Today we went up early to go with WARHEIM to Auswitch for a guided tour. DIABOLICAL stayed behind to take care of some bus business.

Auswitch was awful! I mean, when you have read the history and heard the stories. Watched some movies, you sure know that it was terrible. But visiting was a complete different thing. We were standing right there, where people have been murdered, raped and experimented with. It was like walking around in a funeral that never ended. No one can go in there without tearing up the eyes. It was like visiting a factory created with the sole purpose to eliminate as many human beings as possible. And at the same time document everything. Well, some say it’s a conspiracy theory..

The town square in Krakow is a huge square, probably the biggest in the universe. We drove into it with our car and the police was fast to stop us and give a lecture of street roles. They said you MUST obey the signs! Gosh..

If you have followed our blog you should know by now that we have been enjoying the food very much! This time we went for kebab. It wasn’t that good at all. No more kebab in Krakow for us.

When we first saw the door to Kot Karola it looked like a really small club. The door lead down to a huge maze of rooms and bars. Everything in stone. The stage was a bit small but it was ok. The audience was really good and seemed to enjoy our show. Some old and we surly got some new ones too. We even got to speak Swedish with a couple of them!

After the show we didn’t had to drive our car so we managed to drink a couple of beers and talk to the fans. They were really nice!

Thank you Krakow!

Last night the venue had stairs in the back going down and it was very dark. Marcus was carrying some stuff and didn’t see the two last steps of the staircase and fell and landed on his knees. In the fall He twisted his ankle really bad and couldn’t walk on it. The entire day he had a really bad limp and a cough from his cold. Looked like a hobo limping around the rest of the guys. The ankle got better along the way but he couldn’t use the foot so much.

The promoter gave us wonderful home cooked food. It was the first time we had bigos! He said it was compliments from his wife. Lovely!

The venue was in an area that had to be influenced by Great Britain. The venue was called Klub Liverpool and next to it was Haggis Bar and Second hand clothes from London where they sold clothes by weight.

This was the first time we had local support. It was a trio playing some kind of technical melodic metal and the did a good job waking the audience up for WARHEIM that played after them.

Marcus went backstage when the local support was playing and he got a call from WARHEIM drummer Robert. It was hard to hear what he said because of the band in the background but Robert screamed that he was locked behind the big blue steel door and wanted to get out! This was a Spinal Tap moment delux.

The bus DIABOLICAL are riding in is slowly withering apart. No brakes, water pump died, no idle, no heat, back door won’t lock, fuel lines came off, cig lighter died, back window broke, drivers seat came loose, radiator leaking water and short cut in the dashboard… To name a few.. They are looking for a new bus now :).

This venue was in a small part of the town and the standards was not that high. We loaded in out gear and it was colder inside that outside, but luckily we got some warmth up after loading in and the nice warm food we got served. After dinner they started the smoke machine and the place was filled with smoke, the only problem was that it smelled like burning coal.

After a couple of minutes Dagna, the Tour Manager screamed at the too of her lungs to evacuate the building. It wasn’t the smoke machine. Smoke was coming in from the vents in the walls and it was thick and black. We realized we had to run inside to bring out the merch so it wouldn’t smell of smoke and so we did.

We was standing upside waiting for them to fix the smoke problem and people was running all around saying it’s no problem and nothing to worry about, so we waited. After a while they said everything was ok and that they started to went out the smoke.

When we came inside we saw that they put tape over the vents. Where the smoke came from? No one knows 🙂

The crowd was really great and there were many of them. Unfortunately one dude on floor decided to take his gun out and point at us on the stage and that was really awkward. Nothing happened but he ruined the entire show for us and everything felt just fucked up. We heard later that he does that and he does it to show his gratitude……. Stupid.

Yesterday went by very fast. We had to drive a long way from warzaw and most of the road was excellent highway in 140kmh.

We met up with the promoter at the edge of the city and he guided us to the venue called 4 róze dla Lucienne. Once again we are astonished by the surroundings in Poland, it’s very different everywhere. From ruins to big castles and new houses. Dirt roads to highways.

At the venue we had very little time to set up the stage and sound check. DIABOLICAL made the sound check and that was it. People were already waiting outside to come in. And we had to get something to eat before the show.

I wish we’ve had more time to see the city but unfortunately we never had time to get out of the venue once we got inside.

For the first time we got to sleep in very long and recharge ourselves from yesterday. It was very much needed . The drive to Poznań is not very far, we actually passed it on the way to Zielona Góra, it’s a two hour drive.

We drove together with DIABOLICAL and WARHEIM on the highway when DIABOLICAL called to say that they had to take a detour to a car workshop to fix their brakes on the van. Luckily it wasn’t that bad and we had a couple of extra hours before we should arrive at the venue in Poznań.

In Poznań we and WARHEIM took a tour around town for lunch and sight seeing and when DIABOLICAL arrived it was time to load in the gear.

Soundcheck went good and all bands got a really good sound on stage and out to the audience. We watched WARHEIM and after them we started playing. It was a slow start but we managed to wake the audience up and after all it felt like a great show!

After spending the night in a strange hostel in Slupsk we started the 6 hour drive to Warzaw. The roads in Poland is not quite the same compared to Sweden. But I guess they constantly getting better in Poland and worse in Sweden. It seems like we have a very god GPS, at least compared to the other guys in DIABOLICAL and WARHEIM. We always seem to be the first band to arrive to the destination.

The second show that we were heading for was at Klub Progresja in Warzaw. This is a bigger venue compared to the show we did in Slupsk. It take some time to get used to that the beer is only 4 zt, about 8 SEK.

Sound check went really smooth and we had some really good sound on stage. Except from the two other Swedish bands we had the Polish band BUTELKA warming up the stage. A bunch of very friendly guys who seemed to be working extra as promotors for polish vodka.

Playing at Klub Progresja was lot’s of fun. Not too many people in the audience but we managed to keep the brave ones in a happy mode. I think we can say that the evening turned out to a great event. Especially for Joakim who managed to go through the whole line of Polish Vodka. Today has been hard for him.

We arrived to a sunny Slupsk and met up with the rest of the bands that came with another ferry to Poland than we did. DIABOLICAL and WARHEIM. Since we arrived much earlier than the rest we had time to walk around Slupsk and get accustom with the surroundings. It’s a very nice town but its really hard to understand the language and English won’t take you as far as we are used to.

After a couple of hours it was time to load in all our gear to the venue Motor Rock Pub and we started to sort out all our merchandise we brought with us.

The show went through pretty flawless and we were happy to see that our music was much appreciated in Poland!

Thank you Slupsk and Motor Rock Pub!

Ah! Sweet morning. We’re still travelling to get to the tour. Leif and Pirjo, who had been kind enough to let us stay there for the night made us a really good breakfast.

We topped it of with some Chinese Lizard Liqour. Thank you! The aim was set at Karlskrona about 450 kilometers away. It’s far. Very, very far. We had a short stop in Västervik for food then right back behind the wheel. At last we arrived in Karlskrona. We went for a walk and decided to buy a power inverter for the car so we can charge the computers and cameras. That way we can keep you posted!

On the ferry we checked out our cabin and went for a couple of Okocim. The fine taste of polish malt! The ship rocked us gently to sleep with sweet dreams of Friday.

Sverker enjoying the lonely troubadour.

Tomorrow we will play the first show!

Finally the tour begins. The day started at Northcar, the awesome dudes that let us use a brand new car for the tour. We had to sign some papers, green, yellow, red ones for making the trip in Europe safe and legit. Last night the car got pimped up with our logo as well as the Northcar logo by Vision2. We started packing the car and after loading in 200 tshirts we were amazed how much this car can take. After the bass, guitar and some drum sticks we were all set to hit the road.

After about 6 kilometers it was food time, starting off with plenty of nutricians and vitamins…

The drive today will not get us out of Sweden, it’s a long country (check it out on google maps!). The first stretch is 630km and will take us halfway through Sweden. We will stop for food and sleep at Eskilstuna before we continue to the ferry that will take us to Poland, Gdynia. This is the first tour Souldrainer and we really excited about it.  Horns up!