What is the first things that comes to your mind when you hear the name Israel? Except the constant war, I mean. For me it is the orthodox jews with their black suits, hats, beards and strange hair curls. Well, it was nothing like that.
When we were first approached by an Israeli promoter and asked to play in Tel Aviv I immediately went to check the travel notices on the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Lots of warnings and "don't dos" and "don't gos" and "not recommendeds". The promoter however didn't give up but told us that "Yes, but Tel Aviv is different. It's far from any dangerous areas." So we finally said "yes". Should've checked the map though. In a country of that size, nothing is far from anything.
The show was on Friday, October 16. Our flight was with Air Baltic via Riga, Latvia. Air Baltic means shitty luggage rules, one luggage per passenger, max. weight 20kg. And the most annoying thing: you can't count the weights together. It is 20kg per passenger, not 140kg per 7 passengers. This means that we duct taped together for example 2 guitars to make it one piece of luggage weighting 18kg. Is that now better for someone? It weights more, it has an annoying shape and it's more difficult to lift and carry.
Note to self: from now on Korpiklaani flies only with Luftwaffe, Finnair, SAS, Air France, British Airways or KLM. Preferably Luftwaffe.
Anyway, the flight was at 20:45 on Thursday 15th. This time the luggage rules were once again different. This time it was possible to sum the weights together. Not that it mattered anymore though. So, Air Baltic sucks. The Riga airport is not the nicest one either but on the other hand it does have Lulu. A cheap and surprisingly good pizzeria with vegetarian pizza on the menu as well. And of course Latvian long drinks called Safari. Whoohoo!
The schedule meant that we arrived to Tel Aviv in the middle of the night at 3AM. I switched my telephone on as soon as I walked in the terminal and it rang immediately. The promoter was asking if we've landed. Getting into country wasn't that easy and he managed to call me a couple of times more before we finally got out of the terminal. It wasn't really that difficult to get in. Just slow. And lots of idiots from one certain country that we Finns know so well. And I couldn't really understand why the immigration officers allowed them to go to the passport check the whole family at the same time. Do that in any other country and they'll start shouting at you "One at a time!"
We finally arrived our quite nice hotel at 5AM. The hotel was only 5 minutes walk away from the beach and we basically had a free day but we really weren't in the mood of enjoying that. Everybody went to bed and for example Cane and myself got up a bit before the breakfast time ended, went to eat and returned to bed!
Once we managed to finally get up we were taken to the restaurant next door for a lunch. For some it was breakfast though. From there we were taken to a signing session at a local record store. It was a bit chaotic happening. Lots of people crammed in a too small space. That was us behind the counter! Ok, the place was too crowded anyway until the organizers started to control the amount of people inside the store. There were lots of people and lots of stuff to sign but not a drop of alcohol to drink. Badly, badly organized! I also found some CDs and a Phil Lynott solo LP that I decided to buy. I got them all for free. I guess that made up for the missing alcohol.
Soundcheck was at 17. Or it was scheduled at 17 but Israel proved to be no different to any other country. We were at the venue at 17 but everything on the stage was still a mess. And the beer. It was warm! So, we were waiting for something to happen and trying to drink warm beer. Not good.
Ok, this is a point in this entry where I stopped writing originally and now I am continuing it after a year or so!. I'll try to remember as much as I can.
At the venue there was a girl who came to talk to us as if she knew us. We were being friendly and at the same time trying to figure out who the hell she was. Once we finally got to soundcheck she was there as well with her violin and Jonne remembered that she was the Russian violinist who had asked permission to join us on stage and Jonne, the nice person he is, had said "Yes, of course!"
As said, I can't remember all the little details any more. After the soundcheck we were taken back to the hotel to get ready. I can't really remember what I did to get ready but I'd guess it had something to do with alcohol.
Anyway, the support band was Iron Maiden cover band. We were actually half seriously trying to change the playing order so that we could after our show have a few beers and watch Iron Maiden. In the end that didn't happen though. They were good anyway. And played the songs that originally made me a Maiden fan in the 80's unlike the shit Maiden cover band I saw a while ago here in Tampere who played only the newer (post-92) stuff. Wankers.
I guess our show was good too. At least I can not remember it being bad so I guess it wasn't. The lady violinist was definitely on stage too. That I remember. The place was packed.
I think it is also safe now to tell the following story:
The place was full. We were "smuggled" in from the back alley. It was that full. If I remember correctly the promoter said something about 800 tickets sold. I have no idea what the actual capacity was. Apparently way less. A couple of weeks after returning to Finland I received a phone call from the promoter. "I don't want to worry you or anything but all hell broke loose here after your show. Some people have started to blame the venue because they now have a swine flu. They are blaming us for overselling the place and making people stand too close to each other. On top of that a local tabloid has started to write stories about that too. This is not your problem but if the journalist calls you and asks something about this tell him that as far as you know we sold 450 tickets." The journalist never called.
Still. What the fuck? "I have a swine flu. I know exactly where I got that from." Fuck you.
Ok, that was about all I can now write about that trip. Sorry for all the readers that there was a break like this. No excuses. Lazy bastard.
