The Raven has landed (Back to the future, final part)

Raven. Black Raven.
They are actually to blame that I wound up living in Finland. In a way. They are to blame for many additional things. Being their drummer for over four years I learned a lot about the ups and downs of the tour life, about musical work ethics and, maybe most important, I learned a thing or two about myself. I saw a good chunk of the world. We toured almost the whole of Europe and the American west coast. Tokyo and Osaka in Japan were mind-boggling experiences. Playing a lot in Scandinavia brought me to Finland where I met my girl, so Black Raven is guilty of that, too. And I want to thank them.

Black Raven in 2004.

In the course of time I realized that I had just two conflicts stirring up inside me. I liked to play drums but I missed torturing my actual instrument, the guitar. Black Raven was always in full flow, no time for hanky panky. The other thing was the music itself. I have always liked R´n´R / Rockabilly etc. and always will. But my heart beats for punk / hardcore / metal and all what comes with it. I had to follow my heart and left the band in the end of 2007, nothing personal at all. We are still friends to this day. I´m happy that the band was never forced to take a break due to my departure. We found Fritzo, showed him the ropes and when I left he just took over.

Black Raven since 2007: Torsten, Fritzo, Julian. And yes, the tattoos are real.

To end the Back to the Future - trilogy it´s a pleasure to tell you that after my first six weeks over here, Black Raven came to Suomi. A weekender in Valkeakoski was on their tour schedule and of course I was in! Promoter and long term partner-in-crime Eddie had taken good care of me. He had made sure that there´s a spare seat for me in the van transporting the band to Hotelli Waltikka and enabled me to overleap certain obstacles on site. Eddie, if you read this: kiitos paljon vielä kerran! We met at the airport and it was strange to pick the guys up at the arrivals. It was like watching a tour video filmed by a fan but this time I was a spectator and a spectator only. I don´t regret leaving the band but of course there are sometimes situations when it would be cool to still belong to the gang. Every now and then I miss playing a show with them because it was always fun. Well, rest assured: That weekend we should have fun in spades!

I will not give you too many details but it was a great party. What I value most is that us friends had a lot of time to spend together, talking serious stuff and of course tons of bullshit. I also met other old comrades like the boys in the Beetle Crushers, Lou Cifer and the Hellions as well as scensters I hadn´t seen since calling it quits. Black Raven played a good gig as usual, the Beetle Crushers were incredibly tight and hungry after a long hiatus. Plus there were some great bands I hadn´t heard of before. Rockin´ 8-Balls (FI) blew me away (great singer) and the surprise of the weekender, The Town Rebels (GER) played some great tunes by Cliff Richard, The Tornados and other stuff that you hardly ever get to hear at these weekenders ("Oh woo-pee, it´s Cast Iron Arms or Twenty Flight Rock - AGAIN!"). They had good originals for that matter, too. Pretty impressive and memorable were Fritzo´s mostly successful attempts to defy gravity by piling all kinds of glasses, pints and bottles sky-high! Try that when you are sober but he had already problems to walk properly. Respect!
After too few sleep as always on the road we left the hotel Sunday noon. The weirdest feeling was to wave my buddies goodbye at the airport, them leaving for Germany, me staying here in Suomi. I think that in this very moment I finally realized: The raven has landed.

Make sure to check out:
  
www.blackraven.de
www.myspace.com/beetlecrushers
www.myspace.com/rockin8balls
www.myspace.com/thetownrebels