Poets of the Fall – Saimaa Open Air, Lappeenranta – Rauha; July 23rd 2011

When it was over, we all looked at our watches and didn’t believe that what felt like 20 minutes was really 45. How could time go by that quickly? The intro to ‘Dreaming wide awake’ seemed hardly over when the last chords of ‘Carnival of Rust’ rung out and the guys left the stage. But aren’t the best shows always those that are over in a heartbeat?

It had been cloudy most af the day, but about an hour before the Poets got on stage, the sun came out. There was no place to hide so we just had to live with the heat and drink lots of water. When the gig started, I forgot all about the weather, just smiled and watched in awe, screamed as loud as a I could and even jumped around.

The stage was pretty large and had a walkway into the audience. We figured that would be the perfect place for Marko to be so we stayed there. We were not disappointed – he moved around a lot, but played almost exclusively to us. Ollie and even Jani came out there too, so we had a great view of the action.

‘Dreaming wide awake’ kicked off the show and ‘War’ followed. It was unbelievable how much energy they guys had and the sound was just amazing. During ‘Locking up the sun’ Marko crawled on stage and rolled around right in front of us. It was much fun to watch and I enjoyed not taking pictures and getting lost in the music.

So many little wonderful moments happened, some of which I have already forgotten now as I type this and some of which will remain in my heart forever. One was when the girl next to me reached out for Marko’s hand, hardly able to reach him. He took her hand briefly, but they slipped. He shook a few other hands, then went back to her, she stretched out a little bit further and as a reward he held on to her hand for a while, singing to her. Sweet!

The most memorable song of the show, however, was ‘Diamonds for tears’. Marko had been watching the sky for a while and during ‘Diamonds for tears’ he beckoned the oncoming clouds with a gesture of his hand  and “crying heaven shed your diamonds”. It didn’t work at first, so he added “Come on God, give it your best shot!” – to all of our and Marko’s surprise the wind picked up  and it actually started raining. It was amazing and such a welcome cooldown. I remember opening my arms wide and welcoming the rain and a few others did too. It rained for a little while, then Marko decided “OK, you can go away now, thank you. Bring out the sun” and a few moments later it did and the sun came back out. Amazing timing that made the show all the more wonderful. Not even the skies can resist Marko’s magic. 🙂

‘Illusion and dream’ was beautiful as always. I never get tired of this song. ‘Lift’ rocked the house and had all of us screaming on cue and then it was already time for the encore. With ‘Carnival of Rust’ it was over and they had to leave.  I stood there dazed and with a huge smile on my face. What a fitting ending to the summer tour.

We were lucky and met all of them after the gig. I was busy taking pictures of others with the guys, finally got one with Jaska and Jani and took the chance to chat with all of them briefly. Ollie said there’d be more gigs in late November or December – I sure hope there will be. 🙂
Once they were gone for good, C., G. and I didn’t feel like sticking around. None of the other bands interested us and none of them could possible play a gig even close to what we had just seen. We left happily and ended the evening with a good dinner, reliving the moments.

Setlist

Dreaming wide awake
War
Locking up the sun
Given and Denied
Diamonds for Tears
Illusion and Dream
Lift

Encore:
Carnival of Rust