Insomnium @ Bloodstock Open Air 13.-15.8.2009
Hello again, my beloved tour diary! It’s been a while, but we’re back. We have a new album coming out on September and already couple of shows under our belt with the new material. We’ve had a test run on couple of the new songs on Finnish shows we’ve played, and now it’s finally time to hit the festivals abroad. We were supposed to play Bloodstock already few years ago but we had to cancel it due to overlapping Satyricon tour. Now that this plan actually made flesh, we were more than happy to hit the road again. Story goes like this:
First leg of our journey was from Joensuu to Helsinki via Jyväskylä. Something like 500 km. Markus came to pick me up at nine o’clock in the morning. We were supposed to be early, but managed to hassle with all the gear for an hour so we ended up being in a hurry. Anyway, being on the road felt really good. We picked up Urski (the sound engineer) from Joensuu and Ville F. from Jyväskylä, and speeded all the way to Helsinki-Vantaa airport. Niilo was already waiting for us at the airport car park. Due to limitations in amount of luggage we could take to plane with us, we had to re-pack our gear before check-in. We’re used to traveling light, so we managed to check in with three guitars and only two suitcases.
The few remaining minutes before flight were filled with excitement and rotten humor. We did some tax-free shopping “just in case”, and then off we went. Quick naps and we were at Heathrow. Then we had a three-hour drive to our hotel at Lichfield. We made a brief stop at some service station to grab something to eat and decided to get some beers too, “just in case”. The original plan was to stay “relatively” sober for there was an early wake-up call waiting tomorrow. Our oath of abstinence however started to evaporate as we made our way to the hotel. Two bottles of spirits and a crate of beer evaporated too before we got to there. The party mood was on, but we had to save some ammo for the day to come. So we closed the cap, checked in and headed for bed.
Friday morning was sunny. I had messed up with the time zones and the alarm clock last night and hence woke up an hour earlier than supposed to. It didn’t matter though, none of us felt like sleeping anymore. We had a traditional English breakfast with all its unhealthy components and made ready for the gig. I played the set through with Ville F., sitting by the bed at our hotel room with only underwear on. Great rehearsals! Our driver (local guy arranged by the festival organizers) came to pick us up at ten o’clock and drove us to the festival site.
The festival organization had “professional” stamped on everything from the start. Artist manager greeted us and took us to our backstage at the general back stage are. Soon stage manager stormed in with his crew, and we went through the backline and input lists we would be using. Everything went smoothly and quickly, except for Urski. The house sound engineer showed him the input list for the main stage. Two different cultures collided as Urski’s face begun to turn into grin. “Where is this piece of shit from? This is all wrong.” It occurred that he had got a wrong input list, and soon things were sorted out.
We knew little about the festival itself, so we wandered about a bit. The festival area was kind of huge and spacious and the atmosphere among the metalheads seemed to be very relaxed. It didn’t look too different from Finnish festivals – some people were already totally shit faced before the first bands started. We watched the first two bands play and then made our way back to backstage.
There was a huge space behind the main stage, where the stagehands were able to make backlines ready for quick changeover. It was almost like a hangar, three movable drum raisers and piles of guitar amps. We got our electric equipment tested and stamped by the staff and made our gear ready for the show. Million Dollar Reload played before us and as they finished their set the hangar was swarming with stagehands and technicians. They came off stage, we went on stage and Die Apocalyptische Reiter was already building their backline. We got our drums, two Mesa Triple Rectifier stacks and Ampeg SVT “rantasauna” bass amps on stage, and started to do a quick line check. I went to the hangar behind the backdrop for my guitar and wireless and suddenly realized that they were nowhere to be found. It had been in a guitar stand ready to go, but now even the stand was gone. Soon all the staff was looking for the missing piece of equipment. I was gathering a storm inside my head – only five minutes to the show, I hadn’t played a single note yet to test the gear and now the guitar and wireless were missing. I ended up running around the backstage area and finally ended up at Million Dollar Reload back stage. There it was by some mistake. The band members were gathered around the pile of instruments drinking beer. I made few cave man expressions, mumbled something like “I’ll be needing these right now” and stormed back to the stage. Goddamn hippies…
We had less than a minute of idle time before we hit the stage. Walking on stage was quite a surprise – the area between the stage and the mixing stand was already crowded, and more and more people kept streaming to the field in front of us. Intro was playing; we raised our fists to the air to salute the Brits and the audience answered with a fierce roar. Markus kicked the roller coaster going and we took the ride with dedication. It was a blast from the start to the end. It was a big stage and we gave all our energy to fill the space. 40 min set seemed like twenty seconds, and the crowd reaction was flattering. The stage sound varied from terrible to average and the Mesa amps were on their last run with burnt-to-a-shell tubes. We didn’t mind, the feeling was confident even with the poor monitoring. Definitely one of our best festival shows, and clearly among the top five best shows ever.
After the show we packed our gear quickly and had a little debriefing. Everybody was content. We downed quickly on bottle of Tullamore Dew accompanied with some Budweisers and then got back to serious business for a while. Markus and I got the shortest straws and we went to take our equipment back to the hotel. Ville F. and Niilo went to meet Darren from Candlelight and started the first of the many interviews we had to give this afternoon. We looted the backstage and then gave it up to Sodom. It was less than an hour when our driver got us back from the hotel to the festival area.
The whole afternoon was scheduled with different interviews. We had beers, relaxed and did the compulsory media talk in turns. It was really nice actually, even when discussing the same subjects for the fifth time. Darren took care of us and kept us supplied with drinks. Later in the afternoon we had a signing session. I was quite surprised that there was a hundred meter queue outside the tent. We signed all kind of stuff from CDs and posters to clothes and tits. Some of the fans were really shy, some more talkative. But all of them were polite and none of them resembled the typical Finnish “do more this or less that” –stereotype. Sweet.
We spent the evening at the festival area just celebrating our invasion to England. We met some old friends from Katatonia and Candlelight Records staff as well. It was a pleasant and easy-going evening. The beer they served contained only something like 3,4% of alcohol, so we remained almost unaffected by the ninety cans we consumed. Almost. We went to see Carcass and Arch Enemy for a while, but were unable to concentrate to their sets longer than ten minutes at a time. Back at the bar Markus was trying to order a vodka-based drink called The Monster. He got the name wrong somehow, and ended up just yelling “Big Beast, Big Beast!” to the barmaid. The lady behind the desk stood in awe and amusement as this dwarf-like figure sweated all over the place repeating the same nonsense over and over again. It took a while before I could stop laughing and translated the Big Beast to a Monster.
It was past midnight when we finally took a taxi to the hotel. We were really treated like guests by the staff the whole evening. One fine individual escorted us to the specific production office for our taxi. The walk in a warm, dark August night turned to a rather bizarre event: There was a fireworks going on. Our guide wore a German WWII-style mantle, US style helmet, furry beard and blue nail polish. He threw himself to the ground a few times dodging fireworks and just mumbled something about being mortared back in Nam in 67’. Then he changed the subject and gave a lecture about the invasion of England by the Christians during the last two thousand years. I didn’t get much of it, but it was a great amusement as we waited for the taxi.
Back at the hotel we had to sit down for a while at the park, chat and laugh our asses off. Everybody was happy. Finally sleep caught weary eyes and we crawled to bed. I remember Ville F. starting to snore in a middle of a sentence before I fell asleep.
Saturday was just a long boring day on the way home. The driver picked us up at hotel at noon and drove us back to Heathrow. There was no air conditioning in the car, and the ghost of the hangover looming upon us didn’t make the journey any more enjoyable. Checks at the airport went with a routine. Niilo’s groins looked a bit suspicious so he got some intimate time with the officers. No lethal weapons found. We took the flight home and were back in Helsinki by midnight. Then there was the exhausting drive back to Joensuu, which I took with Markus in turns. I was back home at six o’clock in the morning. I was dead tired but happy. Thank you England, we’ll be back soon.
Ville Vänni/INSOMNIUM
