Tales from the Thousand Lakes

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Tales from the Thousand Lakes
Studio album by Amorphis
Released	12 July 1994
Recorded	September 1993
Genre	Melodic death metal, death-doom, gothic metal
Length	40:13
Label	Relapse
Producer	Tomas Skogsberg and Amorphis
Amorphis chronology
Privilege of Evil (1993) Tales from the Thousand Lakes (1994) Elegy (1996)
Singles from Tales from the Thousand Lakes
"Black Winter Day" Released: 1994

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[1]

Tales from the Thousand Lakes is the second studio album by Finnish heavy metal band Amorphis. It is a concept album based on the Finnish national epic, Kalevala.

The album was an influential release in the development of the melodic death metal genre,^[1] predominantly mixing the genre with death-doom^[2] and gothic metal,^[3] compared to the band's death metal debut. This showcases a more melodic sound for the band, with hints at their later, more progressive direction. The album also introduced synthesizers and clean vocals to the band's sound, though the latter was used sparingly.

This is the first Amorphis release to have an official keyboardist, Kasper Mårtenson, as any previous of the band's releases had the band's own drummer, Jan Rechberger, provide the empty keyboardist role until the band decided to have a keyboardist and also to find one being Mårtenson. With Mårtenson in the band, it is the first time the band's original lineup changed by having an additional member. Jan Rechberger would leave the band after this album but rejoin the band for 2003's Far from the Sun.

The original limited version (on digipack) had a cover of "Light My Fire" by The Doors added as a bonus track. It was later re-released in 2001 with most tracks from the Black Winter Day EP and the "Light My Fire" cover added as bonus tracks.