@ Oulu, Nuclear Nightclub
"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...
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