth-Century Famines for Contemporary Metal Bands: A Comparison Between Hiidenhauta's 1695 (2018) and Insomnium's Anno 1696 (2023)

Abstract

Abstract The Great Finnish Famine of 1695–1697 was one of the worst famines in European history; it claimed the lives of a fourth to a third of the Finnish people in one year. Unlike the better-known Irish Famine, the Great Finnish Famine remains largely unknown outside of Finland. It was a catastrophic episode in Finnish history and has been the inspiration for Finnish metal bands: Hiidenhauta's 2018 album 1695 and Insomnium's 2023 album Anno 1696. Both albums take the famine as their main theme but do so in different ways. Anno 1696 further incorporates witch hunts that took place in the seventeenth century. This article explores and compares how historical events are depicted in the bands’ music and how their lyrical themes fit into a wider metal scene. Hiidenhauta favors an approach to historic events based on a small selection of (academic) sources. In contrast, Insomnium takes a freer attitude toward source material, incorporating aspects found in other metal lyrics or in popular culture more generally. The latter approach is termed “metallization,” in which a band embellishes historic narratives by including aspects often found in metal music lyrics, such as hypermasculinity, violence, and gore. The analysis suggests that the different approaches by the bands are connected to the languages in which the bands sing: Hiidenhauta sings in Finnish whereas Insomnium uses English.