Headbangers Open Air - Warm Up, Session #5

Fates Warning is absolutely one of the bands I look forward to the most at this years Headbangers Open Air Festival. Amazing band which always has been amazingly good the few times I've seen them. Yes, one of my favorite bands and I haven't seen them 5 times even... That's a little strange to be me...

The first day of vacation has passed by waaaay to fast. Ok, we've managed to fix all we set up to do. We've been shopping for the Festival and fixed a little more with the flat so it has been a creative day. Still it feels like it passes by way too fast.

Cheers
E

Headbangers Open Air - Warm Up, Session #4

The first time I saw Slogh Feg was at the Metal Merchants Festival (awesome Festival by the way) in Oslo, Norway. Afterwards I felt stressed out and ehausted by the frantic energy and drive they had playing. Amazing concert and it will be interesting to see if the manage to repeat the Oslo energy.

Speaking about Oslo... It feels very surreal with the explosion in the government building. But it is even worse with the massacre at the camp. How can anyone be that cold? It really is horrible to see these attacks coming closer and closer, no matter who's behind them.

Today has been a good day! It was nice to come home after the Cult Of The Fox and Void Moon rehearsals. But just to realize there is a lot of things to do with the apartment still. Both cleaning and decorating. So today I started off right away and took care of the bathroom. Peter started with selecting poters for the walls. Ok, just a Spiders Lullaby over the TV at this point but more will come later today!!! So I guess vacation will be spent getting the flat in order... I told myself when moving here to fix everything at once so I don't get used to live with moving boxes and stuff like that. But now, almost a year later there's still a lot to do... Need to dig into that NOW!!!

Cheers
E

Headbangers Open Air - Warm Up, Session #3

Tokyo Blade I guess can go either way! The first albums are absolutely amazing. I'm not as convinced about Ain't Misbehavin' and the ones around that era! Line up changes mess things up too but Tokyo Blade was damn good at Keep It True a couple of years back and I really hope they can repeat that at Headbangers Open Air!!!

Don't forget about the Cutlt Of The Fox releaseparty @ Headbangers Open Air!

Cheers

E

Headbangers Open Air - Warm Up Session #2

Circle II Circle playing a Savatage set can not be anything but amazing. Zak's voice is still top notch and it will be nice to revisit some of the Savatage albums he was on again. It just is a little shame Andy Lee isn't in the band anymore. Anyone knows what happened?


Cheers
E

Headbangers Open Air, Warm-up session #1

Some Headbangers Open Air pep talk!!!
Ok, it's no fun at all that Jaguar cancelled and even worse that one of them is ill. But to be a little egoistic, I've seen Jaguar three times this year already. I've never seen Praying Mantis! So for me they were a really good replacement. And this song, or really, the entire "Forever In Time" album is fantastic!!!

I'm not sure what I'm looking forward to the most yet. Circle II Circle playing a Savatage set is of course a candidate! But Fates Warning will be awesome as well.... Slough Feg, SkullFist, Beehler, SETI...

Cheers

E

Recordshoppers Anonymous #3

Only 2 more days now... Then vacation! Ok, I've had a week over Getaway but this time it feels more for real! It feels a little strange to take days off with nothing planned, just be home. Don't remember when that happened last. Ok, Headbangers Open Air happens during these two weeks too so I won't be home all the time...
The release of the Cult Of The Fox album "A Vow of Vengeance" is coming closer. The date is set to July 29th. We got the test press last week to check how it will look like for real. It is quite strange to see that I'm actually ON that record. It still is a little hard to believe! And it seems there's some interest in it too, a big part of the first print has already been sold according to the Record Company, Metalbound Records. That's cool!
So now we are gearing up for the releaseparty which will be held at the campsite at Headbangers Open Air!!! Thursday I think it will be. Come by for a cheer if you're at the HOA Festival!!!

"A Vow of Vengeance" cover artwork

Last weekend gave a little taste of vacation. For a very long time we had nothing planned! Just Peter's grandmothers birthday party and a rehearsal session with Cult Of The Fox. The latter became just half serious since it only was me, Peter and Fritze. But it was fun but I was lazy and left my guitars at home. It took a while to get acustomed to the Schecter Elite 7... One string too much on that one!!!

Another masterpiece is being born

Peter have been creative like hell lately and started working hard on the next Cult Of The Fox album... Ok, it will take some time to get it finished of course and it is good to have time to work with the songs but everything is just falling into place and the three finished songs sounds great already.

The chase is better than the catch

Of course he's writing Void Moon stuff as well. I have a really hard time to try to keep up and dig into everything. So ok, it was a quite busy weekend but compared to all other weekends it was very relaxed. The cat kept us busy though trying to get attention. Getting close his eyes turned black and the vampire teeth showed... He's quite brutal in his play!

Free bird

The birthdayparty was held at a resturant by the sea. And it was a nice one, and a nice day too! The food was good and everyone was happy with the arrangement. Of course a swim was on the schedule after dinner. If I'd jumped in I would have sunk like a stone. The food was good I said, and then desert. Not a good start for a swim... But the others jumped in and seemed to enjoy it. It was a very nice day too.

Badjävlar

I really thought the beach would be a lot more crowded than it was. Ok, I guess a lot of people had given up already when our lunch was over. But that's nice, it is very nice to just sit by the sea and watch. There's always something to see... Birds, boats or people!

Malmö Cityline, not the most dynamic one

There's a renovation going on in Peter's house so from Saturday morning there were no TV... We decided to go rent some movies. We aimed for 80's fantasy but for some reason that section was very limited... We found some interesting ones anyway. But, well, I guess comments isn't needed for these. Monster Slayer, could maybe have been fun but was so slow, the bild-up was 1h25 min and the Monster Slayer part like 5 minutes... Steel Dawn with Patrick Swayze, better production but I don't know... The funny part was the text on the box, "A Mad Max from the 21st Century". The move was from -87! Someone missed something there...

Classics?

The Teenagers from uranus we watched 15 minutes of but it was just oo annoying. Cartoon, hand camera, candid camera bullshit, some ridiculous story line... Naah, the other two was watchable at least.
But it was long since I had a weekend like that! And it was nice!

Now I'm trying to keep up with the reports about the Festivals and I've been quite creative. There's just some adjustments and picture editing left for Copenhell and my plan is to write the mere part of Getaway before HOA... Because, even if it seems quite calm a few weeks ahead now there's so much going on in the fall it's crazy!


The lineup for the Alcatraz Metal Festival is super for me! I want to see all bands!!!! All bands on the bill are really at the top of my list! Vicious Rumors, Anacrusis, Communic... Damn! And then Helloween, Death Angel, UDO, Forbidden, Helstar... And the rest!

I just need to decide where to go! Alcatraz is for sure and also Essen to see Vicious Rumors with Helstar. I had the one at Dynamo Cafe in Eindhoven in my mind too but since Vicious Rumors cancelled that one, I'm not sure anymore. Maybe going from Essen to Deinze through Rotterdam is an option.

Rotterdam isn't the most pleasant town to be in though. And Nuclear Assault plays at Turock the day between Vicious Rumors and Alcatraz Metalfestival too... We'll see, there's still time to decide!!!

And then to the real subject! I'm not sure what has happened lately, I don't think I buy as many records as I used to but still the new ones pile up at the table! Ok, after reading the book about David Byron I just had to get the re-mastered Uriah Heep CD's, a lot of bonus goodies on those. At the same time two classic Deep Purple was put in the cart too!!! Like €5 each so no big deal. And Dia Psalam was good on Getaway too so I decided it was time to get their records as well...

Apart from the pile of CD's there's vinyl too! It's so hard to resist when it is cheap! We should just go to Skivesset to get the Rough Diamond LP (David Byron mania here you know) but then they had a lot of other goodies too! Not that much to make any noise about when it is €1-2 LP's and €0.50 7"'s

But I've done some real shopping too!

The Sorcery box I actually got earlier this year but it was just now I got it delivered! Very cool one, all their old demos printed on LP, the newest on cassett, T-shirt, patch and a mighty zine about the time when the demos were recorded and promoted. All neatly packed in a massive wooden box!

There's just too many cool things being released now. The Hellhammer/Celtic Frost biography/photo book is massive. I had actually forgotten about it when I happened to see it on Gävle. The Lords Of Chaos was bought at the same time.

The Access All Areas by Angders Tengner will be some fun reading! I subscribed to OKEJ for a year or two and I still have a lot of clippings from those magazines. Anders was editor in chief there so I guess it will be some real nostalgia in there, revisit the aricles from the mid 80's. Bruce Dickinson Biography is a must and was very cheap. And the last one, a childrens book really, Jacks Fantastic Journey.

And I've also ordered the Metalion - The Slayer Diaries. The pictures looks amazing! The book of the Slayer Mag was cool, this sure is something else! I really hope I'll get it, all Swedish online shops has been a mess lately. Announcing things they never get into stock and records are removed from the orders without notification. That's really bad. And it is strange when CDWOW, who shipps from Hong Kong is faster than the company located in my hometown.

So, I'm sure what will keep me occupied in the winter at least! I have A LOT of reading to do!

Well, back to business! I've been really good today, done the laundry, cleaning of the apartment and done the dishes (ok, put everything in the dish washer...). the bad thing is that I'm not done yet... Better get back to the cleaning so I can start my vacation in a clean apartment!

Cheers

E

NP: Uriah Heep - Sweet Freedom

COTF - Through Metal And Madness Promo.wmv

One more sample from

Cult Of The Fox

upcoming album

"A Vow Of Vengeance"

and this is a fast one.

"Throught Metal and Madness"

All rain now?

It sure was a busy weekend before my first week of vacation. Iron Maiden on Friday July 1st, Headbangers Open Air Warm Up party at Jörgen's place and then Big 4 at Ullevi which I was fortunate enough to get tickets to from a friend. And one thing I still have a little hard to believe was that Livenation gave me a photopass for the event. It all got too tricky in the end so I decided to just watch Anthrax, Megadeth and Slayer and only "shoot" Metallica... i couldn't bring the camera inside the venue (more than for the photopit for the first three songs) and ask that the Livenation staff should let me back in between each band felt a little too much. I was really impressed with Metallica. I lost interest in them long ago but some of it came back, those classics are really fantastic. But Anthrax were the best on that event, Joey Belladonna just gets better and better. I never thought he would sing the Bush songs but Only worked perfetly for him! Still, the Big 4 couln't beat IRON MAIDEN!!! I asked for a photopass for Iron Maiden as well, I thought I can't get more than no...

More on that on Metal Kaoz

Big 4

Iron Maiden

'Tallica (as the photopass said)

I'm not sure how long it has been since I started talking about a new vest... The old one I think has been with me since -98 or -99 something. They're not the easiest to wash and hanging with me all summers through sun, rain, dust, mud and perhaps some beer too... It takes its toll... Also the backpatch (signed by Mikkey Dee) started to rip. One of the priest patches on the front was completely blank and also the Hall Of The Mountain King was starting to give in, for not speak about the pockets.

I started design in when I still was living in Gävle, made a few mistakes, added patches on the wrong places and gave up. For Maiden and Metallica I realized the old one was at Peter's flat in Malmö...

Said and done! It's still not finished, have a little more to do but I figured I can do that later. Of course, almost finishing up I found a bunch of patches I had picked out from the start so we'll see what happens in the fall with it (and if the homemade Savatage patch on the back holds). It's a little hard to believe the old was just as black as the new one when that one was new. So nowadays I have Black Sabbath instead of Motörhead on the back.

After the hectic weekend it was time to head north. I spent a few days at my parents place just relaxing and help out with a little of each, mowing the lawn and free the wild strawberries from tares and thistles. Those pinchy bastarts itch like hell!!! But it was nice to just be out in the sun wroking a little physically. i also managed to take a trip to Gävle and meet up for dinner with some of my old workmates, that was nice too...

Getaway Rock Festival was another reason I went up there at this time... Again a very nice Festival (Accept & Kreator were the best), great arrangement, cool lineup and lots of friends from now and way past. Really nice. More on that (too) at another time.

Speaking about the Headbangers Open Air warm up! I realized it's no fun, as it was on KIT this year, to just have listened to the bands once or twice prior to the Festival. Even if I knew a lot of the bands it still is much more fun digging into it for real. So after the HOA BBQ party at Jörgens place there has been a lot more music than usual. But that sure is a lot of fun and the more I listen the more I'm looking forward to the festival! Even if know a lot of the bands already there's always new stuff to discover. I looked past Striker for example, a few listenings later and I'm really looking forward to see them. Evil One, Leviathan are two others... I still think the battle for best bad will be between Fates Warning and Slough Feg but we'll see!

But first another week in a very empty office. That's very nice! I still have a lot to do but there's noone around to disturb me. I might actually get something done then!!!

Cheers

E

NP: Vulvagun - Cold Moon Over Babylon