About
Also known as: Rasmus, The Ramus
Few Finnish bands have crossed over the way The Rasmus did. Formed in Helsinki in 1994 by a group of eighth graders, they started out playing funk and gradually shifted toward the hard rock sound that would eventually make them famous far beyond Finland. Their 2003 single "In the Shadows" became a massive international hit, reaching the top three in the UK and pushing their album Dead Letters to the top of charts in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Finland. By that point, the band had already sold millions of records and won a stack of Finnish EMMA awards. The story behind the name is a fun one: they were just "Rasmus" until 2000, when a Swedish DJ with the same name forced them to add "The" to avoid confusion. Guitarist Pauli Rantasalmi, a founding member, left in 2022 and was replaced by Emilia "Emppu" Suhonen. That same year the band represented Finland at the Eurovision Song Contest with "Jezebel". All told, they have sold over 6 million albums worldwide, with 350,000 of those in Finland alone.
