Tuska and Україна

First of all, I got something from Ukraine. I don't know what that is but at least it ain't making me feel any good.

We were on at Tuska festival on Saturday at 17 but my festival trip started already on Friday afternoon when I packed my luggage and myself in the proletarian tube (i.e. train) to go to do a live interview with Jonne at Yleisradio. We were supposed to be there at 20. The actual interview time was 20.15. The train I took was supposed to be at Pasila station at 19.45 which should've been early enough. However the departure time came and went and we were still sitting at the Tampere railway station. Finally we hear the announcement that "There's too much traffic on the tracks and we'll wait here for another 10 minutes." Then after about a minute another announcement says that "No, we're actually leaving right now." And we did. The train moved something like 100 metres and stayed there the next 10 minutes. So finally we were about 15 minutes late from the radio interview, thanks to VR.

Immediately after the interview we met Sampo from Amfisound (www.amfisound.fi) who was bringing me my new bass. That indeed is a beautiful piece of work. I ended up using that at Tuska but didn't take it to Ukraine since I still don't have a decent flight case for it. The bass is just too long to fit in any standard case so I guess it's time to use the services of SmartCase again.

I checked in my hotel and still went to see the last notes of the first day of the festival. I met a lot of old friends, both musicians and "normal" people. Really nice. Since some of them were going to see the bands at the club called Virgin Oil I decided to go there too. I managed to get my American friends there too. I had a festival pass so I had no problems getting in even though the place was sold-out. The girls had no tickets but I was still at that point sober enough to tell the people at the door a sad story about the poor Americans who'd come all the way from Cleveland just to be left out. That worked. It was a nice evening although Turmion Kätilöt were waaaaay too loud. Really, painfully loud.

On Saturday we were supposed to meet Paavo Väyrynen, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development and his Brazilian guests. Or that's what the Finnish representative for Nuclear Blast told us. Scheduled time for that was 14.00. Well, as usual with Nuclear Blast, nothing happens on time but 2-3 hours late if ever. And they weren't Paavo Väyrynen's guests, they were Alexander Stubb's, Minister for Foreign Affairs. So all our other guys arrived to the festival area four hours before they were needed and they didn't even get to meet Paavo. Must've been boring. At least Jonne and myself were doing some interviews to kill time.

One of the bands was actually late. I guess it was Faceless. They knew already a few days earlier about that and we were actually offered their slot on the main stage. It would have been 15 minutes longer but also at the same time as the originally scheduled meeting with Väyrynen & co. so we said no. Well, after all we would have been able to that slot as well.

Last year we had to cancel our Tuska appearance since some of our gear was still in Germany. This time we were coming directly from Tampere so we were not expecting any problems like that. We were wrong. The festival claimed that they had not received any of our riders, including backline rider, so they were expecting us to bring everything including drums and guitar cabs which we of course didn't have with us. Dauntless, the previous band on the same stage were kind enough to lend us all we needed so that all went well. However, it was a bit strange that the festival who had not received ANY of our riders were still able to fill the catering rider exactly...

The show was not our best. The audience was brilliant. The tent was packed and afterward I heard people complaining that they couldn't get in or see or hear anything. I guess we were a bit nervous. Tuska just is a special festival for us. It took years to get to be part of the main event. The stage sound was not perfect. After about 4-5 songs it turned even worse since there suddenly was this really loud mid-frequency rumble that was making it really hard to hear anything precisely. I hope the audience enjoyed the show anyway. At least they got to hear two new songs, Juodaan viinaa and Huppiaan aarre.

Our flight to Ukraine was leaving at 6.55 next morning which meant that we'd have to be at the airport around 5.00. Most of us went to spend the evening at Nosturi but Hittavainen decided otherwise. He did promise to be at the airport at 5.00 though. Well, everybody else was there on time but he wasn't. And didn't answer our phone calls either. We took all his stuff from the van and checked in. The first time we heard about him was when the boarding had just started. He called from outside and asked for his passport which was in one of his bags. Why doesn't he carry it with him? Beats me. Anyway, I informed him that he can get on the flight with just his ID, since the first flight was to München anyway. But of course he couldn't get to the plane since the check-in closes exactly the same time the boarding starts. Well, we boarded anyway and though that he still has like a day and a half to get to Ukraine. How difficult can that be? Well, impossible to some.

We are in contact with him again from München airport. We try to organize it so that we can leave his passport at Lufthansa desk so that he can book the same flights for the next day but that doesn't work out with Lufthansa. Paukku tested it and managed to get through the passport control with just ID, so basically it would be possible to get to the Ukrainian soil without the passport. Ukrainian immigration would be the first one asking for that.

Ok, I have to admit that at this point this becomes a bit blurry since we arrive to Ukraine and it's mostly Paukku who is in contact with Hittis. Arriving there was interesting. Usually we have to get through the customs and immigration by ourselves and only after that there's someone at the arrival hall with a piece of paper saying "Korkiplaani", "Korplikaani" or whatever. In Ukraine they were actually standing right next to the plane when it stopped. Gogol Bordello, a crew of 15 persons, were actually on the same flight. The locals took us all apart from the other passengers, took care of our luggage and guided us through the immigration. It was slow but still probably easier that way. The terminal was interesting. It looked nothing like a terminal. It just like any other old federal building in the former Soviet Union. I guess they don't get that much international traffic there.

We were taken to a really nice hotel near the city centre and then to a restaurant to eat and drink. It was a bit difficult to order vegetarian food but I managed after all. Fried salty cheese is always good.

Now back to Hittavainen. He was trying to book him the same flights for the next day. The local organizers told us that they will be waiting there at the airport with his passport which would be alright for the immigration. However since his final destination was outside the Schengen area they were demanding to see his passport at the Helsinki airport when he was trying to book the flights. Passport number was not enough. Why not, I don't know. You can book that flight on the internet with just the passport number. Why didn't he use the internet? I don't know. Too drunk? Why didn't we tell him to use the internet? Too stupid?

The next idea was to get him to Warsaw, Poland since Poland is part of the Schengen area and passport is not needed. Warsaw is only about 500km from Lviv. Someone from Ukraine would drive there with his passport to pick him up. Hittis then later informs us that he's booked a flight that will be in Warsaw at 21.15 so we organize the driver to pick him up.

In the meantime we hang around the town, check the festival area and just generally enjoy life in the extremely hot Lviv. For a while it looks like everything is good and we'll have a violinist for the show. Until in the evening Hittis calls us and tells that he was denied from boarding the plane because he was too drunk and that he definitely has no money to book any more flights. So we of course do the only wise thing and call the driver back since there's no point in making him drive all the way there for nothing.

The rest of the evening went as usual. Nothing that special to report. However, in the morning we hear from Hittis once again. He's calling from Warsaw and asking where the hell is the driver! He had managed to exchange his booking to a different flight but didn't think it was necessary to inform us. So we started to figure out the ways to get him to Lviv. At that point it was not going to be easy anymore. It was 10 in the morning, showtime at 17 and a 1000km drive. The only way to do that was to get him somehow to Medyka, the Polish border town and at the same time someone would drive to get him from there. After a lot of talk, expensive phone calls, etc. I finally told him: "Hittis, go back to Finland." He couldn't really find any way to get there. So, it was going to be a show without a violinist.

For some reason we were taken to the stadium really early. Hours before they let the audience in. Not that it really mattered though. The catering was excellent and the weather was beautiful. I was a bit concerned if the success of the festival would be like it was in Romania a couple of weeks ago (=disaster) but luckily it wasn't. The turn out was quite good. That's always really difficult to estimate, but a few thousand people I'd say.

We played a good show. Although we were a bit different than basically all of the other bands on the bill we still got a really good response from the crowd. The organizers were the whole time really concerned about the schedule and kept telling us that we should play exactly an hour, not a minute more. We did that and got off the stage. Paukku put the outro on. I was already at the backstage packing my bass when they came to us and said "You've got to play more, you can't just leave an audience shouting like that!" So we had to go back and play some more. The schedule was not a problem anymore. Next morning we also heard from our manager that the promoters were already booking more shows in the area so I guess we were ok. Even without the violinist.

We stayed at the festival till the end. Gogol Bordello kicked ass. The rest of the night is a bit blurry. I guess I was a bit drunk. But I do remember talking to some Gogol Bordello guys outside of a night club. And then later falling asleep at the hotel bar.

Next day we were taken to the airport. It was a terrible hassle with the local airport crew. They didn't seem to know what to do with our gear. I don't really know if the problem was the locals or the Polish airline. It all seemed highly unorganized. We managed to board the plane anyway and to our surprise all our gear ended up at Helsinki-Vantaa airport. Even after the stopover in Warsaw.

Interesting weekend it was.

j.