Poets of the Fall – Virgin Oil, Helsinki; December 8th, 2012

After an eventful year the day had arrived: the last Poets of the Fall concert of 2012 would happen at the Virgin Oil. B. and I had spent the previous night in Turku (already booked when the originally planned concert for that day was cancelled). We arrived in Helsinki in the afternoon, it was dark already. we fought our way through the snow to our hotel, got ready and spent the evening at the Virgin Oil’s bar, chatting over tea.

B. left for a while to get food when Petri arrived. We hugged and he sat down with me to chat for a bit. 🙂 B. returned, people came and went, a few stayed and apparently waited for the concert as well. The guys arrived and said hello to us. Jani, Jari and Captain got their Christmas candy and Jari finally received the second part of his birthday present and Marko thanked me again for the birthday present I had given him on the cruise.

Waiting. A. and her mom arrived, lter H. and S., lots of people whose names I don’t know, S. and M., P., T. and S. – when we lined up in front of the door it got crowded fast. The line was a bit chaotic as it is possible to line up from two sides. The fact that the cloakroom didn’t look like it was going to open any time soon didn’t make things any better. I really wish they’d find a better system for lining up there. However, what made the chaos perfect was the fact that the staff suddenly decided that we had to go back to the main entrance of the Virgin Oil to get our tickets checked and our hands stamped. WHAT? You’ve got to be freaking kidding me! How is this going to work? Of course they only told us in Finnish, so it took a while before the message reached everyone. We went in pairs and finally left our coats at the cloakroom too. Everyone was packed in a tight bundle at the door, not very comfortable. When they finally opened they told us to move back – sure, where to? Seriously, I felt as if I’d been transported back to Germany. *sigh* anyway, I did make it in first and secured a spot for B., A. and me. They got in behind me, only a guy and a girl who had arrived at the Virgin Oil almost as early as B. and I did were nowhere to be seen. We kept a place for them until they made it through. Finally I relaxed a bit. Phew!

We had some more waiting to do, time to get acquainted with those around me. We were all there for the same reason after all. The woman behind me told me I reminded her of a friend. Interestingly enough I had met her friend. Small world, really. We had a nice chat. 🙂 For a while we hope it might not be a midnight gig, but it was. I stood in my usual spot. left of Marko, in front of Jani. B. was next to me. H. and P. at the center/right. The group to my left passed out roses and instructed us all to sing “Happy Birthday” to Marko after ‘Temple of Thought’.

As usual, they kicked off the show with ‘Running out of Time’ and they rocked. They audience responded immediately – this was going to be good. Early on, Jaska threw a guitar pick to a woman in the audience. Without aiming anywhere in particular, he managed to throw it right into her cleavage. This caused much laughter. 😀

During ‘Temple of Thought’ Marko sang to H. and later on during the show he sang to the only guy in front row, which was funny, because he seemed a bit unsure about how to react. When the song was over we threw our roses and sang (or tried to). It was fun, but didn’t work all that well. They guys enjoyed having the roses though – they always make for good decoration. Marko used one of them to spank Ollie with it and Captain threw the last one back at the audience.

‘Cradled in Love’ was really beautiful that night. Over the course of the year I have learned to appreciate this song more and more and by now some of these words have a very special and personal meaning to me. This time, I held up my burning lighter during the entire song and when Marko saw what I was doing he gave me the sweetest smile. Jaska and Ollie were swinging their legs up and down in unison as they had done at the previous gig. They seemed to have practiced though –it was the perfect choreography. 😉

The guys were in such a great mood, laughing a lot and joking with each other. Jari was smiling the whole time and laughed at Jaska when he pretended to drink wine straight from the bottle. At one point Oll, Jaska and Marko were al twirling in circles. Jani took one look at them and decided that he was gonna do no such thing. The expression on his face was priceless. Captain was air drumming and during ‘Signs of Life’ Marko licked Jaska’s tattoo. Watching all this I could not help but laugh.

For some odd reason Jaska had a used rubber glove in his back pocket. At the beginning of ‘Late Goodbye’ Marko pulled it out and put it on for a while, replacing a few lines in the song with “and used gloves”. 😀 When I wrote about the Kemi gig last summer my friend P. had commented on Marko showing us his naked butt complaining she always missed the great fun. Well, not only did he do it again that night, he was also standing right in front of her. I totally cracked up and after the gig I could not help but ask her if that had been enough for her. 😀

Apart form all the fun the music was also exceptional that night. So much beauty, so much energy. For the encores they had a special treat for us. Once again they played ‘Salaisuuksia’ the song originally written for Johanna Kurkela. Before they started, Marko made quite a long speech, telling us that he was nervous about doing a song in Finnish. I don’t know what else he said, my friends didn’t translate every word for me. Either way, there was no need for being nervous, everything about the song was perfect. <3

These were only the highlights of one amazing gig. I could not have imagined a better last concert of the year. When it was over I hugged my friends, said goodbye to some and had drinks with the rest. I got to chat with Ollie a bit before we left to grab some late night food. We parted with one last hug, before B. and I headed t our hotel where we chatted well into the night. Can’t wait  to see you all again next year.

Poets of the Fall autumn tour – 14 gigs down, none to go. Last stop: home

Setlist

Running Out of Time
Diamonds for Tears
Temple of Thought
Cradled in Love
Locking Up the Sun
Signs of Life
Stay
Illusion and Dream
Jeremiah Peacekeeper
Kamikaze Love
Miss Impossible
Late Goodbye

Encore
Salaisuuksia (the Poets wrote this song for Johanna Kurkela)
Roses
Dreaming Wide Awake
Carnival of Rust
Lift