The Odorants
Encyclopedia
Biography
The Odorants were formed in 1995 when Jaska went to high school in NurmoNurmo
Nurmo is a former municipality of Finland. It was consolidated, together with Ylistaro to Seinäjoki in 1 January 2009.It is located in the province of Western Finland and is part of the Southern Ostrobothnia region. The municipality had a population of 12,378 and covered an area of of which is...
where he met Anssi and Rami. Jaska had a friend called Murkku in Seinäjoki
Seinäjoki
Seinäjoki is a city located in Southern Ostrobothnia, Finland. Seinäjoki originated around the Östermyra bruk iron and gunpowder factories founded in 1798. Seinäjoki became a municipality in 1868, market town in 1931 and town in 1960...
and the four of them quickly formed the band. Rami and Anssi could already play their instruments but the other two had no experience. Murkku, being somewhat fluent in English, became the lead singer and bassist with Jaska assigned the drumkit.
The band made their first demo in 1996 under the name "Butt First" featuring their first song "Meat Means Burger". Soon afterwards the Canadian DIY label United Records
United Records
For "United Records", see United Records United Records was in business from July 1951 to December 1957. It was operated by Chicago businessman Leonard Allen, initially in collaboration with Lew Simpkins...
signed the band and included the song "Stay Away" on their compilation "United We Stand Vol. 1" (1997). One condition of this was the band changing its name, which was when they became The Odorants.
Their first EP, "Tales From The Underground", was released in 1998 and the opening track "Not Over You" received national radio airplay. In 1999 United Records closed down, cancelling a planned Odorants tour in Canada & the northern US. Their second EP,"2.", was self-released in June 1999 with Anssi taking over from Murkku as lead singer. After this the band were inactive for a while, with Murkku moving to Helsinki, Jaska to Imatra and Rami to Tampere.
Since 2001 The Odorants were featured on the Finnish TV stations MoonTV
MoonTV
MoonTV was a free Finnish cable network channel. It started off as a channel for programmes about computer and video games but later grew into a channel covering several areas of youth culture. In its prime it was the first interactive TV channel in the world. At its best MoonTV could reach 1.3...
and Nelonen
Nelonen
Nelonen is a Finnish commercial TV channel. It started out as Helsinki's local television channel PTV in 1989 on the HTV cable network, which name was changed first to PTV4 and then to Nelonen. It started on June 1, 1997. Nelonen, in Finnish, means the glyph of the number four. The channel is...
in the Jackass-style series "Extreme Duudsonit", which is where their early recordings are mostly known from. Their third EP, "Sing When You Are Copulating" was released in the same year by The Odorants own record label Mörkö Records. 500 copies were pressed which quickly sold out.
In 2002 the band got their first major recording deal with BMG
BMG
Bertelsmann Music Group, , was a division of Bertelsmann before its completion of sale of the majority of its assets to Japan's Sony Corporation of America on October 1, 2008. It was established in 1987 to combine the music label activities of Bertelsmann...
Finland. Their major label debut "Beat The Odorants" was released March 3rd, 2003. They also released two singles on BMG, "This Night" and "Late Night Call", the latter of which got some commercial radio play. Jaska, being an award winning movie director, directed the video for "This Night" and Rami animated the video for "Late Night Call". Their videos were shown on MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
but the band were later dropped by BMG.
Discography
- 1996 - Butt First (demo), United Records
- 1998 - Tales From The Underground (EP), Self-released
- 1999 - 2. (EP), Self-released
- 2001 - Sing When You Are Copulating (EP), Mörkö Records
- 2003 - Beat The Odorants, (album), BMG
- 2003 - This Night (single), BMG
- 2003 - Late Night Call (single), BMG
- 2007 - Counting Wolves (album), Moby Disc