We arrived in a sunny Cardiff in Wales in mid afternoon. We had some time before soundcheck so me and David had a real walk around town to check it out. None of us had been in Cardiff before and i must say i was surprised. The first thing i saw when i jumped out of the van was a huge castle wall. I love castles so that made me happy right away. When we walked around the city we also looked at the beautiful church and surroundings. The architecture of Cardiff was very interesting i must say. Unfortunately most things were closed as it was sunday afternoon. Finally we sat down at Pizza Hut and had lunch and a Magners (i love the Irish Cider!)

 

The final show of this UK tour was great and we all had a good time. After a tough tour we now went to our "hotel" and slept a few hours until we had to jump in the van again at 06:30 this morning to go to Heathrow. During the flight back home to Sweden again i tried to make some general reflections of the UK trip but only had one thing in my head that kind of blocked everyting else preventing a general conclusion. Can someone please explain this UK-sink thing to me? One tap with icecold water and one tap with boiling hot water. Come on, it is 2013, i don't understand how to use this! This is useless to me! Please?

 

Now i am back home again, sitting i my sofa watching TV feeling great. I just washed my hands in our sink with only one tap, where you can actually chose any temperature you want, hahaha :-)

 

Anyway, thank you all UK Painheads for treating us so well during this tour! I am so happy that so many of you turned up and made our trip all worth it! 'cause i can promise it wasn't all easy! Thank you also for all your kind celebrations during my birthday.

 

 

Slow day, very slow day. Felt like the hours in the van from Glasgow to Derby would last forever... Finally we arrived, soundchecked, had some dinner and then had a good relax at the hotel before the show. The venue in Derby was also in a state where we decided to use our hotel room instead of the backstage, as the hotel was close enough to just have a walk there.

 

I read somewhere, i think it was at Facebbok, that we had people in the audience today that had flewn in to Derby from Dublin to see us. God dammit, that's what i call dedication! Thanks!

 

Today's travel goal is Cardiff. Tonight we have our last show on this UK tour and another 5 shows is history, and tomorrow we fly back home to Stockholm again.

 

 

So, my birthday went along fine. We had a log drive from Leeds to Glasgow and i was watching the beautiful Scottish landscapes on our way there. When we arrived in Glasgow me and David took a walk around downtown searching for any stores that would sell Whisky. I am a Whisky freak and especially the Single Malts from Islay. Being in Scotland i was sure i could buy some great Whiskys everywhere but after our long walk around the city we found exactly nothing! :-(

 

So we went back to the venue, did the soundcheck and then headed for the hotel. It was just one block away and we realized we had to use our hotel rooms as backstage areas as well, as the venue didn't have any. Well, compared to the Leeds backstage, it was a huge improvement! :-)

 

Before i went to the show i opened up my online app in my phone for Bandit Radio (the Swedish rock radio station) and listened when my daughter Kimmy celebrated my birthday live on the radio. She's just too nice :-)

 

Show went fine, and afterwards we went back to our hotel to change clothes again. Then we hit the streets of Glasgow to celebrate my birthday. We found this rock bar called "Cathouse" where we hang out partying until they threw us out at 4 am. Then we continued the party in the hotel, which the guards didn't like at all.

 

Today we have a long drive to Derby and it seems like most of us is slower than usual - i wonder why...

 

 

The trip from London to Leeds wasn't really what we expected. Some four hours drive was the plan but before we were really there it had passed over six hours. The whole evenings time schedule was fucked. Except from heavy traffic in the Leeds area the biggest issue was the major accident that had occurred in the highway between London and Leeds. What we had to see when we drove past this terrible accident made me feel really bad afterwards. I think this was the worst crash i have seen in real life and it kind of paralyzed my mind for some time afterwards, just staring out the window with an empty sight. I couldn't get the picture of that car off my mind. A Mercedes E-Class that is normally slightly under 5m long, was less than 1m long in this piece of wreck. Apparently it also had humans inside that pile of metal. Someone died there for sure and it was terrible to see. That someone ended his/her life on valentines day in the busy highway. It felt terrible. Life is not fair.

Anyway, the place we were originally planned to play in Leeds had closed down right after this tour was planned, so we had the choice of canceling the Leeds show and go straight to Glasgow, or play wherever they will welcome us in Leeds and do a punk show. If we're here we should play, right? So we did the punk show in the cellars of a hotel in Leeds. But it was sold out and packed.

Today we are driving from Leeds to Glasgow. We will start much earlier to make sure we don't end up two hours too late as we did yesterday. Today is also my birthday, and i never thought i would spend my birthday in Scotland :-)

Pain has been playing in UK a few times by now, but never as headline. I don't really know why this country has been left outside the rest of the european conquers where we have been doing that many times, but the requests from Painheads in UK surely demanded a try form our side. After the UK tour with Nightwish in November we announced a UK tour in February as headline act. You have asked us to come and we listened. So, this will be a very interesting trip to find out if you were right! :-)

 

I have found myself into very bad timing as usual. Having fever and a flu chasing me right now, so the early morning call to the airport in Stockholm was really tough this time as i hadn't really got that much sleep. After arriving in Heathrow we drove straight to the venue to start prepare for the show. After soundcheck we went to our hotel that was only 5 mins walk from the back entrance of  The Borderline, perfect distance (after being lost in the wrong streets a couple of times that is...). I could get some well needed rest and medication before going back to do the show.

 

When the show finally started it became pretty obvious straight away that we surely do have loads of Painheads around here in London. It was sold out and packed to the limit, great atmosphere and all good mood. Loud audience always drives the oveall energy in a show, and this was one of those shows for sure. Despite my rising fever and bad flu i got myself through the whole set without any major problems. Caughing and choking for air, feeling dizzy of course, but it all went fine. Thank you all Painheads of London!

 

After the show Jyrki 69 from the 69 Eyes visited us backstage for a while, then i took a walk back to the hotel, took two Nyquill and went straight to sleep. My fever was rising again and i needed to rest.

 

Now i am in our hotel waiting to get going. We have a 4 hour drive to Leeds today.

 

What? Really? I just checked my calendar and realized that our UK tour starts in less than a week. Hmm, i wonder what happened to time?

So, it is time to pick select what guitars to bring, take out the cases and bags from the storage in the basement, check the Eleven Rack and wireless system and get ready for UK. I wonder if UK is ready for us though? We have been in UK before, but only as support a few times and this is our first own headline tour. I am excited over the fact that we are finally doing this, and it feels a bit strange at the same time as we have been touring as headline many times in other regions. I really hope UK will be nice to us :-)

 

On wednesday we will all gather at Arlanda airport and start our journey to UK. We fly to London where we open up the tour, follwed by 4 other dates. I also realized i have to celebrate my birthday in Glasgow this year...