by Guest – Babzz
Stone Gods live @ Eurosonic festival 11-1-2008 Groningen, Holland
A fan’s first Godstricken experience…
It just seemed a very short while ago that I sat in a boring class and received a text from Aimee saying ‘The Stone Gods have a song up on their website, Burn the Witch! And they’re playing a gig in Groningen!’ First thing I did when the class was over was run to the computer room to check it out. I immediately decided I loved it, and that there was no way I was going to miss their first international gig, even when it was in the city that’s the most for away from where I live as possible in this little country! There was of course also no way that Heidi was going to sit at home in Finland when there was a gig to go to in Holland, so flights were booked and tickets were bought.
Finally the day came, I got up ridiculously early to be able to do a silly test in school and then pick up Heidi from the place of horror that is Schiphol Airport. We got offered a ride to Groningen from the lovely Daisy, so after we changed to our custom made (by me) Stone Goddess shirts, we were soon in a comfy car on our way to the north. Since it was a festival there were more bands playing in several venues across the centre of the city, the guys wouldn’t be on until 1.15 so we decided to check out Von Hertzen Brothers, a Finnish band that I would describe as psychedelic rock. They were quite good. We also caught a few songs of Palladium, but we were getting a bit anxious about the huge queues we had seen in front of some of the venues, so we decided to head for Vindicat Mutua Fides. Hope to see more of Palladium if they play Amsterdam sometime!
It turned out that the long Latin name was a bit fancy for a venue that seemed to be built of cardboard and smelled of piss more then your usual public toilet… First thing we spotted when we got in was a few huge flightcases saying The Darkness, yay, they’re actually there! But what we didn’t know was that we still had to survive the band that played before them… Some Portugese metal band that was really so bad we had to cover our ears. When they had finally finished the enormous load of amplifiers, guitars, effect pedals and bits of the drumkit had to be put on the tiny stage, which took much longer then was planned. Because it was such a small room, this all had to happen via the front of the stage, so we couldn’t reserve our front row spots just yet. But after a nasty security guard had been told off by a roadie, he finally let the audience come closer and we practically glued ourselves against the left side of the stage. To be honest I had gotten a little sick with excitement by now, I could hardly speak and I was afraid I was going to cry the second they would come on stage.
But when that moment finally came, after a little problem with Dan’s amplifiers had been fixed, all I could feel was just excitement and happiness, they were on a stage again, where they belonged! They started with Burn the Witch, for us it’s like a classic tune by now so we all sang along and I managed to lose my voice already. The band seemed to be happy to receive such a lot of cheering and headbanging from the crowd. I can’t remember in what order they played all the songs, mainly because I knew less then half of them of course, but we all absolutely adored Gunfight and Magdalene Street! The songs were all, without one exception, amazing and totally rocking. I was so proud of Richie, gone from a roadie to a bassplayer, and now a frontman. And not just any frontman, the centre of the stage is just exactly where he belongs. And Dan, he really seems to be out of this world, with all his gorgeous Gibson Les Pauls and his beautiful curls dancing around his face. This is really a personal thing, but for me it was such a weird feeling to see him in real life again, I have been worshipping this man for so long, he has brought me so much happiness and just completely changed my life, and I just can’t describe how happy I was to see him playing again. We sang along where we could at the songs that we had heard so far, and enjoyed the sight when one of the guys would put their foot on the monitor right in front of us!
The gig was over way too soon, shitty 45 minute maximum. We just sat on the floor having a beer for a while, trying to come down from this more then amazing performance, and chatted to a nice photographer who told us in what magazine we could find his pictures of the gig, and later on when we had all been kicked outside because the place was closing, he kindly told us that the guys were in some kind of portable dressing room outside. We waited and waited and waited watching all the gear being loaded into the trucks, and just when we were a bit afraid they might’ve buggered off trough the other side, they came outside and invited us for a few drinks. It was great to hear how much our support was appreciated! Not to mention seeing Richie dancing to dodgy dance songs. This is not only the most rocking band in the world, but also the nicest one. And for me personally, speaking to Dan again, looking into his beautiful eyes… Wow, I’m lost for words! Toby was really worried about the fact that we didn’t have a place to stay and would have to wander the streets until we could catch the first train in the morning, so Daisy kindly offered us to crash her hotel room. The club closed eventually, and after a couple of big hugs and several kisses from all the band members (three kisses, ‘continental style’ according to Toby) we left for the hotel. Massive thanks to Daisy for sneaking us in and driving us home the next morning. Best weekend of the year so far, roll on Norwich!