Dead to the World
Oceansouls of America
Celebrating 6 years: 2003-2009...and beyond
Oceansouls of America has come a long way from its humble beginnings as a group of American Nightwish fans who wished to start their own fan club. Let's take a look at how it all began, and where we are today.
2003: In late September/early October, an American Nightwish fan by the name of Snowy Owl made a post on Nightwish forum asking if there was a fan club for American Nightwish fans, and if not, that he wanted to start forming one. The response was instant, and enthusiastic. Several fans at Nightwish forum were more than happy to help, and on October 15th, our friends Ann-Marie and Dave at Beyond Ear Candy hosted our very first online forum, and OSA was born.
2004: This was definitely the year when OSA blossomed from a small online community to a serious meeting place among the North American fans. The release of the Once album, and the North American tour that followed, brought in many fans to OSA, and it was at this time that BEC was able to host a small home page for OSA. Promotion for Nightwish from OSAers spread from coast to coast, as Snowy Owl and Troggy used their radio skills to create OSA promos, and C. would expose Nightwish to the rock radio audience of Central California when several Nightwish classics hit the early-morning airwaves of Real Rock 93.1 as part of the J.D. & Rocky Morning Show. Zelda would almost singlehandedly publish the first and only OSA newsletter, with help of articles written by several other OSAers. Ann-Marie printed the first of the OSA t-shirts, to be worn proudly during the tour that brought Nightwish to the American fans for their first real U.S. tour that summer. By fall, OSA would experience its first "presidential election", with founding member Snowy Owl becoming OSA's first president.
2005: Nightwish-OSA.com was born, and OSA would leave the protection of BEC and strike out on their own for the first time. The website received many visits and was considered a frame of reference for many Nightwish fans and "insiders" alike, including Zac Hietala of Tarot (linking our site in several of his posts on his forum). We would also gain a strong ally in our new affiliate, Sonic Cathedral. As the band toured all over the world for the Once album, OSA grew stronger, despite the setbacks of having not one, but two American tours cancelled. Nothing could seem to stop the machine that was OSA...until October, when the open letter to Tarja was printed and the Nightwish community was forever split into two camps.
2006: It is at this time that Snowy Owl steps down as OSA president to commit fully to his new website and fellow OSA affiliate, Rising Forces USA. The only two members of the council, C. and Autarkis, form a brand-new council and bring in longtime OSAer Tramz, and a newer OSAer, yet a clearly dedicated one, Ray. The new OSA council is formed and ready to take on the difficult task of maintaining a relatively sane Nightwish community during a time of chaos. At this time OSA experiences a "Caribbean invasion", when fans from the islands find OSA and become a part of our community through most of this year. While the world mused who the new Nightwish singer would be, and the band swam through piles of audition tapes from people all over the world wanting to fill the shoes of Tarja, OSA would go through their own inner turmoils, with two hackings to the .com site and forum, leaving us at the end of the year with quite a bleak outlook on what OSA's future, if any, would be.
2007: Walking hand in hand into the new era with Nightwish, the year '07 seems to be promising for both the band and the fans. After a third hacking to the site and forum shortly after the band's announcement of Anette Olzon as new singer, the OSAers choose to decide their own fate by parting ways with former webmaster Autarkis and pull up stakes from the .com site altogether. The three remaining council members pressed on, making our new home at Ultimate Metal, and going back to basics. No more stressing over a fancy website or trying to keep up with the Joneses, we decided our strength was in our online community and until the time came until we could find a new webmaster, focus solely on making our little Nightwish community strong again. The seeds that were planted would find fruit during the fall tour, when the band would see the new crop of OSA shirts (printed up by Ray) popping up on their tour stops, from the impressive skyline of New York City to the bright lights of Sunset Strip, and many places in-between.
2008: A busy year for Nightwish and OSAers alike, the dream that had seemed crushed in '05 would be made reality in '08 when Nightwish would return twice more to the U.S. in the spring and fall. Shows were cancelled along the way, and the final week of what was to have been the "final chapter" of the U.S. tour ended on a somewhat low note, but OSAers on the East Coast were loyal and went to the cancelled shows anyway. In spite of the way the tour ended, OSA would not end the tour on such a negative note...as final vindication of the hard work that everyone here has done over the last 5 years, the band would recognize this and dedicate the song "Dead to the World" to the entire Oceansouls of America at their Los Angeles show on September 13th, showing that the Nightwish community that was so often deemed "dead to the world" was anything but..."dead to the world".
2009: The new OSA site opens in early '09 through the EzWeb server, generating more than 1000 hits within the first month of its launch. Due to the success of the new site (and the upgrade of the EzWeb server), we opened a new version of the site a couple of months later, which enabled us to provide even better service to the growing number of people coming to visit the OSA site. The band's tour in May to make up for the cancelled shows from the previous fall brought more visitors to OSA and more contributors to the site when fans shared photos of their tour experience. The Dark Passion Play tour wrapped up at Helsinki's Hartwall Areena that September, ending nearly 2 years of touring for the band and officially marking the end of the first chapter of the band's era with Anette. As the band prepared to go on hiatus, OSA celebrated their 6th anniversary that October, with well wishes from Nightwish fans all around the world.
Now that 2010 has officially kicked off, OSA continues to keep busy even when the band is on hiatus. Nightwish fans received good news towards the beginning of the year when it was announced that the band's cover of the Michael Nyman song "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" was finally approved by the artist for official release. So it looks like Nightwish fans have something to look forward to while waiting for the next album to be released! And OSA will continue to keep all fans in North America and around the world updated on all things Nightwish in the year '10.
