Someone wrote me from Germmany. He had driven 250 km to our show in Hannover. We love you. I'm not sure I can locate the mail anymore, as we switched servers and my Unix is way rusty...so, if you read this, mail me and I will send you a mixtape as a thank you for liking us more than we do:)

...I'm up to Köln, writing...seriously. It'll happen.

26.9.2000 Update number one. It's hard to get connected when you travel on the cheap. This is the first hotel on the whole trip that has phones in the rooms...

It is our plan to comment on each city on our itinerary at a later date. We have been too fucking lazy to spend time writing stuff up. It's much easier to just talk shit and wonder how horny can one actually get. It is a mighty thing to ponder. We know. Now.

This is Vienna. We had a day off. It consisted of a radio interview, paperwork, record shopping and laundry. The cost of clean clothes in modern Austrian society:

Arttu 350 FIM
Tuomas 300 FIM
Petro 450 FIM
Kimi 600 FIM

...Aleksi spent less money on new clothes. Socks mostly.

Zarkus used up all of Petro's detergent and then proceeded to try and borrow some expensive laundered socks, because all of his were wet. The noise this attempt generated in the people who owned the clean, dry socks was audible in parts of Brno. In stereo. So, Zarkus is going to spend tomorrow's drive to Munich in his underwear. We can hardly wait to see what sort of reaction this provokes when we stop for some wurst on the autobahn...

Kim is thinking of selling some ass out on the street, preferably to attractive young women. Anyone? All this for laundry.

The quality of discourse in the van is so low, I think the car's cabin pressure is higher than the air outside. We seem to be sufferuing from the bends on a fairly permanent basis...hmmm.

Look forward to more horror when the complete, unabridged edition hits the web.

12.9.2000 Tomorrow we leave. I shall have a laptop with me, so I'll try to update these pages occasionally. I think our new video will be premiered on Jyrki tomorrow. If I can be bothered to shave my head tonight, I'll go do the interview. We'll see.

Go see dj lämmin päivä (dj warm day) for some life-affirming, brings-a-tear-to-your-eye tunes. He is the Liberace of....well...someplace. You will never listen to Finnhits again. I especially recommend "lenin-setä asuu venäjällä"...

dj lämmin päivä

So that's about all I have time for...

7.9.2000 The time draws nigh, doesn't it? We leave in 6 days. The final (hopefully) immutable tour schedule can be found at our shows-page. Peruse and enjoy. We have some new songs to take on the road. We'll spend a lot of time on ferries. If I can get my hands on FTP, I'll du updates. Right here.

Record sales in the United States are UP UP UP this year despite Napster...does anyone else remember the home taping is killing music hysteria in the 70's? I don't really remember it, but as a thriftstore prowler, I have run into the inner sleeves...This is the same thing. It will take the record industry about 5 minutes to figure out how to gouge you.

In other news: We filmed a video for Helsinki Rock City and it will be finished within the week. Look for it on Jyrki, MoonTV, Viva2, VH1, MTV Nordic, MTV Russia...

Music that rooolz, doood:
Korn: Korn
Underworld: Second Toughest Among Infants
Them good ol' Headz collections from Mo'Wax...

I'm reading Iain M. Banks' Use of Weapons. Wonderful....

Who cares? The next step is putting up a webcam, all about me. A friend of mine is toying with the idea of putting one in his fridge, so he can surf the food situation at work and take the appropriate measures on the way home. To shop or not to shop...this is the answer.

2.9.2000 We was DOWN!! Oh no. Lasted for a week. I think the um...progressive organisational communications practices coupled with a surreal take on...ah shit. Too tired to be mean. Anyway, UIAH fucked up and took katastro.fi down with it. And other boring stuff. I'm back. Played Jyväskylä. What a strange place. Socialporno...there was a guy who gave the dj money. The dj turned the music off and this fat ass middle aged mofo proceeds to mumble into the mic. What? I have no idea. It was subverbal wisdom, I guess. I caught the last line:

I'm not a joke. I'm serious.

Sure you are. I have an irresistible urge to take old guys in leather vests and mullets seriously. Despite the surreal nature of the venue, or perhaps because of it, the show was a lot of fun. Lots of people. Most of them left once Sandstorm came on...

The Jyrki Music Video Awards was last night. We were nominated for Most Exportable Video....ok. Well, our pals Kemopetrol won. The party looked soooooper annoying. At least the part with Ed the Sock. What a moronic idea. A talking sock that's addicted to soft core porn. Great. Gosh. I sure am cranky today....better get some sleep.

I be diggin':
Duran Duran: Rio (side two)
Roots Manuva: Brand New Second Hand
This new song we do about cities and thrones and flowers...
Ian Brown: Billie Jean

25.8.2000 What a bummer! Frederik cancelled at the last minute. I had a nice little chat with Tommi from ÄKT. And walked a way with a coffee mug. I also walked away wondering if we disagreed on anything substantial. Or was it all semantics and hues? Oh well. Not much to report except...

These albums rock:
Melvins: the maggot
Melvins: the bootlicker
Melvins: the crybaby

...a trilogy. Ooooh. Anyway, they're all great.

23.8.2000 Are you ready for this? Tomorrow morning, 9 am, I'll be audible at 96.2 MHz, Radio City, for half an hour. It's a debate about Napster. I will be the PRO. The CON will be King Mullet, Frederik The Macho Man. A strange choice, for sure. Does his fan base do da mp3 thang? I have my doubts, people...Anyway, if you are in Finland and understand the lingo, please tune in. I will be there waving the hatchet in or near the exposed necks of the major record labels. I'm a knee-jerk anarchist. Or something.

Diggin':
Sisqo: Unleash the Dragon ...just the funky stuff. I don't know 'bout the '80's balladry...
Armand Van Helden: Killing Puritans ...i have to say, the code writing idea fucking sucks. it was funny for 5 minutes. the music, luckily, rocks.
Jimi Tenor: Out of Nowhere ...i feel sorry for warp. jimi will NEVER be normal. NO HIT POTENTIAL. good record.

18.8.2000 More links regarding the Napster debacle: click me! Print the article if you can. It's long, but then casting light on the nefarious mathematical alchemists of the music industry requires a long-winded tenacity. It's a pretty good summation of some of the major facets of evil to be found in the current market practices of the entertainment industry. Yes, I know I am foaming at the mouth.

The www.giantrobot.fi domain is now ours. There's nothing there yet, so don't bother checking it out. What the future holds: oodles of nu mediah posing for us, @giantrobot.fi e-mail addresses, vainglorious rockstar photo galleries, pages and pages of masturbatory lyrics...you WILL love us. OK?

Listening to:
Captain Beefheart: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)
Afghan Whigs: 1965
Some traditional Iraqi lute music. I forget the name of the artiste...

14.8.2000 First things first. Here's a link to an essay on Napster by the Artist Formerly Known As Prince. If you have the patience, read it. It resides at the Lifesaver Records message board. Pirkka said he copied it , cos the man's site is so obtuse. He's right. See?

In other news? Nothing. So stop staring at me. Or go look at the new discography page.

Listening to:
Tequila Jazz:...a brilliant band from St Petersburg
Mr Velcro Fastener: Vector Graphics...just can't get enough of it.
Led Zeppelin: II
N.W.A: Fuck da police (DJ Shadow remix...supposedly. I got it off Napster...)

9.8.2000 I will embark on a major renovation of this site. The address will change, too, in the future. The most probable location is www.giantrobot.fi. I'll keep you posted. If you have any requests as far as what you would like to see on this site, mail me.

Found an old review of CYWS at Mesta. It's in Finnish.

Check out Lifesaver Records. Cool store, very nice pages. No bullshit, just information and a message board... which I suppose will be mostly bullshit. They usually are. Of the entertaining sort, though. They have an excellent links-page. I found some very nice Skillsters and Jimi Tenor MP3s through them. Highly recommended.

Cool tunes:
Skillsters and 4 Minute Soldiers: Secret Handshake
Skillsters: Omin sanoin instrumental lp

8.8.2000 Koneisto... over and done with. It was a very nice festrival to see music. Pretty awful to play at, though. On account of opening year jitters, no doubt. Kupittaa Park is a wonderful venue for an event of this sort and they really had the weather on their side. If they manage to work out all the logistic glitches in the years to come, it will be a classic.

Me and Petro are DJing at Mother on the 22nd of August. Forgot to play Devo the last time. Maybe I will now. You just never know.

Heavy rotation:
Supersuckers: Mano Cornuda....fucking rocks. What else can you say...I didn't listen to this for a year or so. Maybe more. Today I rediscovered it. Creepy Jackalope Eye is one of the best songs ever.
Van Morrison: Astral Weeks
Paradise Lost: Icon
Mr Velcro Fastener: Vector Graphics (song)

31.7.2000 Q killed us!! Check it out. It's murdaration! Oh well. Melody Maker gave it 4 stars in one of their recent Oasis-infected issues. The Man in Germany tells us 93% of the press is positive, so... whatever. This is the most fun I've had since Aknestik called us pretentious and artsy. I have to say I don't see the Devo connection. I think Devo is cool, but i doubt anyone else in the band does. We don't sound very much like Uncontrollable Urge to me. And Mark E. Smith? He is tolerable for the duration of one song. After that the attenuated Johnny Rotten thing starts to grate. When someone slams you on such a tenuous basis, it can't hurt. Too bad.

Me and Aleksi are DJing at Mother on Eerikinkatu tomorrow, the 1st of August. Maybe we'll play some Devo!

In rotation:
Deftones: The Chauffeur (duran duran cover. better than the original.)
Jimi Tenor: Organism

26.7.2000 My apologies for the protracted absence. I am on vacation. Celebrated another birthday on my way to the tender age of 100. Getting closer. Went on the Grandmother Tour and gained many kilos.

The big news: there's a new mp3. It's from the Provinssi Jr show we did at Tavastia back in May. Thanks to Radiomafia for the clip. Enjoy.

The show at Tavastia was incredible. I think it sold out. We had incredible lights by Antti Kuivalainen and 3d visuals by juhuu@katastro.fi. It was a resounding success, an exercise in 1970's megalomania, an audiovisual overload. We will ceratinaly do this sort of thing again. It's much more fun than just playing.

In rotation:
Asian Dub Foundation: Community Music
Eminem: The Marshall Mathers LP
Melvyn Price: Jazzbalett Rytmer
R.L.Burnside: A Ass Pocket Of Whiskey

10.7.2000OK. So that was Ilosaarirock. Me and Tuomas got to act like a couple of teenagers whilst meeting Mike Patton. In the spirit of full disclosure, honesty and all that shit that really characterizes these pages, I must say that I was far more excited about meeting Buzz Osborne aka King Buzzo, the man with the coolest hair on the planet. If young Einstein had an afro...maybe a monochromatic version of carrot top with some gray added for diginity. What's more important the the hair is his guitar playing.

Fantomas played the best show of the festival. It was one of the musical highpoints of the year for me.

In a related note: it was a pleasure to see a true spazz in action. Tatu (Mr Velcro Fastener) lost control of his legs, brain, and speech (in that order) upon laying eyes on Mike Patton. Tatu seems to do everything at 150% capacity, which is to be commended. Heartily.

'Twas a strange one for us, too. Thousands (??) of people, screaming. Weird. Here's their impression, in Finnish. All you foreigners: Read it and weep!

In rotation:
Fantomas: Amenaza al Mundo
A-ha: Summer Moved On (song)
Melvins: Gluey Porch Treatments

Both Mike Patton and Buzz Osborne received autographed copies of Crushing You With Style. Those lucky bastards. If anyone knows Buzz's e-mail address, send it to me.;-) I forgot to ask. I was too busy being ditzy...

By the way...huge show coming up "Friday night July the 14th" at Tavastia in Helsinki. It's "Giant Robot presents: 66.6 bpm, The Number of the Dub". The first person to tell me what song title by what band the bold part of the first sentence refers to, I'll put them+1 on the guestlist. We will have lights, bells and whistles plus a return to old skool robotix.

5.7.2000As you may have noticed, this is now the front page, because language is the ultimate user interface and information rules the...aaah shit. Better stop.

Jennifer Kissed Me is on MTV's Alternative Nation. At least according to some guy from MTV:new..."Hey, it's only on Alternative Nation from now on ... unfortunately - great song and cool video ..." So they did show it in the day time a couple of times. My sister's friends (she is 9 years old...) were impressed. Was that 15 minutes...seemed like a lot less.

I downloaded Napster. Finally. Fun. I found some of our songs and chatted with someone in Germany who had Jennifer on mp3. I enjoyed it. Shut up, Metallica. Personally, if I run into something I like enough through Napster, I'll go out and buy it. If I don't like it, it'll fade out eventually. I don't know. I think it's great, both as a consumer and as a musician. It's a very interesting way to interact with people. All you people with Napster...check out Mr Bungle's version of ...baby, one more time.

Speaking of which, we are playing at Ilosaari next weekend. With, among others, Fantomas, Timo Rautiainen & Trio Niskalaukaus...Great. I love Mike Patton. Buzz Osborne is from the Melvins, one of the greatest bands ever...etc. Trio Niskalaukaus is the only Finnish Metal band that rocks since Stone...

We have received press in Germany. I don't understand a word of it, so if someone will translate it for me, I will kiss their ass long distance and be a happy little camper. Maybe see them in Germany and buy them a beer. Whatever. I'll be grateful. Here's a link. It's all good.

Listen to:
Dead Prez: Let's Get Free
Queens of the Stone Age: Restricted...
Entombed: Wolverine Blues
Kauko Röyhkä: Pikku Enkeli

20.6.2000Hultsfred is over and done with. A very pleasant, if tiring experience. We played for about a hundred people, but made a favorable impression according to this article (in Swedish...) The following shows were absolutely incredible:

Queens of the Stone Age...indescribable. Restores one's faith in....everything.
Rage Against the Machine...the earth shook. Literally.
Primal Scream...a horn section, Kevin Shields....
Asian Dub Foundation was very good, but a bit subdued.

Kelis SUCKED! Actually, she was ok, but the band was a bunch of tacky musos. Disgusting. She had a female Steve Lukather on guitar. Get a clue.

Friday was a day of mourning at Camp Robot. Lee Perry's show on Friday was delayed in a most inopportune manner. He played at the same time as we did, draining our audience as well as the very blood out of our veins. Unbelievable.

14.6.2000 We leave for the Hultsfred festival tomorrow. Exciting. Check out the pages to see who's palying...good stuff like Asian Dub Foundation and complete waste-of-time bullshit like Oasis. We're number 6 in the German Club Charts, ahead of Armand Van Helden's Koochy. That's pretty funny. Perhaps I won't bother putting up show dates for the rest of the summer. I'll concentrate on reorganizing the site for the fall. We'll be touring Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Holland, Belgium and France. Three and a half weeks on the road. That's a potential headache. I am getting old. I will try to figure out a way to keep a diary. That would be fun.

Listening to:

Pizzicato Five remix album: Happy End of You
Primal Scream: Echo Dek (anyone want to do that to our album? please?)
Timo Rautiainen & Trio Niskalukaus: Itku pitkästä ilosta

5.6.2000 Right-o. The festival season commences for Giant Robot and I have yet to complete work on the calendar page. My humble apologies. It will happen. The next two weeks are going to be heavy. I have shows with two different bands in Turku this week (Giant Robot and Slomotion Airlines). Next week it's off to Sweden. The record was released in Germany and other such countries. We hope it's doing well. At least one radio station in Austria is playing it. See? That ain't no jive. That be some white funk, brah! It's all good. Well, back to work...

Listen to:

Mr. Oizo: Analog Worms Attack. I bought it on sale (39 mk) and was pleasantly surprised. It's hip hop!
Mos Def: Black On Both Sides. Simply awesome. Hadn't listened to it for a couple of months. I put it on yesterday as I folded the laundry and...BOOM.

29.5.2000We just returned from St. Petersburg. Absolutely beautiful and falling apart at an astonishing pace. Met a lot of very cool people. Was exposed to good music by the likes of Markscheider Kunst and Tequila Jazz. Now, having witnessed the action in St. Petersburg, I can't wait to see Spitfirte at this year's Ilosaarirock festival. We played the Severnyi Udar-festival. It was arranged by Oranssi r.y. Thanks to Vesa, Sergei and everyone else. A special mention goes to the incredibly smelly and noisy Salonen Brothers, connoisseurs of Accept, terrors of da bus. VIIPURII! VIIPURII!

2.5.2000OK. The world conquest has begun. Tee hee. There's a review of CYWS at a Dutch site called KindaMuzik.net. Click it . It's a link, dude. They are nice and we thank them for that. And this is what Radio Nova in Paris had to say about Spelling Robot, a tune Laurent Garnier fell in love with:

Giant Robot, 'Spelling Robot' (Hawaï Sound) La nouvelle bombe de Radio Nova par l'intermédiaire d'Ivan S. Un maxi hip-hop des plus classieux.

Last weekend, the rest of the band played with some Indian musicians. I wasn't there. I was doing yardwork in Somero. I hear the show was fun. Band members got to walk around aimlessly with beer mugs in their hands and look contemplative. Jams are therapeutic. This is all second hand from an undisclosable source.

Stuff you should listen to if ya know what's good for ya:

Laurent Garnier: Unreasonable Behavior
Tony Allen: Black Voices
Sleater-Kinney: All Hands On The Bad One

28.4.2000:Found another mention of our Jyrock show. I am such a narcissist, I spend all my time "stalking the Internet" like a "techno pervert" for mentions of me. This one is from the Jyväskylä University paper, Jyväskylän Ylioppilaslehti Online :

Tiikkainen kehuu (?) myös Giant Robotia, joka kuulemma kuulosti "harvinaisen paljon ranskalaiselta viihdebändiltä".

Translated: "Tiikkainen also compliments (?) Giant Robot, who apparently sound "remarkably like a French light music orchestra".

Tiikkainen is from a band called Dynamo. I'm not familiar with them. Maybe I'll go find something out.

Actual Robot-related news: The brilliant Okko Oinonen took our band picture. Check out the damage he does at Real Life Photography. Look forward to seeing them pics all over the German press. Andreas is prowling Germany armed with promomaterials, whores and cocaine. Plus a length of leadpipe and a can of whoop ass for the recalcitrant minority. We will be advertised in The Wire. T-mu is having a hard time containing his black-clad self...

13.4.2000: So far, I have found only one review from our "tour". It's in a magazine called prospective :

Friday night ended with Giant Robot, which I managed to listen (sic) until they played their biggest hit, "Helsinki Rock City" after which I left. Giant Robot is very popular and commercially successful electro hip hop band in Finland. They might be the next Finnish band to achieve bigger success outside Finland, maybe, but their music doesn't really touch me in any way. -Mikko Saari

Oh well...The commercially successful part is a load of bullshit, though. Piffle, so to speak. It cracks me up when people get that impression. The other day, I was hanging out with Celine Dion and.....Yeah, right! Commercially success eludes us, even in the lilliputian scale of Finland. We are trying to sell out, but...

Real news: Our German label Clearspot has agreed to release Crushing You With Style as a double lp! On 180 gr virgin vinyl! We love Anreas! I just got the new cds from Germany and they look really cool.

4.4.2000: Weelll, over and done with, for now. Giant Robot has left the building. Last weekend's shows went very well, especially Joensuu. Hopefully we'll have a couple of songs to put up soon. There were some gems...We saw The Skillsters featuring Seremoniamestari at Jyrock. Sooo fucking good I won't even go into it. Completely wiped the floor with the man's recorded output. Seremoniamestari comes highly recommended.

We have been receiving loads of complaints lately. In addition to our personality defects, people tend to complain about us not playing in the town where they live. I will probably delve into this at greater length at another time. For now, I'd just like to say "...it's all about the money, boyeeh!" We have minimum seven mouths to feed and an equal number of bodies to house whenever we leave home. If we're not offered enough money to do a show in your town, we'll skip it. Finland, despite all historical efforts to the contrary, is a capitalist society. We are operating by the rules proscribed by this system. If you would like us to do otherwise, I suggest revolution as an alternative.

I'll put up an FAQ page, probably in Finnish, to explain some facts of life to anyone who has trouble understanding the difference between Giant Robot and Elisa Communications. Or not, depending on whether the mail keeps a-comin'.

The most important thing to realize is that it has nothing to do with us being too cool to play outside of Helsinki. The fact is, we play more shows north of Kehä III than in town. It's a statistical necessity.

People from Helsinki get a bad rap. The biggest assholes are always the ones who moved here two weeks previous and have a burnin' yearnin' to solidify their status as big city folk. Funny, since Helsinki isn't even a city. It's a town. Deal with it. It's a very nice town, though.

You can look forward to a calendar of our shows for the summer. You can thank mine and Aleksi's mom for this. She just wouldn't stop going on about it...I don't know why. I don't expect to run into her at any festivals this summer.

If anyone has a chance partake in the musical treats provided by the following beeyootiful peeps, I suggest they do so: possible apple, d'angelo, roots manuva, can, primal scream and our friend Jonny Bro. His ep will be released this summer. It's a Jori Hulkkonen production...

29.3.2000: WOAH! It took a million hours to drive back from Oulu. I won't even go into topics of discussion...suffice it to say, we created at least one new genre of music, reformed all manner of things...I forget what. The prime minister is annoyed with us for not taking notes. We missed the window of opportunity. We could've crushed our own souls in politics by reforming all manner of things. Highpoints of this trip for yours truly:

- Meeting Maako, the bass player for Aknestik, those towering mammoths of Finnish hickrock.
- Giving some Wu-Teens the impression that we are a bunch of fucking wimps. We probably are, actually...except for The Isäntä!
- Witnessing the miracle of The Höystö

I'd like to apologize for the impenetrable nature of today's ramblings. You would understand if you were me...Where do we go from here? Well...

Jyrock Festival in Jyväskylä, Friday 31.3.
Kerubi in Joensuu, Saturday 1.4.

21.3.2000: So our first weekend of touring is behind us and it went quite well. We were still talking bullshit on the ride back from Turku. If this trend holds for the 800 km ride back from Oulu, we be impressed with ourselves. Lots of people came to see us in Helsinki despite a seemingly total lack of postering in the downtown area. All's well blah blah blah and all that. I'm listening to Foo Fighters' Down In The Park. What a good song. I also think everyone should accept D'Angelo as their own personal savior. He is singlehandedly rescuing r'n'b from the macho doldrums. Love him now.

More tour news:
Bar Mary in Porvoo, Wednesday 22.3.
YO-talo in Tampere, Friday 24.3
Nuorisokahvila Walda in Oulu, Saturday 25.3. (all ages)
Club 45 in Oulu, Sunday 26.3.

13.3.2000:This is a historic week for giant robot. We'll be embarking on our first-ever tour of Finland starting here in Helsinki on Friday and Turku on Saturday. We've never spent THAT much time together before...40 mk gets you in at Nosturi (with Lifesaver djs; all ages!) in Helsinki. Barely any cash at all is necessary at the legendary Dynamo in Turku. I'm not sure how much it'll be. If anyone from Turku feels like mailing me, I'll post the cost. Keep checking this site for shows near your village.

10.3.2000: Our third ep came out today. It's called Jennifer Kissed Me. We included a couple of songs on this ep that we recorded for the German release of Crushing You With Style (coming out on Clearspot Records in April). Basically, we want it to sell millions. We want to see loads of people at our shows, forced into having undignified fun by peer pressure. We'd like to see a lot of guys there who hate us, but aren't allowed to say so 'cos their girlfriends love our music and it makes them feel sexeeee. and vice a versa, of course.