KL!

So here we are in the hot, humid, sunny, rainy, thunderstormy, wonderful KL where the people are friendly, the food is excellent and the beer is cold. So far this group of travelling Finns has nothing to complain about.

Hard working people.

When we arrived on Tuesday evening after a very easy flight (yes, Finnair had some champagne waiting for us) we met Natalie, Richard and Bebe from the theatre and they took us out for dinner to a very nice small local restaurant. Both Anna and me agreed on that the food was in the top five best food-experiences ever.

Our pick-up time for the next morning was at 6.15 so we tried to get some sleep (not succeeding very well) to look good for the early morning tv-show.

Early morning birds zirp zirp.

Then there was some radio interviews and web-site interviews and lunch and maybe a beer at some point and in the afternoon we even had time to do a quick soundcheck for Gregory who together with Tobias had been working all day with tuning the loudspeakers and programming the lights.

Taking a photo booth picture.

 We are on the map people!

We are also on the wall.

And in the parking hall.

Yesterday was our first pre-show. The reason why we are here in KL is that last year Natalie, the producer of Gardner and Wife Theatre saw us perform at the Fringe festival in Edinburgh. Somehow she then convinced Mr. and Mrs. Gardner to invite this group called Fork over to Malaysia to perform at their theatre, which they did, and yesterday was the first time they actually got to see what we were all about.
It is understandable that Mr Gardner, who only had seen us giving interviews in a pretty jet lagged state of mind while wondering where we could get a cold beer or how warm the water in the pool is or if we at some point should do the final set list for the show, was a bit pale and nervous before we entered the stage.

We weren´t sure if the audience would recognize all of the songs in the show or if our humor would connect with the humor over here, but there was no need to worry. Even the old Swedish hit Final countdown has at some point made it´s way to KL and the warm and wonderful crowd was happily singing along and enjoying Jontes boldness and baldness.

No words can explain this picture.

Looking forward to tonights show!

One way ticket

Tomorrow we are leaving Helsinki again and this time with a one way ticket. It doesn´t mean we wont be back, it just means that we are flying around the world - literally.
Our first trip will be Helsinki-Singapore- Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We are flying with Finnair and last time we traveled with them we flew First class so you can imagine that our expectations for tomorrows flight are quite high. Don´t disappoint us now, Finnair!

This is not Kuala Lumpur - this is Stockholm where we did a gig last week. The old town in Stockholm is just so beautiful. And empty.

We will arrive to Kuala Lumpur or KL on Wednesday and on Friday we are doing our first pre-view show. The performances are at the Gardner&wife theatre and we are doing 13 shows in 18 days. Not much time to hang by the pool.. Except of course all day.
Yesterday I checked out the home page of the theatre and to my big surprise I realized that somewhere across the Atlantic Ocean the name of our show has changed from Pink Noise to Rockcappella. Interesting. But I guess it doesn´t matter what the name of the show is, what they will get is Fork - the furious Finns from the country where we fish salmon with one hand while we keep the bears away with the other. Mixed with the cheese-loving, wine-sipping French sound wizard.

This is not Kuala Lumpur either, this is Kouvola, a small town in Finland where we also had a gig last week. The old town is just so...different. And empty.

From KL we are flying via Tokio to Dallas, Texas and from Dallas to Raleigh, North Carolina where we on Saturday the 3rd of November are performing at the one and only Sojam festival! And from there we are flying via New York back to Helsinki in good time before our opening on the ElectroVocal Circus.
I will keep you updated on interesting things like how well we are doing with the jet lags, how warm the water in the pool is, how many shoes we have been shopping and so on.

This is Finland right now.

Malaysia here we come!

Pushing the limits

Today was a rehearsal day. Which is a good thing since we are getting closer to the opening of our ElectroVocal Circus here in Helsinki and things need to be decided. We are not the group that makes decisions at a very early stage, no, we like to push the nerves of everyone involved and try their patience.  Last week we had a good meeting about the visual stuff -  clothes, set design etc. Not much was decided but lots of ideas came up. Some good and some that seemed very funny at first but after a while everyone had second thoughts. Those are usually the best ideas, when you aren´t sure if you are pushing the limit a bit too far.  

This was one of the ideas that at first seemed like a good one.

We have also been doing some gigs during the last two weeks. And here I came up with a great idea that has no second thoughts what so ever.

Sponsorship? Yes? No? Having a lady hanging above us in a rope? Yes? No?

We did a concert in Åminne, a very small and beautiful place in the mid-west of Finland.

This was the view from our backstage. Peaceful and calm. Nothing like the people of Åminne doing the lambada...Wild, loud and crazy!

And then we did a live tv-concert in Mainz, Germany. We were of course a bit nervous but there was no need for that. Everything was so well taken care of, the audience was happy, the director was relaxed, the team was fantastic and the backstage was the best!

Finally our own trailers! And not one but three. I don´t know why not four but hey, it´s a start!

And here is a small picture collage of all the fun things you can do at a restaurant in Germany.

 You can design your own hat and maybe use it in the next production.

Or a helmet.

You can make a thing that looks like a banana.

You can practise your juggling for upcoming shows.

Or you can just simply drink as many drinks as you can during the happy hour.

Until next year!

Once again time flies when you are having fun and tonight we are doing our last show at the Fringe 2012. And once again we have had a fantastic time. We have seen some absolutely amazing shows like Frisky and Mannish (where Anna and I laughed so hard we had to redo our makeup afterwards), Tubular bells for two, Nothing is really difficult, Out of the blue (where 20 young male Oxford students made us feel old) and many more. We have also seen shows that were not so good but I guess at a festival with more than a thousand performers that can happen.

We are so grateful to all the people that came to see our show, some of them came back again and again and politely laughed at our jokes for the seventh or eight time. And of course once again all the wonderful people that helped us make this happen. The whole Assembly crew, with Michael and Kelly and the rest of you crazy party animals. To our so good-looking and always smiling flyering team whom without we would have had so much less audience, to Doug and Barry for the lights, to Ruben and George for making sure we stayed within the 60 minutes time slot (which we never did so sorry for that) and to Valerie and Lauren and Andrew and so many more.

So sad to leave.

You might wonder what we have been doing during daytime since our show is late at night. Well here is what we have been doing:

Having lunch at the Elbow. So hard to chose from the very good menu.

Having lunch at Jamie Oliver´s Italian restaurant while doing the Billy Idol lip. 

Having dinner at home with friends. 

Recording stuff in our very high tech studio. (Gregory´s bedroom)

Doing our make-up while acting weird.

Networking. (yeah right)

And enjoying the view from our kitchen. Beautiful Edinburgh. 

Goodbye until next year!

Am I what?

Last year at the Fringe we met Andrew, the taxi driver who then became our taxi driver and who is our taxi driver also this year. It is an extreme privilege to have this man, who whenever we need a ride is ready to pick us up. The only problem is that he speaks with such a wonderful Scottish accent that misunderstandings happen every now and then. As last night, when Linda came home (yes, we call our flat Home nowadays) very late and after a few drinks (she had been networking - as she calls it...) and she thought she had the following discussion with Andrew:
Andrew: "Are you peeing in my car?"
Linda: "What? No!"
Andrew: "Are you peeing in my car I asked?"
Linda: "Andrew! I am not that drunk! I am not peeing in your car!"
Andrew: "Linda, ARE YOU PAYING BY CARD?"
Linda: "oh. Yes."

Andrew took us to a very local restaurant where we had some excellent food. Oh and here you can see the newest member of the Fork family. Little miss Ramsten.

This is our very big and glamorous backstage. When we get dressed before the show we need to follow a very strict choreography to avoid punching each other in the face. But we like it. And the champagne helps.

Last year on our day off we made it up to Arthurs seat. This year we made it all the way to the Highlands!

Oh Heathcliff where are you? We might have been singing Wuthering Hights a few times while enjoying the fantastic sceneries.

Loch Ness. And the monster(s).

Sunshine! That´s what we have had for three weeks now. Unbelievable.

But sometimes, late at night, it gets cold and you have to warm yourself under a cosy heater.

Jump

The first week in Edinburgh has passed and we have been enjoying every minute. Not only because to our great surprise the weather has been excellent (we know it won´t last...) but also because the shows have been going well and the audience has been fantastic. Here are some pictures of what has been going on!

Every a cappella band has to, at some point of their career, make a poster where everybody is jumping. It´s not really working for us. Or is it?

The audience is up and dancing every night. We love it!

Doing the Lambada for the young boys. Enjoying every minute.

Also Jonte is showing off his dance moves. The crowd is impressed.

He can do anything. You say jump - and he jumps.

Tobias has done a great job once again with the lights. He stayed with us for five days and then he flew back home. To recover.

On Tuesday we did two songs at the BBC Radio live. It is very early in the morning as you can tell by the amount of sunglasses.

Linda is getting energized.

Nerves of steel

Hello everybody and greetings from Edinburgh and the Fringe festival!

Backstage at the George square spiegeltent teatro.

Tonight is our opening night and so far things have been going well. Except of course a few things that have been a bit of a challenge... We had a very tight schedule in Finland to get our clothes done on time due to different issues like summer vacation and us being nowhere even close to Helsinki for fittings. Only a few hours before our flight was leaving for Edinburgh I went to pick up our clothes and Outi, who made our clothes, was still sewing the zipper to my dress. With a smile.

Nerves of steel.

Yesterday, only a few hours before the pre-show, Anna tried on her dress and for some reason she couldn´t get into it. Luckily we have Linda, the other woman with nerves of steel. She used her scissors and then she sewed Anna into the dress. Only to use the scissors again after the show.

There is nothing she can´t do.

The pre-show went fine, the clothes worked well, the audience was great and the heat was on! We are so ready for tonight!

Last year we lived behind the green door. This year we live behind the blue door.