On December 15, 2019, Children Of Bodom played their final show. It had been announced six weeks earlier that drummer Jaska Raatikainen, bassist Henkka Seppälä and keyboard player Janne Wirman –who had played on every Bodom album since their 1997 debut, Something Wild –had quit the band to “change direction within their lives”, leaving guitarist Daniel Freyberg and frontman Alexi Laiho to carry on without them.
The show took place at the Helsinki Ice Hall, a short drive from the town of Espoo, where schoolfriends Alexi and Jaska had formed Children Of Bodom 26 years earlier. It was a bittersweet night, but there was a note of tension too. Despite the diplomatic wording of the statement announcing the trio’s departure, the truth was that Alexi’s alcohol and substance abuse problems had driven a wedge between him and his bandmates, prompting the splintering of the band.
“It was a weird, emotional thing,” admits Janne Wirman today. “Right before we went on, I hugged Alexi and I was just struck by the realisation it was the last time I would ever play those songs. With how Alexi was at that point there was no guarantee he wouldn’t choose to fuck it up on purpose either, but he did great. It was emotional, but I was also so relieved because I had gotten so tired of Alexi’s problems.”
Alexi and Daniel carried on working together under the name Bodom After Midnight, but the Helsinki gig would be the last time any of them played as Children Of Bodom. It was the end of the road for a band who had helped put Finnish metal on the global map and who, in their singer and
