NORWAY

Getting in some quality loitering time while Reign Of Bombs get directions

Primitive methods are employed to sell merch at the Yabasta Collective

The Norway-Sweden border crossing

DENMARK / SWEDEN

19 Aug -- Göteborg (or Gothenburg as they say in English). Sitting in the van. It's pissing rain outside. Haven't had a chance to write in a while. The ride from Oslo to Copenhagen was pretty long, but uneventful. We stopped in Halmstad to pick up Olof, a friend of ROB's (that's Reign Of Bombs). Goxne, who had been driving since they picked us up, asked me to drive over the bridge from Sweden to Denmark. I guess he was just tired of driving. I was a little skeptical as I've never driven in a foreign country before, but it was OK. With Adrian (ROB's vocalist/guitarist) reading the map we managed to reach Ungdomshuset without any real trouble. It was just as I remembered it from four years ago: gloriously filthy. Great fucking place, though. We had a really good meal and got our shit set up inside. Shortly after, our old friend Tommas showed up. We exchanged greetings and shot the shit for awhile before the gig. ROB played first. They sounded better than the previous night in Oslo. Probably mostly because the room just had a better sound itself. The local band, Sløseri Der Skader Os Alle, played next and they were fucking fantastic. The Danes just never seem to disappoint. Our set went well as far as I could tell. The cymbals were really giving me a problem, but I did the best I could with them. The turnout was far better than anyone expected, which I'm sure was thanks to the local band. Unfortunately, though, we hardly sold any merch. Oh well, can't have everything. After the gig, for some reason they struck up a little bonfire out back, so we all hung out and drank and smoked and talked for a few hours. Mark, Deuce and I slept in the van again. We got a much better night's sleep than the night before. The next morning Mark, Mikey and I walked over to Tommas' place for one last visit. I also wanted to see Lea (his girlfriend) again, and their newborn son Valdemar. It was really, really nice to see them. We hung out and chatted over some breakfast for awhile, but unfortunately we couldn't stay too long. We had to get on the move to Göteborg. They asked me to drive again, which I did. Again, pretty uneventful drive. Just another stop in Halmstad to drop off Olof (...drop off Olof...haha). It started pissing rain as we closed in on our destination. We had a pretty hard time finding the venue (Spatt), which was on an upper floor of some big, old factory or something. Cool place, but pretty strange for a gig. I had arranged to meet the guys from the Five Outsiders here (a band from this town whose album I am releasing) to get the artwork for the release. Unfortunately they couldn't stick around to hear us play, but I don't think we were their type of music anyway. We played second and Ambulance (fellow Umeåns of Reign Of Bombs) headlined. They turned out being a lot better than I expected. I liked them a lot better live than I liked the record I have of theirs. An old penpal from a few years back popped up at the show, which was really nice. That can sometimes be one of the coolest things about touring like this...getting to meet a friend you more than likely wouldn't have a chance of meeting otherwise. On the top floor of the building was a huge locker room/showering facility. Some of the guys took showers. I foolishly decided to hold out to shower at the guy's house we were to stay at. Getting going after the show was just short of impossible. I think people were just too drunk or something. Anyway, the guy whose place we were supposed to stay at ended up getting so frustrated with our disorganization that he just said, "fuck this," and took off, so we ended up all going to where Reign Of Bombs were to stay. When we got there the guy's girlfriend freaked out about being woken up on a work night by 8 slovenly punk rockers and apparently gave the guy an earful behind closed doors. Mercifully, I was able to at least brush my teeth before being given the bum's rush the instant I stepped out from the bathroom. Four of us had to sleep in the vans and I missed out on my badly, badly, badly-needed shower. The venue we are playing tonight is the same place we played last time we were in Linköping and probably has the best facilities of any venue I've ever played, so I will make a b-line for those showers as a man dying of thirst makes for an oasis in the desert!

Wandering aimlessly in Halmstad	Glorious Ungdomshuset	Sløseri Der Skader Os Alle at Ungdomshuset
Reign Of Bombs at Ungdomshuset	Out Cold at Ungdomshuset	Hanging around outside the next day, getting ready to leave	Mark & I at the after-hours entrance
Deuce on the streets of København	Reign Of Bombs at Spatt	Out Cold at Spatt	The crowd keeps getting younger and younger!

SWEDEN

20 Aug -- Sitting in Skylten, Linköping, drinking a coffee. Couple guys from Ambulance are playing a piano on the other side of the room and it actually doesn't sound too bad at times. Again, uneventful drive. I was very pleased to get to stop in Jönköping, birthplace of my beloved Cardigans. We made it here with plenty of time to spare and I descended upon the shower like it was the fountain of immortality. I'm hard-pressed to remember ever being that dirty in my life. Needless to say, it felt indescribably wonderful to get cleaned up and shaven. I rested in the quiet, clean, airy backstage room for awhile, then checked my email. Szarapow (the guy setting up the show in St. Petersburg and who is also releasing a cassette of ours) sent me a preview of the cassette artwork for us to approve before he goes to the printer. Hopefully they will be ready in time. It's gonna be pretty close. There were supposed to be 5 bands on the bill last night, but 2 dropped off for some reason and another one took their place. So it was just us, ROB, Ambulance, and a band called Iblis. It was an OK show but we had a lot of problems with the sound. The people in the crowd said it sounded fine. Who knows. We sold the most shirts since we left Iceland, which was surprising. All in all, another decent show. A fan from Germany, who just happens to be bumming around Scandinavia, came to the gig. He says he plans on also coming to our gig in Umeå and possibly Oulu. Fuck, now Dag (ROB's other guitarist) is playing the piano, and very well! It's reminiscent of Nigel Tufnel playing "Lick My Love Pump". Who knew he had it in him?? After the gig most everybody went to some local rock club. Mark and I went to the Burger King down the road that we went to the last time we were here, then went to bed in the great sleeping quarters they have here. Man, I love this fucking venue! Well, getting ready to leave soon. Gonna down the rest of this coffee and split.

"Gimme Sopor!"... More like, "Gimme soap or gimme death!"	Jönköping, baby!	Backstage at Skylten
Reign Of Bombs at Skylten	Out Cold at Skylten	Making our getaway from Skylten

21 Aug -- Sitting in Tingshuset, Östersund. We just got here, set up merch and ROB is gonna soundcheck. Really nice venue. Not a huge room, but cozy despite the high ceiling. Full light system and stylish chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. This place seems like it's gonna sound great. You can never tell, though, until you actually play. Anyway, the drive to Sandviken yesterday included another cool pit stop. This time in Västerås, home to the almighty Puffball! Sandviken is a small town just outside Gävle. The venue there, Kungen, is some kind of state-sponsored house. Very nice place with all the amenities you could ask for, even a living room with a television set. As the show got underway it looked like it was gonna be really lame. Like 10-15 people just standing around. By the time ROB played things had improved a bit and people were moving around. As our set got underway people started to really go wild. The turnaround from the beginning of the night was quite remarkable. What seemed what was to be the worst show yet turned out to possibly be the best, just by crowd reaction alone. There were only a small handful of people there, but their enthusiasm made up for their small number. Unfortunately, that enthusiasm didn't translate into merch sales. After the show most of the guys went to some party while Mark, Adrian, Dag and I went to the local lake to take a quick, refreshing dip. It was fucking freezing so we only stayed in for a few moments, but it was pretty cool. We watched some Sealab 2021 and Strangers With Candy on Mark's DVD player when we got back, then went to bed in the very homey upstairs rooms. Deuce and I drove here through the very scenic Hälsingland region. I regret having to drive as I would've liked to have taken some pictures. We plan to drive straight to ROB's hometown of Umeå tonight directly after the show so we can have some time to do some shit like a wash and maybe even some fun stuff before heading northward, ever northward.

Pit stop in Västerås

Outside Kungen, Sandviken

Reign Of Bombs at Kungen

A suprising sight at a random rest stop on the drive to Östersund. Sure to be left out of the guidebooks. This is on the main road in Hennan.

22 Aug -- At Goxne's apartment in Umeå. We ended up here at around 5:00. We had arranged that Deuce and I would drive from Sandviken to Östersund during the day and that Dag and Goxne would drive to Umeå after the show during the night. However, Goxne, after maybe 1½ hours or so couldn't fight his exhaustion any more, so poor Deuce took over much of the ride of the 2nd vehicle. The drive through the night through the Jämtland/Ångermanland/Lappland regions, the deep, dark, northern Swedish interior, reminded me of the stories my mother told me her father used to tell her (he was originally from Sweden) about driving their sleighs through the winter nights, being chased by wolves and being forced to throw their children to them in order to escape. Ghastly, nightmarish tales that used to scare the shit out of her. Not at all true, I'm sure (or I hope!) Apparently the region is pretty dangerous to drive through at night because of all the wild animals, particularly elk, which if hit can cause a potentially fatal accident. We didn't come across any elk, but saw a number of foxes cross the road in front of us like squirrels back home. Well, now we're in ROB's hometown, the hardcore capital of Scandinavia. We should be able to have some fun here.

I have no idea where these were taken. Somewhere in Sweden is all I know.

Reign Of Bombs at Tingshuset

23 Aug -- Sitting outside in the stairwell to Goxne's apartment just to get some peace and quiet. The weather is awesome. Feels like early autumn. We've really lucked out with the weather so far. Hopefully it keeps up. Well, things didn't go quite as planned yesterday. The washing of our laundry turned into a total snafu. There are 2 washing machines here, neither of which Goxne knows how to use, so we had to try to figure them out ourselves. Well, as it turns out, one of them is broken, but no one bothered to put a sign on it or disconnect the power or anything so we didn't find out until it started to malfunction on us. It was a fucking mess. Water shooting up and out of all sorts of openings. Pretty much all our precious free time yesterday was spent dealing with that debacle. Our jeans still aren't totally dry but we don't have time to leave them hanging any more. So we didn't get a chance to do anything yesterday. We just went out to eat at a pizza shop before going to the gig. It was an OK show. Nothing special. Rene (the German guy) was there, as he said he would be. We played with Ambulance again and for some reason they were all wearing this ghoulish make up. After the gig we returned the vans to the rental place in town. We'll be taking cars up to Luleå. That should be a luxurious trip! Today Goxne tried to show us around the city, but wouldn't you know it, by the time we did all the shit we had to do, we didn't have any time left. Such is touring. Anyway, I think tonight's show will be better than last night's. I think Umeå is one of those places where there's so much going on that people just get apathetic about going to shows or something. OK, we're leaving. Gotta go.

Mark & I impersonate homeless people in Goxne's neighborhood

Reign Of Bombs at Stallet

Out Cold at Stallet

Dag & Goxne share a tender moment

More photos from Stallet, Umeå

24 Aug -- Luleå. Sitting in Peter's apartment, a guy at last night's show who let us stay at his place (bless him). The show last night here was at this really cool little theatre that looked made for small plays rather than live bands. The sound was good, though. There weren't a whole lot of people there but it was a good atmosphere. Rene was there again. It's strange to see someone at so many gigs and not be travelling with them. Before and after we played I was running around trying to arrange our rendezvous with Hero Dishonest for the following day (today). Last night was our last show with ROB. I thought they were gonna drop us off in Haparanda (at the Finnish border) but I guess they couldn't. Luckily we found someone at the last minute who said they could give us a lift. Afterward we all came back here to Peter's place to hang out a bit before ROB returned home (they drove back to Umeå last night). It was sad saying goodbye to those guys. We'll miss them. They were a good band and really nice guys to tour with. Hopefully we'll see them again someday. The guy who's giving us a ride to Haparanda is picking us up in around 2½ hours. I'm really looking forward to this upcoming leg with Hero Dishonest. They've become one of my favorite new bands in the current hardcore scene in the past year or so. We're doing 6 shows with them the entire length of sub-arctic Finland. I gotta get some fucking coffee in me! Hopefully Peter wakes up soon.

Outside Lillan, Luleå	Värmedyna, the man, the myth, the legend...the pride of Piteå		Reign Of Bombs at Lillan
Out Cold at Lillan	Backstage at Lillan	Savoring our last moments together at Peter's place.   ...sniff...
One last group shot before Reign Of Bombs heads back home	Northward, ever northward	At the bus station in Haparanda with the kind souls who carted our asses up there	The Sweden-Finland border crossing

Forward to Part Three (Finland)  >>

 

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