Being on tour means experiencing contrasts. As I told you yesterday, the gig in Dresden was marvelous. Chemnitz, on the other hand, was something completely different. Thing was, originally we were not going to play Chemnitz at all. The gig was booked only two weeks ago when another gig was cancelled. What that means is that the promoters had very little time to promote the gig. I'm guessing, by now you have already figured out where this story is going...

We played our show in Chemnitz and we did it good. We didn't let our mood drop, like I know many other bands would, but had a good time and enjoyed ourself despite the fact that literally noone was listening. There were actually zero people in the audience. No, wait, that's not true. We had the bartenders listening and after a few songs a company of three came in and sat down. We also had a few people sitting outside who might have heard some riffs and phrases through the wall.

Just before showtime, we were outside to play a game of ping pong since the venue had a ping pong table. Then came time to go on stage so we dropped our ping pong rackets to get ready. Then, a middle aged couple approached us for a chat. They asked us whether we were from Finland. We told them we were not. We said that it was time for us to go on stage now. They asked what genre we were in. Taivas said "Well, you know, we're just about to go on so you can find out for yourself in just a minute". The man gave us a

slightly apologising look and said "Actually, we were waiting for you guys to finish your ping pong game so that we could have a go at it." Ha! There we were, in Chemnitz, a long frickin' way from home, to share our music with the Chemnitz people and those few that had actually showed up were NOT there to see us but to play frickin' PING PONG! Outrageous! But funny as hell.

As I said, we didn't let it bring us down. After all, we got to stay at a very nice hotel, we got payed, and after the show the promoter apologised to us that noone had come. She told us "Drink!". So, we did. I sat outside in the Chemnitz summer breeze with my very best mates, pints of lager being placed in my hand, and just enjoyed knowing that I'm in the best band in the world. It felt like we carried a big secret and noone in Chemnitz had been let in on it. And it was alright. It's not entirely true though. We did leave a mark in Chemnitz town because we actually sold a lot of merchandise. More than we sold in Dresden. It's still a mystery to me who bought those records and t-shirts considering noone saw the actual show... It must have been those ping pong people.

We have two days off now so you will have to wait a few days for the next tour diary entry. We are going to hang out in the sun, probably drive to the sea to go for a swim and just enjoy being away from home, on tour, together as a band, as best friends and as the big stars of the future.

A huge thanks to the staff of Exil for being such lovely creatures.

And thank you for reading! I'll get back to you in a few days.

Cheers! / Kris

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