This is my kingdom... it means everything to me...

Wow, the past week has passed like nothing!

Last week the Revelation shipment arrived containing over 1300 items (FUCK YEAH)

Opening the boxes was feeling like a little kid on christmas morning, here are some pics




























'Songs to scream at the sun'..

holy shit what a record, I'm probably the only one as far as I know who like this album better than 'The things we carry'.

Flynn has a way of writing songs that seem to match with my life in some cases, maybe that's why I love the record so much, It almost gives me the feeling some songs were written about stuff in my life, and through this, it makes it easier for me to handle with it, so get into the new Have Heart, it rocks

Last week was also pretty fucking hectic if you ask me, 2 last minute cancels for Ieperfest just a few days before the actual fest... Ringworm and Outbreak were forced to cancel their tour so we had to fix this, these bands aren't really bands you can replace by who ever you want so our search led us to, Rise and Fall who replaced Outbreak, a pretty cool replacement if you ask me, they killed it!

Replacing Ringworm we were asking for The First Step, how massive cool that would've been, TFS wasn't an option, me being a big BETRAYED fan proposed to let Betrayed play so we got back in touch with Aram, who said this would work out!

Betrayed was booked, only thing we had to do was book the plane tickets and this is were the shit hit the fan, wrong flight bookings due to siteproblems and being mislead, flight cancellation because they were fully booked, thursday night wasn't looking so good because only Greg's flight was going as planned. I kinda died that night due to stress and lack of sleep...

But for every problem there is a solution, we got the tickets after all through Ivonno Avocado's husband who fixed it all, for which i'm utter gratefull.

Having this solved didn't mean we had time to lay back, Betrayed features 4 members who were coming in on 3 different flight... so we had to arrange a pickup for all 4.

I had no idea who to call, until I looked in my phonebook and called Duive aka Pidgeon, who just said, "why the fuck not, I'll do it". I owe this guy my life, over the weekend he drove 3 times to the airport which is pretty distant from the fest, missing some of the bands he really wanted to see.

He had a big part in making it all happen so a big shout out to him!

Time now to rap up the fest itself, we arrived with the Genet distro at about 1am on fridaymorning, the prefest had ended but there were still some people running around. Started the loadout of the van, storing it all in containers. Around that time the mainstage arrived so we helped out setting it up, no sleep after this as well because the merch tent had to be cleaned up and set up for the next day, when allthis was over it was about 5 am and we were looking at a short night of sleep.

Friday during the day was hell. This year we were forced to move locations, it has been on paved floors for years until this year, the fest took place on a piece of grassland... grassland, rain and thousands of people running around don't match one bit

The fest became one pool of mud which sucked endlessly, next to that friday was the worst day considering bands cancelling or wanting to be switched because they had to catch an early ferry or whatever. Also some tourmanagers are dickheads, I'm not calling any names but fucking hell some people have a serious lack of respect towards other people.

Although friday was quite a disaster there were some good times as well, saw Kingdom play again (check out there release on Genet Records) meeting new people, fun at the afterparty, some dude going completely nekkid on the afterparty, shit was tight!















Saturday: JOY!

pretty good weather, cold wind though but almost no clouds

It became clear saturday was going to be a pretty good day in comparisson to friday, and it was

almost no bands coming late or cancelling except for the John Joseph Spoken word we had to cancel due to trafficproblems which was a personal bummer for me.
Saw Trigger the bloodshed play, and what the hell, I wonder how old their drummer is, he seems awfully young and he rages! See you next tuesday, awesome live band if you ask me, Jerusalem the black who played an awesome set (check their 7" and mcd, it rocks!) Nothing gold can stay who played some of their news songs that will be released on their new cd by Genet records, met up with Danny NGCS, great guy to hang out with, representin Vienna HC

Missed out on Dicarga because I was getting siked for Betrayed who played afterwards

The Betrayed gig was without doubt the best show of my entire life, from the first till the last note, high fives and stage dives, pile ons and sing a longs, an intense crowd for an intense band. Speeches by Aram which should've been recorded because they made so much sense hearing them. Before we knew it, it was time for the last song, being UNDERSTAND, talking about a singalong, in the last part of the song it goes like "still lost still hurting still searching so desperate for anwsers..." there was this maaaaaaaaaaaaassive pile on on stage, I joined in but due to the weight of more and more people we all suddenly fell off the stage which hurted like hell, me being at the bottom together with Aram and some other guys, Aram lost his mic, looking me in the eyes grabbing my head whilst I grabbed his and yelling in each others faces "STILL LOST STILL HURTING STILL SEARCHING SO DESPERATE FOR ANSWERS" ...

I could've died happy there, the show hurted like hell, I got kicked in the jaw fell on my head got punched in the face and ribs but it all came down to that moment right there in front of the stage on the ground.


Amenra was headlining the marquee stage, intense and breathtaking as always not much more to say, sucked ass that parkway drive started playing during RA's set

Saturday night hangout was crazy allthough i called it an early night, I wish I didn't cause I heard the afterparty was off the hook!

Said our goodbye to Betrayed who were leaving in the morning, took some pictures:















Sunday was kinda so so

changing weather, some problems needed to be fixed,

Rise and Fall played, they killed it, like they always do, looking forward to their upcoming release

It rained old ladies during Verse, expected more of this band but it was cool anyways.
Have Heart, still kicks ass, their new songs are like a choking hand around my throat, something that gives you the shivers, pretty bummed about the power failure during their set

took some pictures of H2O which turned out not as good as I hoped. Catched some glimps of The Locust playing as last band for the fest















Rapping up the fest, it was a personal succes, my first time helping out, and I really had the feeling I did some good by helping out, doing my little part

My goal was to meet more people from all over and get to see some bands I wanted to see, and both goals are achieved.

met people from the UK, Russia, Germany, Brazil, Australia, the US, Holland, Spain, Austria...

shit thing about it, I'll be seeing these people only again with the next edition or even later

downsides of the fest:

the new location which gave us a lot of trouble

People trashing the Ieperfest cups

Seeing people wearing an 'armed with a mind' shirt trashing their tent and burning whatever stuff they were too lazy to carry home again, makes you re evaluate the whole deal

too everyone who made the camping to a dump, FUCK YOU, I've spent 2 days helping cleaning up your shit, and the cleanup hasn't ended yet. While i'm writing this there are still people cleaning up the shit in Ieper you left behind, Not only the camping and the festivalground needs some cleaning, the scene could use a big cleansing as well..

We try to to our best to make a difference with the fest with a garbage system we have sorting all the garbage to make a difference and you guys let it all go to waste, thanks a lot for it

And what is up with the tuffguy attitude and fights, I think this year was pretty much the worst, Too much testosteron or what? fighting over silly little things, what is this, kindergarden?

another upside to the fest! Vegan Tash and her kitchencrew perform miracles, such good vegan food, it was the best! thank you for that

Thanks to my friends for helping out at the distrotable or where ever they could

thanks also to them for cleaning up their part of the camping, shit thing is that some people ripped open all of the garbage bags and your efforts are to waste