Marco Hietala


Marko Tapani "Marco" Hietala is a Finnish heavy metal vocalist, bassist and songwriter. Internationally, he is most known as the current bassist, male vocalist and secondary composer to Tuomas Holopainen, of the symphonic metal band Nightwish. He is also the vocalist and bassist as well as composer and lyricist for the heavy metal band Tarot.
He is also a member of the supergroup Northern Kings, and portrayed one of the main characters in Ayreon's 2013 album The Theory of Everything.

Biography

Marco Hietala was born in Tervo, and is the youngest child of the Hietala family. Hietala lived in Tervo until the age of 15, after which he moved to Kuopio to study classical guitar, vocals and musical theory in high school. In 1984, he and his brother, Zachary Hietala, formed heavy metal band Tarot under the name Purgatory. In 1986, Tarot received a deal for their first album and went on tour. Before becoming a full-time musician, he worked as a live and studio sound engineer.
Hietala joined Nightwish in 2001 when Tuomas Holopainen and the band's manager called him and said that there would be a place in the band for a vocalist and a bass player. Century Child was his first Nightwish album, following the departure of previous bassist Sami Vänskä. He was a prominent guest musician in Delain, a project involving many members of the gothic and symphonic metal community. He also participated in the recording of Invitation, by Altaria, providing backing vocals. Hietala has also been part of the bands Sinergy and Northern Kings.
Upon his arrival to Nightwish, several songs were written to contain duets with then Nightwish vocalist Tarja Turunen, allowing songwriter and band leader Tuomas Holopainen to take advantage of Hietala's distinctive raucous voice to add a new dimension to the band. A famous example is Nightwish's cover of "The Phantom of the Opera," from the album "Century Child."
During Nightwish's shows, Turunen would take a break halfway through the set. Before Hietala joined the band, the band would perform an instrumental song during this time. After Hietala joined the band, they performed covers of well-known songs, with Hietala singing the lead vocal part in this break. The band has performed Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train", W.A.S.P.'s "Wild Child", Dio's "Don't Talk to Strangers", Megadeth's "Symphony of Destruction" and Pink Floyd's "High Hopes". Some of these songs have been put up for sale as well on various Nightwish album releases. Following Turunen's departure from Nightwish, Hietala was much more involved with the production of Dark Passion Play, which was released in September 2007. He sang some songs, completely, and wrote the music for the song "The Islander", on which he also plays acoustic guitar instead of bass. Hietala is also credited alongside Holopainen for co-writing the song "The Crow, the Owl and the Dove" from Nightwish's 2011 album, Imaginaerum.
In Delain, Hietala played bass for the album Lucidity and was also the main male vocalist on the album with featured vocals on the song The Gathering. He is also featured as vocalist in two of the songs on Delain's second album April Rain and two songs from Delain's fourth album The Human Contradiction.
In March 2009, Hietala joined the band Sapattivuosi. They cover Black Sabbath songs in Finnish. In this band, however, Hietala does not play bass; he only performs vocals.
On 1 April 2010 it was said that Hietala would leave the band to concentrate on a choir career. This was identified as an April Fool's joke, but was also a reference to his participation in Kuorosota in 2010. Hietala was the master of the Kuopio choir in the program's second season. He came second in the contest, losing in the finals to the Joensuu choir, headed by pop rock singer Ilkka Alanko. Tarot's single "I Walk Forever," from the Gravity of Light album, was performed for the first time by Hietala, Tommi "Tuple" Salmela and the Kuopio choir during Kuorosota 2010; other songs performed included "The Phantom of the Opera," which Hietala has covered with Nightwish as well.
In June 2010, Hietala joined the heavy metal supergroup HAIL! on two occasions, performing Black Sabbath's Neon Knights with Ripper Owens, Andreas Kisser, James LoMenzo and Paul Bostaph at two of their shows in Finland.
On 14 August 2013 Hietala was the first singer to be confirmed by Arjen Lucassen to guest on Ayreon's new album The Theory of Everything.
Hietala released his first solo album Mustan sydämen rovio in May 2019. He released the album under his birthname Marko Hietala and will be using the name also in his other projects in the future. Hietala has described his solo material as "hard prog". An English version of the album, titled Pyre of the Black Heart, followed in January 2020. Joining him on the albums are drummer Anssi Nykänen, keyboardist Vili Ollila and guitarist Tuomas Wäinölä with whom he also toured in Finland in the summer and autum of 2019. The band will embark on a European tour in February 2020.

Equipment

Hietala uses Warwick bass guitars, particularly the Infinity NT and Vampyre NT 4-string models tuned D Standard and Drop C. He also owns a Warwick Buzzard JE with a rusty finish equipped with a detuner, and a Kramer bass. He uses Warwick's Hellborg amplifier and cabs. After joining Nightwish he used a SansAmp GT2 distortion pedal for some time. ¨¨
Hietala also uses a custom made Warwick/Framus doubleneck bass/electric guitar, based on the Warwick Infinity.
From Century Child until the End of an Era Hietala used an Infinity almost exclusively for live and studio applications. Later, the Vampyre became his axe of choice. The first time he can be seen with a Vampyre is the Bye Bye Beautiful music video. From the Imaginaerum tour going forward Buzzard became his preferred brand, but occasionally he still can be seen with an Infinity.

Influences

Hietala has stated that the biggest influence on him as a bassist is Geezer Butler and Bob Daisley, while Ronnie James Dio and Rob Halford are his biggest influence as a vocalist. He has also stated that he listens to wide array of music ranging from "really sensitive stuff to a lot of really hard stuff", saying that he "tend to soak up almost everything" which "somehow ends up being used" when he writes his own music.

Personal life

Hietala has two children with his ex-wife Manki, twin boys Antto and Miro. He and his family currently live in Kuopio, Finland. When he is not touring, he enjoys reading books, playing video games, and watching movies. He especially likes fantasy, horror and science fiction books. In 2016, a Finnish newspaper reported that Hietala had filed for divorce. In August 2018 he married Camila Cavalcanti

Discography

Nightwish

Northern Kings

1990

Amorphis