Henry Walden In Memoriam

In approximately two hours I'll be attending a gig in honor of the late Henry Walden, lead guitarist of Finnish goth groups Varjo and Angelica Kult. For those of you who didn't know Henry Walden passed away in a fire on the 20th of September last year. Apparently two cats named Morrissey and Siouxsie also died in the fire.

I didn't know Henry personally. The only contact I had with the man was through brief glimpses at clubs in Helsinki and seeing him perform with Varjo or Angelica Kult. One might thus put into question the very point of me writing this. If I didn't have any personal contact with the man how could his death have possibly affected me to the point that I must vent about it on my blog?

Partly because I know people who knew Henry and have seen the effect his death has had on them. At the risk of sounding a wee bit grandiose it seems that Henry was no ordinary person. To my understanding he was warm and approachable and in spite of his gothic image an exceedingly cheerful and open person. I might of course be mistaken: for all I know the guy could've been a giant dick, but that's not the impression I've received from people who had any contact with the man.

I'm also writing this because in Henry we've lost another great musician. While listening to Varjo's album "Paratiisissa" (which, in addition to being my favourite Varjo album also ranks among my top five Finnish records of all time) earlier this week I found myself again admiring the intricacy of Henry's guitarwork. To me Varjo has always been a guitar band, with the guitars weaving a texture of sound over which the rest of the music is built. Most of that comes from Henry's very distinctive wall-of-sound style, the guitars sounding mournful while at the same time flirting with shoegaze. It's a sound easy to imitate yet completely synonymous with Varjo in my mind.

The remaining members of Varjo are not going to be going under that name anymore. Officially it's because of a gentlemen's agreement made years ago by Henry and Antti that if something were to happen to the other the band would be terminated. I personally believe that the reason goes beyond just Antti making good on his agreement and thus not cheapening the memory of Henry; to an extent I think it's also a practical matter. No one could replace Henry in Varjo. He was as much iconic of the band as the lead singer Antti is and even though you could easily get some new guy on stage and play the exact same notes as Henry did it wouldn't feel the same. (not only because of Henry's extremely impressive stage presence) Now, this may sound a bit heartless coming from me, stating that one of the reasons for Varjo not going on being that Henry was such an integral part of their image, but just wait 'til I've finished: when we accept that Henry was an irreplaceable part of Varjo, not only as a musician but also as a performer, we can truly appreciate the decision not to go on without him as it shows that the rest of the band also realizes Henry's true worth for the band.

The Finnish alternative music scene has lost a great man, but we can make sure that his memory will live on. For my part I intend to make sure that it lives on in the music I make.