Tapahtumatehdas, Hyvinkää, November 7th, 2026
I have to fully admit that I overdosed on folk metal in the 2010s and really fell out of the scene for a while. But, when Kallomäki—a band I saw once when I was selling merch at the Maaliskuu Musta Messu a few years ago and thought were one of the best acts of the event—decided to both bring on Lost in Grey’s Anne Lil Rajala and throw a little festival, I put on my merch seller’s shoes again. I wasn’t originally planning to do any writing, but I really enjoyed a few of the bands, so I figured I’d throw some words of recommendation out there into the void!
Of note, I was suffering from a pretty severe flare up of my chronic pain, so I had to bail out a bit early and was thus only present for Nest, Kallomäki, and Sattue, missing out on Azaghal and Vilding.
First of all, I want to give a shout-out to the venue, the Hyvinkää Event Factory, aka Tapahtumatehdas. I’ve never been there before, but I was very pleased by the stone-walled atmosphere and honestly, the sound balance. For a bar venue where the bar is taking up most of the center of the room, I was pleasantly surprised by the sound quality. I was stationed near the entrance and I could hear everything clearly. Plus, bonus for the mood-appropriate music that played in between the sets.
Another cool thing? They had a local bone merchant, Pakana Puoti, present, which was the perfect sort of thing to include for the type of event. She had basic bones and skulls, as well as some interesting taxidermized art on display, for surprisingly reasonable prices.
The first act was Nest, aka Alask Tolonen, was a really pleasant surprise. Having only a vague memory of Kallomäki being one of the most melodic acts at a black metal festival, and recognizing Azaghal as a black metal band, I expected a lot more extreme metal on the menu, but Nest was really beautiful, atmospheric kantele music with some backing drums or other appropriate atmospheric ambience. I appreciated the tunic and leather outfit as well—I love a complete package that includes visuals. The set was entirely too short, but I enjoyed it quite a lot. Bonus? He does a lot of his own artwork, which was really lovely, with canvas prints and high quality flags on offer.
Speaking of cool merch, I loved that Kallomäki had sahti cups available. Very thematically appropriate, and they were nice. Also, water bottles? A rare but nice option, and they were solid quality as well. On the note of solid quality though, these two acts really made me start to remember why I used to be so genuinely obsessed with folk metal. I’m not sure how many of them are doing vocals, but one of them seems to be able to do the Tuvan throat singing (or something similar), and I also heard something that was at very least joik-adjacent, if not outright joiking, and the addition of Anne Rajala to the mix did nothing but add more texture and flavor to the sound. The drumming was a highlight of the music and I feel like I don’t compliment drums very often, generally speaking. On top of that, again, I loved the stage look. There were a lot of skulls and face paint and other such sound-appropriate details that added nicely to everything. Really solid set, I enjoyed it a lot.
The last act I caught before the invisible knife in my back claimed me was Saattue. I had no context for them either, but apparently they share Tero Kalliomäki with Kallomäki and have been around since the early 2000s, so I was surprised that I’d never even heard of them before. This was a lot more on the heavy and doomy side, but I appreciated the power in the growls and the contrast with the cleans, as well as some interesting guitar lines and the dank low-end.
All-in-all, despite not being able to stay for the whole show, I thought this was a really fun little November festival, and I hope they did well enough to do another Kallofest next year. I’m certainly not against experiencing some more interesting folk bands if the opportunity arises.
Kallomäki
Bear Wiseman is a semi-retired music journalist, once known for being the owner and head journalist of Musicalypse (2012-2023) and head journalist and editor of Tuonela Magazine (2020-2023).
Nowadays, she mostly writes slice of life fantasy fiction, though for artists dear to hear heart, she still does journalism. To stay up-to-date on her tales and coverage, consider joining her mailing list.
