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