Eternal Tears of Sorrow first took shape in the remote northern Finnish locale of Pudasjärvi, where Altti Veteläinen on vocals and bass, Jarmo Puolakanaho handling guitar and keyboards, and Olli-Pekka Törrö on guitars and keyboards launched the project—originally christened Andromeda—back in 1991. After a period spent laying down demo recordings and completing mandatory military duties, the trio finally tracked their opening full-length effort, Sinner's Serenade, which surfaced in 1997. That release leaned heavily into death metal while incorporating undercurrents of dark and black metal, prompting the independent Finnish imprint Spinefarm to issue the follow-up LP Vilda Mannu the next year.
A measured shift toward goth metal soon followed, coinciding with Törrö’s departure and the arrival of guitarist Antti Talala, keyboardist Pasi Hiltula, and drummer Petri Sankala in time for the 2000 album Chaotic Beauty. The band’s fourth outing, provocatively titled A Virgin and a Whore, sustained this stylistic course yet ultimately became their final statement, as Veteläinen and Sankala chose to reconvene with Törrö and channel their energies into the more commercially oriented gothic hard rock venture For My Pain....
