The Band Biography

Lauri was in a gang in school, they were doing graffiti, sneaking out at night to drink, etc. They were bad boys. Lauri was listening to Metallica and Nirvana. First, he hates the States and after, because of those bands, he was in love with the US. But Lauri wasn't stupid; his favorite subject at school was human biology. He was in a music school,so everyone was dreaming to be famous.

Eero was really shy. He didnt really had friends at school, he was always left out because he was thinking differently. But Lauri was his friend since third grade, and they decided to do a band. Lauri was supposed to play the guitar.

Eero and Lauri have been close mates since this meeting in the third grade. Pauli met Eero and Lauri in junior high at the beginning of the 90's. Then Janne joined them, at the drums. The first version of the band came together in late '94. They decided to make their own music since, because before they were only doing covers of their favorites bands.

December 1994 - Rasmus played their first show at school, but at this early stage they were called Sputnik, and later they changed it to Anttila. Then they called themselfes for Rasmus for several years and when they released the album Into they turned the name to The Rasmus, because there was a DJ in Finland called DJ Rasmus and it was confusing. The name "Rasmus" comes from the word "trashmosh"... In 1995 they got lucky when they met their manager Teja Kotilainen who saw them at Oranssi club and wanted them to record some songs.

In december later that same year they released their first Cd "1st" And now Warner showed interest and signed the boys 1996 and in May 1996 Rasmus released their first album "Peep" wich sold gold...

In November 2000, Aki came to play the drums after Janne left the band, he wanted to find peace with his wife so he left the band. They "found" Aki because he was selling t-shirts at their gigs and they needed a drumplayer, they had heard that he was really good, so the asked him if he wanted to join the band. And, offcourse, he wanted to. At the same time they changed recordcompany. They made their fourth album "Into" in Stockholm, a album they released all over scandinavia. In the same year, they released *Hellofacollection*, a mis of their best songs before Into.

They have support alot of artists lately, like HIM, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Roxette. But Pauli has a studio at home, and he produced the band "Kwan" (a rap/hip-hop band from Finland) and "Killer" (a pop/rock band from Finland). Lauri helped him. Now, the members of Kwan, Killers, Pauli and Lauri has the tattoo "Dynasty" somewhere on thie body, its a pact of friendship.

They released Dead Letters in 2003. They had a big succes, they sold over 1.5 Million albums worldwide, with the hit single In The Shadows. Now it's time to see if Hide From The Sun will do the same thing, maybe even more!

Taken on The Rasmus E- Team Canada