image

In an old, cavernous cargo warehouse down by the docks in Helsinki can be found tonight’s venue, Nosturi, ‘The Crane’.

After a three hour VRail bus replacement service smirking from Oulu to Kokkola, a four hour train journey from Kokkola to Helsinki, a seventy-five minute hike from Helsinki Station to my hotel ( Do Not Even Ask ) and a sixty second taxi ride from hotel to venue, I stand, breathless, looking up at the giant Meccano puzzle towering overhead, incredulous that I made it here in one piece, itching to get inside. The muffled, rhythmic beats of Turmion Kätilöt pulse skywards from the building and scatter the dark clouds menacing above.

Numbering almost one thousand Metalheads, the audience is high-spirited, enthusiastic; voices sing in unison and I’m envious of the Finns chorusing with their band. A solitary English-lyric song in Turmion’s set, the fabulous ‘Grand Ball’, allows me to join in briefly but I shall endeavour to learn some Finnish lyrics so I can truly partake in the madness next week. ‘Tirehtööri’ fits the bill and will be my first foray into their intriguing, indecipherable language. Let’s hope it’s a rude one.

My eyes flit between stage and crowd. There’s a flash of metal, far left side. Not ideal but it’s a starting point. Earplugs nuzzling brain, I lean on the barrier and concentrate on improving this evening’s position. My intent mirrors that of my fellow Painheads standing in the shadow of a wall of speakers blasting out noise to a level rivalling that of a military jet take-off. Nudge and smile as we creep slowly to the right.

We clear the Rupture Zone as PAIN hit the stage and slam straight into ‘Designed To Piss You Off’. ‘Time’s ticking, getting older’, sings Mr Tägtgren. Oh, no, cheer up! ‘Save all your fears, I have no plans to slow down.’ Ah, that’s better, Positive Metal Attitude. I definitely sing to that tune.

Revved up by Turmion Kätilöt, now primed for PAIN, the crowd is a twisted mass of bodies rippling with excitement, welcoming each tremendous song with howls of recognition and fist punches into the sultry air. The band, as ever, sound great, look great, put on a rip-roaring show and deliver the goods; horns up to Painheads, middle fingers up to conformity.

In spite of a sore throat lending him a ( rather pleasing, actually ) husky bent on the high notes, Mr Tägtgren stomps the stage like a man on a mission, throwing discomfort to the wind as he and his band pulverise the crowd with an incessant bombardment of mind-blowing, megawatt, metallic mayhem😄. I imagine, however, he greets the end of the show with some relief. Hot lemon, honey & ginger tea and an early night beckon. But not quite yet.

Something thrilling this way comes. Mr Skaug has climbed onto the bank of speakers front of stage; the very ones featured earlier in the mass along-the-barrier shuffle. He looms three metres above. Oh my God, he’s going to stage-dive! This is SO exciting, I’ve never seen this before and have no idea what’s going on! How does he assess the splat risk? What if people decide, while he’s mid-flight, not to catch him? What if he hits the deck like a flipped strawberry pancake on a marble floor? Disregarding the possibility of embarrassment, what about the certainty of grievous bodily injury? How would one play one’s bass with three fractured fingers, two cracked ribs and a broken arm?

Well, fellow nose-scrunching head-scratchers, here’s what happens. He energetically motions the cheering audience to cluster themselves tightly together into one spot just below his eyrie. Hundreds of Metallers earnestly comply until they form a large target area of concertina’d bodies; arms waving, hands awaiting impact. To roars of delight, Mr Skaug launches himself elegantly into the air, like Buzz Lightyear, falling with style.

Upon touchdown, he is engulfed by the crowd of joyous Painheads before being tossed upwards and rapidly manhandled over our heads. His right foot approaches, inches from my nose. I support his natty trainer, calf, leg as he is propelled stagewards on a conveyor-belt of deft, eager hands. It feels impolite to grab him but I’m delighted to participate in such a hair-raising, death-defying feat of Metal mettle. Such fun, Mr Skaug, you are quite mad!

And what else do you have in your PAIN arsenal this evening, Mr Tägtgren? How can you top THAT? Åh, how about a lunatic jumping off a balcony? WHAAAT?! As the realisation wildfires through the audience, one by one we turn, in shock, to see Mr Andersson standing on a barrier five metres up. OMG! Man U are crazy!

While the rest of the band play random notes and Mr Tägtgren leads a chant of ‘vittu, vittu’ ( probably means ‘ hurry up’ – I happily join in, ‘ vittu, vittu’, haha 😄 ), Mr Andersson clutches a ceiling pipe, purposefully waving one arm, herding, X-marking the spot, prepping the Whoopee Cushion of upturned hands, creating a spine-tingling buzz which boomerangs around Nosturi, returns with a mischievous wink, smacks him on the ass and elbows him towards the edge; with a deep breath and a Wilhelm Scream, he releases his grip on the pipe and takes a giant leap of faith into the sea of PAINheads far below. Landing on his back, he momentarily disappears into the boiling froth of bodies before surfacing and being held aloft by triumphant hands. He is aquaplaned forwards at a rate of knots by the force of a hundred arms and deposited back over the barrier with an undignified thud. WOOOW!!

Oh my God, what a wonderful evening!

As Misters Skaug & Andersson jig across the dressing-room ceiling like a pair of helium balloons possessed by a swarm of psychotic bees and Sebastian flicks the kettle on for his father, we PAINheads tigger out of Nosturi and vanish into the night.

🎸 Youtube ‘Pain – Shut Your Mouth – Klubsen, Hamburg 09.11.2016’. At the end you’ll see the Scandinavian Daredevils perform their party trick.

🎸 Youtube ‘Turmion Kätilöt – Grand Ball Live @ Nosturi, Helsinki 19/11/2016’.

🎸 Youtube ‘ Wilhelm Scream Compilation’ 😉.