Satan Claus was nice this year...

So, Christmas came and went. I drove up to Sandviken a few days before Christmas eve, even if I was working it was nice to get out of the office. Also, the last couple of miles of driving it was real winter. A few degrees below 0 and snow on the road and on the trees. Very pretty. It almost stayed over Christmas too. But I must admit, I don't like green christmases, I want snow. Didn't have time for many activities up there. Perhaps I should have planned better and arranged meetings with my friends, but I'll take that next time. At least I had relaxing days, no stress at all

Now I'll have a few days more working from home. I have a few things to finish but hopfully I will have the chance to use some of my vacation days, still have quite a few left. So now I'll have time to dig in to the lists of the year and finish my own list. The one for Metal Kaoz has been online for about a week now. Rather diverse list I say...

To add it up, just by sum up the places it looks like this;

1. THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT - “Deconstruction”
2. MACHINE HEAD - “Unto The Locust”
3. VENOM - “Fallen Angels”
4. JACK STARR’S BURNING STARR - “Land Of The Dead”
5. PRIMORDIAL - “Redemption At The Puritan’s Hand”

Then of course, we've been preparing ourselves for the upcoming gigs with Cult Of The Fox. One bad thing is that Pelle decided to leave the band due to his new family situaton took too much time. The good thing is that Fredric was in almost right away, at least for these gigs so we could start to rehearse right away. And it has been going really good. But it will be a challange to play for almost an hour... Was LONG since I last played a gig that long.  



So the gigs confirmed now are;

13 Jan @ The Rambler, Eindhoven, NL (w/ Surpuissance and Ear Danger)

14 Jan @ La Chimere, Lille, FR (w/ Surpuissance and Aywarn)

Then it was time for Christmas!!! So I started to get some for myself... Band guitarpicks... Both of them turned out really cool. Now all I need is to learn how to throw them out in the crowd while playing.

Then I've must have been really nice this year! Got a lot of really nice gifts... 

 A Void Moon tea cup to heat me up during these dark ages!!! All with a "rockstar" picture of myself on it as well!

Wine glasses, for white wine... Even if these perhaps are a little too big for that. But atleast they're smaller than the ones we already have (it's hard to doze when you just get one glass each out of a bottle)! The Tony Iommi "Iron Man" (but why the hell did they add the Iron Maiden M in the title?) Biography will be some really interesting reading, it will be fun to hear his version of the story since I've just finished "I am Ozzy". And then another guitarhero of mine, Michael Schenker Live DVD... Very nice!

Waiting for dinner at my parents place I started to check the books a little. I found one big in the bottom shelf that looked rather anonymous with a brown leather binder and small gold letters on the back, John Bunyan "The Holy War". Just looking briefly at it it seemed to be some religious propaganda. Looking it up later it should be a novel. But the pictures, or engravings were amazing. The first one cathing my eye was one of Diabolus and Infidelity at the gates of hell. Then Infidelity the Great escaping prison... And it kept going like that. Of course, good won in the end though, Diabolus had to see himself conquered.  

To find this book at my parents house was a bit of a surprise. I thought I rescued most of them from my grandma's after she died. My parents isn't religious what so ever but of course, this book was rather special. Still most everythig was given to charity organizations. Of course, my parents had no clue where this book came from, mom thought at first she'd gotten it as a bonus from one of the book clubs she used to be a memeber of. But printed in 1893, this was too old for that. It makes sense if it comes from my grandma. But my dad don't remember taking any of her books. So I guess it will be a mystery for a while. But it was a cool book at least.

Cheers

E 

NP: Chariot - Burning Ambition 

Where the hell's the SNOW???

So, again there's been a lot to do, both at work and home... The concert season really went out with a bang! Saxon & Anvil x2, Lizzy Borden & Martyr, Iced Earth, Pentagram, Thrash Fest Classics and Motörhead in about a week and a half... That's ALMOST even overdoze for me! So now again, I have a lot to write for Metal Kaoz so it's really nice with a weekend with nothing planned. Ok, I did plan to see Lizzy Borden in Trollhättan today as well but I really don't want to go anywhere today and I really need the rest. Looking forward to another rough week with long days and tons of things to do.
Motörhead did a really good concert last night, Lemmy's soar voice was long gone and the place was packed... I waited the longest I could before leaving for the concert, not hearing anything about a photopass from Livenation. In the end they granted me one but that was too late, I didn't have access to my email at that time. A bummer for sure.

 

One of the reason this week (too) became as tough as it was, was because of the weather. Monday morning driving from Malmö took about double the time as usual. Apparently everyone was going to work at the same time, very early because of the weather so the freeway was packed with cars driving very slow. I had to try and see if it really was slippry. I didn't feel any of that... But the traffic info on the radio said other things. I guess I'm still used to the way of the north when it comes to driving during winter...

Anyway, I had to make a stop halfway between Varberg and Borås getting some air, THEN I realized it actually was rather slippry on the roads but I couldn't feel any of that in the new blue car with brand new winter tyres on it.



After this short break the road was closed... A lorry with a trailer had slipped off the road and was blocking it comepletely. So I had to take a detour from Björketorp via Fotskäl, Asstorp, Hajom and Skene before getting back out on the main road again. Nice drive but NOT when all I can thinnk of is how to ccatch up for lost time without having to stay in the office all night. Arrived at the office about three hours later than planned.

 And then the snow came... At least for a day! Driving home from the Thrashfest Classics it was sowing heavily, the worst time I could  hardly see 10m infront of the car on the freeway. It's a bit exciting to hope you'll see the fence in the middle or that you're on the right side of the hard shoulder when the next indication shows up.

   

But everything went alright in the end, just took a little more time than planned. That seems to be the case for me these days, doesn't really matter if I fly, drive, take the train, especially on monday's, it ALWAYS takes more time, are delayed or breaks down or whatever. The snow didn't stay long though, the morning after Thrash Fest Classics it was raining and in the afternoon everything was gone again, back to dark and gloomy.

So this weekend will be spent listening to music. I have to make up my mind about album of the year list for Metal Kaoz... It's going to be a tough one this year.... That's for sure. Ok, top three was rather simple, Arch/Matheos - "Sympathetic Resonance", Vicious Rumors - "Razorback Killers" and Hammers Of Misfortune - "17th Street" settled rather fast when I started to think about it... It still migth change, who knows. I have to list 5 for Metal Kaoz and now it starts to get hard. Next three, at this point is Hell, Anvil and Saxon... Then Jack Starr's Burning Starr, Blood Ceremony, Krux, Beehler, Cage and a few more climbed fast when I started to get into them. Still need to listen more. Then I know I've mentioned Argus, Slingblade, Megadeth, Uriah Heep, Ken Hensley too. The Riot album is really nice, Anthrax sounds really good, Martyr, Iced Earth... Gonna be hard to choose, that's for sure!!!

Cheers

E



NP: Jack Starr's Burning Starr - Land Of The Dead

Recordshoppers Anonymous #7

Well... Christmas came early this year!!! First I picked up one package from CDON and one from Dave Starr at ICA. I've planned to buy the Wildestarr "Arrival" album since it first was released but for some reasons that never happened. After posting a few links at the Vicious Rumors forum Dave contacted me asking if I didn't wanted to review the Wildstarr album. Of course I wanted to do that! And at the same time I took the opportunity to buy a shirt too. Dave and London were nice enough to sign the album too! Really nice! The CDON package was more normal, new Riot and new Mortal Sin together with some Christmas presents... And then I finally got the Martyr "Circle of 8" record together with the T-shirt ordered from Metal Blade. Ok, that has been at Peter's place for a few weeks but I haven't gotten around to pick it up until now. Metal Blade really has nice offers for their new releases but the postage fee isn't as fun, and then of course everything gets stuck in Customs in Sweden and tax and fees needs to be paid as well... So in the end the offers aren't that good.

The really cool package though I had to take a little extra turn on the bike (I'm actually happy about the weather now, still +5 and not so much rain which means I can go by bike to work and avoid the busses for a week or two more) by Burken Livs to get the HUGE TPL Package. At first this should have been split in two or three shipments but as it turned out, one was the way to go. And frankly, it was more fun this way. Even the clerk in the shop complained about lifting heavy stuff!!!!
It would have been nice to have some time at home though to be able to listen to it all... But it sure are busy days now. A lot of worktravel (Tallinn and China done) and some for my own fun too. But I sure as hell hasn't been home much lately. So I'm really behind with all the Metal Kaoz stuff... Don't like that! But on the other hand, I'm just as much behind at my regular job too. And then, my work computer decided to pack in on me the last day in China... IT Support managed to start it up again but now it's giving me bluescreens every now and then! (yes, I've made backup's of everything, now!) Still very frustrating to know I will have to spend a few hours setting up a new computer in the already filled days.

But when I do find the time, it sure will be nice days with good music. Candlemass - Doomology, Arch/Matheos (might be album of the year), Portrait, Slingblade, Satans Host, Iced Earth, High Spirits, Vanderbuyst, Mirror Of Deception and a whole bunch of Trouble albums!

I'm still jetlagged from China, I thought the long sleep between Saturday and Sunday really should fix it, and if that didn't, staying up very late Sunday since we saw Crimes Of Passion, Anvil and Saxon in Copenhagen. But I'm still dead tired around the afternoon coffee break! Hopefully that will be better soon. I really enjoy the trips, even if they always mean a lot of more things to do, but ok, it never has taken this long to recover from the Jet lag before...
Cheers
E



NP: Hammers Of Misfortune - 17:th Street

Recordshoppers Anonymous #6

Well, I keep reeating myself that the days at work are crazy and I didn't think it could be more to do than it was last week but I was wrong. I keep on running on meetings all day and then I'm supposed do some real work as well. I doesn't work that well! But ok... I'm scheduling two quite interesting workshops at least so there are a lot of interesting things going on as well. But it shure would be nice to be able to finish something sometimes too.

So to keep my mood up I've been shopping some records again!!! Coludn't resist when Nevermore  "Dreaming Neon Black" was listed! Then of course it gets too expensive to just order one LP when it comes to shipping. So I took the opportunity to get Striker, another Merciless Death, Dio and Quicksand Dream. And then Saxon "Live to Rock" 7", Convixion. The special edition for Iced Earth "Dystopia" also was a must. It sounds really good but I need to listen more before I judge for real.

And it's not only work that has been busy. We've been rehearsing a lot lately, first and foremost to get ready for Malta Doom Metal Festival but of course to keep things up with Cult Of The Fox too! Unfortunately the gig planned for Tilburg won't happen since Grand Magus and that really cool tourpackage should play there at the same day. But it all turned out nice and we confirmed a date in Eindhoven instead. So now we have Eindhoven Jan 13 and Lille Jan 14, still looking for more gigs though.

But it will be awesome to go back to Malta again. I heave the weather gadget on my computer and looking out to a mixture of +2 hailstones and heavy rain that gadet that says sun and +24 feels like a joke. Can't even imagine someone still has summer. I'm really looking forward to explore more of the island(s) too. Now we have time for the harbor cruise, we are going to go to the old temples, Medina, Rabat and more... Eat swordfish, feed the cats (even if they're strange and don't like ham), sit on the rocks with my feet in the ocean, drink colourful drinks and just ejoy! I need that now. 

And then of course the Festival. I especially look forward to see Victims Of Creation again. They kicked ass last year. But the line up is really strong! Pagan Altar, Mirror Of Deception, Nomad Son, Forsaken and of course Void Moon and a few more. So it will be another great weekend in the Woods for Malta Doom Metal Festival.

NP: Michael Schenker - Temple Of Rock

Vicious Rumors Picture Galore

A while ago we went on a roadtrip to see a few Vicious Rumors concerts. At least I had to make up for only catching one more than Keep It True on the last let. My trip started in Essen at the Turock. I really like that venue and this night the camera loved the lights and Vicious Rumors. It sure was an amazing set played too. 24 for songs all in all, only 16 listed on the setlist. Noone can complain about not getting their money's worth seeing Vicious Rumors at least. Killer show as usual and I had a blast!



VICIOUS RUMORS live @ Turock, ESSEN, Germany



The second stop was at the Baroeg in Rotterdam. This city is one of very few places I've actually been scared being out on the streets at night. But ok, that was in the downtown area around the central station. But what the lady in the reception of the hotel at that visit referred to as the Bad and Good nighbourhood I certainly don't agree on. Don't remember the name of the venue I visited that time but apparently that was in the bad part of the town and the hotel in the good. Yeah right! Prostitution and drug dealing in every corner while only night open grocerystores around the venue. The area around baroeg was really calm though!
Again Vicious Rumors put on a great show. I must admit I wonder when they will flip over and actually not top the last time I saw them... Both these shows, in Essen and Rotterdam was fantastic and the best I've seen this far. The same sentence I've been repeating after each Vicious Rumors tour for years now...

VICIOUS RUMORS live @ Baroeg, ROTTERDAM, Netherlands



There are more pictures available on the Metal Kaoz page, also check out the review!

Metal Kaoz Report for VICIOUS RUMORS

Vicious Rumors also announced they'll be joining Hammerfall on their entire European Tour in November and December. That's very cool and I really want to see at least one of these shows, Ljubljana in Slovenia. It's actually VERY annoying to not be home in Sweden when Vicious Rumors actually makes it here... But at least I get to play Rockstar at that time to since we are playing with Void Moon at the Malta Doom Metal Festival. Shit happens, but on the other hand, I've always wanted to see more of the eastern parts of Europe. Still it's rather strange to plan to go and see Hammerfall and I'm sure about that Vicious Rumors will rule over them. Hammerfall won't stand a chance.

Cheers

E

 NP: VICIOUS RUMORS - Something's Burning