Tom Sawyer Guantanamera

Bela & Boris have nothing to do with Tom, but you gotta have a backround, right?

I´m long out of language courses now and for quite some time knee-deep in working life. That means speaking Finnish everyday without the grammatic safety belt, helmet or parachute only a teacher can provide. This beautiful language is like an electric eel, once you think you can grasp it, you´ll be left behind in shock.

Of course I can make myself understood most of the time and I also took a leap foreward concerning my puhekieli. I have noticed though that many grammatical forms have slipped my mind, I even start to forget how things are written correctly.

How do you conjugate verbityyppi 4 in past tense?
How many ä´s has this or that word?
And what is it´s monikon partitiivi?
K-p-t vaihtelu...aaaargh!

High time to do something about it!
Since I didn´t get around yet to check on upcoming courses suitable for my level this has to do the trick for the moment: Tom Sawyer´s adventures in basic Finnish!
Didn´t start reading yet but the blurb was surprisingly easy for my to understand. With this book I hope to combine entertainment with a learning effect. Infotainment, so to speak. Let´s see if my plan pans out.

SONG FOR TODAY:

Die Toten Hosen - Cunt in a Mirror

Chapeau!

I don´t care much for brands and labels, but this, ladies and gentlemen, is a real Stetson! The mad hatter across the street is having sales right now and the headgear is going for incredibly small money.

Had been wanting to check out the tiny shop anyway for a long time. Some days ago I finally did and after a little pirouette I decided on this cool flat cap. When being asked about the price the mad hatter hammered a few digits into her calculator.

"Well, it´s 70% off, that would be 14€ then."

Ha!
14€ for a Stetson, that´s almost for free!
Hats off to the mad hatter, long may she live.

Uudet verhot, uudet valot

Obviously I put some new curtains on the blog, some neon light, too. Time had come for a new look and I think it works pretty well. What do you think?

SONGS FOR TODAY:

Jerry´s Kids - Raise the Curtain


Accept - Neon Nights

D.I.Y. or die - Osuuskunta 82

Osuuskunta 82 is something I most definitely support! And if you live in the area (or the country, what does it matter) and want an independent venue that is unique, far away from corporate bullshit and in it for the cause, then you should, too. At the moment the cooperative is organizing gigs in Helsinki to raise money for a nice place to go insane. I caught a great punk extravaganza almost three weeks ago.

Fuck man, the leap year bestowed an extra day upon us and still I wasn´t able to eke out a review of that show. It took place in Merihaka, easily one of the ugliest parts of town and only a ten minute walk for me away. Go figure, haha! I was badly prepared that night, had left my camera at home and relied on the crappy substitute in my cellphone - big mistake.

Click to enlarge 

That´s not only a bummer because the "venue" Sir Oliver was quite a sight (a shabby corner bar amongst the concrete jungle) filled with punks and crusties, it of course also means no pictures from the bands playing that night.
Won´t happen again, that´s a promise!

Due to a growing Korsakoff´s syndrome it´s a bit too late for a proper review anyway, so I only give you this:

Check out Baltimor if you dig Iron Maiden on speed with growling punk vocals (my fave that night!), give Perikato a try if you are into speedcore à la Siege and D.R.I. (a-ma-zing drummer!), feast on Särkyneet if female-fronted power pop in Finnish is to your taste (very tight combo!) and absolutely lose it with Ydinperhe if you crave old school hardcore as much as I do (Finnish lyrics, 2 gals + 2 guys and did I already mention OLD SCHOOL?!).

Well, you´ll find all links below as usual but let´s go back to the main topic:
Osuuskunta 82. I guess I´ll put them on a pedestal now and instead of paraphrasing their pamphlet, I´ll give you the original flyer which was given to me at the show:

Make sure to check out:

Osuuskunta 82 (in Finnish)
Baltimor
Perikato (their complete tape on YouTube)
Särkyneet
Ydinperhe

Unruhige Zeiten

Patrik Viitala (bass/vox), Jan Ferres (git/lead vox) and Kristian Ketola (drums)

For a long time I´ve made noises and insinuations here but now it´s high time to let the cat out of the bag: di unru is ready to strike!

The odd band name derives from the phonetics for the ambivalent German word Die Unruh. It means that little balance wheel in clocks and watches which makes them tick, as well as unrest, riot or turmoil. Yeah! We chose the moniker because it represents the lyrical content of the songs very well. Cynicism for the dark age.

Our style is maybe best described as a (post)punk/metal cocktail laced with new wave elements. Or something.
Too many genres, too many tags. You decide.

Always hard to describe your own music anyway, so we better let the music speak for itself, shall we?

Here´s our little stomper "Soapbox Dictator" for you that we recorded live on our first appereance ever, a private show on February 11th, 2012: 

As you might have noticed I deliberately sang slightly off-key and fucked up a few licks just to prove that we´re no robots. Our usual razor sharp precision would have only stirred up rumors we´d lip-sync to a playback track...yeah right.

Anyway, so far we got about 40mins + worth of own material and we´re goddamn hungry to play live as much as possible. So if you wanna book us or team up for a show together,
don´t waste any time and hit us up. Send your mail to pviitala@pp.nic.fi or contact us via that devil´s invention called Facebook. You can also "like" us there or send us naughty pictures, that´s up to you. But really, all serious gig offers are immensely appreciated!

Make sure to check out:

di unru on Fuck Facebook
di unru TV on YouTube

Make sure to book us and/or give us a million $ record deal here:

di.unru@hotmail.com (no link, you gotta copy/paste) or in the comment section of this blog.