Timo Rautiainen ja Trio Niskalaukaus is a heavy metal band from Finland, formed in 1997. The band was led by Timo Rautiainen, leading member of Finnish metallers Lyijykomppania, a band which is still highly popular in Finland and has a small foreign following in the scene. The musical influence of the band ranges from Black Sabbath to more modern metal acts. Lyrically, the themes presented in their songs range from global issues to personal tragedy, typically in a dark and serious tone. They have released seven albums to date.
For more than 20 years, Rautiainen has made music in the Finnish language. However, when a friend came to him with the idea of making a German spoken album, Rautiainen was very interested. The album produced during this session, In frostigen Tälern, was the first German album by a Finnish act. In 2004 the band released their second album in German, titled Hartes Land. The albums in German consist of songs which had already been released in Finnish and later translated.
A visional cue in the band's album art is that no upper case letters are used in any occasion. Their logo is a shovel crossed with a pickaxe, usually both covered with breeze.