Total female feel good link

Do you feel bad when looking in the mirror? Your breast is too small/big? Your teint is too ashy and you out-do Casper the ghost? You have a little belly? Only a slight bit of peau d'orange on the thighs or hips? Or, opposite, your ass is no more since you started your work-out? Dark circles around the eye? Wrinkles?

And then you get angry when looking at all those TV beauties? You don't have to. They look the same as you do: Glenn Feron - The Art of Retouching is showing all the make-overs that make a super-b(utt)eauty out of every great looking woman - and even not so great looking ones. Well - when I look a little closer at some of them - they would look better if the graphic designer wouldn't have eliminated the "human expression"... What a revelation!

The looks of the season

Haha. I shouldn't be ranting about fashion. But I do. Let's say - if everybody looks alike wearing H&M the subculture is always much more unique and uniform in the same way. And certain moments of youth culture you'll never see in Paris or Milano on the catwalk but on everyday's street. Do you remember the summer when everybody wanted to look like J.Lo? If you're not 16 anymore and not up-to-date what's hot at schools you can see all those waves coming already on the Hamburg Hafengeburtstag. I don't know where those merchants get their inspiration from, but when they offer J.Lo-style headscarves, it's gonna be an "In" thing. This year I haven't found a typical "in" accessoire at Hafengeburtstag. But - late but the summer isn't over - a hair band made for ballerinas seems to be coming, as the Dom shows.

Long preface, sorry for that. I just never festival-travelled as much as this year, and some typical style and/or behavior stayed in my mind: First fest of the year I noticed was Hurricane Festival in Scheessel/Northern Germany even if I haven't been there. But I met thousands and thousands of visitors at the train stations in Hannover and Hamburg. The Hurricane is a pop/alternative orientated festival, where most of the highschool classes of Northern Germany go to celebrate their last exams. So most of the people look like "normal" end-of-term pupils. Fashion-gem of the festival: silicone wristbands. Strange behaviour of the weekend: Shouting "Helga" ("Helga" was already popular f.e. in Wacken quite some time ago. But it seems to be an evergreen).

At Rock Hard Festival, Graspop Metal Meeting and Bang Your Head maybe only the last was a step from the norm, but I already expected people running around like in the Eighties, and they were. Maybe I didn't expect people at all to wear Glam style, but it was only a few, even with Twisted Sister headlining.

Helsinki's Tuska fest was different. First of all - while there was barely a summer in Germany and "Flip-Flops" turned into more expensive and noble models, everybody seems to wear trecking sandals in Helsinki. I only had my one pair of all-weather-all-circumstances festival boots and was quite envy. While Andy was getting nuts at watching all the ladies in top-notch, sexy cloth - wearing outdoor sandals. LOL!

To give you a glimpse on the fashion: I just found the gallery Hel Looks on the internet. Well, yes, the many glam rock people cought my eye as well.

Something that was present on all the festivals this years were cuddly toys: Whether the pink SM-bunny someone was holding up all day in front of Apocalyptica and Dimmu Borgir at Tuska or the 15 little cuddly toys thrown at Dissection in Wacken or the brown bunny held up high all day in front of the main stage - this year was the year of the plush!

Ah yes, something more about the Hel Looks: Noticed the plastic bags on the first pics there, where people are heading to Tuska? What a funny thing about the conservative Finnish alcohol politics: While you are barely allowed to take alcohol with you on the festival area in Germany (because the festivals get the massive amount of their income by selling alcohol) you could of corse take a huge plastic bag of alc into Tuska Metal Fest as long as it wasn't bottled in glass. And while you had to show your passport to get into the drinking area you would bump into a drunken person and his bottle of home-distilled goods just a meter outside. A bit hilarious, isn't it?

One year older...

Hey! Now I'm one year older and the first number has changed. To tell you the surprising truth: It doesn't hurt! Well, I was suspecting the worse...

Thanx again to Kirsten for the marvellous food, for Cord, Mark & Manuel for being the barbecue chefs and for Olli for renting me the Headbangers Ballroom. And of course for everybody coming around and making the kicker table burn.

Now the week went on and on and on, and I already have a new "official" job - promo girl at Dockyard 1. More about that maybe later...

Back from Wacken

Back from Wacken, back from work. This year I worked as the "host" for the Black Stage again - meaning, I had to take care that the bands are gonna find everything they need - from stage and stagemanager to dressing rooms, catering, signing session - to the much more complicated arrangement of the shuttles in the late evening. Pretty clear, nobody wants to leave if the party is at it's heighth.

Marvelous weather on thursday for Nightwish, and the longest and strongest aftermath - heavy rain and a chill the following days.

Working means of course, that I'm not there to watch the bands, so I could only get glimpses of Machine Head, Finntroll, Zyklon, Dissection, Marduk and Kreator, even though I would have loved to see more. But I took my time, arranged some things in before and was able to see the whole sets of Bloodbath, Sentenced (the show of the festival!) & Samael (pink light!!! pink!!! and apple-green-and-red. Ladies!). Bloodbath was simply fun. Took ages for the set-up of the instruments, but only 30 seconds for the bloodlike paint. Unfortunately it was the first and last gig. Maybe for the band in total but definitely for Mikael Akerfeldt as their singer. Remember Mikael directing the audience? "Growl in a death metal way!" "Now high-pitched!" "and now like Dani Filth" LOL!

Definitely it was the last German gig for Sentenced. Even though they have much too much of a rock'n'roll attitude still I was pretty easily convinced by a person well known to the band to offer them some luxury on their last gig - f.e. a shuttle from the stage through the chill to the dressing room. And of course it turned slapstick, as the lawn was sodden and the van was stuck. Well, the driver was not unblameable, but I was not able to get out the red carpet this quick. Next time I'll arrange a landrover or, even better, a hummer. But there is no next time. Where's the limo?

On a more serious topic, there was a terrible accident where a very drunken person was falling against the side of an ambulance and died, unfortunately this turned out to be true, as the police reports. Thanks god this was the only major incident, most of the minor injuries were caused by bad weather all in all it was an exhausting, but cool and calm W:O:A. Now I got some sleep, and I'm already preparing for the next event, as I'm turning 30 tomorrow...

Next festival and some greetings (to Finland!)

Yes, it's starting all over again:

The red bag is nearly packed. I have my passes already around my wrist. Sabine is already at the camp site. Hamburg is overcrowded by people dressed in black, who one by one go to Wacken to go for the 16th round of the festival. Or: W:O:A. Like every second car says. What a frenzy! Starting earlier each year still. Wheather's shitty? Get a generator and start the heating. Make a new fire. Be there! Hopefully I don't get a cold...

I finished the fixes at the damn database of MI.de just in time. Put on again all the reports. Interviews will follow later, sorry to Thunderstone, Alexi/COB and DEFUSE.

And, something I didn't manage to do the last days (always keep the best for last): A wide grin and a happy-happy hello goes to Jukka aka Shrike! What a funny end of my Tuska visit. "A what?!". Exactly. Greetings to your sister as well!

Katapult - inside the Hate Crew pt. 3

Well... The great finish of my trip with Children Of Bodom was the shooting of their video to "In Your Face" last monday/tuesday night. I hate to write about one thing twice, so you have to grab your dictionary once again and rummage your way through my article on the Metal-Inside.de.

But... as there are several little bits and pieces that were much too nasty for a proper report on a real metal magazine, here is the background information I had to cut out:
First of all, KATAPULT Film did find a location so far out in the woods - em, old eastern parts of the city, that you could really imagine old DDR. But(t) marvelously it was close to our hotel.

The clip is already cut in the first version, so don't hesitate to go on Katapult's website and have a look, maybe it's already on in the public part. It was a whole lotta fun to meet Jessica Andree who was doing "set tourism" as me. She had a lot of funny stories from working on Sarah & Marc in Love. But even more fun it was to see serious Chicken-Holger turn into his evil, macho twin again ;-)

I mentioned the hotel already: The Ibis Berlin Mitte is worth a recommendation - no complains about our parties, 24/7 bar - what else, please!?

What I did cut out of my report as well was the "Roope of the day". Tuesday morning's quote was "We're running by the force of alcohol". I highly recommend to make a "Roope's corner" on the website. Honestly!

Women on The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown

Geeeez! What a fun! Here you can compile yaself as a South Park character. My first "other me" I've posted on my myspace.com account. And already some people who know me very well recognized some features that it actually can be me. Do you think it's possible that one day you can stick your South-Park-self into your passport? This picture I would really like, even though it is for sure no help at airports or the US customs ;-)

And I think it was inspired a bit by Almodovar, well.

Hairy Porno - em, Potter...***

So, yes, exactly 24 hrs ago I finished off "Harry Potter and The Halfblood Prince". I think I merely needed 2 1/2 days or less than 30 hrs. The book is a page-turner as the others were, and it's not true, what some critcs said, that it's weaker than it's predecessors. It holds a stunning revelation and I think it gives everything the story needs. The tragic death of (*if you wanna spoil your own fun then look here*) is not as half as surprising as it was the death of Sirius Black in "The Order Of The Phoenix" - he* prepares Harry with everything he knows himself and everything he might need to know in future. That there are certain things missing still as Harry is not even of age - well, yes. There are some questions in the end, which are a bit bewildering: Why isn't Dumbledore telling McGonagall everything he knows? Why does Harry really think he can solve it on his own and outside the school - while the secrets for sure still lay in the school? But I'm already keen on no. seven, because I think that the fog will clear there. More light-handed and more furious than Tolkien, I'm sure ;-)

Next question which was apparent in some of the reviews I read so far:
Is (*if you wanna spoil your own fun then look here*) a traitor or is he not? And which proof had Dumbledore for thinking he isn't? Well, yes of course he is a traitor, but his reasons are not really obvious: Something in his motives must have changed. While he was loyal to Dumbledore over most of the last 5 1/2 books, he must have felt save in the school. Save from the fellow death-eaters. But now, for a headstart, he hides Wormtongue, and in the end he betrayes everybody. I doubt it's only because of his favourite Draco and the spell Bellatrix and Cissy put on him. There must be some promise awaiting him at Voldemort, while on the other hand Harry Potter annoys him more and more or makes him more aware of his dreadful past. Something like that.

And, to finally join the guessings: The only one I can imagine having got and possibly destroyed the horcrux before Dumbledore and Harry got there is Regulus Black. Now, how long till book no. 7???

***(The headline of today was not really funny but inspired by this stoopid t-shirt which is out of print for some more or less obvious reasons. And, c'mon, the t-shirt is funny!