The tour is finally fully booked! 18 shows in 19 days; 2 shows in Finland, 1 in Estonia, 2 festivals in Latvia, 2 shows in Lithuania, 3 in Poland, back to Latvia for another festival + a club show, ferry to Sweden, a show in the Netherlands, then 3 shows in Denmark, 1 in Norway and the grand finale at a festival in Sweden! This is gonna be the longest tour I’ve ever done.
In my top 3 is Woodoom tour in 2019 with 12 shows in 7 countries and Pidari/Hellbastard tour in 2023 with 10 shows in 9 countries (from which 3 didn’t happen!).
But my summer run is not gonna start there! Two weeks before the tour I’ll be playing with Смерть a free show in Riga at the Latvian Academy of Art, then 2 days later we will be traveling to Finland to play with both Смерть and .338 at the Manserama, an indoor skatepark festival. After that I’ll crash for a week in Tampere for band practice. On the first day of the tour I’ll actually skip the show and travel to Tallinn instead, leaving .338 to play in Tampere with a fill-in bassist. In Tallinn we with Смерть will open for the mighty Weedeater and on the next day after that while the band will go back home I’ll be traveling north to Helsinki to catch .338 on our second tour date and jump back in on the schedule!
My hypothesis is that I’m gonna feel a bit isolated during the tour due to being the only one out of 8 in the tour van who doesn’t speak Finnish. But that’s all right, I’ll keep myself busy with editing after show videos on my phone, reading books and drinking. Oh hell, there’s gonna be shit ton of drinking. Finnish alcoholics touring south where booz costs 4 times cheaper! Holy shit a hellraiser!
The dates are
03.07. Riga, LV – Latvian Academy of Art with Смерть
A friend of mine is having her bachelors done and she wants to attract an audience to see her work so we thought of helping her out (and have a public rehearsal before the Finnish date). The show is gonna happen on the 3rd floor, room number 38. It’s a free party with BYOB. The rest of the academy is gonna be closed so we all can feel like creeps in a castle!
05.07. Tampere, FIN – Manserama
.338 guitarist and songwriter is part of the organizers team. The whole festival is a skateboard competition with punk and metal bands playing here and there. The line-up for our day is fantastic! Estonian metal punk brothers Hõbekuul are opening, then Bosnian punks Lopoč, Finnish best friends Mörv (with whom .338 is releasing a split before the tour!), then .338 and finally Смерть.
16.07. Tallinn, EE – Paavli Kultuurvabrik & Tampere, FIN – Vastavirta-Klubi
.338 will start the tour with the hometown show while I’ll be traveling 4 hours south to meet up with Смерть guys once again and play for the biggest crowd we’ve ever played for!
17.07. Helsinki, FIN – Playhouse bar
I’ve never been to a Playhouse but as far as I’ve heard they are some kind of DIY venue usually closed during summer but opening up specially for the .338 show!
18.07. Tallinn, EE – Ülase12
Ü12 is a great DIY antifa venue. I’ve played there countless times and this is not gonna be the first time for .338 either. Ü12 didn’t want to book us at first because of all the touring bands in the Baltics due to Munky Pride fest but our previously booked-newly-opened venue The Krypt canceled so Ü12 took pity on us.
19.07. Vandāni, LV – Munky Pride fest
Latvian Obscene Extreme festival is mostly hosting gore and grind bands but weirdly enough we are squeezed in between two ska orchestras. Later same night Choking Victim member’s new band Public Serpents will take the stage. Never been a fan of skacore but this will be a nice “check” in the list of bands I’ve seen live. I’m proud of the opportunity to show my Finnish boys the peak of Latvian DIY fests in 2024.
20.07. Ropaži, LV – Ļunku Ļembasts fest
I planned to book a Riga show for us but with Munky Pride, Hard’n’Heavy, Punk & Rock and other festivals all happening on the same weekend the idea disappeared. Lucky Skala Bünte got us a spot in a tiny pagan festival just outside Riga. Having zero expectations but the roof to sleep under, food and crazy few people in the audience is more than enough. And we might even be headliners for this one as much as I know.
21.07. Vilnius, LT – XI20
The old and legendary XI20 was the childhood house of my punk teenager era. And with friends I made 10 years ago we’re gonna rock the old basement on a Sunday night. Great queer place, home of many local bands. Stage for many touring bands. This will feel like playing a hometown show for sure!
22.07. Kaunas, LT – Garazh
Surprisingly for myself this will be the first Kaunas show where I’ll find myself on a stage and not the other way around. The only Kaunas’ metal venue Lemmy was not interested in booking us so we had to settle down with a garage. Probably nothing more than that but I don’t mind! We are bringing our own gear and while the booz, speed and weed will keep coming we will keep rocking!
23.07. Gdańsk, PL – Paszcza Lwa
24.07. Słupsk, PL – Motor Rock Pub
25.07. Białystok, PL – Balance Klub
Haven’t played in Poland in 5 years and haven’t been in any of these venues ever but 2 of these shows are booked by a member of Polish crust sort-of-legends Death Crusade and one of them is by punks that are bringing Flower, the USA Nausea-type crust band over for a festival in August! So I have my trust in them.
26.07. Renda, LV – Zilonis fest
Friends in west Latvia have invited both Смерть and .338 to play at their annual countryside festival. Few years ago when I first played there it was a small gathering of friends in the middle of a forest but since last year the festival has grown up to a level of a decent stage and a TV crew coming over to document the action. It might not be the biggest, most original or best organized festival but it for sure is on a list of must-attend Latvian DIY events this summer.
27.07. Liepāja, LV – Gypsy camp
Back to Liepāja! The craziest, most active metal city I’ve visited in recent times. Our friends from Trencheard drunk talked that they are trying to book themselves a spot as an opener band for .338 and if that works out, the show will be legendary! It’s an open air stage in the backyard of a rich man’s hotel (the dude declined us to pay the full fee but sends pictures from his vacation in Zimbabwe or somewhere instead for no reason). Anyway on a run of best parties in Baltics we can’t skip Liepāja so it is what it is and fuck the money!
29.07. Groningen, NL – Waterskaap
Last minute addition is a show in the north of the Netherlands at the water tower squat after a relaxing day off on a ferry across Baltics sea. It’s not much, just a door-deal but we could use some quality weed, a roof to sleep under and warm dinner, and hopefully a bed or mattress or a sofa. 8 fat and smelly crusties in one van, wasted and passed out in a tent for the third week is not the healthiest way to keep sane.
30.07. Thylejren, DK – Thylejren an old
Yeah I don’t know about this one… It’s supposed to be a festival ground and an empty and forgotten village for the rest of the year. But somehow we managed to book a show there in the north of Denmark. It’s organized by friends of our driver and guitarist so I’ll let them deal with this!
31.07. Aarhus, DK – SideSporet
My very favorite venue in all of Europe. I’m trying to add SideSporet on every tour I organize. The place and the people there are phenomenal. One story out of a million that just came to my mind is from the Hellbastard/Pidari tour last year when one of the tour members had kidney problems and he had special needs, like a clean bed to lay down and specific medicine to inject and so on. All promoters were informed and took it seriously. But when we arrived in Aarhus, a local friend of mine came to our sick crew member, gave him a few grams of weed and speed and wished him a good recovery. The sick guy ended up snorting all night and shaking the whole day.
01.08. Copenhagen, DK – Ungdomshuset
Impossible to book a city if finally caught! A guy on socials reached out to me and offered to book a show. And why not? I have heard only good things about this venue! It’s supposed to be with a big stage and plenty of room for mosh pits. Hopefully there’s nothing else happening nearby and we can have a little K-town crustival!
02.08. Oslo, NO – Boksen
The story of booking Boksen is hearthwarming. Last year I played in Oslo with Pidari and a lighttech came to me after the show and gave her contacts just in case I ever needed help there. We were struggling to book the date and I remembered about the contact, reached out and boom – she got us a gig! And will do lights as well. Punk is love!
03.08. Gothenburg, SE – Fragile Mountain fest
And finally for the second year in a row I’ll get on a Fragile stage to impress unimpressible crusties that have heard the same d-beat pattern for the last 44 years. The crowd is a bit lazy there but the organizers are cool. Hopefully I’ll have the power to chat with the crew about the difference between Swedish and Baltics scenes during the night time again.
04.08.
And then home. Our vocalist lives in Sweden so he will just take a train, Finns will take a ferry to Turku and I’ll take a ferry to Riga. The goal is to sell around 10 books during the tour to pay for the ferry in case we go in minuses.
July is gonna be a pain in the ass. Being a punk is a full time job. Thanks for reading. See you in shows!