Hello! Surprise! blog

I have some technical issues with the blog at the moment (I cant upload photos any more). Therefore I’m leaving for a weeks vacation and I hope the problem has solved itself when I’m back. Ta-da.

Parklife is a one-day festival in Midsommarkransen, Stockholm. It is today.

The gig schedule:
1610 Racket and Ball
1740 Everyday Sensations
1850 Choir of Young Believers (DK)
2000 Boat Club
2110 The Honeydrips
2220 Santa Maria
2330 Theoretical Girl (UK)

Open from 15 to 01. The dance-floor will Dmitry Fyodorov take care of.
The tickets are 120SEK in the door. You have to be 18 years or older.

See you there.

I just got back from Emmaboda and me and a friend took some of photos. Right now I’m too tired to upload all the photos so you’ll have to manage with a teasing 45 seconds video clip of Of Montreal.

I got an email yesterday. There were around 1000 people on the camping area. Two days before the festival starts.

This is the last Emmaboda festival, there won’t be one next year. They’ve sold more than 3000 tickets, but will let more than 4000 in on the area this time so there are tickets left.  See you there!

If I may summarize:

• I heard there were 800 people there, but I dont think there were more than 200-300 (max) in the audience listening to the music. Why?!
• The first day was better than the second. On the second it was like if everyone was having a hangover and no one did anything “extra”. My Darling YOU! excepted. This might be because I had very high expectations on the bands.
• Television Personalities‘ singer Dan Treacy should probably take it easy on the alcohol in the future. Maybe this was how they wanted their gig to be, but… I don’t think they managed to finish a single song. He was pretty close on Part-time punks where he got 80% of the lyrics right, on the fourth(?) try. People in the audience weren’t pleased about this. This morning when I was leaving the area I saw Dan walking (oh well) around, still drunk. His mates wanted him to jump in the car so they could leave, when he dropped the immortal “There’s always time for a beer”. Pure class?
• Great DJ-sets from Air France and Jens Lekman. Even though they were quite short.
• I’m not sure I like the whole festival-concept (not being able to shower/sleep like home, rain, mud, lots of people everywhere - I’m not a peoples person..).
• Very nice arrangement. Short breaks between the bands and they played in time.
• A big thank you(!) to my festival guide on the friday who helped me out with the basics (this was my first more-than-one-day festival) and was great company.
• Why did everything stop at 2? Everything official that is..
• I picked up a hitchhiker and I’m still alive. He was standing in the rain in a pink t-shirt and a pair of pink shorts (he had been standing there for one hour and twenty minutes!) wanted a lift to Säffle. He wasn’t sober. After explaining to him he was on the wrong side of the road (Säffle was south, he was trying the get a ride north) he introduced himself as den rosa mannen (“the pink man”). After doing some googling it appears he has been dressed in pink clothes since 2001. I repeat: I’m still alive. He was a nice guy though.

On a side-note, I can’t find any Rip It Up-coverage in the big news papers over here. Weird.

There wont be any photos from Day 2. Even though I charged the batteries it doesn’t want to start. Rumours say it might be dead.

Update: If you have any photos I can use, please send them to hellosurprise at colorize dot net.

Since I didn’t have any fancy plans this summer, I’ve decided to borrow a car and go to some festivals. My computer will come along with me and so will my camera. In this blog you’ll see the results along the way. There will be updates here for each band I see, with the exception if the technology lets me down.

First out is the Rip It Up-festival this weekend (July 6-7).

You’re all welcome to follow me here along the way.