What can I say? (Helsinki review)

[TomiT14]

What can I say? No, it wasn't obvious the day would end up this way.

Note that this is going to be a looooong post. So I made chapters if you don't want to go through all that shit.
It took a while to get this typed, so that's why I'm posting this with three-day delay.
Also, I'm still in shock, it's still hard to figure out what really happened three days ago.
So excuse me if I don't seem to be as enthusiastic as it's deserved to be after this.
And bear in mind that the day mainly consisted of many coincidences, which made it even more special.

So, get ready for the longest post in TNS history.

Intro
You may have noticed that I was asking for some questions to ask from the Sums. I had asked Matt if it would be possible to interview the guys for Sum 41 Finland. He said he would try to make it work, and he would send me a message about their schedule here.

So came the day. I knew the cruise would be here 10am, so I was up early just in case so I would be ready to go any minute.
So I waited for a message. And waited. And waited a bit more. It was 2pm, and I was thinking they might have the soundcheck around 3pm, and after that it would be relaxing and getting ready for the show for them, so my time would be running out. I sent Matt a reminder just in case, but that didn't change a thing. I had lost almost all of my hope for getting this interview work out.

It was freezing outside, so I wasn't planning to go to the venue too much earlier. Checked my emails for the hundreth time. No new messages. The doors opened at 7pm, so I decided to be there around 6pm. I was going there with two friends, my little sister and her friend. We were there about 6:15pm, to notice that the line was already quite long. Rest of my group started to queue, while I made a quick visit to check the tour bus on the other side of the venue just in case. Dead silent. There were no one near the bus. So back into the line. Luckily I had something to keep myself cold (as an opposite to frozen). The promoter of the show didn't plan on advertising the show at all (radio stations haven't played Sums here since 2002, so no one really knows them), so I had contacted them if they could make some posters for me, so at least I could do my best to advertise this thing. So I had some posters left, and started to sell them with my friend, to keep us moving. No one really wanted to buy one before the show, so we decided to sell them afterwards. And it was still freezing outside. My sister said one of her friends had started to queue from 6am. I didn't feel my toes after only 15 minutes.

Finally the doors opened and we got inside and undressed all the winter clothing. Even though I wanted to buy some merch, there were still people coming in after us, so I decided to prefer great viewing spots and planned to buy merch after the show. We headed to the crowd, and we were about in the middle of the field. That wasn't too far away, since the venue was only for a capacity of 900 people, so we had decent views. But of course, my goal was to get as front as possible. Veara started just after we came there, so the journey towards the stage began. It was easier than I thought, and before Veara quit, I was about two meters from the front row. Not bad, but still not good enough.

Review: supporter bands
The Finnish crowd has its special character. Whatever the event is (rock show, sport event, theater etc), the crowd either rocks or it's EXTREMELY LAME. Unfortunately, during all the supporter bands, it was the latter.
For me, Veara did a great job. They were much more energetic than I thought they would be (I told that to their drummer after the show). Even though I didn't really know much of their songs (or by the Gamblers), I liked their performance, while the rest of the crowd stayed almost still. All of the members (except the drummer of course) kept coming near the crowd so the wildest fangirls could touch them and so.

On came the Riverboat Gamblers. Their performance was a little better than Veara's, so the crowd was slowly turning on. They continued where Veara left off, the members handshaking the crowd. The singer was really active, jumping around a lot and stuff. The higlight was when he dived into the crowd, and started to climb up and hanged out of the rafters of the second floor, singing the song while doing so. Unfortunately, no pics, since I was saving my memory card space for the Sums.

To me, The Black Pacific wasn't as great as the other ones. I prefered their music, but the stage performance wasn't as lively as for the previous bands. Still the crowd was again turned on little more, but for my disappointment, no one seemed to have heard their songs before. So when Jim (the frontman) told the crowd to sing along during Living With Ghosts, it was necessary for them to instruct the crowd every time they wanted them to sing. Bummer, but I was expecting it, since I know the Finnish crowd culture. The highlight was a Ramones cover of Blitzkrieg Bop, which got the crowd wild for once.

Review: The Sums
I'm still shaking when remembering this. When the TNT started to blast off the stereos, the crowd went insane. And when Intro started playing, the athmosphere was huge. And yeah, forgot to mention, I made my way to the front row with my sister and her friend. My friends preferred the pit, so they stayed in the middle of the crowd. We were just in front of the spot I knew Brwon Tom would be in.

So came The Sums. I was so excited. They started with The Hell Song, as I expected (although I hadn't checked any setlists from the current tour). And this is the spot where the night started to become crazy. Brown Tom was playing right in front of me. I had a long chat with him in Prague three months ago, so I was hoping he would recognize me. So during the second verse, I waved at him, and got a wink and smile as the response. Fucking awesome! I was so happy! And right after that, Matt noticed me too and gave a laugh. During the extended bridge he came to shake hands, which was really cool of him, since I was a bit disappointed earlier for how the interview didn't work out (later I found out that he didn't have any Internet connection to check his e-mails).

So there I was, happier than ever before. The athmosphere was so great, so awesome. For me it was a big surprise, since the crowd was so lame during the supporting bands. But now it was fucking crazy. On came We're All To Blame, with a slightly different intro than we're used to. And when it was time for screaming Sacrifice, I was waving again, of course. After looking at few guys next to me, Deryck looked at me saying "You wanna sing? Alright I'm coming out there". Then he came off the stage, came to me. And I just couldn't breathe anymore. For a note, I had been sick for a week, so I still had a little sore throat. And in addition to that, I had so dry mouth at the moment, hadn't had a sip of water for hours. So adding the disability to breathe, my shout wasn't as badass as I would've wanted, but I didn't care! Fuck this shit man! I thought I already had my highlight during the Hell Song!

The show went on with full energy. The next memorable moment was when I almost dropped my camera and jizzed my pants when a familiar drumbeat, yet previously unheard live (for me at least) started rolling. Stumbled with trying to press the record button, since I was so excited to hear Skumfuk live for the first time. And I must say it rocks! So badass played live! And I was shocked to hear the crowd sing along!

Then it was time for some metal music after the 88 instrumental. "What's your favorite metal band?" he asked. Big guy with a long hair (who was later brought on stage) yelled AC/DC. Deryck was surprised, looked at Tom, who said something to Stevo, and they started to play Back In Black. Afterwards I heard it wasn't planned or rehearsed by any means. Then some Iron Maiden, and of course, Metallica.

Next stop, Underclass Hero. During the extended bridge, Deryck splashed some water into the crowd. I was having a time of my life, so maybe I deserved it, when Deryck came in front of us and splashed the water to my face.
Surprisingly, they played Fat Lip before the encore. Before they came back, Introduction To Destruction was played, which was a nice surprise, while the encore song was In Too Deep.

The Setlist
The setlist was something I expected it to be, all the basic stuff. This was their first time ever in Finland, so even though they said they would play some rare stuff before the tour, I didn't count on that. My only wishes were Skumfuk and No Brains, but luckily enough at least one of them was played.
I managed to get the printed setlist after the show. They played Paint It Black instead of Pieces, which was quite a shame. Afterwards Deryck told me that during the show, he didn't feel like playing Pieces tonight, so he told Tom that they'd play Paint It Black instead. Also P4P wasn't listed either, but they still played it.

One major disappointment. All-ages shows should be forbidden by law. Every single of my videos are more or less ruined audio-wise because of that stupid 10-year-old boy (!!!) whose girly voice made it impossible to hear Deryck's voice at times. I told him many times to shut up, with no results. Fuck. Singing along is okay, but with a voice so high it should be limited to only few parts of the songs. Why the fuck are these kids let in before they grow up?

1. Intro + The Hell Song
2. We're All To Blame
3. My Direction
4. Walking Disaster
5. Skumfuk
6. Motivation + 88
7. Metal Mayhem
8. King Of Contradiction
9. Underclass Hero
10. Paint It Black
11. Welcome To Hell
12. Still Waiting
13. Over My Head (Better Off Dead)
14. Fat Lip
--Encore--
15. Introduction To Destruction (playback)
16. In Too Deep
17. Pain For Pleasure

The Aftermath

I had so much fun, so of course I couldn't leave right after the show. But after waiting for some time, the security guys told everyone to leave, except those girls who had got a special guest pass (about 5-6 girls, same thing in Prague too). So a little disappointed, but still very happy, I decided to leave with my friends and sister. But on the hallway I ran into Matt. I asked him about the interview, he said "Oh yeah, about that. Would it be okay to do it by email? Send me the questions after the tour. It was nice to meet you though." And then he left. Bummer, but what can I do. When we got to the merch section, there were Veara and couple of Gamblers. So I decided to take a short chat with Veara. Told them they were much more energetic than I was expecting. Also, talked a bit about the tour, their first one outside North America. The guitar player asked me if I knew any good places for an afterparty, but since it was Tuesday, I didn't know any.

After the chat, I went to buy some merch, mainly the hoody and the Skumfuk shirt. Unfortunately, I lost the hoody that night (worth 50 euros, 67 USD). I'm quite sure it was either Dan Moyse or Mr. Diaz who accidentaly took it, since they were wearing a one afterwards. And I only noticed back home that I didn't have it. Oh well.

My two friends were waiting for me next to the doors so we could go and sell the rest of the posters outside. Then a coincidence leading to another, the next thing I know that I'm waiting outside the dressing room with my sister and her friend. Since the situation happened so fast, my friends were left aside. Sucked for them, but it was a sacrifice that needed to be made. We went inside, and there they were, the band with the crew members, along with Marc, the Black Pacific guitarist. We hung out for a while, talked about everything between ice-hockey with Cone and airplanes with Tom, and drank some shot inbetween. Of course I had to ask some Sum-related stuff from the members too.

After a while, everyone started to pack their stuff. I saw that it was time to leave, we thanked everyone, said goodbye and left the dressing room. Again coincidences happened, and next we find ourselves at the back of the tour bus with the crew members. The band itself wasn't there, but we had a great time with the rest of the guys. Dan Moyse the Ladies' choice, who had invited some girls along too, made sure everyone had a drink all the time. How cool is that! Little later Tom and Deryck joined us, while Stevo and Cone were gone to sleep already. It was terribly freezing inside the bus! The heating was broken, so everyone had a winter jacket on, except Deryck, who said he's not used to wearing a winter jacket. He put some music on, some classics like Beatles, Costello, Stones, Tom Petty etc. There we drank and again, talked about everything that drunken minds had in mind. Deryck was really quiet all the time, but after some Jack he started to talk a bit. I took this as an advantage and started ask him some stuff. Matt laughed, saying "I don't know how you did this, but seems you got your interview afterall".

We had a great time. Tom was busy trying to put up a fight between me and Kalle (the Swedish guy who writes the blog for EastpakAntidoteTour.com), so he could act as a referee between the vikings. Unfortunately my sister had a morning shift at her job, so we had to leave in the middle of the party. But that didn't matter, since it was still the best day in my life so far and forever.

The information!

1. Screaming Bloody Murder
-These are the same I posted in the SBM thread.

-The reason they keep telling the same stuff in interviews all over again is that they just answer the questions. It's not their fault the interviewers are stupid to ask the same things. They would be glad to tell something new, but no one ever asks them.
-The album is fully recorded and mixed. No mastering yet.
-Album will most likely come out in March. The label says that the albums that get released Christmas time will be forgotten fast, so they prefer to release it in Spring.
-SBM the title just came to Deryck's mind while trying to get sleep and hearing the voices outside. He asked the guys how that sounded, and they liked it. It was the first and the only option for the title, so there were never any other alternatives.
-No artwork has been planned yet.
-Asked about the song Deryck was going to give away free like a year ago. He didn't remember what song that was, since he's tried to get songs released couple of times already.
-The first single will be Screaming Bloody Murder. Whenever that happens.
-I asked about other titles, he started his sentence but then something happened which took Deryck's attention elsewhere, and the topic changed after that. So didn't get any new titles.
-"I'm over you, congratulations" is a lyric from Blood In My Eyes.
-"How did you come up with a 12-minute long song?" - "It just happened."
-Tom said Jessica Kill is part of the 12-minute song. This is NOT true. No idea why Tom would think of that.
-Sometimes there was rumour here at TNS that the title for Jessica Kill would come out from the show Heroes and its character Jessica. Deryck has never seen an episode of Heroes, so obviously not true.
-Jessica Kill is a real person, but the song itself is about a fictional character. When Deryck saw the name, he thought it would be a cool song title. So first came the title, then the song itself.
-Jessica Kill is about a girl and a guy who love each other. The girl has a lust for killing people, so she asks her boyfriend if she could kill him. The guy loves the girl so much that he's willing to sacrifice himself to give her the joy.

2. Other stuff
-answers by Deryck, except where noted.

-"How much do you listen to your own songs?" - "Not at all. Well, we listen to the new stuff, but when the album gets released, we basically never listen to them anymore.

-"Do you ever go to see other bands' shows?" - "Never"

-"Do you prefer big or small venues?" - "Doesn't matter, it's all about the atmosphere. Sometimes big crowd rocks, but sometimes it sucks."

-To Stevo: "Fans are wondering, why you don't play any other P4P songs?" - "Really? I thought no one knew them!"

-Tom doesn't really like playing Paint It Black live, since "there's no chorus that the crowd could sing along".

-By the time of recording DTLI, Deryck was into The Beatles, who had song titles like "Maggy Mae" and "Mean Mr. Mustard". Deryck thought they were cool titles, so he made up Mr. Amsterdam and Billy Spleen. So they don't mean anything, and the songs themselves are not about a certain person. How he came up with those, he doesn't remember anymore.

-"Who's the Skumfuk?" - "Oh man, there are a lot of them, especially in California."

-"Who's the King Of Contradiction?" - "It's about our old manager.
-"You mean Greig Nori?" - "Yeah, that's the one".
(I took a deep breath.)
-"I'm not sure if I can ask this, but what happened between you and him?"
(Deryck looks at Matt and laughs: "Oh, he's got all the dirty ones!")
"He betrayed us. He stole a lot of money from us."

(To light up the mood a bit, I asked a random question.)
-"You seem to wear a pin of Mickey Mouse sometimes. Any special meaning to that?"
(Laughs) - "No, nothing. It was a gift. But it's a very old one, like from the 60s or something. Vintage"

----------

So there you go. I was a bit drunk, so I didn't remember all the good questions I had thought of.
Also, I hope you don't get mad at me.

Pictures from the day.

I'm not sure if this post contains something I shouldn't have told.
Please, do not spread any of this too much outside the forums.

[Shelley41]

I read the whole damn story!
Hahah fantastic how you after all got your interview. Thanks so much! And I am happy for you that you met them!

[Mitchell]

Awesome story!
lots of interesting stuff!
I was hoping for some kind of miracle too.. but it actually worked out for you!
Nice pictures too.. btw which girl is your sister?

[Heather]

wow, crazy day, I too read the whole thing. I saw your vids on youtube yesterday and was looking through them, so cool that you recorded the "sacrifice". Glad you got to hang out with them and they remembered you. Nice info on Nori, the booze helped that I'm sure..haha.

[Bobbyjames]

fuckin' hell, you wrote enough?!

I'll read it later when I have time, I should be working right now.

[Boni]

I didn't know that about Greig Nori. Looks like you had fun. :

[Lars]

Awesome man! Really glad things worked out!

[FuckT41182]

I read it all ...it is quite interesting how you managed to meet them ...good for you ! :)

[Emil]

Pff, the Finns aren't vikings. And Marc is awesome, when he used to be in Dropkick Murphys he always jumped into the crowd and the security flipped over.

[TomiT14]

Pff, the Finns aren't vikings.

That's what we kept telling him, but he was too drunk to pay attention to what we were saying.

[Emil]

Pff, the Finns aren't vikings.

That's what we kept telling him, but he was too drunk to pay attention to waht we were saying.

Haha, i can imagine. And i agree about the whole all ages shows sucks, for the shows in Sweden you had to be 14 or 15 i think to be allowed in.

[UltraKolby]

Cool!!! Glad you had a good time!!
That kinda sucks that the album isnt coming out til March

[Hentaiman]

I read the whole thing and seems like you had some great time there! Some great new info and that Greig Nori part.. wow, if this is for real, it seems to be some heavy shit.. they never talked about anything regarding parting ways with Greig.

[Druska]

Pff, the Finns aren't vikings.

That's what we kept telling him, but he was too drunk to pay attention to waht we were saying.

Haha, i can imagine. And i agree about the whole all ages shows sucks, for the shows in Sweden you had to be 14 or 15 i think to be allowed in.

here it all depends on which venue, though there weren't many kids in barcelona, maybe it's because the show was originally planned for a +16 venue.
sounds like you had fun

[Mike]

can i order those new t-shirts online anywhere?

[Susanne]

Congrats man! Sounds exciting

Sucks that I couldn't even go to the concert :[

[Mitchell]

lol Tomi

you killed all the other threads single-handedly

[gejmik]

Wow really great report. I've met them for shorter time it was about 10 mins :D. You managed pretty good meeting after all :D.

Tom was busy trying to put up a fight between me and Kalle (the Swedish guy who writes the blog for EastpakAntidoteTour.com), so he could act as a referee between the vikings.

this got me
Also thanks for the new informations and great reading for today's morning :)

[Nic]

I loved reading this post. Thanks for posting it!

-By the time of recording DTLI, Deryck was into The Beatles, who had song titles like "Maggy Mae" and "Mean Mr. Mustard". Deryck thought they were cool titles, so he made up Mr. Amsterdam and Billy Spleen. So they don't mean anything, and the songs themselves are not about a certain person. How he came up with those, he doesn't remember anymore.

"Mean Mr. Mustard" is an interesting title because Mustard is Matt's nickname. I have a feeling the meanings of the title and nickname might be related?

[Mitchell]

I loved reading this post. Thanks for posting it!

-By the time of recording DTLI, Deryck was into The Beatles, who had song titles like "Maggy Mae" and "Mean Mr. Mustard". Deryck thought they were cool titles, so he made up Mr. Amsterdam and Billy Spleen. So they don't mean anything, and the songs themselves are not about a certain person. How he came up with those, he doesn't remember anymore.

"Mean Mr. Mustard" is an interesting title because Mustard is Matt's nickname. I have a feeling the meanings of the title and nickname might be related?

Exactly what I was thinking