In 2006, there were 4 Finnish bands at MusExpo. My friend was invited to come see Bloodpit perform by their manager and she brought me along. And it was fantastic… Matthau Mikojan was in his “Jack Sparrow” phase and ripped the stage with his high energy performance and eye bending high kicks with his long legs. Apologies but I can’t find the great photo that used to be on MusExpo’s site of Matthau in mid kick. Have a picture of him in the spa instead… dressed!

We were sorry to realize that we’d missed out on seeing Kwan who’d been the first band on stage because we are big fans! After Bloodpit, we went next door to the Rainbow as is our custom and Kwan ended up sitting at the table next to us on the patio. Between their gang and their friends, they were too many for a little table of four so some of the friends moved to our table. Which is how we met The Winyls, yet another Finnish band there to play a showcase. But to our mututal dismay, they’d already played the night before so no chance for us to see them on stage. They’d come out that night in support of Kwan and because The Rainbow is the Finnish Rock Mecca. While I can’t speak for their onstage performance, I can tell you that Leady, James James, and HC are a bunch of great guys and look forward to meeting them again one day.

Redrama was also there but I didn’t see them at all. Poking around the MusExpo site I found a video clip of highlights from 2006 that shows a few seconds of performances by Bloodpit & Kwan as well as several interview soundbites with Matthau, Mariko & Tidjan (Kwan). Redrama appears at the end and all there is of the Winyls is a fragment of “Let’s Sing” in the video’s fade out.

Fast forward to 2007, three more bands jetted over from Finland. However, this time around, we only saw Deep Insight. I don’t know why Finnish people consider themselves the rudest and unfriendliest people cause they’re nothing but the opposite when they come here! Jukka, Johannes & Ville Boy were a pleasure to get to know. In the showcase, Johannes, Jore and Ville boy really rocked it and I got to see how Jukka uses his moodiness on stage. Have a couple pictures from MusExpo.net for now and later I will post my own photos from that night.

We also met their manager, Asko Kallonen, co-founder of HMC (Helsinki Music Company), Deep Insight’s music label (and HIM’s). It wasn’t til later that we realized that we’d just met with Finland’s version of Simon Cowell! Asko is the “ruthless” judge on Idols, the Finnish version of Simon Cowell’s show. He was nice enough in person but I enjoyed talking with Sami Peura of SamAgency (label for Bloodpit, The Winyls & Poets of the Fall) more.

Note: This is left over from the first incarnation of FinnishRock.com where I wrote about going on a road trip to see HIM for the first time. Keeping it because I did go… and it was my first concerts with a Finnish band

Looks like Ms. M and I will have a 3rd person on the road trip with us. We do have a couple of other gals joining us for parts but “Mrs. Vam” will be along for the whole ride since she’s in the same boat as me, we have to fly out from CA.

A mutual friend of Mrs. Vam’s and mine was laughing recently because the irony of having two friends come at her gushing about Finnish Rock and The Rasmus in particular is definitely amusing. She finally realized that she had to put us in touch with each other.

Mrs. Vam and I took to each other like ducks to water and so far we’ve only exchanged a handful of emails and had our first IM conversation tonight. I’m cracking up still over this exchange we had when we were talking about learning the Finnish language:

[21:55] Mrs. Bebe: I’m intimidated
[21:55] Mrs. Vam: I am! and I can say several completely useless words
[21:55] Mrs. Bebe: the whole deaf factor and everything
[21:55] Mrs. Vam: PP was saying that.. and I was like “its okay.. she can be deaf.. cuz I’m dumb.”
[21:55] Mrs. Vam: so we’d make a good team
[21:55] Mrs. Bebe: ROFLMAO
[21:56] Mrs. Bebe: yea well she should have also told you that I get along just fine most of the time
[21:56] Mrs. Vam: we just need a blind person and we could travel the world as a three person George Bush impression
[21:56] Mrs. Bebe: HEEHEE!!

This is not to mean that Ms. M’s blind but holy shit wouldn’t that be funny?

Note: This is left over from the first incarnation of FinnishRock.com where I wrote about going on a road trip to see HIM for the first time. Keeping it because I did go… and it was my first concerts with a Finnish band

Today was pay day so I was able to send Ms. M the money to pay her my half of the minivan rental. I bought our St Louis tickets which is the last of the concerts that we’re definitely going to. That just leaves Omaha as a question mark.

I also went onto Ebay and bought some HIM flags that we’re gonna use to cover the windows of the minivan so we have privacy at night.

Getting more excited cause at this point, it’s nearly all systems go and it’s gonna be so much fun!

2 of the flags had to be bidded on (edit: won them) and I’m planning to make one or both into full sized blankets. Gee I wonder which one Ms. M will want.

I’ve been completely deaf for the past two weeks thanks to a little furry demon who chewed up my earpiece.

Today I got an old earpiece that I found re-equipped so I could use it since the new one has not yet arrived.

It was pure pleasure to get back in my car and punch on the music which started at No Fear by The Rasmus.

Audio orgasmic.

Note: This is left over from the first incarnation of FinnishRock.com where I wrote about going on a road trip to see HIM for the first time. Keeping it because I did go… and it was my first concerts with a Finnish band

I finally booked my plane ticket! Now it was more of a reality then a dream! I needed to let Ms. M know so she could book the minivan that we’re going to use for the trip. She’d made a funny pun so I played on it some more.

After a good giggle, she booked the minivan on Hotwire which was the lowest rate we’d found for unlimited mileage in the US.
Now we’ve got just about all the key items on our checklist in hand: Tickets for first three concerts, Plane ticket for me, and minivan rental.

Just need to get tickets for concert #4 and then we’re all set!

We’re gonna leave it open ended whether or not we go to concert #5. I suspect we’ll be too bushwhacked to go all the way to Nebraska because that adds an extra 600 miles of driving that must be done within 24 hours.

Mere days after deciding to make the plunge and go on this crazy road trip for a band whose music I didn’t know, I find out that the same band is shooting a music video in LA not far from me and was calling for fans to come be in the video. HIM was doing a 2nd video for their song, “Killing Loneliness”.

Ms. M, of course, was the one to tell me about it and we were sad because she was really the one who should go but she was half a continent away. So I decided that I would cast my name in the hat to be picked and if I was, go as her “proxy” and report the experience back to her. So I wrote up my letter and sent it in. Needless to say I was vague about the fact that I wasn’t actually a HIM fan. I didn’t feel guilty about it because I was already planning to go to 4-5 concerts in mid May and by the time that’s over with, I know that I WILL be a fan.

I got an email response almost right away that indicated to me that I had probably been picked to go. But it wasn’t til a couple days later, that I got the official email telling me to watch for the next one which would contain all the info we needed about the shoot. The email was supposed to arrive either Friday or early Saturday. The shoot was Sunday, April 2nd.

The email didn’t actually come til around noon on Saturday and contained all kinds of instructions about what to wear and what kind of makeup. I was annoyed because it didn’t leave me much time to get ready. Fortunately, I didn’t actually spend TOO much time trying to figure out what to wear because they turned out to be much more relaxed about it all then their emails made it seem.

More on the Video Shoot experience coming soon. To date, KL is the only song I’ve heard by HIM and I’ve heard it about a dozen times now including once at super fast speed.

Note: This is left over from the first incarnation of FinnishRock.com where I wrote about going on a road trip to see HIM for the first time. Keeping it because I did go… and it was my first concerts with a Finnish band

About a month ago, Ms. M and I were chatting online and talking about The Rasmus and bands and etc. She mentioned that she was looking at buying tickets for HIM which had just gone on sale.

For some time, I’d been thinking about when The Rasmus finally comes to the States and how I’d like to fly out to Ms. M and go with her to their concerts since she is the one who introduced me to their music. However, it does not look optimistic for this to happen anytime in 2006. If we’re lucky, they’ll come in 2007.

Anyways, the most famous band out of Finland as far as I’m aware and understand at this time, is not The Rasmus but a band called HIM. The two bands are friends and even share management. Some years back, TR opened for HIM on one of their European tours. This past February, they co-headlined another European tour along with a 3rd finnish band called Negative.

At this point, I still had never heard HIM’s music but I knew enough to know that it was practically a given that I’d like their music.

I’m the kind of person that likes to do crazy and spontaneous things so it was perfectly natural to me that the next thought I had while listening to her was: “Hmm why don’t I fly out and join up with Ms. M? We can make an adventure out of it and go follow HIM around the MidWest for a week. Road Trip!”

I’m not rich or even well off. Nor am I really much of a concert goer. But I’m excited as hell cause this is going to be fun! So what if I still to this day haven’t really heard their music? There’s still a month or so to get familiar with it.

Some people may think I’m nuts for doing this but nuts are tasty and delicious and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

It’s been a long time since I did a road trip. I don’t count my yearly meccas to Burning Man since the focus is on the destination rather than the journey there.

I’ve always wanted to see the MidWest.

I’ve always wanted to “follow a band” just for the experience. I like to do new things… and do it again if I like it.

I only know her online but we’ve gotten to be friends and I think we’ll have a blast driving around together.

We plan to camp out in the minivan and save money on hotel rooms. I’ve slept in my car many times but it was never planned that way. So this is another adventure aspect, I’m looking forward to as well. Doing a literal version of “Car camping”.
Lastly, I consider this road trip a “practice run” for when The Rasmus finally get their skinny butts here.