Veli-Matti "Läjä" Äijälä (born 29 September 1958) is a Finnish musician,

comics artist A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons (individual images) or comics (sequential images). Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comics illustrators/artists in that they produce both the literar ...

and

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

. He is best known as the singer and primary songwriter of the legendary

hardcore punk Hardcore punk (commonly abbreviated to hardcore or hXc) is a punk rock music genre#subtypes, subgenre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots ...

band

Terveet Kädet Terveet Kädet are a Finnish hardcore punk band. The group was founded in Tornio in January 1980. They have had a major influence on bands from all over the world, especially in Brazil (which some have claimed was because of a member from the le ...

. Äijälä has been associated with many side projects like the

synthpop Synth-pop (short for synthesizer pop; also called techno-pop; ) is a music genre that first became prominent in the late 1970s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s ...

band Leo Bugariloves,

rockabilly Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music. It dates back to the early 1950s in the United States, especially the Southern United States, South. As a genre, it blends the sound of Western music (North America), Western musi ...

group Billy Boys and

noise rock Noise rock (sometimes called noise punk) is a noise music, noise-oriented style of experimental rock that spun off from punk rock in the 1980s. Drawing on movements such as minimal music, minimalism, industrial music, and New York hardcore, a ...

band Death Trip. In 2004, Äijälä released a compilation album ''Passions of Läjä Äijälä'' which includes music of Terveet Kädet and eight of his side projects. Läjä Äijälä has been working as a comics artist since the 1980s. He has released several comics albums and a book of his poems. Äijälä has also done the artwork for some album covers. One of his works is the cover of Johannes Kastaja by CMX.CMX Biography
(in Finnish)

References

1958 births 20th-century Finnish male singers Finnish punk rock singers Ambient musicians Finnish comics artists Finnish album-cover and concert-poster artists People from Tornio Living people {{Finland-musician-stub