My last entry: I would apologize for not writing sooner, but I did that last time and the excuse is the same anyways!! Haha! As you might imagine, the final few days of the tour were very hectic; we had 3 shows to play and a lot of driving to get to each of them on time, so needless to say, there was not much internet browsing or typing on a laptop in a crowded Mercedes Sprinter to get to it all in time!
So, where did I leave off??? Oh yeah, we were leaving Bologna to get to Freiburg and then on to Aschaffenburg to play at the Collasaal (sp?) club... So, we made it back to Freiburg and (by now) our new home at the local Etap hotel! We got in with enough time to grab a few brews from the machine downstairs and make a couple of Skype calls back home. The next day we left for Aschaffenburg. What can I say, this was a cool little town with lots of gift shops and places to walk very nearby the venue... What no one told us was IT SHUTS DOWN at 7:00PM, so after soundcheck and dinner I thought I would actually get a chance to take a walk and do some shopping... WRONG. Oh well, the airport gift shop it is - AGAIN...
So, the show was really cool! Our good friend Oliver, from Keep It True was onhand as well as some other friends of ours and the crowd, again, was just very kind to us! We played an extended set which included Angel of Death(e) and that made Oliver happy... We made some new friends in the band Evolution. Cool guys, you must check them out as well... So, we basically did the gig and left to stay with our Friend Chris from Courageous and his wife in their home. Again, the hospitality was rolled out for us and we all had a good place to sleep and got some much needed rest. In the morning, Chris's wife treated us all to a HUGE breakfast!!! Yum! All kinds of eggs, sausage, bacon, deli meats, fresh fruit, cereal, it went on and on my friends!!! So, we filled up our tanks and then left for Hellendoorn to play with Forbidden.
Meeting Forbidden was for me a very cool thing. We shared a room with them and yet another cool, up and coming Dutch band named Thrashed. These kids were great! They have a lot going on and hope to hear more from them! All three bands had great sets and spent the rest of the night partying in the room until it was time to go... Which for us was back to Ramon and Kirsten's place in Eindhoven! Ah, like going home again! It was definitely a good thing we did go there as opposed to heading towards Sweden as we had originally planned... The promoter, Roman, had all of our passports!!! Man, that was a close one! After luckily getting in touch with him, we spent the morning cleaning out and repacking the van for the last trip to Sweden...
Just as we finished, Roman pulls up and gives us our passports - RELIEF!!!
So, we end up leaving Eindhoven at 2:30 for what should have been about a 7 hour drive - uh, no... Our dumb asses took a longer route which took us through Flensburg and then Copenhagen. We did not get to the hostel in Copenhagen until 1:30 in the morning!!! Arrgghh!!! That was the longest, fucked up drive of the entire tour my friends!!! My head could not find the pillow any faster than it did that night! To top it all off, we had to check out by 10:00am!!!
Okay, enough bitching! We woke up at 9:50 in the morning and in what has to go down as the quickest Helstar has EVER gotten ready and left a hotel in the ENTIRE HISTORY of the band, we were out of there at 10:00 am sharp! Wow, so why can't we ever do that any other time???
So, off we go to pick up our agent, Lars and his buddy and we head off to Solvesberg for Sweden Rock. We arrived within 2.5 hours of leaving Copenhagen and proceeded to check in with the festival staff and then off to check into our hotel rooms. Man, that was a nice place! It wasn't the best hotel I've ever stayed in, but man, it was a nice way to end the run! I almost didn't wanna leave to play the gig!! haha!
But, we couldn't do that, we had a siging session at 5:00 pm, so we took a quick 1 hour nap, got ready, and again, hit the road to the festival.
Upon arriving at the festival grounds, we immediately headed for the signing session. It was cool; not as many fans as we thought might show, but in retrospect, there was SO much going on, it was understandable why not so many fans did come... Not to mention, our new Forbidden buds were just about to hit the stage! So, we wrapped up the siging about 5:30 and headed for our trailer to unload some gear, ate a quick dinner and the ran over to catch up with the Forbidden guys jsut before they were about to go onstage. Man, that was way cool to check them out from sidestage... So, I watched the first 3 songs and then headed to get warmed up for our show. I have to be honest, I was a bit worried that we might not have a good crowd to play to - we were the very last act to go on before Heaven and Hell, playing the smallest stage, after a long 4 day festival... To top it off, they put up a large screen and displayed the qualifying soccer match between Sweden and Denmark right up until 20 minutes prior to our gig and then SWEDEN LOST!!! So, as you might imagine, when the game was on, the tent was PACKED with like 2000+ people. When the match was over, the place CLEARED OUT!!! We were really wondering how this would turn out...
Little, by little, people started to come in, at first there were only a few people in front of the stage as we performed last minute line checks....Then a few more... Then a few 'Helstar, Helstar, Helstar' chants began... Next thing you know, the intro is rolling and we are about to hit the stage. When I walked out just moments before hitting the first few chords for The King of Hell, I was very pleased to see a packed house!
We busted into probably one of our most inspired and energetic performance to date and the crowd loved it! We had an absolute blast and before we knew it, it was down to the last song. Little did any of us know what James was up to offstage... I ran over to let him know we were cutting the set by one song in order to make the time and next thing I know, he runs up onstage with fellow Texan and lead singer for Candlemass, Rob Lowe. Actually, Rob didn't know either, but he had made the most of it and helped us get the crowd really fired up for Baptized in Blood. When it was all said and done, we were totally psyched and happy to have been invited to play this festival and we hope to get invited back to Sweden again in the near future. The Swedish fans waited many, many years to see Helstar live, so hopefully it won't take as long from here on!
So, really that about sums it up for me... Sure, there is more, but it is really just more driving, taking wrong turns, getting the GPS screwed up, etc, etc, so I don't want to end on that note.
What I would like to end on is this: This tour nearly failed. We nearly packed it all in that day in Hamburg, but we didn't give up. I have to give credit to James for his perserverence and determination to forge on and make this trip happen; I have to thank each of my band mates for stepping up to the plate and hitting it out of the park each and every day; I have to thank all of the promoters who took a chance on us and all of the very cool people who came out to support us at each and every show (Stefan, again with the whisky!!!). I also want to thank Schmier, Oliver, and 'Tom Cruise' for coming out to support us and the Forbidden guys for being way cool. I have to thank all of our support acts for being cool enough to loan us gear every night...
Lastly, I have to thank our very, very good friends, Ramon and Kirsten, Chris and Chris, and Gabe for offering up their homes to us. Randy Rand for teching for us in Essen and Kuno for selling our merch, not once, but twice! There are no words to describe the generosity these people displayed and for that, we are forever thankful...
I know I am missing some people here, but trust me, we appreciate each and every one of you out there - Until we meet again... Stay Metal my brothers and sisters!
Horns up!
Rob.
So, where did I leave off??? Oh yeah, we were leaving Bologna to get to Freiburg and then on to Aschaffenburg to play at the Collasaal (sp?) club... So, we made it back to Freiburg and (by now) our new home at the local Etap hotel! We got in with enough time to grab a few brews from the machine downstairs and make a couple of Skype calls back home. The next day we left for Aschaffenburg. What can I say, this was a cool little town with lots of gift shops and places to walk very nearby the venue... What no one told us was IT SHUTS DOWN at 7:00PM, so after soundcheck and dinner I thought I would actually get a chance to take a walk and do some shopping... WRONG. Oh well, the airport gift shop it is - AGAIN...
So, the show was really cool! Our good friend Oliver, from Keep It True was onhand as well as some other friends of ours and the crowd, again, was just very kind to us! We played an extended set which included Angel of Death(e) and that made Oliver happy... We made some new friends in the band Evolution. Cool guys, you must check them out as well... So, we basically did the gig and left to stay with our Friend Chris from Courageous and his wife in their home. Again, the hospitality was rolled out for us and we all had a good place to sleep and got some much needed rest. In the morning, Chris's wife treated us all to a HUGE breakfast!!! Yum! All kinds of eggs, sausage, bacon, deli meats, fresh fruit, cereal, it went on and on my friends!!! So, we filled up our tanks and then left for Hellendoorn to play with Forbidden.
Meeting Forbidden was for me a very cool thing. We shared a room with them and yet another cool, up and coming Dutch band named Thrashed. These kids were great! They have a lot going on and hope to hear more from them! All three bands had great sets and spent the rest of the night partying in the room until it was time to go... Which for us was back to Ramon and Kirsten's place in Eindhoven! Ah, like going home again! It was definitely a good thing we did go there as opposed to heading towards Sweden as we had originally planned... The promoter, Roman, had all of our passports!!! Man, that was a close one! After luckily getting in touch with him, we spent the morning cleaning out and repacking the van for the last trip to Sweden...
Just as we finished, Roman pulls up and gives us our passports - RELIEF!!!
So, we end up leaving Eindhoven at 2:30 for what should have been about a 7 hour drive - uh, no... Our dumb asses took a longer route which took us through Flensburg and then Copenhagen. We did not get to the hostel in Copenhagen until 1:30 in the morning!!! Arrgghh!!! That was the longest, fucked up drive of the entire tour my friends!!! My head could not find the pillow any faster than it did that night! To top it all off, we had to check out by 10:00am!!!
Okay, enough bitching! We woke up at 9:50 in the morning and in what has to go down as the quickest Helstar has EVER gotten ready and left a hotel in the ENTIRE HISTORY of the band, we were out of there at 10:00 am sharp! Wow, so why can't we ever do that any other time???
So, off we go to pick up our agent, Lars and his buddy and we head off to Solvesberg for Sweden Rock. We arrived within 2.5 hours of leaving Copenhagen and proceeded to check in with the festival staff and then off to check into our hotel rooms. Man, that was a nice place! It wasn't the best hotel I've ever stayed in, but man, it was a nice way to end the run! I almost didn't wanna leave to play the gig!! haha!
But, we couldn't do that, we had a siging session at 5:00 pm, so we took a quick 1 hour nap, got ready, and again, hit the road to the festival.
Upon arriving at the festival grounds, we immediately headed for the signing session. It was cool; not as many fans as we thought might show, but in retrospect, there was SO much going on, it was understandable why not so many fans did come... Not to mention, our new Forbidden buds were just about to hit the stage! So, we wrapped up the siging about 5:30 and headed for our trailer to unload some gear, ate a quick dinner and the ran over to catch up with the Forbidden guys jsut before they were about to go onstage. Man, that was way cool to check them out from sidestage... So, I watched the first 3 songs and then headed to get warmed up for our show. I have to be honest, I was a bit worried that we might not have a good crowd to play to - we were the very last act to go on before Heaven and Hell, playing the smallest stage, after a long 4 day festival... To top it off, they put up a large screen and displayed the qualifying soccer match between Sweden and Denmark right up until 20 minutes prior to our gig and then SWEDEN LOST!!! So, as you might imagine, when the game was on, the tent was PACKED with like 2000+ people. When the match was over, the place CLEARED OUT!!! We were really wondering how this would turn out...
Little, by little, people started to come in, at first there were only a few people in front of the stage as we performed last minute line checks....Then a few more... Then a few 'Helstar, Helstar, Helstar' chants began... Next thing you know, the intro is rolling and we are about to hit the stage. When I walked out just moments before hitting the first few chords for The King of Hell, I was very pleased to see a packed house!
We busted into probably one of our most inspired and energetic performance to date and the crowd loved it! We had an absolute blast and before we knew it, it was down to the last song. Little did any of us know what James was up to offstage... I ran over to let him know we were cutting the set by one song in order to make the time and next thing I know, he runs up onstage with fellow Texan and lead singer for Candlemass, Rob Lowe. Actually, Rob didn't know either, but he had made the most of it and helped us get the crowd really fired up for Baptized in Blood. When it was all said and done, we were totally psyched and happy to have been invited to play this festival and we hope to get invited back to Sweden again in the near future. The Swedish fans waited many, many years to see Helstar live, so hopefully it won't take as long from here on!
So, really that about sums it up for me... Sure, there is more, but it is really just more driving, taking wrong turns, getting the GPS screwed up, etc, etc, so I don't want to end on that note.
What I would like to end on is this: This tour nearly failed. We nearly packed it all in that day in Hamburg, but we didn't give up. I have to give credit to James for his perserverence and determination to forge on and make this trip happen; I have to thank each of my band mates for stepping up to the plate and hitting it out of the park each and every day; I have to thank all of the promoters who took a chance on us and all of the very cool people who came out to support us at each and every show (Stefan, again with the whisky!!!). I also want to thank Schmier, Oliver, and 'Tom Cruise' for coming out to support us and the Forbidden guys for being way cool. I have to thank all of our support acts for being cool enough to loan us gear every night...
Lastly, I have to thank our very, very good friends, Ramon and Kirsten, Chris and Chris, and Gabe for offering up their homes to us. Randy Rand for teching for us in Essen and Kuno for selling our merch, not once, but twice! There are no words to describe the generosity these people displayed and for that, we are forever thankful...
I know I am missing some people here, but trust me, we appreciate each and every one of you out there - Until we meet again... Stay Metal my brothers and sisters!
Horns up!
Rob.
