Tagged: nightrage
My year in rock – 2013 retrospect
We’re a few days into 2014 already and I never really had time to do the usual look in the rearview mirror to summarize what 2013 was like for me.
Compared to the past 5 years, it was less eventful than usual, and a lot of it has to do with my father’s passing. I cancelled some gigs I had planned to go to and well, just wasn’t in the mood for anything really, but there were still a few highlights in 2013.
January started with Gothenburg Sound Festival where I met up with FIREWIND-drummer JO NUNEZ who was playing with NIGHTRAGE.
Shortly thereafter, I went to the US to see a few FIREWIND-shows and meet up with the new singer KELLY SUNDOWN CARPENTER for an interview at the Gramercy in NYC. Went to Atlanta and the Masquerade as well, pretty cool venue.
Got stuck in a blizzard the day I was supposed to fly home from JFK via Toronto, and made it home in the very last minute. Drama!
Swedish bands CRAZY LIXX & H.E.A.T played at KB, show got interrupted by the fire alarm and the club was evacuated.
Went to beautiful ICELAND with my friend Henny, that was a trip I won’t forget anytime soon – Iceland is a fairy tale country and I hope they never let the ways of the “outside world” change what they’ve accomplished. It’s amazing.
[This isn’t even Photoshopped – it actually looks like that!]
Gigs, there were a few. IRON MAIDEN played at Malmo Stadion, I spent all day in line to get a front row spot. Well worth it!
MEGADETH played at Vega in Copenhagen, they had just released Super Collider and played the title track from that album live for the first time. Dave Mustaine also brought a kid up on stage, not a usual sight at Megadeth shows. :)
STEVE HARRIS and his British Lion played at KB in Malmo, and although the attendance was low, to say the least, it was insanely cool to see a musician of his caliber that up close! I got dust from his sneakers in my face when he stomped on his monitor, he was THAT close. It wasn’t as bad as people say, the band had a good time and that’s what I remember the most.
Another memorable gig was PAUL GILBERT in Gothenburg, at Sticky Fingers. Been a fan since forever, Paul is amazing. There are some fantastic shredders in the world, but Paul is unique. I love his goofy style, his dry sense of humor, his playing, his way of interacting with the crowd… It was a great show.
After Apollo Papathanasio’s departure from Firewind, I decided to keep track of his other projects, so I went to Hamburg, Germany to visit my friend Su and see Apollo with SPIRITUAL BEGGARS. A few months later made a last minute decision to see the band in Thessaloniki, Greece as well.
Apollo also visited me in my home in Malmo for a video interview and a nice lunch. Awesome dude.
Of course, there were a bunch of FIREWIND shows this year as well. Rock in den Ruinen in Germany, SWEDEN ROCK FESTIVAL, and of course, the tour of AUSTRALIA. I opted out of all other shows because I needed the $$ for Australia.
SWEDEN ROCK FESTIVAL was a weird festival this year, it was only days after my father’s passing, but I had to go to fulfill my duties to Sweden Rock Magazine and also to my friend Su who was visiting from Germany, SRF was her bachelorette party.
Memorable interviews: DAVID COVERDALE (WHITESNAKE), love the man, he rocks!
[A short clip from that interview]
And finally meeting LITA FORD for the first time ever. She was great, I’m glad she didn’t turn out to be a bitch.
Also saw her shows in Gothenburg ad Sticky Fingers and Malmo, KB.
Went to the UK twice in May to see WHITESNAKE, Thunder and Journey. I could see Whitesnake a million times and it still never gets old. :)
GUS G came to Malmo for the SWEDISH METAL CONVENTION, had a great time with him and Andy R, thanks to Pontus for bringing him to the convention. Also met Tallee Savage and her sister Amanda, Jorn, Anders Johansson (YNGWIE, HAMMERFALL) and a bunch of other people.
(Anders Johansson (Hammerfall, Yngwie), Pekka and Gus in the VIP-room)
Gus G and Paul DiAnno:
Straight after that…business class with Emirates to Sydney via Dubai, went on a safari, met koalas, saw the first Firewind show of the Australian tour, continued to Brisbane, met up with Clint, flew to Adelaide and then finally Melbourne. Stayed there for a week after the band had left. Met a few more koalas and then some really nice people at his BBQ party.
The free BAR in business class at my Emirates-flight to Sydney. :) It didn’t suck. ;)
Came home, got another tattoo and saw BLACK SABBATH in Copenhagen.
An old friend, singer of the Swedish sleaze-band NASTY IDOLS, Andy Pierce, passed away at the age of 45, something that I still can’t quite grasp…
Finished my year in the US visiting friends and checking out two gigs that I wrote about in my previous blog, both Savatage-related.
That was it – in a nutshell. Less travel than usual 2013 but I’m already looking forward to the Steel Panther European tour in the spring and Gus G’s solo-debut! Welcome 2014!
My Year In Rock – retrospect 2011 (part 3)
Geez, yeah I guess it’s been a pretty busy year. So, here’s the last part of the 2011-blog – part 3. :-)
I left Split, Croatia very early in the morning on October 1, think I got up around 4 am that day. With a stopover in Zageb, I landed in Copenhagen, Denmark early afternoon, took the train to Malmö, Sweden, went home, threw my suitcase in the hall, picked up my recorder and practically ran out the door while calling a cab on the way out because I didn’t want to waste any time on finding a parking space….
SEBASTIAN BACH visited Malmö, Sweden
Rockmässan in Malmö had a special guest: Sebastian Bach. He is an old friend, and I was glad that he finally came to my home town. He was glad to see me too, Baz is one of those people who I’ll probably be running into when I’m 80 somewhere in the world, and everything will be as if it was still 1989 and we just met yesterday!
[Baz and I 20 years ago… anything but sober, but definitely having a great time!]
And Baz and I – 2011 :-)
I had about a week off after the Baz-interview, living my “normal” life (whatever that is in my case…) before I got on a plane once again, and landed on the other side of the Atlantic – New York City. I just spent the first night at Hilton, then got on the first domestic flight to Tampa, Florida – a place I know very well, as I’ve visited it at least once a year for the past five years. It’s the home base of Jon Oliva’s Pain and a place where I’ve got good friends. Felt nice to be “home”.
FIREWIND kicked off their US-tour – and YNGWIE MALMSTEEN just kicked ass!
This time I rented a car and drove to a nice little hotel close to State Theatre where Firewind was kicking off the US tour. Much to my surprise, I found the guys of Nightrage staying at the same hotel. They were one of the opening acts on the Frets of Fury-tour. Really cool guys, drummer Jo played double duty on that whole tour – with Nightrage and Firewind, pheew! The guy is amazing though, he’s now officially the drummer of Firewind.
Singer Apollo was back for the US tour. Things back to normal for the FW-fans, in other words.
It was a tough tour for me though, dealing with a bad jetlag and very little time to get any sleep whatsoever, as I was flying from city to city three days in a row. Tampa – Atlanta and NYC. Zzzzzzzz…………
But once again – totally worth it! Here’s from the last Firewind-show I saw this year, at Gramercy Theatre, NYC:
Two weeks now, until I see these guys again, in Bob Katsionis’ (mr keyboard player) home town Athens. :-)
Anyway, after the three Firewind-shows, I stayed in New York an extra day because another one of my favorites was playing – the one and only YNGWIE MALMSTEEN! I havent seen so many people show up for a club gig in ages! One of the guys in front of me in the long line just said: “There are a lot of guitarplayers in New York City”.… No shit. :-)
Fantastic evening, Yngwie was my big idol in the 80’s and he still kicks ass! I filmed pretty much the whole thing – here’s from that show:
A classic guitar hero, how can you not love this man?! :-))
WRAPPING UP 2012 WITH WHITESNAKE AND THREE GIANTS IN THE UK
That was mid-October…. jumping straight to November and the WHITESNAKE-gigs. That wasn’t too long ago, so if you’ve followed this blog you’ve already read all about it. Whitesnake is probably the ONLY band I haven’t grown tired of. I could see them over and over and over again – and I HAVE for years. If you want the best of the best, go see Whitesnake. I just love everything about that band, so sue me. :-)
Another great thing is meeting new, cool people – Whitesnake-fans are super-nice. Three ladies that I met up in Kristianstad also came to Vega in Copenhagen and we shared a cab home in the middle of the night. I’m sure I’ll see them around somewhere as soon as there’s an interesting concert around here again. :-)
Last but not least…. Went to London/Manchester with my friends to see Def Leppard, Mötley Crüe and Steel Panther at MEN Arena. Steel Panther stole the show, no doubt about it. But Tommy Lee’s drum-solo and Nikki Sixx‘ Happy Birthday-singing crowd wasn’t half-assed either. :-)
That pretty much sums it up. It’s definitely been an interesting year and I’m convinced that 2012 won’t fall too far behind…! I’ve already planned a few things (check “My Concert Dates 2012” – maybe I’ll see you out there somewhere!).
Black Sabbath reunited, probably the first and the last time I’ll see THAT, and it’s going to be absolutely amazing. I know what they can do, separately (seen Sabbath a number of times when Tony Martin was fronting the band) and Ozzy solo, I have a pretty good hunch what they can do when they let the MAGIC begin!
Not to mention VAN HALEN hitting the road in 2012….! Holy shiiiit!
But first…. January with Firewind in Athens and Steve Stevens / Sebastian Bach in New York City. The rest will come as I go along… :-)
I hope you all had a wonderful 2011 too and I wish you all an even better 2012! :-))
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2012!!!!!
IN THE REARVIEW MIRROR 