SONATA ARCTICA - South American Tour Blog Available

SONATA ARCTICA keyboardist Henkka Klingenberg has posted his tour blog from the band's South American tour, which took place in October, online. An excerpt is available below.

16.10.2010 - Mexico City
"Alrighty, we left home on Thursday evening, flew in to Helsinki and spent the night at the airport hotel. On Friday morning we got our shit together and left for Mexico via Frankfurt. Some 20+ hours later we arrived and checked in to the hotel. Had a few beers, witnessed a mariachi-band, met the guys from THERION and ultimately got too tired to stay awake just around midnight. Jetlag rules! This morning we had a very nice breakfast together and I just got back from hanging out by the pool and enjoying the nice weather here. Checking the latest headlines online, appeareantly nothing really mindblowing has happened. People still killing each other, sports teams winning and losing and some has-been celebrety getting caught for doing drugs or drunk-driving. Throw in a couple of minor or major natural disasters and the dinner is served. Btw for those of you into NHL and speaking Finnish, Jouni Nieminen is keeping an awesome blog on hs.fi , check it out. Ok, now it's time for soundcheck, hopefully all the gear is working...

...so during soundcheck I found out that my rented piano was broken. Well no biggie, I worked around it during the show....but: Not having played a show since Kemi on the 21st of August. we were all quite excited to get on stage. Everything started really well but then.. Marko's bass started to drop out every once in a while and it took a while for our techs to work it out, eventually they fixed it....my shoulder keyboard died half-way through the show but a couple of songs later it was redeemed as well. Apart from those minor tech-related mishaps the show worked out well and as always the crowd in Mexico was fucking amazing. Thanks a lot guys."


17.10.2010 - Guatemala City
"A nice and early wake-up call at 0500 to go to the airport. With a show the night before we didn't really get that much sleep.....but whattahell we'll sleep when we get home. The flight was quite smooth and we arrived to our hotel after a short drive sometime around noon. Luckily we had a couple of hours to sleep before heading for the soundcheck. Tonight we're playing at somekinda outdoor amphitheater, nice stage but some parts of the PA & monitoring system was a bit interesting. Anyway, our techs managed to get everything set up so I'm sure we'll have fun. I just came back from dinner downstairs and in about an hour we're going back to the venue for a meet & greet and the show."

Go to this location for the complete blog.

Sonata Arctica recently issued the following related update:

"Ever wondered what it would be like to be on tour? All the ups and downs, drinks and burgers from the South American tour of Sonata Arctica will now be brought to you absolutely free. Starting with Part 1 on Monday, November 15th, the movie has an undisclosed number of parts with a new part being released every Monday. Join the band as they travel through South America, starting from Finland on October 14th and all the way through the adventures until they get back home on November 1st."

Check the trailer below:

As previously reported, an additional show has been confirmed for Sonata Arctica's upcoming European tour in February/March 2011. The tour will now kick off in Bratislava, Slovakia on February 24th.

The band's complete schedule is as follows:

February
24 - Majestic Music Club - Bratislava, Slovakia
25 - Petöfi Csarnok - Budapest, Hungary
26 - Cvetlicarna - Ljubljana, Slovenia
27 - Alcatraz - Milan, Italy

March
1 - Masters of Rock Café - Zlín, Czech Republic
2 - Szene - Vienna, Austria
4 - Kaminwerk - Memmingen, Germany
5 - HsD - Erfurt, Germany
6 - Hof ter Lo - Antwerp, Belgium
7 - Garage - Saarbrücken, Germany
8 - Z7 - Pratteln, Switzerland
10 - Theatre Barbey - Bordeaux, France
11 - Apolo - Barcelona, Spain
12 - La Riviera - Madrid, Spain
13 - Rock Star Live - Bilbao, Spain
15 - Transbordeur - Lyon, France
16 - Élysée Montmartre - Paris, France
18 - Wulfrun Hall - Wolverhampton, UK
19 - Corporation - Sheffield, UK
20 - Garage - Glasgow, UK
22 - Academy 2 - Manchester, UK
23 - Milennium Music Hall - Cardiff, UK
24 - Sub 89 - Reading, UK
25.- Koko - London, UK
26 - Essigfabrik - Cologne, Germany
27 - Effenaar - Eindhoven, Holland
29 - Patronaat - Haarlem, Holland
30 - Halle Gartlage - Osnabrück, Germany
31 - Substage - Karlsruhe, Germany