And with that, it was time for me to embark on my last concert for some time. To be honest, I have to admit that it’s going to be pretty nice to have some “time off” from this, as the past weeks has been exhausting. If it was the concerts themselves, or the fact that I also started a new job a town over at the same time, I will leave unspoken of, but something has made it really tiring.
Of course, it was not all fun and games. Firstly, I slept on the bus to the point I actually missed my stop. And it’s funny, because I dreamt that I would miss my stop. And then I wake up to us leaving Terminal 5. So, as you can hear, it wasn’t superbad. All that happened was that I got off at Terminal 4 and walked back to Terminal 5…. only to discover the HUGE LINES everywhere and nowhere.
Yesterday, a terroristattack happened in Sweden and because of this, the security had been increased. So, waiting time for securitycheck was about an hour – and for once, I was even out in good time, and despite that, the airport staff had to escort us ( I found another girl who was in the line for Helsinki) ahead of the line so we could, barely, catch our flight. Oh how good it is to be TWO people when shit like this happens. But I’d like to tell you about something – when I first got in the line, there were a couple ahead of me that were getting on a plane that was taking off at 06.55. The time was 06.40.
I guess I never saw it before, because I was lucky – but the reviews on Arlanda’s websites are true. It is a pretty slow airport, and it doesn’t seem to know how to deal with massive amounts like this.
So, safe and sound and in time, I landed in Helsinki, collected my luggage and headed off into the city for some breakfast or possibly lunch. Basically, I was in Helsinki by 10.30 or so, and my hotel wasn’t open for check in until 16, so you could easily say I had some darn waiting to do. Spent the first two-three hours at Espresso House – in these cases it is real good that I’m such a slow eater – and after that I killed some time in the Forum shoppinggallery. The last hour in Forum I sat and read the sales book by Fredrik Eklund, before I could FINALLY get out and check in the hotel. The gallery is only five minutes away, so it was a looong wait.
Once in the hotel, I quickly got settled and then went to bed. I had had to take an earlier bus than expected, and because of that, I hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep and figured I’d be better off actually resting a little bit before the show. Once woken up, I got ready for the show and then went off to The Circus – which is no less than five minutes away – this hotel is nothing but golden.
Ember Falls
I arrived just on time as the first band walked on stage (phew!). So, first opener of the night was Ember Falls, a Tampere based metalband formed in 2010. They delivered a very energetic set, and they actually seemed to have some fans in the audience. Not too common, so it was cool to see! The band was okay. I’m not entirely taken by them, but it could have been worse… as I was about to see.
Blind Channel
Next band on stage was Blind Channel. Based in Oulu, the band was formed in 2013. All clad in white they performed some strange merge of rap and metal. I guess it’s had some nu metal elements to it, but I really could not like this. And it did not get any better, whatsoever, when the singer came out in a robbers hood acting like a basic rapper. I have a hard time for these kind of merges, as the kind and side of metal I like is not the “fuck the police”, and well… Yeah. Simply not for me. But they did seem to have quite some fans in the audience, and they had charisma.
Amaranthe
They left the stage and at 21.15, Amarathe’s very very long intro started and at 21.30, it finally hit off with “Maximize”. It was a pretty…. slow? audience. Like, it wasn’t as much response from it as I would have thought it would be. The opening was quickly followed up by “Boomerang” and their big hit “Hunger”.
So, as you guys probably know, Jake E decided to completely leave the band in February this year after having a hiatus from the band for some time. At the time, the news were heartbreaking, and the initally we all thought the spot would go to Chris Adam who’s been filling in for Jake during the past tour. It turns out, he has in fact turned down the offer, and while he still did some of the Swedish show, it was a new face on stage tonight filling in for Chris Adam, who is filling in for Jake.
And this person is no one less than Nils Molin, the singer from Dynazty. Dynazty is one of my favorite bands that I very very rarely see. They are incredibly hard to catch live, and seeing that Nils personally is one of my all time favorite male vocalist, seeing him on stage with Amaranthe, or seeing him perform all in all was very.. emotional. It was a moment of “Finally.” I was in ecstasy, as well as being smitten by the prescence and just happy. We will see if he will remain in Amaranthe or not.
They followed up with their big hit “Hunger”, and then “Invincible”. These songs had a little better audience response, even though it left much to be desired. The band was really good though – Elize is not as shy as I remember her, which is soo good to see. It’s so good to see her really get out there, connecting with the crowd and everything.
“1.000.000 Lightyears” was next on the list, followed by “Trinity” before it was time for Nils and Elize to have their moment in “True”. And you know, just hearing him work his voice and them two harmonizing together is simply amazing. They work so well together.
Right after this two person song, Henrik got to have his own little moment in “Fury” before everyone left Elize to her own thing with “Endlessly”. The thing is… I’m gonna say this, and get so many haters. Elize can sing. And she can sing well. But I never understood why she keeps stretching things – It’s a lot of, in my eyes, unnecessary screams and extensions, and this happens in almost every song. I don’t see the point in that.
“On The Rocks” was next on the list, and the audience seemed a bit more awake this time around. Morten was left on his own to perform his mandatory drumsolo before it merged into “Automatic”. “The Nexus” was next on the list, followed by the big audience favorite “Amaranthine” before they wrapped up the set with “Call Out My Name”.
After a little bit of wait, Andreas came out and did his… “stand-up-comedy” part before they hit off the encores with “Digital World”, followed by “That Song”, “Dynamite” and then have the whole set wrapped up with “Drop Dead Cynical”.
Speaking of that song. As the band was about to thank for the time and walk off stage, a record label representant came on stage and delivered gold singles for “Drop Dead Cynical” for Finnish sales. Congratulations Amaranthe! Well deserved.
After THAT, the band thanked for the evening and walked off the stage.
And me myself, I hurried off to the hotelroom, had some quick dinner and then went to sleep. Early day tomorrow.
// Sara
Sara Hammerzmith 