Finally get to write some "real" news to this blog and not just mindless bs;
"NEW ADDITION TO THE FAMILY; LUNAR PATH'S NEW BASS-PLAYER; JESSE MÄLÄSKÄ!
We were surprised how many applied when we started the search for a new bass player. Many good players applied, so the choice was hard.
But after after careful consideration, Jesse Mäläskä stood out among all others, fitting our description perfectly! He sealed the deal in yesterdays jam/rehersals, so we're proud to announce Jesse as Lunar Path's new bass player!
Jesse has played bass for almost a decade in various heavy metal bands, for example Fatal Sound Project and is currently studying a degree in bass pedagogue.
He's a very talented and motivated guy, so were all eager to see what change this new sound will bring to our new songs!
More info on Jesse on our Members page
A big thank you to everybody who applied!
And an even bigger thank you to our very good friend Elmeri for filling out the low end rumble on the Deathstars and Paul Di'Anno support tours!"
"It was a dusty old night and I'm the first to admit it I am sure i upset someone But my memory has chosen to omit it" -"One Way Ticket", The Darkness
Last day on this tour, and last gig for a while for us. The venue was small, but amazing! Like Trollhättans Backstage Rock Bar, this was another small venue, but run by musician and people who really care about live shows and bands. The backstage was ready when we came, was told that if we drink up all the booze, they'll bring more. Excellent! Everything run very smoothly. As a bonus rock n roll street cred +1, our backstage shared the same corridor with a strip bars' backstage, so half naked russian strippers were walking in and out. Free, unlimited amounts of booze, russian/estonian strippers, sauna, what perfect ingredients to make a perfect last gig! End the tour with all guns blazing!
As accustom for last gigs on tours, we had to pull some shenanigans, as they would for sure pull some on us. We brainstormed for quite a while, it was hard! Elmeri, who has a unique taste in pranks, was first in the "let's piss in their drinks!"/"let's piss in the fruit bowl!" department. After we calmed him down and reassured him that we don't want to endanger anyone's health, we settled on more mild, funny stuff.
Di'Annos band pulled a few pranks, shouted "last call to Copenhagen" and a few heavy metal screams on our monitors. Then Johan (the drummer) and Rasmus (the guitarist) came on stage with snacks and drinks and started to feed us. I was playing a guitar soolo, and Johan poured tequila shots down my throat. Then Rasmus fed me some chips, while Johan peeled and fed some clementines to Pete. Johan had stuck a banana in his zipper, resembling a penis, parading around the stage with his fruity phallus. Then Janica bit off the head of the banana, castrating him. It was hilarious!
Right before "Now I Know", the electricity to my pedal board went out, same problem like in Vaasa. Tried to fix it quickly between songs, almost missing the cue for the song!
Then halfway trough the song, I blew a fuse in my Peavey amp and the whole thing went dead. Continued to play the song, although there was no sound coming from my amp. As I'm quite bound to my chair and crutches, I signaled help to Elmeri, who is quite a MacGyver. To fill the gap, I forced Pete to do a drum solo. Elmeri got a new fuse from the backstage and got the 5150 running again. Pete was sweating bullets with his impromptu drum solo, but did well! The show continued...
In the last song, one of the new ones, "The One Behind The Mirror", I broke my low B string on my 7-string les paul. After the technical difficulties, shenanigans etc. I could do nothing but laugh! I ripped the string off the fretboard and transposed on the fly. When the song ended, I have usually played a small part of the "I Am The Black Wizards" riff from Emperor, but now I just ripped off all the strings. Figured, if the low B string brakes, why not brake them all off. Fuck! Venom! Blaurgh!
It was a great gig, had loads of fun, even though the tech side was going ape shit.
Went up on stage with Di'Anno on "Running Free" and they sang it as a duo. Pete was playing "cymbals" for Johan. It was fun. Everybody was running up and down the stage and joining in on the fun. I was watching from the back of the stage, with a 30 something scantily clad russian stripper dry-humping my crutches. Crutches, not crotches! Talk about bat country, man.
Here's a video of the song:
Then they played the last song, a cover of Ramones "Blitzkrieg Bop". I found a mic on stage and did some growling vocals for that song. Too bad I couldn't go onstage with my crutches (so small stage full with people and cables on the floor).
Then the afterparty... Start out with a quote from one of my favorite movie;; "I was right in the middle of a fucking reptile zoo, and somebody was giving booze to these goddamn things." -Raoul Duke
Di'Annos tour manager David brought in some fans to meet and greet Paul, the rest of us were partying. Tuukka chased some strippers down the hall. People were throwing clementines and smashing bananas in the wall. One clementine hit Gayvid in the balls, he wasn't too pleased with that. Especially, when everybody had been ripping on him the last week. Everybody calling him Gayvid, even Paul shouting "GAYVIID!!" whenever he needed something. Poor Gayvid.
Scribbled some shit on the backstage wall. Elmeri wrote "Gayvid was here - 20.3.2010". Btw, Gayvid scared off the russian stripper that Tuukka had lured into our liquor marinated reptile zoo.
Proceeded to our hotel, Rasmus and Johan brought some long drinks to our room and continued the party. I must say that I don't remember much of what happened in the hotel room. I'm amazed that I survived and didn't fall once. Or suddenly realize that "hey, my foot doesn't hurt anymore, I can walk ok!" and then be in a world of pain the next day. That happened to me a few years ago when I broke my leg. It's amazing how much bourbons and whiskey can numb any pain!
Woke up today at 10 am, still drunk and no memory. Jeesch. Fun to ride in a car for 8-10 hours drive back to Helsinki from Oulu, hung over.
Had a nice run! My warmest thanks to Elmeri, for standing in as our bass player! And a big thanks to Toni, Susi and most important, Paul Di'Anno and his band of bandits! It was a great tour, had loads of fun! Hopefully we'll see you next time!
I'll post some pictures whenever I get my shit together at home...
Now I will pull the curtains on my world, exit stage left and sleep for a couple of days...
The venue was really cool. The hotel, restaurant and the club were all in the same building! Had really nice hotel rooms that our boss-guy Thomas had arranged for us!
Had a warm up act this time. I think they called themselves Metaphor? They seemed a little shy and new to the stage, but nevertheless rocked well. Good luck to them! At least they had good rock n roll spirit, after the gig they all got really, really wasted. The singer pissed on the clubs' wall, got dragged out in a headlock and thrown out by the bouncer.
The gig was pretty standard stuff again, exept for some weird ghosts in the machines. First of all, the fluorescent light caused some serious buzzing to my guitar, so we had to do the check with the stage lights on. Tuukkas wireless unit was colliding with some other wireless unit, so he had to skip it and use a wire instead.
Then during the gig, the power went out randomly on my pedal board, the mic switch on my guitar wasn't functioning very well, Janica almost stepped on my cast while she was running around the stage, Tuukka blew a fuse in his poweramp etc. But the gig went well still, luckily Tuukkas power amp has two channels, so the show continued almost seamlessly. I just had to kick around my pedals and flick the mic switch a bit extra if they started to fuck with me. So no serious problems.
Janica went Spinal Tap on us once again. She welcomed the audience with "Hello Oulu!" and started chanting "Oulu! Oulu! Oulu!", trying to get the crowd in with the chant. The only problem is that we were in Vaasa. This same thing happened in Tampere too, on the Deathstars tour. "Hello Turku!!" and the audience is confused and thinks we're fucking with them. Heheh, funny.
After the show, we took our yesterdays backstage booty to our hotel cabins, drank long drinks and watched Team America. It was a good day in Oulu... ehm... Vaasa.
As usual when we play in Porvoo, some things are always pretty "häää". This time there were some weird railings in front of the stage, blocking my view completely (as I have to sit and play). Exchange some token bullshit with the cream of the crop/the mr vip, fake smiles and phony words, blaah, hate that. But also got to talk to some old friends, blaah blaah blaah... where's the beer? Otherwise pretty nice, lots of drinks and good food in the backstage.
The gig went well, basic gig. It was way too loud in the PA tho, many complained that it was so loud that it was a few decibels from ear bleeding sonic massacre. Yeah rock n roll jadda jadda jadda öörgh, blastbeat, venom, /../, but if you can't enjoy what you're listening to, then well it sucks for the crowd and nobody want's to come closer to the stage, as they're already suffering 10m away... But stuff like that happens when there's a different sound guy at every venue. Sometimes it's low like some fröbelin palikat show, sometimes your ears are bleeding. Fuck, we should get our own FOH guy. Like everything, the only thing stopping us is money. Fuck. I hate money, the lack of it ruins a lot of fun. Hmpfh... Buuuuut... whatchagonna doo when they kanttoo youu?
The "afterparty" turned into a miniature Fear and Loathing in Porvoo on my part. The floor was very bouncy and little green men running around biting my ass. I think my blood sugar level was low. Or I had some bad fish. Damn those rotten fishes, always ruining everybodys good time.
It was great fun tho. Don't try that at home, kids.
Woke up at home yesterday for a change. Load in at On The Rocks went well, soundcheck went well, gig went well. The sound guy was in a very pissy mood at first at DiAnnos band, but we tried to get everything running smoothly, so he was pretty calm with us. Nice to have Toni with us again, he was with Bibelblack and some other bands while we were in Sweden.
Plää plöö.
Drove to Porvoo after the gig, Elmeri and I crashed at Tuukkas palce. Other than that I can't actually come up with anything. Total blackout. Writers block. Nothing. Kiitos ja anteeksi.
"Uh."
Elmeri forced me to enter this word, "kuk". He's been repeating that since Sweden. Tuukka started it, and Elmeri carried the torch of "kuk" with Pete trough scandinavia.
Wow. It's amazing what drinking beer for breakfast and calmly watching Saturday Night Fever in your undies at Tuukkas place does to you. The fart polluted air in Tuukkas apartment, the week of waiting and this current city should be enough to numb anyones senses, then add this, and all in all it's like a neutron bomb to your mind.
Yet again, it makes me wonder, how this is a very peculiar profession one has chosen for oneself. There's only beer to drink at venues, if you want something else you'd probably got to buy it. End result, beer beer beer all the time. But at the same time it's not the "friday night let's get let's get let's get fuuuucked"-drinkin. At the same time this touring it's as real as work as anything, moving the backline, working the tech, performing, sweating like a pig. The only difference to a 9-5 job is the working hours and circumbstances, they're just really fucked up in the music business. But still, it somehow is all worth it, atleast more than a 9-5 job. The 30-45 minutes per night is what we live for.
But in the end, beer and good company makes the endless waiting tolerable. And with a small buzz, makes moving around with crutches a lot easier since it dampens my fear of falling down = I don't fall down so often. Heh. So fuck it, I'll stop this pseudo philosophy crap, it's twelve o' clock somewhere...?
Tonight Porvoo.
To quote a wise man: Those of us that had been up all night were in no mood for coffee and donuts, we wanted strong drink. We were, after all, the absolute cream of the national sporting press. -Raoul Duke
Arrived to Finland today. Next stop is tomorrow in Helsinki, so we got to go home to rest our bones for this evening... Finally get some internet, weird how wi-fi is very rare in Sweden, apparently = no chance to update this blog in real time. Scribble this drivel offline, and then have to shoot em up online... at some time?!!
Finally get to eat good old home made food. You get really tired of MC Donnellz and other fast food when you eat it every day for a week.
Rundown of the Sweden/Denmark leg of the tour: -Jonas and Elmeri got tattoos -Watched "Armageddon", "Borat", "Signs" and "300" on the cars DVD video system -Signed about 13 autographs and gave a few picks -Sold so much EP;s that were able to pay the gas to our car with the profit -One completely sold out show, all in all very good attendance on every gig -Had a big dog in the audience in Stockholm -Got some nice gig pictures in Trollhättan by a cool photographer -Tuukka lost his shoe -Janica lost her phone (but got it back) -Maybe 2-3 hours of sleep every night, no sleep at all from Copenhagen to Stockholm -Broken one bed
I'm pretty tired, but that's all I can remember. All in all good stuff. Will update with more pictures, but forgot my blackberrys usb cable in the van! So check back!
Tomorrow we continue this same chocolate train trough Finland! Next stop @ On The Rocks, Helsinki
"The question is not so much where we are as when we are. "
We drove all night, right after the Copenhagen gig, to Stockholm. Everybody was really tired and hence everything was really funny. Everybody slept maybe an half and hour approx, so needless to say, the jokes weren't that smart, but indeed funny at the time.
I lost count, but we shouted "KUK!" probably a million times during the trip. To easily communicate our apparent road rage to our fellow commuters, we did a small sign that read "KUK!". It came in very handy when we got stuck in Stockholm during rush hour.
When we'd stop to eat at MC Donnellz', Tuukka noticed that he'd apparently lost his other shoe. How does one loose a size 47 (uk/us size 14) big New Rock boot with bright red flame ornaments? Easy, don't sleep for a couple of days and keep your boot leaning towards the door, so if anyone stops for a piss, it'll drop out from the van. We concluded the boot is probably somewhere 400 km away where we stopped for a piss. Shit happens, I lost my winter jacket on the Deathstars tour a month earlier...
Ironically Janica got her phone back (oh yeah, she lost it in Öresund) and then we headed for downtown Stockholm to buy new shoes to Tuukka and to wander around aimlessly. Took us 3 hours to find a parking spot. Went to Södra Malm or something like that, found a nice pizza place there where we stopped to eat. Then Elmeri got some ink done, three doves flying around an old tattoo he had on his arm. Very cool!
After not sleeping for two days, everybody passed out when we got to our cabins at the boat/ferry/whatever. After a few hours of sleep, the "guinea pig sneezed" (marsu aivasti, "tsship! glug glug... aah.") and helped ourselves to some liquids we found at the tax free shop. After a few hours of drunken philosophical debates in our cabin, we went to the boats nightclub. There were mostly old people, and I mean very, very old people, shy businessmen sipping on a drink alone, horny old drunken swedish men and a few drunken and flamboyant hags looking for cock... i mean company. Regular Stockholm-Helsinki ferry stuff actually.
So the gig in Trollhättan was a success! The venue was a small bar with a lot of attitude, a great crowd and an awesome staff. In fact the place was so nice, so Sven (Tuukka) decided to help out with the cleaning afterwards, which lead to a serious ammount of questions about Svens possible insanity. The staff even asked if they needed to pay him for the job done.
The following morning we started our 5h drive from Trollhättan to Copenhagen. The plan was to check in at a hotell in Helsingborg, but when we came there no one was there. We called and they sayd they would come and open, which they eventually did, but by that time we had given up, and continued on our journey. The bridge between Sweden and Denmark was shorter than I had imagined. We were over it in just a couple of minutes and in Copenhagen.
Copenhagen seemed like a really nice city, kind of like a blend of Helsinki and Oslo, With the cosyness of Hki and all the nice looking buildings of Oslo. We kalled the management which hooked us up with a new hotel in CH which they did in a blink. The venue was really nice here, and the sound was spectacluare. We really enjoyed playing, though there wasn't that much crowd.
After the show we came to the conclusion that we would have about 5h time to sleep before we had to start driving back to Stockholm again. It felt kind of unessesairy to pay for hotel rooms for such a short time, so we hit the road again.
It's now 6.35am local time, and we have about 200km left to drive. In a couple of hours moore we've left about a thousand kilometers behind us in less than 24h. So with the suns first light hitting our faces and the theeme of MacGyver blasting from the speekers we bid Denmark and Sweden (and possibly out real names too) a kind farewell and leave with a promise of a reunion in the near future. Thank you and goodnight!
The Danish venue was very cool. Old building with tarred stairways up and down, which looked cool, but very uncomfortable for me and my crutches. Nevertheless, cool place, and very, very professional FOH guy! The sound check was over in a couple of minutes, didn't need to explain anything or take any crap. Everything worked right off the bat and the sound was awesome!
Had our own backstage this time, ours was an old dungeon. Having an own backstage is very very important to me, because usually I like to take it easy, wipe the sweat off, grab a cold one and enjoy the silence for a moment. This time, as the place was reminiscent of a snakes and ladders game for a cripple, I took a well deserved nap before and after the gig. Not so rock n roll but fuck, it does take a toll on oneself, moving around in different venues, hotels, cars, shows etc etc for nearly a week with crutches and only one working leg.
The gig itself went great! The attendance was very low comparing to the Sweden gigs, mainly because there were a bigger show a couple of blocks away, and well, it was sunday. But the ones that was watching seemed to enjoy themselves. Somebody from the audience said after the gig that this was the best gig that she's seen in three years! Nice!
Even though I only saw Denmark from the inside of a car and a venue, I fell in love with Copenhagen. Beautiful city, cool people and great culture! We must definitely come back some time even though I can't understand shit of the Danish language! Kamelåså!
Last night was awesome! The venue was probably the best venue for us that we´ve ever played although the stage was minimal. Open bar, awesome food and exceptionally great staff and service! Can't thank you enough Backstage Rockbar in Trollhättan!!!
The place was sold out and filled to the rims with drunken metalheads. The pressure in the front row was so hard, that the FOH had to repeditively urge the crowd to take one step back. One guy passed out and was squeezed out on front of the stage. DiAnnos drummer went to help people, handing out waterbottles to those in the front row! Very cool of him!
The gig went very well, and man, it was hot on stage! A very very small place packed with about 200 people and your banging your head in a corner, it´s bound to get salty afterwards. And that it did. But luckily, with an open bar for the band, there were more than plenty ways to cool one self down.
The hotel had wi-fi, so I finally got to go on FaceBook and update this blog with yesterdays blog. Although it was late late late in the night/morning (6 AM) when we finally got to the hotel... :)
Over and out, now denmark... ->
/Håkan (aka Jonas)
(pics coming later, forgot my blackberry's usb cord in the van)
Arrived in Stockholm at 12 am. The idea was that we’d leave early for Stockholm, have time to wonder around the capital for sightseeing and shopping. My back started to hurt and my left foot started to cramp pretty bad after a walking around with crutches a couple of kilometres so I had to sit down for a while and let my bulgioning, veiny and manly muscles recover for a while. First thought was to catch some dinner somewhere, but then it occurred to me, "Fuck, let’s get a tattoo". And so I did. About and hour later, I’ve got an all black, wireframe, graphic style tattoo of the Lunar Path symbol on my left arm. Veerry nniice, jagshemash.
As the Di’Anno crew apparently had a hard time keeping up with schedules, and they’d had some problems with their trip today too, so we deliberately arrived a bit late to the venue. Well, still we were the first on the scene, again. They finally arrive, about 4-5 hours late. The regular house tech wasn’t available and the stand in was "some" guy that apparently wasn’t so familiar with the tech side of the PA. Ok. Di’Anno’s band got their gear hooked up and then they waited an hour before the soundcheck could start. Why I do not know, my theory is that the FOH guy was probably in the backroom reading the manual for the mixing console.
Doors were open when Di’Anno’s band started their check. We had a small audience when we did our check, I think the time was around nine pm, doors opened at seven.
The main reason why a band would like to soundcheck in their own privacy is to prevent confusion for the audience. For example, now when we had to check with the venue open, a few of the audence members came up to us after the check, asked for autographs and congratulated us on a nice gig. They probably thought that they catched the end part of the show or something. On the bright side, more bang for your buck if you can see the same bands do two sets, and if that works for them, then great!
Everything was sort of ok, The FOH didn´t apparently know or the logic to learn the basic hand gestures for soundcheck, monitor levels etc.. "Vad är det som er gitarrist vill?"... So we basically had to stop the song every time to adjust monitor levels. Well, fuck that, it´s like that sometimes. Check ended, everything was sort of acceptable, monitors and their balance were shit but thats ok, nothing unusual. Then waiting...
But the fun didn´t stop there. Pete´s tooth went to shits and got inflamed, no antibiotics around. Mild painkillers, beer and a whole lot of traditional Finnish sisu (spirit, not the drops). We didn´t have a backstage or any storage room, so we had to keep our stuff in the corners of the venue. Yay.
Then showtime. I plugged in my guitar, did a last minute test line check and the signal was dead. It sounded like someone was farting faintly in the other room over a telephone. Nothing. The intro tape was already at full blast. As a last resort, also to check if it was the amps fault, I plugged the guitar direct to my amp, bypassing all the effects, it worked. Then challenge #2. I play live with a Peavey 5150II, and for those who don´t know, they´re fucking awesome, but very prone to feedback slightly noisy. Now my gate, tuner etc was bypassed, so we were riding bareback. So to prevent a delightful CHUGG CHUGG -HWEEE CHUGG CHUGG HWEEE, feedbacking at every stop, I had to do some volume trickery during the whole show, turning the volume up and down. Very distracting. And I could´t tune up either, so I just had to rely on my sevenstring that it would stay in tune. Luckily I beat the shit out of my guitar playing live so it´ll probably stay in tune just fine. Hehehe., That´s irony, eventhought it actually did stay in tune perfectly!
Then my amps channel switch slided slightly out of reach for me (as my foot is broken, I sit and play), and I had a hard time switching channels. My guitar mic switch was fucking with me also, sometimes cutting the volume in half. Elmeri stepped on my cord a couple of times, knocking the jack out of the amp.
Halfway through the show, Elmeri´s bass poweramp died. Luckily the signal went also straight to the PA, so the stage volume was the only thing that went to shits after that. The monitor sound was shit, nobody heard anything, so there wasn´t a lot of choices other than to mosh like hell, play the shit out of everything, hope the audience hears everything like they should and that they don´t realize shit has hit the fan on stage.
At the latter part of the show I experienced a Spinal Tap escue moment. There was this guy in the front row that had a really good time. He had a black Nikki Sixx style hair-.do, and had a awesome rock n roll attitute so I wanted to salute him with the heavy metal horns sign in the middle of our last song, as a thank you..Long story short, I accitentally flipped him the bird. Because I had a pick in my hand, my index finger was stuck to my thumb holding the pick, as a reflex I used the finger next to them, the middle finger. Oh shit, nonnononononoooo! The guy smiled with a slight confused look, and gave the finger back laughing like "ok hehe yeah fuck yeah fuck you heheh!". Well, if that guy reads this, sorry! 'I´ll buy you a beer sometimes! :P
After the gig, having no backstage or any privacy, we packed our shit and headed to the hotel. Then Di´Annos tour manager mr D. said that we have to ask the venue for gas money for DiAnnos tour bus or else they would not get to the gig tomorrow hence not perform... A. How that is any of our business, B. How the hell don´t they have money for gas. C. Why isn´t he doing his job? The answer is; I do not know. As a favor of good will, Janica got them the money they needed eventhough mr D-A tourmanager, the big D (not Dave),should have gotten the bird and not the fan in the front row. Everybody makes mistakes and miscalculations of course, but this wasn´t the first llast minuteshenanigan from his part. Well, enough of that shit, if you´ve got nothing good to say then don´t say anything, right?
Olof (aka Elmeri), myself, Mårten (aka Pete) and Sven (aka Tuukka) went to the hotel to catch some sleep and recharge our batteries. My broken foot had swollen from all the sitting. With the cast, it looked, and felt, like a ripe zucchini showed up someones ass, and it hurt like a motherfucker. So sleepytime and rest for us. Gunilla (aka Janica) and Per (aka Peik) went downtown for a drink with Skinny (Deathstars bass player).
The cherry on top of this shit sunday was when we arrived back at the hotel. I sat down on my bed, loud crack, the bed broke. Good night.
Load in was at 16:00, we arrived a bit late, maybe 16:20. But no panic, Di’Anno’s crew and the backline arrived eventually 2 hours late. Well, shit happens.
The venue was surprisingly small, with a stage so small that if we’d had Petes drumset or something bigger, we wouldn’t fit!
Otherwise the whole day was pretty standard stuff. The venue provided excellent food (medium rare stake, ribs and delicious cream garlic potatoes). Cool house tech;s. The hotel was awesome too, very stylish and pretty close to the venue.
The backstage though, wasn’t really up to par with the food and service. Our table was a shelf-board on two crates. The toilet was broken, so it came with a lé picant ammoniac scent and a complimentary turd. They also didn’t realise were Finns, or they don’t have that much experience with Finns since we only got half a (small) crate of beer (about 8 beers). That’s breakfast in Finland!
Luckily we had some long drinks and such in the car, so no worries. But all in all everything sorted out and most important, the gigs went very well!
We're happy to inform you that we now, in this foreign country, somehow feel comfortable enough to finally stop using our stage names. Lunar Path and crew will there for, from now on, respond to the names Håkan (aka. Jonas), Sven (aka. Tuukka), Mårten (aka. Pete), Olof (aka Elmeri), Pär (aka. Peik) and of course me Gunilla (aka Janica).
So far everything is good, we're all alive, haven't even tried to kill one an other.. yet.. oh! Exept for some outsider, who tried to scare us with a small fire in the microwave oven this morning. Makes me wonder..will they never learn?! For all of you jealous bastards out there, who insist on trying to kill us with fire... A small hint! Try water or something! Fire doesn't work on us!! Well anyway, we're all still friends; which of course comes in handy since we're living in the family suite at Örebro Plaza Hotel. Not bad at all I tell you! Four window view, very nicely decorated and with a very very nice staff. Whooh!
On the road here we kind of almost didn't find our way out from Stockholm, 'cause we decided to disaggree with the sat.nav., which fellt as a really good idea, untill we came to the conclusion that the way we were heading would lead us right back to the harbour from where we'd just left. Then we finally let the poor woman talk again, and with her help we found our way away.
After me having a minor disaggreement with the parking mashine we went to grab a bite. Everyone else managed to fill their bellies with a normal pizza or pasta, but Håkan, who as we all know also earlier has proven some tendencies to megalomaniac behaviour ate a UFO. Now were off to show some good manners, and help the headliners to load in the gear. Catch you all later! -Gunilla
Yeah! First live tv-broadcast done! Janica, Tuukka and I (Jonas) were guest performers on YLE FST;s "Min Morgon" morning-show. Had to wake up at 3 am, soundcheck at 5... that kind of schedule is really unhumane and borderline mental torture for any long haired slacker musician that sleeps all day and rocks all night ;)
We performed an acoustic version of "Paper Dove". It went pretty well, the only fuckup was that Tuukkas DI box malfunctioned, so his guitar line was mute for the most of the song. Was not our fault, pure techical mishap, we had no idea... But hey, shit happens, and besides, you're not a real band unless there's some degree of Spinal Tap;ism in what you do. ;)
We're really exited that tomorrow we'll embark on a new journey, first time performing live abroad! The boatride to Sweden takes all night, but we're prepared, we've got jallua!
Ouuulrighty then. We did a 3-gig mini tour supporting Deathstars a couple of weeks back... 26-28 february to be exact. The other opening band was Fear of Domination.
Better late than never ;P
26.2. - Turku Klubi The trip went nice. Basic load in, soundcheck etc. As usual, for supporting bands, soundcheck time was sparse, but no problem. The gig went well, exept for a minor case of riff dementia confusion in one new song, "Promise Me", but that didn't stop us. It's ok since the song is new, so we can almost get away with some improvisation as nobody exept us know how the song is supposed to go... ;P
After the gig most of us went partying. Tuukka and our session bass player for the tour, Elmeri, went out to party. I won't go into details, but the end result was a whole lot of shirtless def leppard karaoke, a passed out bass player, spillt urine on the hotel walls (yes, SPILLT... don't ask), somebody stole my leather jacket and somehow Tuukka had found Deathstars singer Andreas' military hat-stageprop. Hmm. Ok. Good times tho'! Rokatessa roiskuu ;)
The next morning Elmeri had the worst hangover ever. As we exited the hotel, he had a a chunky and discolored rendezvous with yesterdays dinner.
When we arrived at the venue to collect our gear and move on to Tampere, suddenly Klubis door was swarmed with blaring sirens and a bunch of firetrucks and firefighters running around. My first thought was "oh fuck no not again, this time I won't jump!!". Luckily, it was only a false alarm, no fire in the venue. It was just steam that looked like smoke to someone, someone who called the fire department...
27.2. - Tampere Klubi That day soundcheck-time was even more sparse. We didn't get a soundcheck at all, only a quick line check before the show. But no worries, in the end we played what was probably the best show we've ever played! Tickets were sold out! People lining up on the street as early as 3-4 hours before the doors open! Fucking great! The crowd was awesome!! And the venue had (as usually) VERY good food for the band! 10+
Fear of Dominations driver fell in the backstage, twisted and broke his ankle! Ouch! Now there were two guys with crutches... We called up our ex-bassplayer Ari (it was his birthday) and sang happy birthday to him! Then afterparty to Inferno with all the guys and girls from the bands. Went to bed around six in the morning.
28.2. - Helsinki Tavastia
Had loads of time to soundcheck. Really nice house crew. First time I hear a stagemanager complain how LOW the volume is on the amps! "Goddamn turn 'em up, we're not a bunch of pigeon fuckers here! Fuck! In the days of Albert Järvinen (Hurriganes) we'd crank up the stacks so hard that your sideburns would shiver like autum leaves in the wind!". Thats the spirit!
Usually sound techs want minimal stage volume, so they can tinker the sounds on the board and get everything through the PA;s with minimal stage bleed. That "hush hush" obsession can be really irritating sometimes, so it was cool to finally have an old school kind of guy with a rock n roll attitude.
The gig went awesome! Great lights, great sound, great everything! After the gig we went to bar bäkkäri for the afterparty, and then to royal onnela for the afterpartys afterparty, had loads of fun!
After that we went for a late night snack at the MC Donalds right around the corner. There a drunken, well known finnish male ex-pornstar expressed his opinions on how tabloid wanker slash common asshole Timo T.A. Mikkonen ruins a town called Mäntsäläs' reputation and how I could get a whole lot of pussy showing off my cast to girls. Ok great :)
All in all it was an amazing tour! The guys from Deathstars we're extremely laid back and fun to work with! Professional musicians and above all great guys! A big thanks to Deathstars and Fear of Domination, it was great working with you guys (and girl)!
Here's some pictures from the Tavastia gig!: METALSCOPE
We were surprised how many applied when we started the search for a new bass player. Many good players applied, so the choice was hard.
