Ilosaarirock 2003 review

Being blessed by Sorvali Jr, I woke up early in the morning, kicked Key and our slipping bodies run to Helsinki bus-station to go to Joensuu. It is far, believe me. 8 (eight!) hours by bus… - only Finnish forests, Finnish bushes, Finnish villages and Finnish lakes seen thought the window and Finnish metal in the ears.
When we got the bus, it was about 7am , it was cold – about +12'C. In Lahti it was raining like hell . We were glad we tool lots of umbrellas, warm sweaters and leather coats. But! 8 hours later Joensuu met us with bright blue sky, as blue as it's possible only in summer Finland, with baking sun and… the temperature was +31'C. Holy fuck …
Running from shadow to shadow, we jumped to the accreditation point. Key got a card with CrimsonDawn.fi %). And then we went to press-center. God knows, how much I love Ilosaarirock for it's high organization. It is the only one festival I know when it's not only meant that journalists should work, Ilosaarirock organize a perfect circumstance for work. In press-center there's chairs, tables, constantly updates information desk and mane computers and lap-tops. And I do appreciate press-secretaries, who do their job perfectly and know everything you may ask.

As long as we came to Joensuu at about 5pm, we've seen Don Johnson Big Band on the main stage. It was horrible. Loads of people in weird clothes were dancing on stage to a weird easy music. It was so unpleasant to watch and to hear, so we preferred to waste some time at press-center. At the same time singer of Tequilajuzzzz came there as well and gave an interview to… Russian journalist :). It reminded us that we need to arrange our interview with JP Leppaluoto, Charon singer.

Speaking to some people at press-center and then at Kaarihalli, we got a time of interview - 7pm @ Kaarihalli, after sound-check. We came there a bit earlier. There were no Charon, so we spoke to securities, touched the scene and looked into the backstage room. We didn't find anything spectacular and sat down on the perfectly green grass near the entrance. Our rest was shattered by yellow tarantass, used to be Sentenced tour bus. But the bus was stopped near the entrance and the guys jumped out of it and began to carry the gear to the hall.
The first fact I was impressed by is JP's height. When he is on stage, on the pics and in the videos he looks huge. But is it at least 20 cm smaller than I thought. The rest of the guys where the same as they should be:)

And then we made our interview. I felt happy, because JP was happy. He was happe because of everything ! I'm from Russia - he's in ecstasy. We have a site - he's in he's in ecstasy. We had been at Ruisrock and Tuska - he's in he's in ecstasy. We've heard lots of JP's compliments to Sentenced, while he congratulated us with Opeth replaced by Sentenced at Tuska. And the whole interview was amazing. We found a perfect place for interview - a lawn near Kaarihalli. What we spoke about you can read in our interview, but how it was I hardly can explain. But it was sweet and funny. JP was so emotional whatever he spoke about "fucking" Emanzipation Production, about meeting Ville Laihiala for the first time or about Negative. And even when JP spoke about something he didn't like, he still smiled and laughed.
Especially memorable thing was a… lighter. Before we started interview JP clapped jeans pockets looking for a ligher, then he asked if have one – we hadn't, so he run to the hall to ask for a lighter from someone. This someone was Pasi. A few minutes later Pasi came to us to get his lighter back, but JP was lavish - he gave Pasi just a fag-end. It was … funny :)
And then I ' ve seen Charon sound - check . It was everything, but not tuning - only laugh and jokes. It was the moment I've heard In Trust of No One for the first time… live. Impressed but this beauty, I rushed to see Monsorrow.

Vikings were true, as the should be, as they always are. They were serious like it was yesterday at Tuska. I have to say, that at black Tuska headbanging fans look organic and usual. But here, at sunny Ilosaarirock, Moonsorrow fans looked gorgeous. Especially I remembered a young true-viking. He was very skinny, extremely drunk, in black hip-jeans with huge metal belt, with arm-pad with black-metal pins and his head was breached and his hair was in his fresh blood. The fact he just smashed his head somewhere didn't prevent him to jump in the first row and sing Jumalten kaupunki lauder than Ville Sorvali.

As to Sorvali Jr, he made me smile again. Somewhere in the middle of their performance he made a speech: "Yesterday we were at Tuska. It was cool there. But today it's rainy in Helsinki , and here, at Ilosaari, there's lots of sun and the weather is beautiful. That's why we are gonna sing Unohduksen lapsi now" speech... loooool… Of course, I'm not even trying to describe Ville's heroic face while he was saying that speech. But it was impressive, trust me .

Paalava wasn't attractive on Saturday. At least when we came there again something called Sonic Youth played on the main stage. I can't say I wanted to hear it, but laud and absolutely unpleasant voice of an old woman was heard everything. And the last I heard from her are an amazing scream: "Now I ask a stupid question. Do you wanna more?" Why do people ask stupid questions? Did she want we all reply something like "Yeaaaaaaaaaah". Anyway, we dislocated to Kaarihalli again, it should be open finally and Meteliklubi should start very soon. Performing bands were local Scalping Screen, dear Charon and ugly Kotiteollisuus.

At the entrance of Kaarihalli we've got another one colorful bracelet, the fifth one on my hand:) Should I try to describe Kaarihalli? It's a simple hangar, iron and semicircular outside and with basketball baskets inside. And when we came inside, it was dark and the hall was empty. And it was pretty scary to realize that the firth fans who came there were the fans of Scalping Screen – they were bald and drunk.
I don't know what Scalping Screen sing about, frankly I don't want to know it… But their look and sound are terrible. Anyway, there're five ugly skinheads on the stage in boxer shorts on ugly tattooed bodies. Actually, I wouldn't call them a band, 'cos what they play isn't music. But still they have fans . Many fans . These people were absolutely unequal, and all of them meant visiting a gig of their favourite band like monkey jumping and knocking down everyone who stands near. Especially they were happy when they kicked down someone of the fans. Well… it was scary. But I found an ideal way out . The whole gig I was standing turning my back to the stage. But it was not only my contempt, it was also a necessity - to observe the crowd if somebody of the fans are doing to jump on my place.
Well, everything was ok and I just can't get one think: why they supported Charon.
After Scalping Screen there was a short pause, and a few dozen of gothic-girls came to the hall. I bet Charon could get much more people at the show, but as the same time on the main stage of Ilosaarirock headliner Guano Apes performed. Interesting organizers' decision…

But… the rest words are useless, 'cos finally Charon appeared on stage. The intro was beautiful and infernal, and it feet to Charon music a lot. Yep, the guys are on stage and it means that my 8 hours of trip from Hell to Joensuu wasn't useless.
JP was in t-shirt with angels, like on Poisonblack promos and in khaki trousers with undone button (porno!:)). Van Hast was… he was Van Hast - t-shirt, leather trousers, lots of chains and rings and so on. Teemu… I prayed to see him in "my" skirt, but he wasn't. He was in another one skirt and it was beautiful:). I do love Teemu in skirt and heavy NewRock boots. Pasi was cute . We all know he is cute, don't we? And he was in the same "performing" jeans with holes. It's so sweet:) As to Antti, he was drumming.
Seeing Charon I was constantly comparing this gig with the previous one. The stage was much bigger, and this time JP had enough place to fuck microphone support, to wave his hair and to jump everywhere around. And this time there was a hole between stage and audience, and it disturbed JP a lot, 'cos, I guess, he used to be touched by fans and swimming in the girls' love and lust. So, JP had to jump from stage to the hole, then to the girls, then on stage again, to come to Pasi, to hug Pasi, to jump to the hole again… Ah yes, Charon homoerotism is something really sweat and beautiful, if you know what I mean. And the only one outgoing thing I noticed was that nobody cared about Van Hast. I mean, everybody was talking to each other, touching each other, even hugging, and only Van Hast was alone during the whole gig.

The gig itself started from a furious Death Can Dance, which I wanted to hear live so much since the moment I bought a single. Classic hits like Sister Misery, Erase Me and Cum Tonight (yeah-yeah, that's the way this song was written in set-list) are always good on stage. And I was amazingly happy to hear old As We Die and my favourite Christina Bleeds. *sniff* But Charon don't want to play Your Christ for me:(. Should I say that during Little Angel the audience was the most excited. People screamed "Paita pois!" (kinda: "take off your t-shirt "). Obviously people wanted to see JP's striptease, but his reaction was banal: "Ladies first". People got it enthusiastically, but nobody took off anything:).
The gig was ended by a magical In Trust of No One.
Set-list of Charon at Ilosaarirock:
1. Death Can Dance
2. Sister Misery
3. Craving
4. At the End of Our Days
5. Bitter Joy
6. Erase Me
7. As We Die
8. Christina Bleeds
9. Little Angel
10. Cum Tonight
11. Desire You
12. In Trust of No One
The show was surprisingly short, just 55 mins. But it was good 55 mins, really. And those 55 mins worth our sacrifice!
After the show we came to JP to bask in his glory and to share our emotional opinion. And that was a time when ugly masculine Kotiteollisuus went on stage. Actually, after ecxiting Charon I didn't want to see anyone else and chatting with JP was pleasant enough .And then JP came went to his wife and we went to camping.

Oh yeah, I never could imagine myself in festival camping, but this time it was real. Three of us were gonna sleep in a single-place tent. And this tent was among the punks' tents. Lots of Finnish punks:). Next to us was a tent with a really young couple, they were making dinner on a primus stove. Looking at a very small girl cooking in this weird sircumstances was entertaining, and her boyfriend trained my Finnish while she was cooking and washing dirty plates.
Sleeping was weird as well, people around us were listening to hard-rock very loud, somebosy played guitar and sang… And it was cold and almost sunrise.

I went out from a tent at about 6. Quite . Peace and quite . Lots of bright colorful tents. It was beautiful. Shit-machine returned me to the real world:)Actually, I have never cared what happens with people's shit in those blue cabins all around the festival areas. But now I know it:) And it was so funny to see scary people who jumped from the cabins, while the machine sucked out the shit:)

We walked in a quite peaceful Joensuu to the bus station, looking for kahvi ja pulla. Lots of people legs jutted out from the bushes and lots of dead bodies were slipping on the benches and on the fields. And we found our coffee- bliss somewhere at Kauppatori. And right in front of our eyes there was a door and a banner: Stress Remover. LoL) We thought we are late to visit this clinic, but the name is nice:).
The rest of the morning we spent on the bank of the beautiful river with beautiful rapids, waiting for our 11am -bus, which took us back to Helsinki , to see The 69 Eyes, Finntroll and some other bands at Tuska.
But still… I had 8 hours of bus-trip and every mitune again and again I though about our crazy brainless trip to Joensuu, and again and again I was sure that next time I can fly to Mars to see Charon and I wouldn't regret.

Melamory