Malmö, Dec 20-21 '07

In Malmö, Matt and I stayed with Petter Herbertsson from Testbild! (the exclamation mark is part of the band's name, but I could also use an exclamation mark because it was good to see him again and Testbild! are a great band). We were in Malmö for a few days. We found a mysterious handle on the wall in the foyer area of the apartment building.

We spent a fair bit of time at Douglas's place. He's also in Testbild! I'm not showing any photos of any Testbild! members because they have a funny non-image policy. At Douglas's place we rehearsed some songs that we would all play together at the gig. Both Matt's and mine. And we did some recording, working on a song Matt wrote. The nicest sounds were the amazing vibraphonette and the polysix synth.
Look, there's Matt and Ellen! The exclamation mark is not part of Ellen's name, it was cool to see them because they're from Hobart. Only the day after we left Copenhagen and spent a lot of money on a hotel there did I learn that Matt and Ellen are living in Copenhagen.. We all went out and had delicious mexican food or something.
There's Mattias Nilssen who runs the great kning disk label in gothenburg and put on the festival there.
There's a guy called Dan Park who loves music and apparently goes to every gig in Sweden and gets very drunk (yes he was, but he was a lot of fun).
There's Matt and Katja and another guy. Katja has done some vocals for Testbild!
And then we went to some place which seemed far away, we were walking around the streets for ages, and Katja had her bicycle. Matt and I both had a go on it, and I started getting clever and showing how I can ride backwards and stuff. But it soon turned to injury and embarrassment when I crashed into a parked car, cutting my face and bending my glasses. Again.
Then the next morning Matt and I were up early to get on the train to Stockholm. The only seats left were expensive first class ones. Anyway it was a pleasant journey. This photo is in Malmö train station, after I'd knocked my coffee cup on the ground, breaking it and spilling coffee everywhere, then with embarrassment asking if they'd give me a new one, and they did. I needed the coffee.

Copenhagen 19/12/07

I thought I should include the dates I went to these places, because I'm writing this blog in retrospect. I've been back home for over 2 weeks now.

So, after Matt and I finished our sightseeing duties in Göteborg, we had a couple of days free before we were due in Malmö so we thought we'd pop over and check out Copenhagen. So we went there on the train. There's a bridge between Malmö and Copenhagen that is partially a tunnel. I thought it'd be really exciting to go over but it wasn't really.. Being in Copenhagen, we felt more like we were on continental Europe, probably because we were. And it looked a lot like Amsterdam. We opted to stay in a real hotel, which was pretty expensive, but nice to do once in a while. One can only stand so many days sleeping on other people's couches and stuff. As we were retiring to our respective rooms that night, I challenged Matt to a challenge. The challenge was to write a song in the hotel room that night. The person who wrote the better song got to be the winner. We were both up till really late, trying to write a song. They turned out very different, but both about our travels. The winner has to this day not yet been decided, but Matt thought mine was better than his, and I didn't argue - his song was kind of silly..

look, its someone who fell over and looks like he's in the same position he'd be in if he were standing up. That's cos he's made of plastic, I think.

There's Matt, wishing he could ice-skate.

There's me next to a famous sculpture, wishing I could be more classy.


There's an amusement ride that didn't appeal to us at all..

Gothenburg

In Gothenburg, it was quite a different place compared to all other places, as far as music goes. Or at least that's what it seemed like because of the festival that was going on. We played at a thing called Preview, which went for 4 days, and it was in a theatre that's usually for plays and stuff.

The festival was designed to get indie pop and experimental performers who usually play in little clubs and stuff onto a stage where people could watch and listen to them properly, in a different kind of environment. It was pretty unusual, because it was a big stage with bright lights, and tiered seating, and everyone sat down and gave their full silent attention. It was pretty unnerving but also quite nice. We saw the Embassy play on the Saturday night, and the place was packed. Jens Lekman was there and I caught up with him a bit. On Sunday Matt and I played. There weren't quite so many people, but there were certainly enough to make us feel well appreciated. I don't have any photos from there, but there's video you can watch here:
http://www.uppvind.se/preview/dayfour.html
Unfortunately I left my guitar tuner in my suitcase..

The best thing about it was that indie music was given a real stage, and there was a real audience, and they came for 4 days, and they were really listening and enjoying, and buying CDs and the music was all pretty good.

Matt and I hung around in Gothenburg for another day and a half or so after that. There's Matt on the hill.

There's Matt and I with Sabina, who was one of the helpers at the festival and was friendly and showed us around the town a bit and stuff.

There's Sabina's cat with me putting a mug on his head. I think he liked it.

That's what Gothenburg looks like in the city, there's a river.

There's me in a cafe with a tea strainer.

There's Matt in the city near a tram in the afternoon.

There's me in front of the big gallery building at the top of the avenue (like in the jens lekman song) and they were projecting stuff onto it with sound too, it was a big show.

And people were frozen in the street, all looking at it. I like this photo.

That's what the street looks like.

Fredrikstad

In Fredrikstad, it was good. It was the first place of the tour where I had been less than a year earlier, and knew people. So I suddenly felt a bit more comfortable because it was all more familiar. And also its actually a nice place with people that like music. I found out that yes, it is a bit nicer playing somewhere when you've been there before, because some people know the songs and know what its all about. Our host and great pop friend Christoffer Schou from Remington Super 60, pictured above with Matt and I, was feeling a bit ill.

That night (we were only there for 1 night) Matt and I started the evening with our usual combination of Matt's set with me playing guitar with him, then my ipod karaoke set, with Matt joining me for a couple of songs. But it was actually another Frode Fivel gig, and they sounded fantastic. I was really impressed at the sound system for the size of the club. Well it wasn't that small, but the stage was. It was kind of weird. Pictured above are the girls from Elak Bingo (who didn't officially perform, but were dressed up in their performance clothes, and jumped up on the front of the stage during my song mathematics (which they insisted that I had to play - I wasn't originally intending to, I don't like the song all that much anymore) and danced around in front of me, which was great, because they took all the attention away from me) and a film director who's name I've forgotten. He was cool.

Then everyone went to this party at this other place, and I was there for a while but I'm not much of a party person and felt a bit bored. Then we went back to that venue again, which had started playing loud rock music, which apparently is more normal for that place. I didn't like it and I was feeling tired, so I went back to Christoffer's place while the others partied till very late and then Christoffer, Elisabeth and Matt came home and kept talking for ages while I didn't sleep.


The next day Christoffer was feeling quite unwell. I was cold outside so I didn't go out there.. Matt and I worked on writing a song together. And then we went to the train station to get a train to Gothenburg, Sweden. We met the same film director guy and talked to him on the train until he got off. He was allright.