08-16-11

Monday, August 15th, 2011.

Wow… These past days have been pretty hectic to say the least – although we’ve only played one gig. We arrived in Frederic Chopin Airport in Warsaw, Poland early morning the 8th and had to wait for about two hours to get our sprinter van. When the van finally arrived it took us another hour to get the paperwork through and people were tired and hungry so it didn’t start as smooth as it usually does. But anyway, it worked in the end and we started driving towards Budapest, Hungary (which is only 12 hours drive approximately).

We arrived in Budapest the day after, thanks to Elvar and Addi who drove like maniacs (they didn’t hurt anyone or anything that we know of on the way), so that was nice. We’re not used to this extreme heat so we all got pretty dizzy right away, but there’s only one way to cure a heat stroke, and that’s beer – and loads of it. And that’s basically what we did to cure ourselves. You can’t go on a tour and just die the first or second day, so we drank a lot of beer and had unexplainably good time. Saw many of our favorite bands and met some really nice people. And by the way, the swimming halls here in Budapest are unreal! Wow, you have to see them to know what I’m talking about. Simply amazing.

But alright, let’s stick to the program. It’s August 14th and it’s an extremely hot Sunday and we’re getting ready to play our official gig at Sziget Festival in Budapest, Hungary. We’re tired and sticky (because of the heat, don’t read anything else into it) and just really pathetic. But the show must go on, so we jump into our super-sprinter-awesome-van and drive early Sunday morning to the festival campus. We get to our backstage, which is a shipping container! Nothing wrong with that. I guess it’s nice to be in one if a thunderstorm breaks out or zombies start to attack you, so the day at the campus started really nice. We played at Europe Stage which is a really nice outdoor stage and can fit pretty many people so once again; so far so good.

We were pretty lucky with the soundcheck, there is; we got almost two hours to get the sound right, and like always, we only needed about 10 minutes – that’s why we’re pretty popular among sound guys. Simple setup (simple minds).

It’s ten minutes to gig. We start our pep-up with the mouse, the lion, the elephant and the… Doesn’t matter. When we get on stage the audience are pretty stoked and therefore we get some extra energy and start with an extended intro version of Kastljós and A LOT of feedback. The heat is about 34 degrees Celsius (93 degrees Fahrenheit) and we’re sticky! The set list is about an hour and the fun we had playing this set, for this crowd and at this stage was just… Amazing! After the show we jumped like professionals off the stage and right into the crowd to sell CD’s which went pretty well. Usually bands don’t sell CD’s at festivals by themselves but we did it anyway – it’s much more personal (and that’s one of the main reasons why we’re doing a Pledge via PledgeMusic.com if you want to check it out).

The day after (today) has probably been the hardest one to handle. We’re pretty sore in our necks and bodies and pretty burned also thanks to the sun who bullied us the whole time. But enough whining! We’re back in Poland at some really nice hotel in the country side, driving towards Riga, Latvia – it’s about 20 hours drive. We’ve driven through Slovakia, Check Republic and now, Poland, just working really hard on computer stuff and media stuff.

Anyway, take care for now and we’ll hear from you soon!

All the best,

For a Minor Reflection.