Sunrise Avenue Discography | Samu's Blog 2007 auf Englisch

Blog from 09. January 2007

Nintendo Wii tour Hamburg - Berlin - Munich

Beginning of the year has been cosy resting and waiting for the adventures of the New Year.
At last on January 9th we left for Germany with Janne for Nintendo's three day tour to promote our music together
with the new Nintendo Wii game console. These trips only with Janne are a bit easier as there are only two guys on the road,
there might be some fewer temptations to hit the city every night.
The gym clothes may be with me for not only as a luggage fill.
Usually when we travel, we take the normal economy class. This time the Nintendo people had booked us to the Business
class so also for that reason this year and it's first three flights started being royals.
The plane was Finnair's Embrayer, a small 30-metre jet where we were by ourselves in our own
VIP class and we had our own stewardess. Yeah!

It was 15 degrees in Hamburg, whatta hell? Also otherwise Hamburg seems to me like a city where I could easily move
to if there is going to be more stuff to do in Europe. Somehow it reminds me of Helsinki. At the airport Mr Jan Engel,
our driver/security/travel manager for the next couple of days, was waiting for us.
Totally awesome guy who does everything concerning entertainment and travelling as a freelancer and has previously
played rugby and American football on high level. You can see it from his shoulders.

We had been booked to Hyatt hotel preferred by all the stars and even to the Club Floor where is all the privileged
refreshment areas and services. Five stars! Sound check at around four and back to the centre around the hotel
to eat and shop.I found new gloves to replace my lost ones although we had so warm weather that I really didn't
even need my jacket.

So it was Nintendo's and our night. Nintendo was promoting in Germany their new Wii console what you don't
play traditionally with a joystick but you use handheld sticks as controllers which you sway in different directions
depending on the game.

For example boxing was totally cool. You go in front of the screen in a boxing position with your friend and you
make fighting moves with the controllers in your hands. Janne was knocked out already in the third round.

We played four acoustic songs for the invited guests and to the winners of our German fan club.
In Hamburg we went pretty early to the hotel to eat and sleep around midnight although there would
have been drinks available. Somehow I was tired and I wanted to go to the hotel's amazingly
cool gym in the morning. Jesus what a bed ...

Blog from 10. January 2007

Hamburg - Berlin

I woke up in the morning as Janne was banging on the door with the gym gear on and called for the gym. What can you do ;)
Cycling for almost an hour and a little weight lifting session made the circulation running nicely and when you
afterwards eat a good breakfast, it was nice to head for Berlin. Jan had changed the E-series Mercedes from the previous
night to a bigger Mercedes R 320 small limousine. Not bad, the poor
(that's me and Janne) were horrified as we were heading 250 km/h to the capital.

Before the gig we were following with Janne the HIFK-Blues ice-hockey game from Internet and the damn Blues went and
won and took my three points. Janne was picking on me for the whole night ....

The Berlin stage was a real nice show-case place, a gallery-like lounge where they had set up PA and necessary
gaming equipment. In Berlin also we were staying at Hyatt (thanks to Nintendo) and standard of the rooms
was as awesome as in Hamburg.

And there were even more people as yesterday. Now we stayed after four songs (Make it go away, Diamonds,
Heal Me and Fairytale) to enjoy the evening.
There was even more of the Sunrise gang from the fan club and elsewhere and we boxed and played tennis against
almost everyone. Jesus how shoulders can get sore from that kind of thing. A local TV channel had wandered around
the city at the day and asked people to sing Fairytale Gone Bad and those two singing best got tickets for night's game.

At night we had one night beer with winners of a EMI record company competition, Arianne and Fatima,
and then again to a comfy Hyatt bed to snore. No time for gym in the morning.
Flight for Munich leaves already at eleven and the Merc has to be returned and stuff. Luckily there's no time.
I think I had couple of beers at night and I might have a heart attack.
You don't have to work out every single day. Our manager Bob will join us tomorrow if his plane is able
to take off from London.

Blog from 11. January 2007

Berlin - Munich

I didn't sleep well and I was so tired in the morning. Luckily our driver Jan had slept like a baby the whole night at his home,
so he is living in Berlin, and drove us safely to the Tegel airport in Berlin.
Merc to the parking hall and to Lufthansa's Business class.
I fell asleep before the plane took off. It is nice to fly Lufthansa as they always have leather seats.

In Munich they had organized us some other programme, not only sight seeing and dining. In the day we had our
sound check and after that directly to local radio channels. First we had a live session of two songs in the studio of
Bayern3 radiochannel and gave a interview. From Bayern3 to NRJ Munich, where we had some guys we knew.
I didn't even remember we had been there for an interview in September before going to shoot the Forever Yours
video in Spain. Janne remembered. At first I of course said he is wrong. We were asked to name the top 15 songs
of all time for a local music club and of course we had to include David Hasselhof's "I've been looking for freedom"
that we have played also in Germany in live gigs as a joke. Knight Rider is a tough guy!

The Nintendo session was probably the best organized of all cities. Serving and everything were perfect ten and there
was so much people in the premises that we were lucky to fit in. Although we had agreed with our sore shoulders
that we won't play any games in Munich, we were so hooked that we couldn't resist the temptation. Totally great people.

At night we left for a local disco club to get a taste of the nightlife. Hey, the Friday was a day off.
Somehow I was feeling a bit tired so we drove to the hotel around two Jan, Bob, Janne and me all to sleep.

The other's had been to the Hilton breakfast except me. Somehow feel really ill. I hope I don't get sick now.
They say that there is snow waiting for us in Finland.
And tomorrow we go to Pieksamäki to play a double show in Savonsolmu, cool ;)

That kind of gaming console we have to have in the tour bus.
I can beat Osama in boxing and beat the real golfers Janne and Raul in Golf ....

Blog from 19. January 2007

NRJ Radio Awards

Yep.

I really don't know what to say. Yesterday there was NRJ Radio Awards in Helsinki and I still have a feeling I'm flying
in the air. Or actually I am flying as I sit in the plane towards Switzerland,
but I'm 30 cm even above this economy class seat.

Yesterday was one of the coolest days in my life. The day was really long and we worked really hard although this case
was supposed to be piece of cake. But it was worth it. We got four NRJ trophies, just one short in order to be able to
set up a fight ;=) But no-one was wondering yesterday who gets what.

The gig was a real hard pull. I mean it was damn cool but technically one of the toughest in Finland ever.
Already on the sound check on the previous day we had big problems, and so did the Finnish Pop Idol Antti Tuisku,.
We both spent over two hours in the sound check after setting up the stuff.
And somehow I probably had some extra pressure from the excitement and all and I had my thighs on lactic acids already
after the second song, Diamonds.

Maybe the coolest thing in the show yesterday was, when we had first played our 30 minute show for the 12.000 viewers,
we got back on stage after fifteen minutes to play one song more at the gala for TV. Often after shows you have the feeling
that if you only could go back. And yesterday we did. And there was bombs and stuff.

Receiving trophies and giving the speech is damn easy when you practice it at home. If I could have said my words in front
of my bathroom mirror, I probably would have said a lot more. Incredible how frozen you can get. I hope I remembered
to thank those most important; Bonnier, Welldone, Bob, NRJ and our lovely fans. If I missed someone, I'm sorry.
It sounded totally cool as thousands of folks shouted "Arschkrokodil." Yeeeaaahhh ;)

NRJ has supported us so much in Europe and we're listed even in Lebanon. We are on the 16th position in the all Europe's
NRJ chart. If I remember correctly as a first European band, the ones in front are from America and UK.

Now we are going to Zurich, Switzerland via Basel, where is a boxing heavyweight title match.
Against each other are an enormous Russian Valujev and Mr. McCline from USA.
We escort the Russian giant into the ring with our song "Faitytale Gone Bad" and the thing is TV broadcasted
into 56 countries. I slept two hours last night. I hope they zoom more on the boxing stars than my eyes ....

Blog from 10. February 2007

One evening alone after German tour in Stockholm

I'm sitting here in Stockholm in my hotel restaurant alone. Well, the other tables are crowded and sure
I have my new black Apple MacBook with me. But yes, I'm alone for the first time in weeks.
It's amazing when the band, crew, promoters, media and fans have surrounded you for weeks,
it's hard to be suddenly alone. I'll probably start talking to the wine bottle soon.
We're here in Stockholm together with Janne doing some TV, radio and press promotion for our album that was released
last Wednesday. And we already got gold singles for Fairytale Gone bad from Sweden at the release party,
thank you! The start in Sweden couldn't have been better. Janne is having dinner with his Wife and two wonderful
kids down town. They arrived yesterday from Helsinki as we were doing this TV show "Bobster"
(our manager BOB will hear about this;) with the most wonderful hostess Malin & her crew in Malmö, southern Sweden.
Janne got a family room. I'm still staying jealously in my single room with all my guitars and stuff.
Well, I guess the 4 persons and all the children's stuff would fill even a triple room.

Last weeks Friday on the 2nd of February we started our first tour in Germany. It was all sold out and those five shows
was the coolest thing I've ever experienced. I mean we've played for big audiences in Finland sure, but to have clubs
sold out in a foreign country and especially for such wonderful audiences is just amazing. The tour was tough.
My throat wasn't that good from the very start and especially in Hamburg and Cologne I was almost sure we'd have
to cancel the show because there was no sound coming out of me.
Thanx to ten liters of honey, Rum, Whiskey and hot water I was able to take care of my job as a singer with ok grades.

The shows were just awesome. In every city we went to the staff working with us was so kind and professional.
And for the first time we really worked with our European tour agent Enrico and his right hand Basty,
who we all fell in love with deeply. Basty will take a bigger role in taking care of us and our needs from now on
and we all feel really good with that. And I must mention our wonderful inside crew FOH Mikko
(he makes the sound for you guys), MP the monitor guy, Mikko our light guy, Karri the tech genius,
our driver & security chief Mättö and not to forget mr. Legolas (Really Antti, but he looks like a knight from
the lord of the rings) selling the T-shirts and stuff. I realized on tour that to get the girls,
you shouldn't be the singer who has to be behind curtains most of the time. You should be the guy who's selling
the merchandise. Leeeegoolasss ;) And of course there was Bob in the buss too.
Bob is our manager, (a former antique sales man from London. That we found out in Stockholm),
who finally got our signatures on the management contract in the buss after the Dresden show.
We just haven't had any time before. Bob's our man. I was a bit worried to jump into the buss with these guys and
thought there might be moments when we can't take each other snoring and walking around with nothing but underwear.
They were all so cool. I remember these moments when Karri carried whiskey for me before Forever Yours on stage
to clear my sick throat. Bartender ;) I felt so proud when I looked at these guys walking around and doing their
work in Sunrise Avenue Crew Hoodies or T-shirts before and after every show.

And our fans... I don't know what has happened but even though we sell out the shows and they are really fanatic
(even establishing fan clubs and Arschkrokodil teams ;), even the most hard core fans are extremely nice and leave
us alone when we need time for ourselves to rest and stuff. And when the music starts, they scream so loud that
it can be heard in the moon. That's so cool. I've never heard any audience sing that much with the band.
The crowd should get some of my salary in all five cities. I still can't get the stuff some folks say about
the Munich folks in general about them being cold and stuff. We only have extremely positive experiences.
Like everywhere in Germany. I've been thinking about having a house in Germany, probably in Hamburg,
and this trip definitely made my feelings even stronger for my second homeland. And we met some band members
of the legendary future girl-band Rosino Cayale in Berlin .... We've seen it all now. Especially their drummer
Ariane banged herself into our hearts by serving us strawberries at the backstage .... Sweet!

So the Stockholm Debaser Club show was sixth show in six days for us and those of you who've been to our shows
know that they're pretty physical for us - lots of sweat. The last two promotion days with all the interviews
have felt a bit hard, but we've made it together with our lovely local promoter Hilda (who has Finnish roots).
Tomorrow is A DAY OFF!! And our local Record company Bonnier has arranger us (Janne & his family,
my Swedish friend Andreas and I) tickets to the Sweden Hockey Games to Sweden vs. Finland. I must say facing
Sweden in ice hockey makes me more nervous than any show we'll ever play. They're good. But we will keep the faith.

On Monday we will perform at the national TV morning show and head back home in the evening.
We'll stay in Finland for one whole day and on Wednesday morning we'll take off to Switzerland and Austria.
We spent last Christmas week in Austria with Jukka and I really liked the whole country, especially Salzburg.
And from Vienna we go to Italy. Cool! I must remember to send email to my mom every now and then and tell her
not to worry ;) The little things you must do to be able to do this job and to keep your head together are
pretty weird sometimes ....

I'm having Reindeer toast for starters and Duck fillet stuffed with spinach and herbs with pasta as main course.
And probably a hot chocolate cake with cranberries & vanilla sauce afterwards.
A bottle of good Spanish red wine and a new diet coke every time the glass gets empty.
This is my night off and I'm going to spend it without any clubs or other noise.
I'll probably fall asleep soon and keep snoring like a bear until the ice hockey game starts tomorrow.

Fuck I love my life and especially you guys! Once again I feel I must be the luckiest guy on the planet.
I'm gonna go up to my room and write a new song "Fairytale gone pretty well so far ...."

Blog from 18. February 2007

Promotion Switzerland & Austria

I'm sitting here in Berlin 840 AM having a coffee in a restaurant where you can see the Tegel runway and the planes
taking off. We flew here from Vienna pretty early this morning to take the second flight home in about an hour.
We did a two-day promotion trip to Zurich and Vienna promoting our album and single.
It's going really well there, thanks to EMI.

Before the Wednesday in Zurich we had a day off in Helsinki. Well, I had one radio, two magazine and one
TV interview on my "day off" but it was pretty relaxing anyhow.
We were back from Germany & Sweden the day before and at least I really felt good sleeping 13 hours in my own bed.
And I also had a haircut on Tuesday so actually the day was pretty tough and challenging ....

Our local promoter Sandra was waiting for us at the Zurich airport. Every time I land into Zurich, I get the feeling
"Everything's a bit better here." I don't know why, but all the folks in Switzerland seem to be happy and ok with all
their stuff. Anyhow. We did phoners (meaning the reporter calls Sandra's phone and she hands it to me)
& went to local radio stations to play our Fairytale acoustic.
We also had our first experience with the (Finland based) Habbo online chat thing. Was actually pretty cool.
After the lunch in a really nice restaurant Sandra had booked we went to EMI Zurich office to do some stuff
for TV and web. In the evening we were taken to the Swiss premier of Hugh Grant's and Drew Barrymore's
new movie "Music & Lyrics" in a really nice theatre. Since the theme was music and songwriting,
they presented us in front of the premiere audience and press and they asked some questions about songwriting and stuff.
The movie was really good; at least we liked it a lot.

Two beers with Sandra and Janne in the hotel bar and the idea of diving into the bed sounded pretty good.
You know, the electricity plugs are different in Switzerland and there were no adapters left in the hotel for the
"normal" European kind. I didn't get any power to my MacBook and couldn't read my mails and couldn't
log into myspace. Whatta hard life ....

Wake up at six and after a quick coffee Sandra took us to the airport.

I slept the whole way to Vienna. I love to sleep in the plane. It moves a bit like a cradle and there's this relaxing
sound of the engines. I love to fly. I remember them going through the security stuff before hitting the runway
and the next time I opened my eyes was when the plane stopped to let us all out in Vienna.

Our local "baby" promoter Katharina was waiting for us at the airport.
The first thing we wanted was some power to our laptops, how rock credible ;)

We drove to the centre and as she put the radio on,
Fairytale gone bad was the first song on the biggest radio channel Ö3.
I guess she had called them to play it as soon as we had landed. Just kidding.
Just like all EMI countries & areas so far, the Austrian EMI team is doing a terrific job with our music
and it's going really well. We are in top 10 with the album and with the single and we have the same situation
in Switzerland. Choosing EMI as the European partner wasn't a bad idea at all.

We drove to a really nice hotel; the one where also Sting and Whitney Houston stay on their trips to Vienna and the press
day was organized damn well. They had arranged this conference room at the hotel with drinks and Sunrise Avenue posters
and stuff all over the place and the reporters came in one after another. We spoke to all the biggest news & daily papers,
radio and stuff. We also drove to the Ö3 radio station to play some acoustic stuff for their programs.
The day started at 8 and as the last interview was done at 830PM we felt like we had earned a beer.
Almost all of them asked how we feel about being such stars and being so successful.
For me it's pretty hard to get. I don't feel like a star at all. I still don't mind carrying my own guitar,
but probably as Janne said, we haven't had any time to realize the great stuff that has happened in the last months.
I might have to learns how to demand fresh strawberries after every question .... Would I be a start then?
I don't know. It's just so cool to be this normal guy from Helsinki even though we play our songs for pretty big audiences
every now and then. I love normal & simple life and I hope I never lose it no matter what happens.

We had a really nice dinner in the evening together with the EMI folks including some local red wine and dessert
wine and even some hot chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream in the very end.
I hope we didn't eat our entire marketing budget.

Wake up was at 5:45, yes too damn early but we made it. Janne has a bad stomach and he's trying to get some rest with
all this noise at the airport. We have a weekend off until Monday morning when we go to Italy, Jeeeee ;)
We'll be there for three days and fly to Helsinki on Thursday evening only to take a boat right away to Estonia to play
a show there. Then we will fly directly to Germany for more than a week to perform at the DOME and to do some acoustic
shows all over the country. This means the next time I'll be at home is more than two weeks away again.
Luckily this weekend is off and I get to sleep a lot and go to gym. Only two interviews and that's all.

I'm going to see if I could write some lyrics for a new song I wrote a few days ago.
It's called "Welcome to my life" and I think it's going to be on the future albums.
I have a good feeling about the song ....

Blog from 23. February 2007

2 days - Milan, Copenhagen, Helsinki, Tallinn, Copenhagen, Berlin

A restful weekend in Helsinki is behind and I got all the sleep I needed. I was already about to go to sleep on Friday
at home as our German tour agent Enrico called me that we’re supposed to meet in Tavastia Club in Helsinki to see this
possible support act for the German tour. I had totally forgotten. Jeans on and into the night…

For a reason or another I slept extremely bad on Sunday night and I felt really tired on Monday early wake up at 6.
And when you’re tired, everything goes straight to hell. I woke up a bit later than I was supposed to and of course
when you’re in a hurry, the taxi call girl says “well, it’s pretty busy right now, so if there’s no car in 20-30 minutes,
call again.” The hell I will call again. My plane starts boarding then. I was an asshole and called two taxies fro
two different companies. I hope the second one never got there. I needed to catch my plain. Damn…

Fist flight was to Stockholm and Jukka had to buy a new pair of Sunglasses (Versace investment again of course)
because he was so tired and the day was too bright for him. From Stockholm the plane flew to Milano and I slept
the whole way even though it was cold as hell in the plane. The older kind of MD aircrafts should definitely
be replaced. As we landed I realized again how nice the winter could be in the Mediterranean area. +15 Celsius.
It was minus 10 back home.

Valentina Lamparelli (Whatta cool name!) from EMI Italy was waiting for us at the airport and her driver drove
us directly to MTV TRL show. We performed Fairytale Gone Bad in the very beginning of the program and all was
organized pretty well. TRL. Nice start for Italy. We also met our first Italian fans, or anyway girls who got our
autographs as we walked back to the car. Damn the brown eyes... I could sink into them.

Jukka, Sami and Raul were taken back to the airport pretty soon and they flew back home the same evening.
That was a quick drop by in Italy. We stayed until Wednesday with Janne and did tens of magazine, website,
radio and TV interviews. I learned to say Arschkrokodil in Italian.
It’s “Cocodrilo di culo” and actually I was able to launch the famous green fellow in a live TV show. Jeee ;)
Klaus Das arschkrokodil got an Italian colleague. Together they will rule the world.
Especially our TV / Radio promoter Pablo “Carlo Gambretti” seemed to love the crocodile stuff.

On Tuesday evening we had dinner with my friend Juhku and his better half that live in Northern Italy working
for the EU. Well, Juha only plays golf and drives their brand new ML 320 because he hasn’t found a descent job so far.
Bad life… Since we were in Milan, we sure had to go shopping. It was some kind of a fashion week and I stopped
counting the beautiful tall models the first afternoon. But anyhow. Everything was available from high-end fashion
to regular H&M & Bershka stuff. I ended up buying only a pair of Converse All Stars (my 22nd pair ;)
and a spring jacket. We had a walk in the centre and found the five-floor Ferrari store with real Ferrari
formula 1 inside and also a Kappa store with full size pictures of my favorite Ice Hockey team (Helsinki IFK)
players Jere Karalahti and co. In Milano (???). The Italians have great taste in food, clothing,
weather and stuff, but obviously they also support the best hockey team in the world.
We were walking down the road and I was on phone as Janne suddenly started repeating IFK, IFK… I thought
he became totally mad (not saying he hasn’t been on the way all the time) or that he finally realized what
is THE team to support in Finnish league. But no. He didn’t become any madder and he still sticks
to the Espoo Blues team.

Now we are on our way back home up in the air. We should have traveled to Helsinki via Copenhagen,
but there’s a huge snowstorm above Denmark and our flight to Helsinki is cancelled and the one from Milan took
off 2 hours late. We’ll have to be in a boat to Estonia at around five in the afternoon to play a show for boatful
of students. So I guess Scandinavian Airlines will assist us with hotels and stuff in Copenhagen and I hope we get
home early enough tomorrow. Usually these things turn out fine but I must get my other suitcase from home for
the week in Germany.

So tomorrow we go to Estonia and from there we fly directly to Germany to do these acoustic shows and for some
signing sessions. We will end our week in Germany by performing LIVE at the dome in Mannheim.
They will organize a big black grand piano for Jukka and all acoustic stuff for us and it will be so damn
cool again. It’s the third and obviously the last dome for us with Fairytale Gone Bad.
Some 8.000 viewers and millions at home behind the TV screens. I already miss the weather in Milan and the
lovely EMI folks. And one more thing. There’s this really famous song in Finland called “Tarantella Joe”
and I was sure it’s from Italy and a famous song there. You know they have this Tarantella kind of music,
this kind of restless but happy stuff. I tried to sing Tarantella Joe to EMI‘s Valentina and Pablo and they
had never heard about it. I must send them the song. Arrivederci Italia e Cocodrilo di Culo! Until next time,
hopefully soon…

Everything was a huge mess in Copenhagen. We have just spent our night on the really cold airport floor.
There were hundreds of folks hunting for connecting flights and hotel rooms and by the time we got to the airport,
all the hotel rooms were gone, even the Hilton was full. Taxi cue to the centre was 4 hours and there was no other
way to the city and to any hotel. We bought flights online for to the first SAS plane to Helsinki just to be sure
we get home in the morningand to be sure we catch the boat and get to play our show. As we were ready to jump
in the plane in the morning, we realized the plane would be at least 4 hours late. Would be to late for us.
So we had to buy the third flights home, this time with Finnair. And now I’m actually sitting high above the
Baltic Sea on our way home. Seems as if we’ll have time to get home to get some clean clothes and have a quick shower.

There was this very pretty girl at Copenhagen airport asking for my autograph right after I woke up.
For the first time in my life I thought of saying no. I must smell bad; I didn’t even have a toothbrush that time.
But sure I couldn’t say no. ;) They’re so sweet and they are the reason we get to travel and play our songs with my boyz.
So, the trip ends well. I hope our bags travel below us. If not, we’ll have a good excuse to update the whole wardrobe ;)

Copenhagen again. I’m getting pretty familiar with this airport. It’s actually quite nice, but it would be cool to get
to our destination, Berlin. The show was just great yesterday and we felt like we’ll have a cool signing session
week I Germany, but no. The connecting flight from Copenhagen was cancelled and we had to cancel the autograph
sessions & the acoustic performances in Leipzig and Berlin. Vittu! There will be another in Berlin tomorrow though.
The new flight they booked us on is already 2 hours late and we’ll see if we ever get to Berlin.
Julia has been waiting for us at the Berlin Tegel airport for 5 hours already with my new perfect Gibson acoustic guitar.
Finally I get it 3 months after ordering it.

Our bags disappeared somehow two days ago and they still haven’t found them.
So Janne and I we have our spare clothes in other suitcases and I really hope these will end up in Berlin today on my
22nd flight this year. Otherwise I have no clothes left.

Sorry all you guys who were on your way to the sessions today ;( We’ll make it another time. What can you do..?

Tour & kidnapped little brother

When you seriously start aiming towards something with your band, you have this vision in your head.
This huge stage and this wild audience. It’s this kind of a wonderland, you really don’t know what it is,
but you’ve seen the big acts performing for thousands of screaming listeners and you know it’s gotta be something nice…..

The Italian EMI had booked us to do the MTV TRL TV show the day before the tour in Germany would start.
In a way I was stressed out because of the extra stuff right before the four shows in four nights period.
It’s the throat thing and this time we’re also going to record a live DVD for commercial use in Cologne on the 3rd tour day.

But the Italian EMI office staff is so sweet and cool and everything is always so well organized in Italy,
so the trip was more of a holiday. It’s was only Janne and I and we did pretty many interviews for newspapers,
magazines and TV and we also met the very first fan club members. They were all so sweet and they talked so fast ;)

We took a plane from Milan to Dresden 0n 22nd of March just to sleep on night and rest before the tour starts.
The rest of the guys and the crew would pick us up the next day. We stayed at NH hotel and the funniest thing
was that at the sauna/gym area the Germans walked around naked… Woooo?
In Finland we’re pretty used to naked folks in sauna, but at gym…;)

One step forward

As we arrived to Chemnitz Club, I realized we’d taken one step forward what comes to the clubs and stuff.
The venue was the smallest one on this tour, but bigger than any of the February ones. Probably 1000 capacity.
Our diamond crew had set everything up all the way to the wireless internet connection and it was time to adjust
the brain on tour mood.

A typical day on tour is something like this. We wake up somewhere either in a hotel or in the buss.
You don’t know where you really are and usually the first thing is to explore the neighborhood a bit.
If there’s not too many folks waiting for you by the entrance already.
And the wakeup is (at least for me) usually something between 11 AM and 1 PM. The later the better.
You know the show ends at 11 or something and I really can’t sleep until 2-3 at night.
The blood runs through your veins too fast after the show.

Afternoons are typically filled with interviews, photo sessions or some record company stuff.
Our lovely tech guys do al the sound checks and stuff for us, we might only do a double-check if it’s an
important day, DVD stuff or something.

Then we just sleep and well… try to go jogging or move a bit. And sure we eat a lot.
The 90 minute show eats a lot of energy and the worst thing is to get up on stage with an empty stomach.
I can easily run 10 kilometers on a running mat at the gym, and after the shows the feeling is pretty similar.
We just play the guitar…

After the show I try to get warm, not the get ill, and eat a lot again and drink lots of water.
Then the tech boys clear the stage and pack the stuff in the buss and trucks and off we go. To do the same
thing again the next day.

The second show was in Berlin, Universal Music Hall. Really cool place. We had the famous photographer Olaf Heine
(shot guys like Bon Jovi, REM, Sting, Ricky martin, etc) shooting us all day first at his studio in Berlin and
later at the backstage and sure also during the show.

We took a Limo service minivan to Cologne with Jukka right after the show. I really wanted to go to sleep to be
well during the DVD shootings the next day. Just the idea that some crewmember would become friends with the
jack Daniels bottle and sing all night and destroy my sleep, sounded bad.
Our friend Jörn was the driver and we were in Cologne in no time. One of our lovely EMI employees gave us their apartment
to get the good night sleep, how cool is that! They were out of town. I hope we remembered to clean the place ;)
The shows can be pretty tough for the throat sometimes, last time it was really bad on the 4th and 5th show.
Well I was sick then but anyhow. I was a bit worried how it would be.

I felt like a bird in the morning, I felt like Pavarotti (only a bit skinnier and no ass) after sleeping next to Jukka
for some many hours. Julia took us to the Cologne E-werk venue.
That was big. The capacity was more than 2000 and it had been sold out for weeks. Lot of fans were already
behind the gates as we arrived at 1 PM, 8 and a half hours before the show.

In Cologne we had a proper sound check especially for the DVD sound and we also had to go through all the special
camera things and pyro stuff. The whole 35-person crew seemed to know what they were doing.

Looking at the venue and the amount off staff working for the production to make our songs sound and performance
look cool, gave me Goosebumps. This is what I meant with the first few lines.
The thing you’ve been fighting for all the time, to have this kind of thing around you and the band. Knock knock knocking
on wonderlands gates… Well not yet, but one step closer.

The show was just amazing. Just like the three others. Even though we all knew there’s the DVD stuff going on,
we all were relaxed and we all enjoyed the night so much. I am usually able to stay cool behind the microphone,
but that night I really had to bite my lip hard to stop the tears coming out of my eyes a few times.
I nearly broke in the first two minutes of wonderland. The atmosphere was so amazing.

It’s always a great thing that happens at the back stage after a great show. All the shows on this tour have been just
fantastic and the audiences were just amazing. But this time, probably because of the DVD and the size of the venue,
there was some extra emotion in all us. After hugging the guys, management, Agents, EMI guys, the Crew and all,
I really had to find a silent spot where I could sit alone to get back on the planet.
That was the happiest moment of my life. I have felt love and I have shot goals in football and I have seen
audiences before. But this was all that together times 1000. Times all orgasms in the world.
If I had died right there, I probably would have gone with a smile on…

After having the DVD monkey off our back, the Hamburg day felt like a holiday. We walked around Reberbahn,
with Janne and Sami and avoided all the strip caves. It’s amazing that they start their day at eleven.
I mean I thought strippers work mostly at night. That’s what I’ve heard from the big boys,
but there they probably go to work the same time as everyone. 2 hours before the singers wake up.

The venue Grosse Freiheit 36 was a really cool traditional rock club and you could feel all the hundreds
of acts who’d played there during the years. The show was probably the best performance musically ever
from Sunrise Avenue, even better than the three other shows that tour. We were so relaxed.
I didn’t have to worry about my throat that much, we’d also have ONE full day off after this,
and there’s no TV cameras. And the audience was just great! Again. I really like Hamburg a lot.
Reminds me of Helsinki somehow and every time I drive through the city I get the feeling I could really live there.

Archkrokodil kidnapped my brother and Karri stole our show
After the show there was the necessary after party. I usually don’t wan to get wasted, but especially the crew
seems to celebrate the “great success” after each tour. They got all so drunk, especially our guitar Tech Karri,
who sang himself into all the hearts on Remerbahn by performing “still loving you” in a karaoke bar for
hundreds of fans. The after party was in a small karaoke bar next to all the strip bars.
Nothing VIP, it’s cooler to hang out with the fans and stuff.

My little brother had come over from Finland to see the show. Everything went well and this 18-year-old baby promised
to take a taxi to his hotel right after we took off with our buss at three in the night.
People had seen some Team Arschkrokodil members partying all night with the cuter brother and he wasn’t
able to “escape” until 9 in the morning. Must have been nice to sit next to our mother in the plane with no sleep
after being forced to drink all the booze there is in Hamburg. Good boy!

We had a really cool buss and a really nice buss driver. I’m sure he was a bit surprised how well we behaved.
No drugs or throwing TV’s out or nothing. But luckily Karri (guitar tech) and Aki (lights) fixed the image during
the last 300 kilometers before arriving at the airport. Mikko (FOH) was able to capture some footage of these guys
climbing above the driver naked and waving the male parts over the poor driver’s head. They obviously drank all
the stuff from the buss and in the morning we all woke up to this awful smell. The floor was full of throw
up and all shit. The buss wasn’t the same as it was before and the driver did a good job keeping his face cool
as we walked out the last time at the airport. Karri also woke me up in the middle of the night and wanted to
fight me – half seriously. We went out to fight. He looked so stupid attacking me wearing these “grandfather”
kind of indoor shoes. I don’t really know what they drank, but I was a bit worried. And as I half seriously asked
the crew to calm him down, they were all too drunk to operate even them selves. It was sort of fun. He didn’t
remember a thing in the morning. I’m so happy there is a video cam in most of the phones.
We experienced the whole naked stuff and our fight club at the airport. We’re all friends again…;)

It’s two weeks from the tour now and we’re flying back home from Hamburg again from Radio Hamburg’s city festival.
We also got the first rough cut of the DVD… Makes me smile.
It will be out after the summer with some special backstage stuff.

Thank you so much for the wonderful 4 shows again! My words can never express how much we appreciate you being
there and singing our songs with us. We are the luckiest guys in the world. And thank you for the wonderful birthday
and other presents. I really wish I had time and a chance to thank everyone personally.
And it’s just amazing that the album went gold. The record company EMI has done a terrific job together
with our management, but nothing would have happened without you doing the most important ground level work.
I slept for 3 hours last night but I don’t mind. I am the happiest guy on the planet – again ;)
And that’s all because of you. Thank you!

Blog from 29. Mai 2007

Here and there - right before summer starts

We took off from Helsinki to Düsseldorf on the 11th of May. We had this cool event in Bochum Germany operated by Nokia.
They had given us new N95 mobile phones some weeks ago to get some footage on the screens when we perform.
We had shot a lot of stuff, hours to be exact, from DTM, stages and stuff.

All was organized pretty well apart from the technical stuff. Our crew had to work an extra day to get everything in order,
but I guess it was mostly because the folks behind the evening were doing it for the very first time and the whole setup
was kind of a special thing. There had been contests all around Germany where people had been capturing themselves singing
Fairytale gone bad and out of these hundreds of contestants, we were glad to chose one guy to join us on stage to do the
song with us. The winner, Mr. André took the stage as any pro.

We slept for one hour (Crew + myself we didn’t sleep at all because Aki, our head of lights serve us red wine)
and flew all to Barcelona to see the Formula 1 race and to relax for a few days. We invited the whole crew.
They have definitely earned a few nice days off too.

Barcelona is one of the coolest spots on the planet. I can’t say why, but somehow the smell of “shit” makes me feel good
every time I walk the main street La Rambla. Not shit really but the smell of life. Everything is not that sterile over there.
The weather was pretty much perfect. We spent the days on the beach and went shopping and out in the evening & night.
We were also joined by some of the guys’ girlfriends and kids, plus the Finnish label manager Mikko. Well, Bob was there too
but he flew away right after the F1 race. I bet he didn’t want to see our crew hit the night clubs ;)
Perfect gang anyway. I had rented four apartments for the travel party from the very center of the city.
It’s much nicer to stay in an apartment than in a hotel, I think.

The F1 trip was cool and all, but our hero Kimi Räikkönen broke his Ferrari engine on the 5th lap.
As Finland also lost the Ice Hockey WC final against Canada the same day, we decided to focus on enjoying the city.
It was quite a challenge finding an Ice Hockey bar in Barcelona. But our FOH Mikko did.

The last night in Barcelona we had dinner with Jukka and Bonnier Mikko
( It’s amazing how many Mikko’s you need to carry out this kind of a project) and later Karri and Aki joined
us with Sami and MP. Karri and Aki made clear to us all what “manhood” really means on the streets of Barcelona.
I am so happy for both of you guys and you know I love you and that I admire you certain kind of skills and attitude!

16th-19th we had 4 shows is Switzerland. Three shows supporting the local Hard rock giant Gotthard and one show case
for EMI world wide MDs. I didn’t really know about the Gotthard guys before our tour agency proposed the support stuff.
Their music is kind of hard rockish traditional rock and I’m not usually a huge fan of that kind of music.
This time I must say that the Gotthard guys, their crew and especially their audiences rocked their way deep into my heart.
I really hope we get to do stuff with these great guys in the future. Probably the best thing about the band itself is that
the guys are extremely great with their instruments and you can definitely tell that they’ve done the stuff on stage for
a zillion times, but still even if they’re pro and all, you can sense the enjoyment miles away. Whatta mixture.
I wish I had the same when I’m pro ;)

I fell in love with Luzern, the last city in Switzerland. It’s this kind of a middle size city in the middle of the
mountains by a beautiful lake. Bob, our manager, rented a boat and took some of the guys to the lake with it and I went
swimming with FOH Mikko, Tech Karri and Light Aki. I wasn’t actually supposed to swim at all, but there were some girls
near us as the other guys dived into the water and I didn’t want to look like a pussy…

After the Luzern show we drove to Milan, Italy. Temperature just got warmer and warmer. We had the first day off and I had
rented a car for myself for four days and Jukka got one for himself too, so we drove to Lake Garda together with Basty
(Tour manager), Mikko’s, Aki and Karri. A day off at one of the most beautiful spots in Europe. We took silly Baywatch
pictures in the water and just relaxed. Really stupid pictures. David Hasselhoff would get jealous if he saw them:

http://irc-galleria.net/archive.php?nick=^^Singeri^^ HYPERLINK
"http://irc-galleria.net/archive.php?nick=%5E%5ESingeri%5E%5E&album_id=1549715"& HYPERLINK
"http://irc-galleria.net/archive.php?nick=%5E%5ESingeri%5E%5E&album_id=1549715"album_id=1549715

The show day started with a typical media circus for Janne and I. We did several interviews and finally the rest of the guys
joines us for the photo sessions in the afternoon. Probably above all again beautiful Valeria and her funny
partner Luca at All Music TV.

We knew the venue would not be full. It’s always like that with the first show no matter where we play. Fortunately our local
Fan club had been promoting the event for us and we got the club half full. After tasting the energy of an Italian audience,
we all agreed we need to get more of it. We need to get back there ASAP!

The band, Crew and staff drove to Zurich in the night to get planes home. I drove to my friend’s and his wife’s little house
by the lake Maggiore in the north. Jesus. The lake was just less than 10 meters from my bedroom window and the
place was so peaceful. I finally had a few days off after 4 months. We just drove around the lakes of Northern Italy and
enjoyed the sun. And I got burned a bit too of course. I never learn to protect myself with sun lotion enough. Well,
there was a football game the second day and nobody remembered my red skin as AC Milan won Liverpool in Athens.

I flew to Hannover Germany on Thursday to go though some stuff for the DOME TV show. I also had a long and nice
chat & dinner with our manager Bob and Julia from EMI. The guys were going to land the next day and there were a lot of
things to be done before they come for the show on Friday etc.

The DOME was again as cool as can be. Pyros and stuff. This time even the red carpet felt better than ever.
Probably because we didn’t expect anything special and probably because we are getting to the point that we can say
there’s been some success already in Germany. And of course the after party as late as possible again.
The coolest thing was to meet the local singer Idol NEVIO, who I think has the coolest voice on the planet.
He’ll have a long courier. And it was very late again as we got to our hotel beds.

The wakeup to get to the airport was early again. We had to be back in Finland pretty early to headline a summer
festival near Helsinki. All went well and we got to our destination, but our guitars, headphones and stuff never got
to the plane for a reason or another. My little brother and our former Lighting guy kindly borrowed their gear.

It was so cool to play the first open air real summer festival by a nice lake out side. It was a nice start and
we’ll get a lot of it in the next few months. On Wednesday we’ll play one more show inside at the Helsinki ICE Arena
and after that everything is outdoors. And rock am ring & Rock im Park next weekend.
Can’t wait. One of the dreams come true… Again.

I feel so god. I wish I could share the rising sun of Scandinavia with all you folks.
You just gotta see it ones in your life, it’s like nothing else. It’s 03:07 and the light is already climbing from
behind the buildings creating a new cool day for all of us.

These are the moments that you keep inside your heart to guide you then - The day you fail again

(From “The day you fail again” – Hopefully one of next album’s songs)

Blog from 09. June 2007

Rock Im Park & Rock Am Ring

You play guitar all your life and you dream about things, such as released records, real tours of your own band
and gold albums. And waking up next to Kylie, Jessica Alba and Adriana Lima the same morning, of course.

Rock am Ring & Rock im Park have definitely been two of those wet dreams for me all these years and now I am
sitting on a plane to play the main stage of both of them ;)
At least the Ring is sold out for the first time ever and they released some more tickets.
It’s going to be less than a 100.000 listeners, so no need to get nervous…

The audiences in Germany are usually perfect. I’ve heard that these with festivals even the Germans can get cruel.
Some of our colleagues have been thrown with eggs and stuff. I hope we don’t get to the grocery category.

I first decided just to enjoy the trip and take no photos and write no diaries, but hey.
If I get to enjoy this trip, then so should you.

I slept pretty bad last night after going through some new songs. The melodies just kept on speeding around my thoughts.
I tried to find the missing line for this one song so badly, but nope.
We perform at this Radio show today in Cologne and tomorrow we take our tour buss towards the Festivals. Jeeeee ;)

Surprise, surprise

As we arrived in Cologne yesterday, the schedule said there would be an acoustic performance at the 1LIVE radio station.
One of the biggest In Germany. Sami said next to the luggage belt at the airport that he smells something burning in the
whole picture and he thinks there is actually gonna be a gold award surprise party, no acoustic radio show.
It was all pretty unusual. The EMI folks told us last week that they would arrange all guitars and stuff and we
don’t have to worry / bring our own… Usually we do.

EMI had booked us right next to their head office. I remember feeling strange going through EMI garage to
“Get the guitars” for the radio show. Julia guided us to the elevator and as we got the EMI lobby
“to get the instruments,” the whole company was there cheering! So cool. That was one of the head skins I have been
dreaming about for years. To get a gold award from a major market. And actually two awards.
We got gold for Fairytale gone bad too.

Julia had edited a video for us about the first year traveling in Germany and Europe and I must say I never had such
confusing emotions. In a way I never felt that happy before. Just looking back all the amazing things we have been
blessed to experience the first year makes you feel like you’re luckiest guy on the planet.
The evening was made perfect with a nice dinner with many EMI folks who have been fighting very very hard for us.
For us this whole thing is a dream come true.
Fort them it’s just a job and it’s amazing how much they put their hearts and free time into our band.

The buss took off at 01 AM towards Nürnberg, Rock Im Park… Tired but damn happy.

Rock IM Park

Yep ;) The first one done and my God it was cool. Rock im Park is a festival at the legendary Nürnberg historical spot.
That was the biggest audience we ever played for. They said it was probably 50.000. Fifty thousand!!!!!!!! No eggs ;)

There was a problem with some technical stuff before the show and we had a 10-minute delay.
We had to skip 2 songs (All because of you and Wonderland). Everyone was coo, though.

We just woke up inside the Nürburgring race track. The main stage and backstage are located inside the ring,
where our Finnish ice man Räikkönen drives his formula car once a year. Te whole Saturday was off and we just did some
interviews and a Diesel clothing photo shot together with Eva Padberg, the German model. She was….wow!
I have had her wallpaper on my Mac for a year already. The second time this happens.
Collien Fernandez was the first celebrity I met with a wallpaper history ;)

On the road in Germany

I didn’t have time before to finish this, so I am sitting on the front seat of a minivan speeding towards Hannover,
Germany. We perform there today at this city festival. We are in the hands of Captain Dirk, our limo service driver
and their new Mercedes minibus. But let’s reverse back to last Sunday to Rock am Ring.
It was kind of annoying to look at the stage for two days and see all the big acts performing there.
I mean two days is definitely enough time to get nervous ;)
We stood at the area behind the stage where Karri (guitar tech) brings the bass and guitars.
There was no signal from my Gibson. Probably because the stage is so huge and we were behind the stage on the left side.
My amp is on the right side.

After they announced us we walked on stage. I didn’t realize the TV crew and the screens cameras were zooming on me and
I said “Vi Vittu” pretty clearly. It’s a Finnish expression you say when you’re either very angry or positively surprised.

The audience was just awesome! And no eggs ;) I just went through the whole show with my laptop and apart from my little
fault in Fairytale and Sami’s creative start for sunny day, all was perfect. And it looked soooo good.
Walking down the staiers after the show was one of the best moments in my life.
The evening after the show went partying like hell.
We had two friends from Finland joining us the whole weekend so there was some extra strength in the party gang.

Hessentag

Yesterday was the first Hessentag experience for us. Hessen is this kind of a state in Germany and every year one Hessen
area city or village gets to be the host of the party. This year the glory and pride went to the village of Butzbach.
The festival runs for one week with all bands and amusement parks and stuff and there are eve pretty big names performing,
such as Aerosmith this year. A local radio station there presented us and even though we played a 90-minute show,
the audience was just great and jumping and claping their hands like crazy. I mean usually 90 minutes for an audience
who might now know the songs could be too much.
Today there’s another show in Hanover and tomorrow we perform in my country again. It’s a huge city festival in the centre
of Helsinki with some 70.000-80.000 listeners + live TV.
We got the new Bon Jovi album (released yesterday in Germany) form a lovely fan yesterday. There is a great ballad they
sing together with Leann Rimes. I need to close my eyes when listening to that on iPod.
I’m still really tired after last weeks interview circus. 31 degrees Celsius, blue sky… Life could be worse.

Blog from 18. June 2007

Austria Nova Rock & Tollwood Munich

Nova Rock Austria

I’ve been to Austria once officially before with Janne doing some interviews and stuff and I spent last Christmas there
together with Jukka. We were supposed to go to all the classical concerts in the capital, but we rented a BMW instead and
drove to Salzburg to enjoy the bars. And I also went skiing in Saalbach and Zell am See some years ago. Great slopes.

The Nova Rock festival show was the first contact to the Austrian live audience and even though we had heard good stories
about the festival, we really didn’t know what to expect. We only knew that our album has sold well so far and Fairytale
has got great airplay on the local radio channels.

We had the working week off before the flight to Vienna and it was nice to see all the guys after a
“long” break at the airport. I spent the whole week in Southern Finland enjoying my days off. It was a mistake.
It was so cold and it also rained pretty much in Helsinki. On Thursday afternoon it was 12 degrees….
In June! Poor Japanese tourists taking photos in front of the parliament building.

To be honest, I was a bit worried how the audience would take us. I mean everywhere we go for the first time,
the folks mostly expect something much more POP and teenage stuff than what it is in the very end.
Sure we knew that the live audience couldn’t differ that much from the great and noisy Germans, but still.
The first touch is always the first touch.

They were just great! Even at Rock am Ring the folks sing our songs pretty much through the set,
but here they sang really loud and they were really active. I’m so happy there will most obviously be some club shows
in Austria too on our European tour starting in October. I hope they announce the dates soon.
And I must mention that the girls were extremely pretty at this festival.
Sure they came from all over Europe but still for a reason or another the opposite sex really pleased
our eyes this time. Sure it’s nice to have them wearing the bikini only ;) on a hot summer day.

On the way to Munich

We’re stuck in a huge traffic jam on our way to Munich to play the Tollwood festival.
These are the less unknown German festivals, but just like with the Hessentag & Hannover last week,
I’m confident it will be so cool again. I could walk faster than the car moves, but probably it’s better just
to enjoy the view and continue writing the lyrics for new songs.

Home. Sofa.

Tollwood was really nice. Somehow the “family festivals” are really relaxed and especially the back stage
area & crew there was nice this time. We performed in this kind of a tent, a huge one, and the crowd was really cool.
Not probably a typical Sunrise Avenue audience, but a really nice one anyway.
I guess there were many many folks who had never heard more than Fairytale Gone Bad,
but still they sang Nasty really loud in the end. And they shouted us back on stage two times ;)

It’s 12 degrees and raining again in Helsinki. I could go back to Munich, it was 20 more and sunny.
I’ll just do some interviews and stuff this week and hopefully there will be time for gym and stuff.
We’re also planning the European Tour this week together with the crew. The first details are so cool.
Can’t wait ;) Next weekend we play the famous Mid Summer festivals in Finland.
I’ve been standing in the audience so many times dreaming about playing those stages and now it finally happens.
After the second mid summer day we all fly to Athens, Greece for the first time.
It’s this MAD TV show, obviously something fun and mad. And after Greece we go to Poland I guess and then to Belgium
and Holland. 58 flights this year and counting… Counting my flights is one of the few hobbies I have left.

Blog from 01. Juli 2007

My country – Athens – Catania - Gothenburg

I really didn’t know what we’d get with the midsummer festivals in Finland. I actually had prepared myself not to expect
a success or too well organized stuff around the weekend and I headed towards the shows with my own car. Especially on
our Finnish tour in the spring, some of the club owners or local staff made me hate the whole live scene from time to time.
So going with my car is a way to enjoy the sunlight in the night just driving to the next city if the mood at back stages
is poor or something else sucks. It really happens. I mean the Sun doesn’t set at all in the midsummer in my country.
You gotta see it once in your life.

Surprise, surprise. The whole weekend was really cool. Be played both Bigger Mid summer festivals RMJ & Himos and
I must say that all was really well organized and the crowd was extremely cool. Especially at RMJ. Miss Pamela Anderson
and her giant hooters were the guests of honor at RMJ and the fuzz about her hosting the show was just ridiculous.
She only appeared on stage for 2 minutes. With her dad!!
If I ever start performing together with Mr. Haber senior, please tell me to quit, ok?

The 1st festival RMJ was built on a beach in Rauma, on the western coast 250 Km from Helsinki.
The weather was just perfect and everyone seemed happy on a nice sunny day. RMJ is the biggest midsummer festival
and so it was kind of a test for us too. We are still a new band for even most of the Finns, even though we have
had music control number 1 (the most played song in Finnish radio) for 22 weeks during the last year with Fairytale,
Forever yours and Diamonds. Still most of the folks had never seen us play live and RMJ was a perfect chance for
us to show them what we really are about. That was probably the most enjoyable show for me in Finland ever so far.

I took my car after the show and drove to Tampere together with our Finnish label manager Mikko.
It’s half way to Himos and we had booked hotels there to get some rest outside the festival mess.
Mikko was really, well, in mid summer condition and I had my hands full saving him from the older Tampere ladies at the bar
after arriving at our hotel. He’s a handsome guy, you know.

Himos was also very well organized. We had this kind of a summer cabin to share with Miss Paula Koivuniemi,
our Guitar tech’s Karris favorite singer and former employer. It was pretty warm when we got on stage and after the third
song the sun went down and it got really cold. I nearly lost my voice.

I drove home with Janne in the night and I was home already at 2 AM. That was a good choice not to go with the buss
with the guys drinking and all. I went to gym at eleven.

Athens, Greece – Mad TV awards

We had never been to Greece before and I really didn’t know what to expect. The only thing I knew about the country is that
they got great food, extremely great looking ladies and that they won the Eurovision song contest one year before our Lordi
raped the system with his Hallelujah’s. And of course they are European football champions form two years ago. And well…
most of the western philosophy and justice system comes from there. We were gonna stay at a hotel right next to
the Acropolis hill. I hope Zeus and guys let us have some sun…
And sun we got! It was 44 degrees in the day and the sun had no mercy for the Finnish skin.
Already at the rehearsals the day was so hot that I was afraid I’d melt. The days were pretty nice though,
we did many interviews at the hotel and had some other meetings by the swimming pool at the hotel rooftop terrace.
We wore only swimwear and we had the possibility to jump into the cool water every now and then if the
questions got too tough. From the rooftop we could see how huge Athens is.
The show was just amazing and the way the audience reacted on us was awesome.
We must get some shows booked in Greece soon!
They also speak really good English, they have subtitles on TV, David Hasselhoff doesn’t speak Greek.
The +12 and rain in Helsinki made me want to go back. We agreed with Jukka to book a holiday in Athens area asap.

Catania, Italy – Festivabar

It was nice to get a flight to Italy after nearly getting a cold in the rainy Helsinki.
I really like my country and all, but mostly I could easily life somewhere else. Somewhere warm.

Anyhow. We flew to Catania Sicily one day earlier with Sami and Raul since we had nothing to do at home.
It’s very nice to have a full day off in a place where you’ve never been before, go to the beach,
shopping and sure a nice dinner in the end. The weather was really nice, not too hot,
and we spent the first day pretty much in the sun and swimming in the Mediterranean sea.
There was this cool kind of a beach built on lava from the volcano Etna. And when you swim,
you’re surrounded by lava stones. Don’t get that in my country ;=)

Festivalbar is an event where they have many artists, local and international, performing for an audience and also TV.
It all happens a few times a year every time in a different city and it’s said to be popular.
We were the first band to perform and it was kind of funny to listen to the hosts talking about us in Italian before we entered
the sage. The only part we understood for sure was “Beachboys from Finlandia….?”

The crowd was really cool. The sound of my vocals was a bit funny in my ear monitors,
but I guess I was just a bit nervous. It’s been a while. I’m human too…

We had a nice diner with our local Product manager Valentina and everyone went to bed pretty early.
Wakeup was at 4.45 AM to get the first flight of the day. There’s three of them today.

On plane from Munich to Gothenburg, Sweden (we play there today)
I sat next to this Swedish guy and after traveling 30 minutes,
he asked me if I play in a band. I said the band’s name and he didn’t know us. Whaaaaat!!!
He’s from Sweden and he must at least know Fairytale, our first single there too.
So I gave him 5 seconds with my iPod and he knew the track immediately.

He is Mr. Anders Bonander from the Swedish national pistol team. They had just been
practicing in Zagreb to get ready for the European championships in Granada Spain in July.
Good luck guys!

We’re losing altitude slowly towards Gothenbugh airport. I’ll be fun today, the first summer festival in Sweden ever!

Blog from 17. Juli 2007

Summer driving & Flying through walls

Lakeuret ja Järvisuomi

I'm on my way to Copenhagen to shoot our next music video. I'm pretty tired a€“ I didn't sleep that much last night because
I drove through Finland with Sami (you can see some adult content at royalartistclub.con).
We played 4 festival shows in 4 days in Lohja, Tampere, Vaasa and Iisalmi.

We took my car with Sami instead of the buss to ride free. It's so cool to wake up at the hotel and just sit an hour at the
breakfast table and start driving when you feel like it. With the buss you must to have a clear schedule, it's so many guys.

The first show was at Lohja at Rantajamit (Isn't Finnish language funny ;).
All was ok apart from the weather but fortunately the whole thing happened in a huge tent.
The only thing I must say the Finnish festival organizers can't take care of is the privacy stuff.
It's only in Finland where you get to your dressing room after the show and it's less than a minute when people
are knocking the door to get autographs. Cultural thing. We drove home after the show to get deep sleep in our own beds.

The rest of the week we just drove with Sami in my car and listened to some great music.
Keith Urban's latest album was on for more than half of the time. It's soooo good!
At Tammerfest I experienced a fan attacking me for the first time.
It was this older drunk 'lady' who just walked to me as I was signing autographs after the show and she grabbed my balls.
I didn't realize how hard I pushed her away. She really flew a few meters against the fence and the security
fence went down. Primitive reaction. Fucking idiot! The faces of the younger girls were a bit shocked but you gotta
draw the line somewhere. I felt a bit bad for 3 seconds. On the other hand, some folks don't meet their fans and since
I and we do it, there's always a risk some one is a bit too excited.
It's funny how we've only had problems with these drunk 40+ ladies. All else has been pretty ok.
There was this one very drunk lady who forced herself into the backstage in Kuopio (Fin) and as I wasn't willing
to kiss her, she decided to throw up on the backstage carpet.

The third show in Vaasa was our first real touch with the summer rain on stage.
We had been really lucky with the weather so far but there it all changed.
In a way it was cool to get really in front of the stage in the parts I don't sing and just rock in the rain.
Sami had a lot of interviews that day alone.
He's from that area and he was the big star of the day! And he did a great job, I have a lot to learn from him.

On the way to the fourth show in Iisalmi, we stopped at Sami's mom's in YLISTARO.
It's where he's from and it's actually not the biggest city in my country ;=)
Her mother cooked us some home made food and even the potatoes were from their own field!! So tasty!

The weather in Iisalmi was pretty much the same as it was in Vaasa, but the audience was just amazing.
I mean they stood there in the heavy rain and were really loud. Usually when it rains it sure eats some of the energy.
12 minutes after the show, we already sat in my car with Sami on our way home. This is definitely the way to travel.
You get to your own bed for the night. My mother sent me a message yesterday that she had bought me new pillows
for my name day (you celebrate that elsewhere, right?) Not bad mom a€“ Can't wait to lay my head on them ;=)

Copenhagen Denmark - Heal Me Video

I've been in Copenhagen a few days shooting video for Heal Me. It's a very cool story with some more artistic shots
than what we have had in the previous videos. I flew through stuff, was in the ocean, was glued and all...
The TWENTYFOUR SEVEN production team lead by the director ANDERS WALTER (Who is the brother of the lead singer
of Danish band Grand Avenue - Check it out!) was so relaxed and nice that even though my days were really tough and long,
it was definitely enjoyable.

The rest of the guys did their part on Monday morning and I got a later wake up. They only stayed for a few hours
and I only saw them quickly. I had to do the acting - hope it looks gooda€... The feeling about the whole thing
is really good. We will get first drafts next week and the video will be released in the fall along with the single.
I am actually on my way from Copenhagen to Helsinki to our studio to record vocals and guitars for the acoustic version
of Heal Me. There will be many remixes and versions again, even a house remix, and that's so great that the record
company invest in us and let us play with our songs like that.

I didn't sleep that much in Denmark. Both of the days more than 10 days of work and I was already tired when I got there.
I hope I don't look to dead on the video. Copenhagen was really nice. The feeling was pretty much the same as it
was in Brussels. It's very continental European, but has the best pieces of London in it. Whatever that means...

I'll have a nap now with Keith Urban...

Blog from 21. August 2007

Changes in Sunrise Avenue

I established a band called Sunrise 15 years ago and later on changed the name to Sunrise Avenue.
There have been hard times all the way but the hardest moment for me and for all of us was 2 weeks ago when
we had to make a very hard decision.

A band is a very complex thing. It’s like marriage between the members and it’s much more than what people see and
hear on the outside. Sometimes bands spend whole moths together, day and night, and of course like all bands,
we also have had our stupid meaningless fights and disagreements. Everybody is tired and stupid things are said.
This case was not about who gets to sit next to the window in the car. It was something that had been going on from the
first recorded track at the studio. The reason we were able to go on together for so long is all the
success we have had with the support of our wonderful fans, but now even the gold awards weren’t
enough to cover the pain and to keep us together.

Why the change….

Nobody did a bad job and like in most of the relationships that end nobody was wrong or right.
The cold fact is that we simply didn’t fit into the same tour bus anymore and it would have been impossible to go on
and create new music together when the atmosphere is not healthy. Some of us have travelled to shows with our own cars
for months already because travelling in the bus felt unpleasant. That is not healthy but we really tried.
You can erase your thoughts for the 60 minutes on stage and show a happy face for the audience but you cannot escape
the feelings you have for life and if nothing changes, there will be the day you will have to make a choice.

You might ask why didn’t we try talking about it. Yes we did. And again, nobody was wrong or right,
we just saw the things so different that we never got to the point. If there is something wrong between two or more
people it’s impossible to clear the air if both / all sides can’t see or can’t accept the real problem.
It’s ok for some time to find peace for two weeks after every conversation and fight, but in the long run
it kills everybody to argue about the same things month after month.

I understand it is really hard to see the points from the outside, but I bet you all understand nobody would be left
out of the band without a reason. The cause has been there for a few years and the pain inside got tougher and tougher
the further we went. Every single person in our Band, Management, Record Companies and Live Agents understand
the reasons behind this arrangement and stand behind the situation fully. The band and myself asked for help in this
matter from all of them already last year but there was nothing nobody could do.

Digging this issue and reasons of it deeper now would only hurt both sides and especially Janne.
We will not build a soap opera around the situation. Nobody will get anything from that. We don’t want to publish
an open letter on our website about who did what and all. This is the bands internal thing and it shall stay like that.
As Janne says in his letters, we also would have done anything to avoid this mess but this time there was no other way.

We honestly wish all the best for Janne and his future from the bottoms of our hearts and of course we understand
the anger and all he is feeling right now. We respect and value the work he did for the band and he has gotten
and will get every credit for his efforts.

And we understand the confusion everybody around us feels right now and we can’t blame anyone for feeling sympathy,
sorrow or even hate. The last months and especially the last 2 weeks have been really hard for all the band members
and the folks behind us and we really hope you could all give us the peace to recover
and move on and Janne to build up his own future.

Sunrise Avenue will keep on touring, promoting and travelling just the way we have done so far.
For the next few weeks there will be a guy playing the guitar, not as a band member,
only as a hired musician. We will let you know as soon as we have a new guy, a new member in the band.

The shows in Gothenburg, Sweden yesterday and on Sunday were really great. We were really happy with everyone in the
audience and back stage and how the unnecessary chewing of the topic was skipped and we were able to focus on our jobs.
We really hope that would happen wherever we go. You should all know the arrangement puts us in a very tough place
finding and training musicians for the future. Still even if it’s a huge workload with our partly broken hearts,
the move we made was something that needed to be done. Otherwise there would have not been Sunrise Avenue at all.
The decision is final and there is no coming back.
Thank you for you patience and understanding,

Samu and Guys

Blog from 01. September 2007

Hamburg Radio promotion and Stars for free in Berlin

I’m sitting in my hotel room in Park Hyatt Hamburg and I just came from the gym. The day was pretty easy and relaxed.
We just drove around Hamburg and Kiel with our local Radio promoter Toby and visited all the radio stations around here.
A short stepper session and a long swim in the nice pool downstairs was the perfect thing for the evening before we have
dinner with the German EMI folks. I heard that the Swedish pop miracle Darin might also join us. He sings so well.
I’ll sleep like a baby as soon as I get my stomach full.

I arrived already yesterday and I had the evening free. As I was having dinner alone in the hotel restaurant,
my friend sent me a text message saying “Greetings from Hamburg…” I had no choice but to invite him and his two
colleagues to have a glass of whine with me. I thought my friend still works for one of the biggest TV and radio
networks in Scandinavia and I thanked them all for supporting our songs.
The fact was he had changed his job in JANUARY and the gang was pretty surprised for me being grateful for the
airplay support. They work with customer relations, nothing to do with pop music.
Time flies, doesn’t it. Wines on me anyhow.

It’s Thursday now and the rest of the guys will come to Germany on Saturday.
We perform in Berlin at this Stars for free event. The only one who arrived already today from his Swedish trip is Riku,
the guy who will play the guitar on stage with us for the rest of the year.
Riku is a nice guy and actually he was the first guy in Sami’s and my mind after the change in the band.
I met him for the first time in Helsinki after the New Year as I was having dinner with Jukka and his producer partner Aku.
Riku joined us then telling that Hanna, the Finnish Eurovision winner 2007 had just kicked him out off the band.
He had stolen the show from her, she had said.

The last weeks have been pretty hard for us all and there is still a lot of work to do and wounds to heal. Still I must say
I am happy how the fans, media and everybody around us have taken the challenge the band had to face.
It’s not easy at all, sure for nobody involved, but life will go on. For everybody.

I downloaded three albums from iTunes during the gym session to entertain me tonight.
Three musts; Iron Maiden’s Fear of the dark (yes!), Metallica’s And Justice for all and Sheryl Crow’s The best of.
I will listen to “If it makes you happy” before ordering a bottle of red wine tonight…

Blog from 23. September 2007

Poland – Germany – Greece

We made our second trip to Poland last week. We started the promotion trip from Warsaw where we performed at the
brand new Hard Rock Café. It was the first acoustic show with Riku on guitar and therefore it was good to have
3 hours for sound check. And the check was fun. We played all the worst Finnish schlager songs as the
waitresses were making everything ready for the evening. They thought we're crazy…

After a TV morning show the next morning on a TV building rooftop we started driving to Zielona Góra for a huge
TV show festival. The distance is 450 Km and it took more than 9 hours to get there, The driver was
so lost all the time and I must be honest and tell you we were pretty close losing our temper.
The roads were amazingly bad too. We missed the sound check (by 3 hours) and we had 11 minutes to prepare
everything when we got to the venue late at night before the show. Karri, our backline tech,
really saved the day and us in front of the 100.000 viewers + a lot of folks behind TV screens at home.
And experience anyway.

The show was cool and especially the dinner after it. In the morning we faced another traveling challenge when
the plane we were supposed to take back to Warsaw had never arrived the airport.
We had to take a Polish bus to the next city to get another one.
Even though our trip was full of challenges, all the folks were really nice all the time and we will definitely
give them another chance ;=)

Yesterday we performed in Rastatt, Germany at the New Pop festival. The venue was the Mercedes Benz factory
and actually the robots and engineers were at work and stopped only for the performances.
They also made the car builder robots "dance" with the music.
It was very cool apart from the fact that nobody told us we could have played one more song
since we were the last ones on stage. Felt so bad walking off the stage after only three songs….
We could have done many more.

Luckily today we play a 30 min set in Athens at the Taekwondo arena. I just spoke to Karri on phone asking if I should
bring some acoustic guitar strings with me to the venue if the ones on my guitar aren't ok.
I have some strings with me because I am staying 4 more days in Athens to write some songs and to relax.
The weather is just perfect. Anyway, Karri told me that the venue is amazing. Something very very old and there
is a great atmosphere. We'll see. I'll put my jeans on now and get to the lobby where the driver is waiting
for us to take us to the back stage….

Blog from 07. October 2007

Frankfurt acoustic & Wetten Dass in Basel Switzerland

I'm sitting next to Jukka in a plane from Zurich to Helsinki. His surname is Backlund and I'm Haber and since his
starts with B, he always gets the window seat. Daaaaamn!

We flew to Frankfurt on Thursday to perform at this RTL II party for their clients, advertisers and folks.
It was only four songs with the big acoustic setup and after that we were supposed to get back to the hotel
and sleep well to be fresh at the Wetten dass rehearsals the next day.

I don't know what happened, but as the catering guys kept on carrying extremely tasty tapas plates and drinks
to our back stage area, we just kept on eating and drinking. Finally Riku and Karri went back on stage to get our
guitars and we played and sang all night long together with the local RTL and other guys and girls.
They finally threw us out at six in the morning and we went to the hotel to be picked up one hour later.
I was an idiot and went to sleep (for an hour, what does that help???) but the other ones understood their
best and stayed in the lobby bar. And dear fellow citizens, we don't want to apologize Jukka's behavior
at Frankfurt airport in the morning… ;=) It was funny!

We slept the whole Friday and got ourselves back together.
They say Wetten Dass is the biggest TV show in Europe. It has more than 15.000.000 viewers.
It was probably the strangest thing we've taken part in. The Germans are betting some stuff like "I bet you can't
eat 20 eggs in a minute…" The lineup was cool; Avril Lavigne, Jamie Foxx & Jennifer Garner and us of course.
Avril's backstage room was three times as big as ours.

We were supposed to go to sleep early again last night, but somehow we ended up in this bar in the center of Basel.
I wouldn't say it's a party town based on what we saw but we found a very cozy bar where they gave us discount
for beers and Jägermeister because we play in a band…

The tour starts on Tuesday in Stockholm. Everything is set and I'm so much waiting for the few months on the road.
See you soon!

-Samu

Blog from 10. October 2007

Show must go on – Tour start

Samu, Raul, Jukka, Sami, Riku and the shaved Flight 97 in year 2007. I'm flying to Stockholm with Sami, Jukka, Raul,
Riku and the management duet Mikko & Bob. Today is the tour start.

This is the thing we have all been waiting for a long long time. We've been playing around Europe for a few years and
finally now we step in the bus to spend a few months on the road. When you do the fly in – fly out shows and festivals,
it can actually be a lot hared with all the flights and stuff. Usually you must fly in the day before to be there in
time to do all the interviews and checks for the show and then you must wake up the next day to get
the plane to the next city or home.

Now I will have a shower after the show, have a glass of wine and eat my stomach full and fall asleep with a movie.
The next morning (or afternoon…) I will wake up from my own bed in the tour bus not knowing where I am.
And of course there's promotion and stuff to be made but during these weeks,
the show for you guys and girlies comes first. The rest if there's time.

The tech crew Karri & MP (Backline), Gorilla-Mikko (FOH), Aki (lights) and Tuomas (Monitors) are already in Stockholm
putting the stage and stuff together with the local crew. Aki told me to bring this shaver to so I could shave his head ;)

The journey starts from Stockholm, then to Gothenburg and Malmö. Then one day off and to Oslo.
I guess we will spend the day off somewhere in Norway. I have never been there and we have this ski jumping thing
we might do at Holmenkollen. On Monday we start the Continental European part of the shows.

We feel really lucky being involved in something like this. I'm sure the trip will be hard and we will be tested big time,
but it'll sure mostly be a lot of fun. I hope we will have some time and energy to write songs with Jukka on the way.
I even brought my new (Olav Loef Hand made) "songwriting guitar" with me. Now it's definitely the time to
erase all the past, especially the unnecessary shit, from our minds to give you the best on stage.

Rock you soon!

PS: Thanx for everybody for voting at the MTV thing. The fight goes on…;=)

Blog from 13. October 2007

Oslo at night after Sweden

Here we are in Oslo Norway. It's actually the first time in my life in this country and I must say it's really nice.
I woke up at 11 AM in the bus as we were still driving towards the capital and we sat in the upper front lounge with Raul
"the Nutcracker" and it looked so beautiful. I don't know if it's the approaching winter or just the fact that Oslo
is so close to the big sea, but the air here is so fresh. It's good for you they say.

We slept the whole day at the hotel and Riku woke me up as Aku, Jukka's and my studio partner had woken him up to get
a contact with me. I had to pay this invoice for a mixing console we had bought for our studio in Helsinki
and I had totally forgotten the whole thing. After sending the money to Sweden we walked to the center with Riku
and had a nice non-fat-free dinner at Fridays. Riku kept on inviting the locals to the show tomorrow
as I focused on getting my stomach full…

The three first shows in Sweden are behind now and tomorrow we play for the Norwegians.
The first show in Stockholm was not probably the best we can do on stage but in Gothenburg and Malmö we were a lot
more relaxed and things worked out better for the whole crew too. I guess it's kind of a "first game of the season"
that also goes for the first show of the tour. All three shows were still very much fun and I must say the Swedish
audience was really cool again, even though all the clubs weren't sold out at all.

I was also a bit worried how they'd take Riku on guitar after the change in the band, but after we all saw how he took
the audience in all the cities, the new guy on stage hasn't bothered us at all anymore.
We had heard a lot of good about him before we got together and got on stage together,
but when we really were up there with him I understood what the people had been talking about. He is awesome.!

The setup is not easy for him either. He has to fill the bots of the former lead guitarist and even if it's only
a handful of fans that have insisted Janne back in the band, I'm sure he kind of realizes the past of the group.
I just hope Riku will get the peace to do his job and we could all remember that he has nothing to do with getting
rid of one past band member. He is actually the one who is saving the tour. And all this really went well in Sweden
– 10 points for that. Tack so mycket. Vår mamma sager att vi måste äta mycket mera grönsaker!

The band has never been as good on stage as it is now. It amazing in a way because the challenge to find a new guy
and all on stage + a new monitor mixing guy Tuomas after MP started working as the second back liner has kept our
hands full. Actually we didn't have a chance to practice the set together before the Stockholm show but now we are
back on track. We had a few glasses of wine at this jazz bar this evening and Sami and Raul said that they haven't
been this happy for the whole time they have been playing together with me and I must share their emotions.
The atmosphere is just awesome.

The show must go on. I can't wait to get back on stage again…. Rock you all soon!

Blog from 18. October 2007

Oslo-Hamburg-Magdeburg-Berlin-Vienna

I'm in a plane on my way to Vienna, Austria. Flight 98 this year, still counting...
It was supposed to be our first day off in Germany, but Riku and I will spend it promoting the album,
DVD and the tour in Austria. The Austrian EMI girls are very cool and relaxed and it will feel like a day off.
The last time it was just so much fun to see them park the car in the radio station garage.
Took ages and finally I had to do it.

We kind of owe the day for the Austrians. The last time we were supposed to do promotion there,
we had to cancel everything because of the chemistry problems in the band and probably because of the fights
and stress I got really sick and we had to cancel all the shows and everything for a couple of weeks.
And of course we needed to find a new guy to play the guitar too. But we're fully back up now and it's a good
way to give a little payback to the Austrian promotion team and of course the fans who missed the
shows and stuff the last time.

The tour has been just amazing. Really amazing. The set we play is kind of long but it goes by so fast.
Soon you're playing Wonderland and the end is near. We have been really shocked with the amount of listeners
in ever city. There are 18 shows in Germany alone and still there's enough people for every place.
Being on stage has felt more and more relaxed after every show and probably it was good to start with a bit smaller
crowds in Scandinavia and then hit the bigger Central European clubs. Yesterday the bigger production and our own
big stage worked like clock. The local crew and of course our own boys Karri, Mikko, MP, Tuomas,
Aki and Basty are doing a fantastic job.

I was a bit worried having 11 guys inside the two-floor bus for such period. I mean we never really traveled this much
together, not this tight. So it's the band and our own crew and Basty the tour manager who share the space.
But somehow it feels as if the bus is half empty in the night when we drive to the next city and that's good.
There's a huge lounge downstairs with DVD, Play station, kitchen, WC and stuff.
The upper floor has 12 beds and two cool lounges in both ends with all audiovisual equipment.
It's so cool to play the guitar in the front and see the cars go by. As stupid as it sounds,
we all hated sleeping in a nice hotel on a day off in Hamburg. Everybody agreed with Sami who said at breakfast
that he had missed the bus bed and the rest of us. I'm sure all this will change as we spend some more days together.
We will get enough of each other. But all feels very cool so far.

And one thing…. Every time we've played Fairytale Gone bad, there's been a lot of people raising some kind of signs for us.
The first show in Hamburg is said "JEE, " in Magdeburg "NOW" and yesterday in Berlin "WE" and I must say yesterday
I was already waiting for the words to appear. Somebody said it would go through the whole tour. NOOOOOOOOO!!!! ;=)
I can't sleep until I know what the whole story is. Maybe "Jee, Now we can celebrate HIFK as the new ice hockey champion
of Finland…" Could it be…? Anyway the trick is really cool and who ever are behind it have given us some odd but nice
feelings on stage. I can't wait for the next show and the next word.

Our driver Mr. John Dear told me there would be new clean sheets in my bed when I come back tomorrow.
It's not that I drool much, just to keep it clean. He's a cool guy, somewhat scary when you first meet him,
but inside he's a real teddy bear. I'm sure he will learn to love my car and the Finnish Kummeli Movies.

So we're about to land now. I'm gonna wake Riku up and put his seat in the upright position. I hope Jukka,
Sami and Raul are having fun in Berlin & Dresden while we have to work ;=) Jukkas producer partner Aku is also still
in Berlin together with my singer colleague Max "Maximilian Largo" from the Band Killer Aspect.
Could bet that they are snoring off their hangovers…

Rok U Soon,

PS: Remember to vote at the MTV thing!

Blog from 23. October 2007

Dresden – Leipzig – Erfurt - Hannover

I am having dinner with Sami, Gorilla Mikko, MP and Riku at Crown Plaza, Hannover. Mikko, MP and I have goat cheese
with bacon for starters, Sami and Riku took a salad. How healthy are they!
Main courses are fish recommended by the waitress. The red wine we have is made by the Fetzer Corporation in America.
The best US wines in my opinion.

Yesterday was the first real day off for Riku and me. The last day there was no show we had the trip to Vienna and
even though it was really relaxing and well organized, I must admit the two morning flights messed my tour rhythm
and I was really tired for a few days. Normally I like to stay awake after the others go to sleep at night and just
write some lyrics, watch a movie or do something alone. Then I go to bed at 3AM and usually really wake up at 1 or 2 PM.
You need to sleep a lot on tour and actually I have never slept this good in my whole life.

I feel like shit today. The back stage at Dresden was pretty cold and we all felt something in our throats and noses
after the show. It's annoying when someone gets sick in a gang like this; everybody gets it sooner or later.
Jukka has felt really bad already for three days and yesterday he had a really high fever.
Even if I told him not to rock & sweat that much on stage the last few shows,
he just couldn't help it. Our little fighter ;=) I had 5 hot drinks with boiling water,
rum, honey and lemon last night before going to bed and actually I was able to sleep for 12 hours.
I feel a bit better now but I must take it a bit easier on stage today.

The shows in Dresden, Leipzig and Erfurt were amazing. I was a bit worried if there would be enough listeners every night.
The distance between the last three cities have been less than 150 Km but the rooms have been full and the folks have
been so loud and fantastic.

I will have some tea now with Sami's some kind of miracle medicine. I will skip the sound check and try to get some sleep.
There are some fans outside the venue next to our bus and I hope they don't mind skipping the photos and
autographs this time. Jukka said he's feeling better already so maybe I'll be fine soon too. The show must go on…

Blog from 26. October 2007

Hannover – Braunschweig - Dortmund

I just came back to the hotel from the center of Dortmund with Jukka. We all slept the whole day first and after the
snoring we needed to do some shopping. It is just amazing but I have almost won my flu already even though it started just
a few days ago. I must say the show in Hannover was really painful and I honestly had to focus on staying on my feet.
My throat hurt like hell but amazing as it is, it was still a lot of fun. Mostly because of the great audience.
I was so sure I was gonna be too sick to sing at all in Braunschweig but no. Sami's and our Driver John's miracle
medicine helped. And of course the 12-hour sleep in the buss. John even gave me an extra pillow to make it comfortable.
He is a real teddy bear! And probably the hot rum drinks had something to do with it too. Anyway, it's really nice
to be back on my feet. I must say the thought of canceling a show or two because someone's sick doesn't feel nice at all,
but of course that might happen in the future. This time we were tough enough. Jukka is also feeling far better.
We saw the crew guys downstairs when we got back to the hotel with Jukka and they said they all feel a bit bad.
Hope it's not their turn. The two shows, especially the way we do it sweating so much,
is definitely not what the doctor told me to do to get better,
but I must say it's amazing how much energy you get from a great crowd.

Our back stage was really cool yesterday. It was this small club with a real bar and sound system and we had a huge party
there after and before the show. Sami and Gorilla Mikko were the DJs and the musical menu was mostly Ramones and other
credible rock. Well Jukka and I stood by the venue gates after the show with some folks who'd been to the show but some
of the lovely girls from the crowd assisted us with getting some drinks outside while we took pictures together
with the others. I could stand there for hours every night but sometimes it's just so cold and you must think about
the shows the next days and you must get into the bus to stay warm. You don't want to risk the next few shows because
of a few more autographs. So everybody felt a bit tired today after partying and especially after Riku's Bacardi Cola
session in the bus on the way to Dortmund.

I must say Riku has done a great job so far. The boots he stepped into are not easy to fill at all and even though our
songs are not Mozart or Vivaldi level difficult, he has done a brilliant job. I also feel really happy how the fans,
listeners and media have taken him more as a musician and the savior of the tour than a guy who's standing on someone
else's spot. Personally I must say I have never been this happy traveling with anyone and even though many of us have
been sick and some times tired too, the atmosphere is just awesome. I hate to think that there are only 18 shows
and then we all must go home.

I had a chat with our management today and I was told that the MTV European Music Awards thing is getting really tight.
There are seven bands left and every day they drop one more. Only the top three get to join the MTV awards in Munich
next week and of course I am hoping for the best. The message we got today is that we still have a chance but it is
really a tough fight between the seven bands left. I believe in the folks who support us and no matter what happens,
I know a lot of people have been clicking their fingers blue with this one. Would be cool to be able to thank them all
every now and then. Angels. Of course it would be nice to get to perform for hundreds of millions at the awards,
but I decided not to think about it from the very beginning that much.

I'll go to bed now and try to get up early in the morning for a little gym session. Good night everyone, wherever you are….

Blog from 29. October 2007

Dortmund - Osnabruck – Köln

I can't sleep…

I'm in this very nice hotel room in Cologne and we had this tiny party today with Jukka, Raul and some EMI folks.
The bus dropped us in front of the hotel at 12 in the day and I had to continue sleeping until 6 PM in my huge room.
I just can't get it why I sleep so much and so well on this trip. We saw some Kummeli movies (Great Finnish humor)
with Jukka all night in the bus and fell asleep at 5. Still laughing.

Now it was only 2 shows and again a day off. I guess that is a great way to tour; a day off after every 2 shows.
Especially when some of the boys are ill like now. The flu has left us alone and apart from some crew
members everybody's feeling all right.

We played for 2 amazing audiences again. The loudest audience so far was, no question in Dortmund.
It was a sold out club with some 2000 listeners and I actually had to remove my ear monitor from my right ear a couple
of times just to hear the real sound of the crowd. Osnabruck (never honestly heard of the place before)
was also very nice but very hot too. My jeans were all wet from sweat after the show.
The venue is in the middle of nowhere and as we arrived there in the night at 2 AM the club was still open.
We went in with Jukka, Monitor Tuomas and Gorilla Mikko and we saw this guy (40+) dancing in a mini skirt.
Nice. Seemed as if the party couldn't get better ;=)

I tried to climb over a fence in Dortmund after the show to meet some folks that have been to the show and I hurt
my arm pretty bad. I didn't see the spikes that were up there up on the iron fence to get rid of the birds and their shit
and I hurt my hands pretty bad. Our driver John cleaned my hands with Absolute Vodka to avoid any bad infections.
THAT HURT…… Amazingly the hands are ok now and we can go on….

It's amazing how much dirty clothes you get traveling like this. Today we visited some local EMI folks homes to clean
our clothes with Jukka. They also fed us and gave us some red wine. They are an EMI couple working for us together
and ULI, the guy actually is also recording with his own band and Jukka was able to give him
some recording and mixing tip in return.

It'll be so cool to play the Cologne Ewerk again tomorrow. That is where we shot the DVD that is out now.
Feels like coming home. My mom and Mikko the guy who once sold his house in Helsinki to pay the studio costs are going
to see the first show on this tour and that makes it even more exciting.
The Ewerk is a big hall with a lot of air inside even when it's full of music listeners and I am really looking for that show.
Köln is also my favorite town in Europe. Again today as we arrived here, I felt like I could really live here.
Köln is a very open minded gay-city and the atmosphere is just awesome. And even though I really like girls,
the open minded feeling makes you feel ok even though you come from my Country.

So… I'll try to sleep a bit now. I have 8 hours in bed until the bus will pick us up in front of the hotel.
I already missed the morning take off twice on this tour and have been following the bus with taxi after a few hours.
Tomorrow I will be there in time and get to my booked gym at one in the center.

Can you believe it's only 4 bands left ion the MTV voting. Well, no mater what happens,
life will go on and even if we don't get to the top 3 to be able to perform at the gala,
the fans have made a terrific job. But of course I have faith in our own gang.

I will try to sleep now. The bed is huge and kind of inviting. Rock you soon.

Blog from 03. November 2007

Saarbrucken - Nurnberg

We had two relaxing days off in Nurnberg historical and beautiful city and everybody was supposed to have all the energy
in the world to rock the stage again. Yesterday we had dinner together with our German crew in the center.
The crew is doing such an amazing job and all the guys are really cool. It'll be a challenge to find guys like them when
they leave us after the tour. Their next project is the Nightwish European Tour.

Unfortunately some of us got this stomach flu from the food we had yesterday.
I'm not going to say the name of the restaurant because the illness could be caused by something else too. Anyway.
I was feeling a bit odd in the morning and I slept very bad. You know this kind of feeling that you're too weak to get
out of bed (actually pretty normal for me in the morning ;) and you feel like throwing up all day.

I was feeling bad all the way to the moment I saw the security guys open the club's doors for the audience today but
then suddenly it got better. Jukka had been sleeping the whole day complaining about the same stuff.
And also Tuomas, our monitor guy. And we all had the same food yesterday. Right before the show everyone seemed
to be ok and usually even if someone has a flu or fever we are still able to make it through the show.

The venue (Löwensaal) in Nurnberg was the hottest place I have ever played at and the amount of sweat was amazing.
I saw sweat drops falling from my fingertips already on the second song and that means there's a lot more to come.
The light control console broke because of the heat and the crew had to steal Sami's fan that keeps him cool
during the show. They needed it more to cool down Aki's lightning desk and equipment.
That's how hot it was. When Riku was playing his solo, Jukka said he couldn't make it until the end of the show.
He has played for you guys and girls in very high fever just like all of us, but this time the look on his very pale
face was more serious than ever. He promised to try to do Fight til dying and Fairytale but then he kind of fell down
and had to go to the back stage to wait for medics.

It was a bit strange playing the end of the set only with Sami, Riku and Raul and a keyboard standing alone in the dark.
I felt a bit sorry for the people who missed a few songs and most of Jukka-Energy because one soldier
was down but hey, what can U do?

Now we are in the bus on our way to Giessen. I'm watching Collateral in the upper front lounge with Riku,
Jukka is trying to sleep alone on the sofas in the back. The rest of the gang is either sleeping in their beds or playing
play station Soccer downstairs. I hope Jukka gets better for the show tomorrow. I really don't want to skip it.

The MTV EMA stuff went as it did. I don't feel sad or bad about it at all. The only thing I feel kind of sorry for,
are all the wonderful people who were fighting so hard to get us there. The truth still is that we have already gotten
so much in a very short time and nobody can have everything you see in the horizon. It would have been cool to get there,
sure, but especially after I saw how the three finalists were together on stage waiting for the final results,
I don't know if I really would have wanted to be there. Just like Miss Europe finalists.
There were two losers and one winner. Thanks for all the votes and all the efforts.
We will never forget how you fought for us.

I will check Jukka's condition now and then start the next movie with Riku.
It's funny how we end up on the same sofas in the front with him almost every night watching a movie, just the two of us.
Everybody in the bus have their silly routines. Just like Sami arranging all his DVDs on the shelf above his bed.
I bet they are in alphabetical order now too ;=)

Our Driver John will give me only one glass of wine tonight. I had said on TV in Austria that that's how he treats us
every night. He gives us one glass of wine and puts us to bed. He had been watching PRO7 TV channel in his hotel
room and saw me saying that. He said it's only one glass for me this night since I said it on TV ;=)
I will find the hidden bottles... I'll find them!

When we left the venue after two hundred autographs tonight,
John took us to the legendary Zeppelin Field in the Nurberg city where Mr. A Hitler used to do his speeches
for the huge crowds. A really cool spot. That's also the place for Rock Im Park where we performed on the main stage
this summer. He knew most of the SS buildings and stuff in that area and we got a free
sightseeing tour and a free history lesson.

I cross my fingers for Jukka's condition and for the show tomorrow....

PS. Jee, Now we are in wonderland where we want to stay together 4ever….. And counting!

Blog from 08. November 2007

Giessen – Wurzburg – Stuttgart – Kempten – Munich

I just woke up (2:30 PM) in my bed as Riku was watching Sheryl Crow live DVD in the front lounge.
First I was a bit angry for the loud sound but then I couldn't help myself enjoying her great voice.
Whatta great way to wake up.

I told the guys last night I would arrange a trip downtown to gym for all who want it,
but obviously it's too late now. I told them to wake me up at 12. Nobody did. Nobody dared to wake
up the sleeping baby. Or then they were afraid of my reaction. I am not a morning person…

It is the last show in Germany today. It's amazing how fast time goes by. When I looked at the list of shows
in the beginning, I thought it would be a lot of work and a hard trip. It could be pretty tough performing three
nights in a row but I must be honest it feels like holiday. Our live agent said this might be the last time we play
in smaller cities in Germany. Next time it could be only the bigger towns, such as Hamburg, Berlin, Leipzig, Köln,
etc, but I must say the atmosphere has been just super everywhere. And the clubs have been so full. Luv it ;=)

I must mention one of the highlights of the tour in Wurzburg celebrating Riku's birthday.
We splashed a Tiramisu cake onto his face after the last song on stage and some of the clothes still smell like
Mediterranean dessert. I hope somebody got that on youtube or something.
The club looks very nice today. Yesterday it was pretty cold, I mean they turned the air-conditioning very cool
before the show and especially when there are these small breaks for me, I should have brought a huge towel
or something to keep it warm. Luckily the audience was warm, again ;=)

I have two Finnish friends visiting us today, One from Milano and one from Helsinki. They are the same guys who
drank all the beers and other liquids at Rock am Ring back stage in the summer and I guess we'll have a tiny party
tonight down town. I will stay in Munich with them for one night and we will drive to Linz tomorrow.
The Italian guy came with his car. It took only a few hours from his home, that's how south we are now.
The rest of the band and crew will drive to Austria tonight.

The rest of the tour will be pretty easy. First we play in Linz, then day off. Then shows in Vienna and Graz and
a day off again. Then shows in Solothurn and Pratteln and a day off before the final show in Continental Euroipe
in Zurich. I guess there will be a "tiny" party after the Zurich show and actually we fly back home the next evening.
We end the tour in Helsinki (Nov30th) and Seinäjoki, Sami's home town (Dec 1st). I still don't know for sure what
will happen after that. There are so many plans going to new continents, recording new songs, finishing the new studio
in Helsinki and all, but let's see after the show in Seinäjoki.

We have had two support acts in Europe. German Cristian Venus (and his hilarious band;) and the Danish Grand Avenue
(In 5 cities). The singer of GA is the brother of the guy who directed our latest video Heal Me. Grand Avenue sounds
so much bigger that Sunrise Avenue… We might change the name to Sunrise Highway.

In Helsinki we will be supported by Killer Aspect and Giant Leap, both from My Country, and the last show we play
together with KA only. Killer Aspect is the band whose album Jukka is actually finishing right now and it's supposed
to be ready until the end of the year if all plans go well with our new studio. You gotta check them out.
Their drummer Teijo plays on our album tracks like Diamonds, Choose to be me, Heal me, etc and we are pretty close
friends with the guys. Their singer Max has the coolest boat on the planet.

I feel very lucky and happy with the shows and crowds we had I Germany. I will miss this part of the tour and all the
folks working and rocking together. But I'm sure the Austrian and Swiss shows will be very cool too.
They are the first real club shows we play there and I hope there seeing us.
I heard that Zurich is sold out and that is a good sign.

Vielen dank für alle Deutschland! See U soon again. And Austria and Switzerland, here we come ;=)

Blog from 12. November 2007

Munich (Night off) - Linz – Vienna

I just woke up. The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes, was this room service woman in front of me with a look
on her face saying, "Mr.Haber has over slept…." Sorry….

I had decided to complain about the internet connection failures and all at the reception, but since I was the one
who was late and the girl at the desk smiled so nice, I decided to skip it.

I stayed in Munich after the show and my God that was one party. My friends from Milan had planned the whole night for me.
The rest of the band & Crew took the bus straight after the show and a few autographs to Linz Austria.
I found myself in my hotel bed at 9 in the morning after experiencing all the high and low class clubs of the town.
The best one was probably Pascha (can remember how it was written). I even lost my phone in a unofficial
(Albanian or something) "taxi" in the morning but the nice guy driving it brought it back after I promised to pay
the full value of the Nokia.

The Milan guys were traveling by car and so they gave me a ride to Linz where I had a full day off.
The city was very nice, although I wasn't in a condition to enjoy it with a full heart.
Shopping at the local H&M and Peek & C-something felt a bit unpleasant without eating anything the hole day.
I fell asleep before midnight.

The show and the venue in Linz were just great! It was the first club show in Austria and we really
didn't know what to expect. The only experience we had with the Austrian audience was the Novarock Summer festival
in Nickelsdorf and that had been ranked as one of our best audiences ever. That brought the expectations a bit higher.

But the night was perfect apart from my bleeding hand. I cut my finger in the morning at breakfast cutting the bread
and the wound wasn't that bad before the show until I started to annoy the cut in my hand with the guitar strings.
There was so much blood and the looks on the faces in the first rows were funny. I survived.

Yesterday we had a day off in Vienna and the evening was filled with music. After an early dinner we went to the
center to listen to some of the local "pop stars" composers. It was a quintet playing the masterpieces of Mozart
and of course since we were in Vienna, the second half was stuff from Mr. Strauss.
I must say some of my hair is still up towards the sky after the experience. There was also a female singer and two ballet
dancers performing in some of the tracks. Very nice. I can recommend it to anyone visiting the Austrian capital.
The classical journey was a gift from Jukka, our musical mastermind.

After Strauss and Mozart we took a taxi to a different cultural event. We went to see the show of LOVEX, our Finnish
pals in the center in a very small club. The guys are also on tour and actually in Munich the played just next door but
we didn't have a chance to meet them then due to the interviews and all. Theon & gang even played Bon Jovi's Runaway
for us Sunrise guys ;=) There can never be too much BJ played in any part of the world.

I fell asleep at 12 in the night and I don't know why but I woke up at 4 in the night. First I tried to force my self
back to sleep, but it didn't work. Finally I gave up, opened the mini bar and started writing lyrics for the new songs.
My hotel room was on the top of the hotel in the Center of Vienna and I saw the whole city under me through my window.
The snow we had here yesterday had melted and the wet city streets looked so lonely and peaceful.
What could be more inspiring?

Blog from 13. November 2007

Gold in Austria

We played one of the coolest shows of the tour yesterday in Vienna at the sold out Vienna Arena and the local EMI
had arranged a very very very nice surprise for us after the show. The album had reached the gold limit in Austria
(more than 15.000 sold units) and Fairytale gone bad is the most downloaded song of the year
(more than 22.000 legal downloads).

I have no words to thank you enough. Go Österreich!!! And rock you gain today.

Thank you!

Blog from 17. November 2007

Graz – Solothurn show & Day off – Pratteln

We just arrived from a signing session at the Media Markt record store with the guys and now we are having dinner
at the catering area at Pratteln Z7 club backstage. Probably the best insalata caprese on this trip.

I hate the fact that there will be only two shows more on the tour and then we go home. It helps a bit to know that
there will be two shows also in my country the NOV 30th and Dec 1st but I must say the trip has topped
all my dreams in many ways.

I know my mom has cleaned my whole apartment ten times while I've been away to make it nice for me to come
back home… And Mom, if you read this, it was not a suggestion ;=)

My gym and jogging rhythm has gone very bad on the trip. That is probably the only downside there is.
Like in Solothurn on the day off I was supposed to go working out in the morning of the show day and have a nice sleep
the night before but Jukka said we needed to plan some recording stuff for the next album that we start
working with in January. We were supposed to have the famous "one glass" of red wine in the lobby bar.
After a BOTTLE of wine we decided to head downtown for one more "Glass." We found this really nice bar full of men
and on the walls they had pictures of topless guys. It was a gay bar, of course. They folks were very funny and they
treated us like any regulars. I even tipped the waiter putting 10 Euros inside his shirt.
So much for the gym the next morning.

As we finally found our way back to the hotel, the rest of the guys were trying to save Riku's MAC.
I had bought an external hard drive to keep his important files during the new system installation,
but of course I had forgotten to make it mac suitable. MP, Raul and Sami were all sitting on the hotel floor fighting
with the missing files… Oooops.

I was so sure I would die on stage in Solothurn because of the after shock of the gay bar drinking, but again,
the show and the audience was very cool and enjoyable. It's so great how in every city
the folks in the audience have taken us.

Tomorrow is the last day off and then the last show… The highlight for me is that my little sister is coming over
to the Zurich show. She's only seen a few shows in Finland and that was before the audiences got a bit bigger.
Her being there gives me extra energy. She has been one of the biggest supporters for me going on with my music when
the times have been hard. She's coming together with my mom and her most of you people already know.
She is there all the time ;=) It's her third of the fourth show on this tour. Sweet!

I will join our support act Christian Venus and the band on their sound check. Hope they don't mind.
I wonder if they'll give me a guitar.

Our song CHOSE TO BE ME got selected as the theme song for BIG BROTHER Germany next year. Pretty amazing.
The album has been out for almost 18 months and there is nothing new in that way for anyone.
I hope we get to visit the house in the spring ;=) I could never take part in a program like that.
On the other hand we are living our own BB life inside the tour bus with the hairy tech crew.

I have fallen off the stage or the raisers only once so far on this tour and I didn't hurt myself that bad.
Our tech guys say I must cool it down a little. They sat they must close their eyes especially when we play DESTINY.
Especially in the end when I jump around. I can't get it. I have full control of my long legs and it's so much fun ;=)

Blog from 21. November 2007

Zurich – Home sofa

I woke up this "morning" at 3 PM on my new sofa they had brought to my new flat while I was away.
My head was still hurting after the party in Zurich we had after the last show in Central Europe.
I had to drive to the record company to get some paper work done and as I started my car and drove out of the garage,
I realized I must change my winter tires on. It's minus degrees and I couldn't live with
crashing my car because of the slippery roads…

So the tour is over for now. Well, we have 2 more shows here in my country but the 2-month trip and living together
with the band and the production is behind now.

The show in Zurich was just amazing. Super. And of course there was this extra charge in the batteries when every
one on stage and behind it knew there would be a few weeks off after it.
And my mom and my dear sister were there and they were in my thoughts most in a funny way even if I trid to avoid it ;=)
Our promoter had booked this private club for us with all the food and drinks and to be honest,
it was also one of the coolest parties ever. We actually didn't sleep at all before we had to leave
the hotel to the airport. Sorry for everyone staying at our floor.
There was a N.A.S.T.Y. after-after party at Riku's room. Hopefully there was nobody on a honeymoon at the hotel.
The noise sure would have destroyed all peaceful love plans.

The tour was the best 2 months in my life ever. When we started the whole trip in Stockholm, I was a bit nervous with
all the folks traveling together and cold weather attacking my throat and all but it all went so well.
I will miss our driver John and his two minded jokes and our humble German crew who made the stuff so great for us every
night. Still the biggest thing that amazes me still is the audience we had every single night.
I was wondering before the tour if there would be enough listeners performing in so many towns.
The rooms were so full in every place and most of the shows were sold out. How great is that!

They say you get depressed after a tour like that at home if all goes well on the road. And I must admit I miss
it all already. Luckily I have so much to do that it's only in the darkness of the night when I have the time to think
about it. We must finish the album of Killer Aspect together with the band and Jukka & Aku and all the other stuff
from 2 months is undone in my studio room.

I must say we are the luckiest guys on the planet getting to be a part of a tour like that.
I can never thank everyone enough clapping their hands and singing our songs every night.
I can never express how great it feels.

We will have our brothers from Killer Aspect supporting us in the last shows in Finland and the tour finally ends
in the 1st of December in Seinäjoki, Sami's hometown. And in Helsinki the new great sounding Finnish Pop/Rock
band Giant Leap warm up the crowd before the KA guys. I heard that the tickets have sold very well and I guess we will
have two wonderful nights to end the whole year 2007 and the 169 shows we have played this year.

Thank you so much for the support, the very funny and amazing gifts and stuff and the moments together before
and after the show. We will rock you soon again… ;=)

Blog from 17. December 2007

Last words of Year 2007

Hey all,

I'm sitting at home on my sofa; the most comfortable sofa on the planet and it's only three more days before I start
my Christmas holidays. It's been pretty hard to relax after the tour, post stress I guess.
Once restless - always restless.

The year 2007 was one hell of a year for us. We played 169 shows, I had 105 flights and there were very high
mountaintops and deep valleys on the way here. It's all part of the game. We reached many of our dreams,
traveled to many new countries and experienced the coolest audiences ever all over Europe.
I've cried tears of happiness and also tears of pain and to be honest, I wouldn't skip a drop or one second of it.

In January we will get keys to our brand new studio in the Center of Helsinki with Jukka and his producing partner Aku.
I'm very happy we will have a place where we can start recording our next album in January with all the time we need.
If all goes well, the album will be released in 2008. It all depends on how much we need to travel to new continents.
I have a good feeling about the whole thing and at least so far there's no pressure with song writing and stuff
even though the first album did so well.

Jukka will be responsible for producing the album and therefore he might not join us for all the shows and activities
from January to July. It's up to him and the schedules. The album comes first now. We have decided together with him
that he will stay as a full member of the band. In the summer he decided to leave the band after the European tour 2007,
but since everything has been much better internally, he asked for a permission to stay.
This might mean you folks have been too nice to him ;=) I am personally very happy he's in.
The songs on CD or on stage would not sound near the same without his master skills. And his big blonde hair…;=)

Mr. Riku "Räjähde" will also be performing with us next year too. Let's see if he will become a full member
in the band too some day. We will have many long chats about his role in the future. We received very much positive
feedback about him and we must admit we all like the guy very much, but there's no rush to make any fast decisions now.
Let's make the album first and see where we are and what everybody feels when it's done.
Thank you all for taking Riku so well and friendly on the tour. I was personally very very nervous.
The situation was very difficult for all of us and for you listeners, fans and supporters too.

I hope the way we have handled you has shown how much we value your support everywhere we go.
The feeling in my heart is a mixture of love, thankfulness and also pride having the best and craziest people clapping
their hands in the audience night after night and establishing the coolest support websites and stuff.
I know the fact that I myself or Sunrise Avenue as a band wouldn't be anything like this without you and your efforts.

So once again... It's been one hell of a year and there are no words to express how thankful we are for all of you.
I hope you all have a great Christmas with your loved ones and let's keep on rocking in 2008 ;=) Jeeeeeeeeeeeee
Thank you & Merry Christmas & Happy New year 2008!

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