W:O:A 2007

Wacken Open Air 2007 then. A big metallic pile of 80.000 fuckin’ people, drinking, shouting, headbanging, fucking, singing and all that comes when you put so many young people together.

It was awesome!

So, I guess it’s finally time to sit down and write about this thing. Boy is this going to take a while…

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W:O:A 2007 Gallery filled

So, I’m back as you probably figured out. No big post yet but the gallery for the festival is filled with stuff. Until I can get around to writing the damn blogpost check it out and feel free to comment on stuff.

Unfortunately, two of my better and bigger vids where corrupted after I took them (no idea why. Size I guess?). But if you think you might be able to restore them, by all means attempt it! I’d be grateful if you did.

As for the post, I’ll try to split it into two parts. The first will be about my experience in the festival and will be hosted here, while I’m planning on writing the second over at my last.fm journal just for the heck of it.

Write to you soon.

WoA ready

• Pile of camping stuff: Ready
• Shit Kickers (To hold against the rain): Ready
• Pozer outfit: Ready!
• A crapload of torrents downloading: Done!
• Rsyncing my whole music collection to ftp since I have the time: Why not.

Alls good. I probably forgot a shitload of stuff which will mean that I will end up in a very bad situation but what the hell. Lets screw up.

Wacken 2007, here I come!

Manowar Resurgence

So, yesterday me, Arnoc and Alisa had arranged to head over to the Magic Circle Festival in order to see some bands that each of us liked. Vadim wanted to see Stormwarrior, Alisa Majesty and me mostly for Gamma Ray but since I had the chance, [tag]Manowar[/tag] for the first time. In the past I’ve always avoided Manowar concerts because of the overwhelming feeling of suck most people informed me of.

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Swordbrothers

Can’t be bothered to write something about it now. Just see the gallery for now

Underground gigs

I’m starting to like the Metal scene in Frankfurt more and more. Yesterday I met with Maubi to go to a little gig of a few underground bands at Die Halle that was organised by FFM-Rock. Initially we though the price must have been 6-8 €, judging from previous experience. I even though that for 5 bands it might go as high as 10.

I did not expect it to be just 5 FUCKING EUROS! Five!! That is, 1€ per band. And the beers were at 2€ each! Two!! I don’t have enough exclamation marks for this shit!!!
The bastards at the Harley bar in Thessaloni charged us 15€ for 2 bands and the beer was something like 4€ or 5€! Bastards!

Moving on

Initially we met with [tag]Maubi[/tag] at the underground station at 20:15 where he informed me that two others would join us. I do not remember their names now bur needless to say, they were familiar faces from the Final Destination.

We got on the train where they proceeded to speak mostly in German. To pay them back I started filming them I even managed to finally get a pic of Maubi for my called ID.

We arrived at the concert hall, (die halle heh) at about 2:15 and as I expected, they knew everyone around.

The place was a regular bar and there must have been about three dozen customers. As you could probably listen in the previous video they were doing the sound check when we entered.

The First band that was playing were Chiabola. I did not think to take a video of the band at that point so you’ll have to be happy with this picture only

What surpised me about them was that only one member of the band had long hair, something usually common in Nu metal bands. Their music however was quite good, reminding me a bit of Paradise Lost in their newer albums. They only played 3 or 4 songs if I remember correctly.

The next band, Force Trankill, was the one that had Maubi’s two guitarists from his other band, Everfest. They were playing progressive rock, and without wanting to sound biased I must admit that they were the ones I like the most. Of course, this is not to say that the other bands were not good, quite the contrary. I was amazed at the quality of the bands I saw for just 5 euros!

The singer was probably one of the reasons why this band sounded so goo. This is the same singer that I saw in a previous [tag]gig[/tag] I went to. Maubi told me that band was his other project at which point I started wondering if everyone around here two pet bands as a pastime.

I believe I have to also mention that the whole environment was really cool. Although I hand’t really spoken to many people by that point, everybody seemed friendly and a girl regular even promised to help me get a flyer of the gig.

The area in front of the stage was not packet and I had enough space to move around and take photographs and videos. That is not to say that people where not head banging and stuff.

Next on the stage were Crystal Crow, of which the singer I had noticed outside just because he was wearing a bandanna exactly like mine, as well as a leather trench coat, like me. When he went on the stage, I just knew he had stolen my idea (if I ever became the frontman to a band that is )

I must say that they were pretty good. The singer could grab both the high and the low notes and used a guttural voice similar to old school Sentenced. Their songs were a bit melancholic and dark-themed as well which was a good change from the rest.

I think this might be a band worth looking into in the future. I’ve been meaning to find another darkware metal band as a replacement for the now disbanded Sentenced.

The next band on the line was Liquid Horizon, a clearly progressive act with quite a melodic undertone. The singer, as you’ll be able to see from the vids, was also the Guitarist which imho is a no-easy fit when you’re playing prog.

I took two videos of these dudes mainly because I run out of space on my mobile phone and had to move some files around.

Fun fact. During one of the songs, due to the beat that sounded similar to native american rythms, the drummer put on a feather headress for the whole song. Nice touch

At this point, our other friends had already left because they were tired, leaving just me an Maubi. Fortunately I had already started talking with various people around the place, including the owner who even bought me a drink. During my conversation with the owner, I asked him directly, how could he manage when he was charging such low prices for entry and drinks. He explained to me that it was quite difficult in the start, where he almost closed down, but now that people have learned the place and more gigs are happening.

You know it actually makes sense. Bands don’t come to play here for the money and as such don’t expect a high income (perhaps 10 euros). This in turn allows the owner to charge low entrance and drinks which brings more people to the scene. These people then promote the bands using word of mouth (like I am doing currently) and even buy the bands’ own merchandise. In the end everyone wins, unlike Greece where everyone was losing.

Anyway, now the next band was on the stage, going by the simple name: Scenes. We had already been told by enthusiastic people around there that they were the best of the lot and as they started doing the soundcheck I could see that the singer would make a good performance.

I was not dissapointed. The singer was quite the frontman and their music was quite enjoyable really. Although it was not not the band I liked that night - and there were a few people headbanging on the front row, which goes to show that I was probably in the minority - I must admit that for an underground band their music was quite impressive. They reminded me quite a lot of Queensrÿche.

Unfortunately at this point it was time for me and Maubi to head out as well in order to catch the least train so we couldn’t really see the whole gig. We said our goodbyes, I received my flyer as promised and I vowed to return for more

Ahem, just one more time…5 FUCKING EUROS!!!1!one!

Keep it True VII

So I’m back from the 7th Keep It True festival where I went with my new friend, Arnoc and two of his friends, Alisa (or is that with a “c”?) and Eugene (I hope that is the correct spelling).

We were supposed to meet in front of a supermarket on Saturday morning, so when I got off the Train, there was a girl in front of me that looked like part-goth, part-metalhead (patched jean shirt and stuff) and I thought it peculiar that she got off at the same stop as me, and going the same direction as me, and going to the same supermarket as me, and shit! she’s waiting for someone as well! So, in order not to make things any more awkward, I went to her and the guy she was talking with and asked them if they were waiting for Arnoc. Not surprisingly, they were.

Arnoc arrived, and after getting some supplies (aka beer, alcohol-free) we were on our way. I must say that his friends were very good. Even though they barely knew me, they were very friendly
Arnoc must feel very unfortunate that even though he was the only one who wanted to drink beer, he was the designated driver, even though the rest of us stayed sober. No one else could drive
We arrived at the festival 2 hours or so later after driving through some very interesting landscapes and taking care not to ride over any frogs (no seriously, we saw a sign). You could easily tell when you’ve reached the festival since there was a full parking lot, where the predominant figure was a black clad, long haired male. For some reason, patched jeans were quite common as well. It seems to be like a metal-cred thing. Your jean overcoat says who and how tough you are

So we parked and soon were on our way to see the inside. And I found an excuse to use my mobile’s video camera as well

Yes, that is me talking in the background. Please do not comment on my accent. And yes, that is the soundtrack from Conan the Barbarian playing in the background of the festival. That’s how True they are keeping it. The girl in the end of the vid is Alisa.
The festival was housed in a basketball court and half the field was shops while the rest was reserved for people to watch the bands.

There were quite a number of shops selling merchandise but I was a bit disappointed that only a few were selling anything other than albums and t-shirts. I was looking forward to cool stuff. I was also a bit surprised on how many people were still buying vinyls (or buying at all). Some of the prices on the “rare” items were insane.
We did some shopping (I got a hat chain) and on the process I met a Greek (clad in a Greek flag for some reason) that came all the way from Athens for the festival. Talk about having money to throw away…
Half an hour later we went back to the car to leave the stuff and drink some more (warm now) beer and I took the chance to take more pics.
Then we moved back to watch Twisted Tower (I hope I remember the name right).
Arnoc and Alisa were next to me on the front line but according to them, the band’s lineup was inexplicably changed so the band live pretty much sucked.
Of course, I said hello to the camera every time one of the video crew filming the festival turned to the crowd.
Even though, the other’s weren’t impressed by the new lineup, they did find something interesting to headbang to.

For me, on the other hand, they reminded too much of Helloween in the Keeper days, although the others say that this is just because the singer was crap and couldn’t reach the high notes.

When the band finished, unfortunately the food queue was huge, so we ended up eating chips and ice creams to hold us until we left. We returned just in time to see Piledriver which was what Eugene was waiting for. My first impression of the band was “Oh, not another band in masks” (Although Arnoc later told me that they were one of the first to do so.) my second impression was “Here’s a band where everyone is fat”. No seriously. It’s like they did it on purpose. The worst part is that the singer was waring leather straps instead of a shirt which just multiplied the effect of “spillage”…ugh

After that, nobody was really interested in seeing other bands, so we agreed to head out. We made a brief stop at McDonalds (the first time I’ve been there in years) where I got an expensive salad. Then I fell asleep in the car and finally reached Frankfurt at about 9pm.

All in all this trip got a bit more expensive than I expected (50 euros) but the experience was great. Next time I’ll be more prepared however (which just means I’ll listen to at least a few of the bands playing so that I can enjoy some part of the festival.)

Arnoc and crew were an excellent company. Even though they could speak in two different languages I could not understand, they were considerate enough to speak in english now and then.

And yes, this is just sweet talk because I know Arnoc is going to be reading this post (to steal my videos) and I want to be able to use…err…join him in the next festival he’s going

Grow a beard you wuss!

Καταραμένη Βαρεμάρα

Τελειώσα και το Neverwhere το Σάββατο (που παρεπιπτόντως είναι καταπληκτικό), αφ’οτου γύρισα απο το Final Destination, και την Κυριακή επήλθε η απίστευτη βαρεμάρα.

Χωρίς βιβλίο, χωρίος υπολογιστή, χωρίς μουσική, μόνο με το καμμένο MTV να παίζει κωλο-fakeality shows…πολύ χάλι μιλάμε.

Πάλι καλά που ξύπνησα κατα της 4 και δεν χρειάστηκε να βαρίεμαι όλη την ημέρα.

Κατα της 6μμ είχα βαρεθεί αρκετά οπότε την έκανα για πλατεία Zeil μπας και δω τίποτα ενδιαφέρον. Αφότου ξόδεψα 7 καταραμένα ευρώ για μια μακαρονάδα έφτασα στην πλατεία και χάζευα τα μπιχλιμπίδια. Σε μια φάση, όπως κατέβαινα προς (την παραλία; όχι δεν είναι Θεσσαλονίκη.) την λαχαναγορα, είδα κάτι Gothαδες να περπατάνε προς την ίδια κατεύθυνση με εμένα και είπα να τους πάρω στο κατόπι να δω που πάνε.
Αυτό αποδείχθηκε καλή κίνηση μιας και, αφότου έπαιξαν 10 λεπτά ποδόσφαιρο με ένα τενεκεδάκι (FFS δηλαδή.), κατέληξαν για λίγα λεπτά σε μια καφετέρια. Για να μην τα πολυλογώ. αποδείχθηκε οτι εκείνη την μέρα είχε Battle Of the Bands στις 8.

Είχε 10 έουρο είσοδο αλλά τα άξιζε. 8 μπάντες, 30 λεπτά η καθε μια και οι περισσότερες πολυ αξιόλογες (με τρανή εξαίρεση την πρώτη, την οποία ο τραγούδιστής χαντάκωσε εντελώς με την παραφονία του). Στο τέλος ψιλογνώρισα μερικούς απο τις τελευταίες μπάντες, που με είχαν προσέξει να κάνω headbangin’ και μου έποιασαν την κουβέντα. Δεν είπαμε πάρα πολλά διότι είμουν στην διαδικασία να απομακρύνω την ύπαρξη μου απο το μέρος, αλλα nevertheless είναι μια καλή αρχή μιας και μπορεί να τους ξαναπετύχω.

Ωρίστε και μια φωτό που πήρα με το καινούργιο νέο και αστραφτερό κινητό μου. Αυτή η μπάντα λεγόταν Monkey Suit (Ο Τραγουδιστής προσπάθησε να σιγουρέψει οτι θα τους θυμάμαι. Μπορώ να πω οτι πέτυχε.)
Ψιλοχάλι η ποιότητα αλλα τεσπά.

Τώρα το μόνο που μένει είναι να μπορέσω να διαβάσω τα φυλλάδια που πήρα ώστε να μπορέσω να δω πότε είναι ο επομενος γύρος του BotB.

Α, και να βρω τι να κάνω την υπόλοιπη εβδομάδα.

Skyclad Live (Συναυλία Skyclad Part 2)

So, this Saturday Skyclad played at Athens. The concert was held at the AN club in Eksarchia.

As soon as we got there, I contacted my good friend, [tag]Baggio[/tag], and went by his place, or rather by Alexis’ place.
We sat there, killing time for a while, until it was time to head out to the concert.
The original plan was to take Melas’ car to go to the club but unfortunately Athens traffic had other plans for us.
After being stuck in the traffic jam for half an hour and with no clearing in sight, we decided to ditch the car and tale the metro; and good thing we did because we later found out that the whole downtown area was off limits due to a skinhead march (?!?).

After much swearing and cursing, we reached the concert area and me and Philippos immediately headed to the front of the stage.

The support band was X-piral which I must say, wasn’t half bad if I must say. They were a more classic Epic themed band of the power metal school. Interesting was how a girl next to Philippos was very excited. We guessed that she was someone’s girlfriend >:)

After a long pause while [tag]Skyclad[/tag] came on the stage and set-up their own instruments (Oh how far they have fallen!) the show started.
Did I mention that the club was very small and had no railing? Luckily there wasn’t too many people, although that could be considered an unfortunate event as well.
Anyway the concert was excellent and the band was very energetic, especially Georgina who didn’t stop jumping around the stage when she played.
The crowd wasn’t very excited at first, at least for Greek standards but as the time passed and great songs were played things got more and more energetic. Especially on some songs like Anotherdrinkingsong and Inequality Street we went wild. Me and Philippos were dancing folk, others were stage diving etc.
They played a lot of the new album, Semblance of Normality but also some popular songs from previous work. Luckily I didn’t know only a few songs.

After the concert, the band headed to the Metal Night Club, Texas which I had heard a few bad things about. However it felt too much like Cult back in Thessaloniki.
There I saw one gorgeous girl that was, unfortunately, with another guy. However that didn’t stop me from staring discreetlely…she was that great.
Pity

In any case, after an hour or so, Skyclad came to the Club as well and went to the upper floor. Philippos and me followed after a while to meet them. They are a great bunch and pretty down to earth. I talked with Steve, Georgina and Kevin and we also took a group photo with them.
After I mentioned that I liked the track “Ten Little Kingdoms” Kevin promised me that they would play it in Thessaloniki the next time they visit but I’d have to bring 10 of my friends with me

On another note,
Steve also mentioned that they would have a new album by mid-2006 and probably a new tour soon after that.

Anyway, after half an hour or so, we took our leave. We didn’t want to bother them all night after all and went downstairs where Baggio and Tasos were waiting for us. We stayed in Texas until 5 am. I had started getting very tired by 3:30 and I was feeling a sickness coming on and so I couldn’t stay any longer. We were going to leave by 4 but we stalled as we tried to find some place for Philippos to sleep. Unfortunately, due to my not sending a message to Tasos and the parents of Baggio babysitting, we couldn’t find anything and due to my meltdown I also couldn’t keep Philippos company until Texas closed. So we said goodbye there (he was going to leave the next morning while I was going to stay one more day) and took off. I felt really bad about leaving him alone but, seriously, I couldn’t do anything else, other than collapse on a table and sleep.

The road to Tasos place was especially hard as well, I was barely walking and something I ate must have been spoiled (I blame the peanuts) because I was feeling like I was about to throw up. Luckily I didn’t and after a long trip, I finally reached the bed where I slept like a concrete block.

PS: New Feature: From now on I’ll be posting what book I’m currently reading. Just for archive’s sake.

Currently Reading: Επίκουρος - Κείμενα ~ Πηγές της επικούρειας φιλοοφίας και τέχνης του ζην

My feet hurt!

So I’m back from my Iron Maiden Tour, Eddie Rips up Athens and my feel still hurt from the sheer amount of walking we did in Athens. Did anybody listen when I told them to take an organized tour with a bus and everything? No, we had to take the damn Train and suffer so many hours of waiting and boredom. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The original plan involved us getting the train to Athens and then waiting in the station for the next train to head back, my idea was to wait at a bar or something while we were there and take an early morning train. Well OSE (Greek Railroads company) had other plans for us.
For of us, Dimitris, Lampis, Athena and me were on the same trip. We met up in front of the station and started our journey uneventfully. Now allow me to rant about the quality of seats in these damn trains…they’re impossible to sleep in! While we spent most of the trip talking, I still tried to catch an hour or so of shut-eye but it was nearly impossible. The seat is just VERY uncomfortable (It’s uncomfortable enough just sitting) and there is just too much interference from around. In any case, the six-hour journey was unproblematic and I got to know Athena who I was seeing for the second time. So far, so good.

Due to a spot of good luck the train driver makes a stop, just for us metalheads, to get off in Malakasa (where the concert is taking place) and he start marching to the concert area a simple 1km trip. Luckily it was a bit overcast and we didn’t had to suffer the sun on our heads the whole time.
We reached the concert area 3 hours before the doors open and we have the joy of sitting there doing nothing but hearing the cantinas around us advertising their ridiculously overpriced goods. I mean 4 Euro for a damn Souvlaki Sandwich? WTF is that? I didn’t give them the joy of my money of course Dimitris was pretty much starving so he had no choice, especially after they enticed him with a free souvlaki.
As the four hours were reaching the end, another good event happened. A romantic acquaintance of mine showed up and brightened my day and I think that Athena got a bit moody about that but I can’t be sure. In any case, the last hour went by pretty quickly and then the doors opened.

I got inside the concert area with said former acquaintance and cruised the are to the stage where she decided to enter the mass of people and head for the front a few hours before Maiden were scheduled to start despite my warning that it wasn’t a good place to be. Oh well…
After that Dimitris called and we met in front of the toilets (of all the places) and slowly the rest of the crew gathered as well, including four other people that arrived in a private car.

First Dragonforce came to the stage to the dismay of everyone else in the crew instead of me. I can’t say they were perfect, at least not for the Greek crowd, but I enjoyed them and I even headed for the front at one time. Let me tell you, never head for the front in a concert this big. There are at least two thousand people wanting to get to the front and they all try like mad to get to the first line. I, for some reason, can always get to the front line if I really want to and I proved that to myself by getting to the front on W.A.S.P. and Queensryche/Nightwish at last year’s Rockwave. In any case I got till the third line where the sheer amount of pressure around me was enough to suffocate a smaller person and that’s when I thought of my friend. I threw a desperate search for her but it was just impossible to find her. I sent her a message where to find me and returned back to my cluster of friends only to hear them groan about how long Dragonforce had to play.
I don’t understand why so few people like power metal around here. Almost everyone I meet likes all kinds of metal except power for some strange reason. They either find it too happy or too stupid or something other like that. It’s very strange that I keep liking it so much.

After Dragonforce there was a half hour pause to get the stage ready for Maiden where I took the time to grab something to eat and look around the area. There were some nice clothes shops around with some shirts I really wanted to buy but the some price tags were unbelievable. I just can’t spend 65e for a damn shirt, not in my condition. Funny thing is that the guy who was selling the shirts was very enthusiastic when I looked around, telling me how they were from the US and showing me all the nice stamps and whatnot but I soon as I mentioned that I had no money, his enthusiasm died like a spider on a frying pan. I headed out and to the cluster of friends again.

At last Iron Maiden came on, among cheers and whistles and let me tell you, these guys know how to put up a really nice show. There where entrances, fires, giant eddie balloons, giant Piece of Mind Eddie’s walking around and other fun facts. I’m sure there are many sites giving an adequate review, even in Greece so I won’t go into detail about that. Needless to say that the rest of the crew, along with several thousand other people, were jumping around like insane rabid monkeys on crack. Especially Dimitris who was seeing maiden for the first time was cumming out of his nostrils, so to speak. I am sorry to say that I wasn’t as excited as I could have been because I didn’t know the song quite as well (They played only the first four albums which, while I have them, have not listened to them that much) and also because I was a bit afraid about what happened to my friend. Thus I ended up only really getting down to it at a few select songs like Running Free or Number of the Beast.
When the concert ended it caught as all in a bit of surprise as it looked like they (Iron Maiden) were waiting for a second call to stage (We Want More) which never came. I don’t know if it was because people didn’t like it that much (I don’t think so), because they were tired or because they didn’t understand. In any case I later heard that the Maiden where pissed off for some reason and this could just be it. Last song of the concert: Always look on the Bright Side of Life

After that we were running or, more appropriately, strolling quickly, to the train station. Unfortunately not only did the crew not go quite as fast, but they also stopped not once but twice for water on the way. As a result we lost the final train and we stayed at the station for no good reason. At least I got something out of it when I met a girl there that Athena had started chatting with. She turned up to be a 30 years old freelancer photograph and I ended up chatting with her until we reached Athens. How did we reach Athens? well after an hour and a half waiting at the station it finally dawned on us that a train was not forthcoming and we headed out to find the bus. At one point we reached a crossroads where someone had told people the bus would come through and people stopped there and started lighting fires and stuff. Sooner or later people would be jumping over the fire in a mock pagan ceremony. In any case we headed out and finally learned that we should take the bus from the concert area groan.
At the concert area it was panic. A whole lot of tired people wanting to get on the bus without having any money and patience. Shouting at the bus drivers, shouting at the managing team, shouting at everyone, panic I tell you! Luckily we got in the bus before any riot started and I dozed off for the half hour or so it took us to reach Athens, (Happy moment: The reporter felt comfortable enough to sleep on my shoulder ).

So we are at Athens’ train station and after I give my goodbyes (and phone number ) to the reporter, we learn that the first train to Thessaloniki is approximately 7 hours away Groan! again. We decide to visit a local bar and grab a drink so we catch a ride to the central square of Athens and we almost get into a fight with the Cab driver. After I calm the spirits and we reach the square, we get to eating. For some reason Lampis takes a dive in a eats one Everest sandwich and two Croissants. Talk about hunger. After the we argue a bit where to head to and finally we decide to go out to Psiri. We almost get lost, get past a few hookers and find a nice enough bar playing rock but not quite. Unfortunately at this point exhaustion was creeping in and my usual talkativity was giving way the sleep. After about two hours we pay the very expensive drinks and head to the station again.

Now the waiting was just awful. While at the bar, I could sleep wherever but at the station, due to the noise and commotion, it was impossible to sleep. Whenever you drifted into the arms of Morpheus at fucking train would come by and whistle you into the land of bitter consciousness. Athena decided to get the Intercity train in order to get to Thessaloniki 3 hours sooner, paying 18e in the process, but we, as eternal brokes waited until the 9:45 train. It finally came and after a brief struggle with the train staff about where it was appropriate to sleep (we were in a kid’s playground at the time) we got into our chairs and tried to sleep. I ended up getting cramps in my lower back and sleeping approximately three hours our of six.

Now, I’m back in my room after a good solid 5 hours of sleep in my comfortable bed and I’m ready to head out into the night!

Oh, and my feet hurt!