According to the Hunter Davies version I was a big Worms fan from the very beginning and gladly joined them when Uke quit.
It´s true that I was glad to join Worms, but before that there was lots of hassle. (Albert Goldman didn´t write this but his spirit possessed me while I did).
I used to hate Worms and their music earlier on. The change actually happened when the guys persuaded me to join Finnish Black Sabbath. This wasn´t easy, however. The guys knew this, and they played safe. About the strategy a little later.
Finnish Black Sabbath asked me to join them in late 1988. I was the roommate of Tapani the guitarist.
They wanted me to add another dimension to the group´s public image and thus to widen the basis of their audience. FBS´s always looked for crossover success.
The army had made me a superstud. Elvis´ spirit possessed me in Christmas eve while I was being medicated in the military hospital. The diagnosis was gout and I was being treated with codein, fructose, laxatives and ethanol. And hypnosis, of course.
I´d learned to sing excactly like the King and since that I´ve had an admirable following among elderly ladies. (I´m the reason to most of the numerous Elvis observations since the King´s passing). So I was the perfect match to the other guys who were so young and fresh, adored by those lovely student girls. I even did karate on stage, breaking bricks and stuff.
HOLD ON, I´M EATING
The trouble was that I hated Black Sabbath - I hated nearly all good music back then. I had my own group "Eino´s Rendezvous", claiming we were a musical meltpot with "The sound of the Beatles, the energy of the Stones and the touch of the Hurriganes" (the latter was THE Finnish rock band of the 70´s). Much later it occurred to me that the name is pronounced like "Anus Rendezvous".
We actually played 12-bar boogie. Boogie is O.K. but we played boogie TERRIBLY. Bad versions of standards, some cliched originals like "My baby left me because I´m a homo" and pointless instrumentals, occasionally with a funny title a´la "All you need is Hegel". (This was supposed to be a joke at Hessu and his studies in philosophy).
KAMA SUTRA
Hessu´s then girlfriend Susanna is a fan of Nico (of the Velvet Underground fame), by the way, and from Mikkeli, my hometown. She once told that I was known in Mikkeli as "Crazy-Eikka". I never knew it before that.
I´d figured out Hessu´s hair caused his charisma and I planned to cut it violently or in his sleep so Susanna would give him up (I was envious of Susanna like everybody else). I never did that, but Hessu much later confessed his hair had a lot do with his self-esteem. Remember Samson and Delilah in the Bible?
He gave up the long hair in the early nineties when he´d graduated. I thought he wanted to look a bit more adult as he got a part-time teaching job in the University, but Hessu told me he wanted to look like KOJAK.
Eino´s Rendezvous didn´t do much to win Susanna for me, however.
I´d fallen in love with McCartney´s looks in the "Let it be" -movie, and the only thing I presupposed from the band members was A FULL BEARD. Quite naturally we had many extremely bad players.
Full beard was fashionable in the local gay community those days, practically a trademark. Finland was a very homophobic place back then, particularly a peasantville like Jyväskylä. So no heterosexual wore a beard as everybody was afraid it might stigmatize them.
JERKING OFF AT THE YMCA
Except me. I knew nothing about this, and as I wanted musicians with a full beard, everybody thought it was going to be a gay lib group a´la Village People. Almost all the players were gay. Practical in that the group was self-contained sexually, no need to hunt groupies. The downside was that some of the guys never stopped debauching with each other backstage, and on gigs they were totally fainted.
Eventually I had to impose the "30 minutes rule": no sex in the last 30 minutes before the show so the guys would have some time to collect themselves together. Quite understandably a few guys left the group immediately. Rock´n´roll is about sex after all.
Besides the real life soap opera the best thing about "Rendezvous" was our famous stage raps a´la "Fame is like a narcotic - once you get a taste you want more", "Our drummer treats his fans like his Vagitrim balls" or "This song tells about putting everything you can find into your mouth".
WEDDING BELLS
We played shorter and shorter songs so there would be more time for the raps. Eventually we played no songs at all. This was very practical in that we didn´t need guitars and amps and drums and other shit. Also we could drink as much as we wanted to.
FBS thought I was the man for them. IF only my musical taste was a bit more like theirs (and if I knew how to play ...) They believed I had an admirable sense of humour - they didn´t know all this Rendezvous stupidity had happened accidentally.
REASON TO PANIC
So one night Petri invited me to Ilokivi pub and made me drink huge amounts of beer and wine. We got extremely pissed, got thrown out of the pub and went to Petri´s home (in an abandoned house). I passed out on his couch.
Morning came, or maybe afternoon, and I woke up - to Hawkwind´s "Brainstorm", playing VEEEEERRRY loud - and I´d been tied to the couch! APOPLEXY!
My head was aching from the last night´s gargantual drinking and I was feeling crappy in every way. And the guys kept on playing "Doremi fasol latido" by Hawkwind and "Paranoid" by Black Sabbath, from their split-single with Status Quo, for several hours.
I finally told them "I just haven´t taken my time and listened to this kind of music, but now that I hear it, I think I like it." Of course this was a lie, but I had to do it to get out of the horrible brainwash.
I thought I´d made it, but the worst was yet to come. I got home, went to the toilet (ever seen a man throw up?), saw myself in the mirror and HUH ??? My beard was away and gone - I only had a moustache! There was no way I could play with Rendezvous looking like Geezer Butler!
THE SPIRITUAL AND HEALING EFFECTS OF MUSIC
Finnish Black Sabbath was better than nothing, so I had to humble myself and join them. I lived for music, after all. I always liked SHOCK ROCK a´la Bowie, Danny and Hector, and thought Finn Sabs had the same glam/horror show quality.
But I hated the music, so I insisted we forget Sabbath and play KISS instead. The guys threatened to renew the Hawkwind/Black Sabbath treatment and I gave up.
Eventually I learned to like Black Sabbath´s music and even the FBS guys. So later when they wanted me for Worms, I was ready and willing.
peräsmiehen synty #4, the birth of fartman #4.
It´s true that I was glad to join Worms, but before that there was lots of hassle. (Albert Goldman didn´t write this but his spirit possessed me while I did).
I used to hate Worms and their music earlier on. The change actually happened when the guys persuaded me to join Finnish Black Sabbath. This wasn´t easy, however. The guys knew this, and they played safe. About the strategy a little later.
Finnish Black Sabbath asked me to join them in late 1988. I was the roommate of Tapani the guitarist.
They wanted me to add another dimension to the group´s public image and thus to widen the basis of their audience. FBS´s always looked for crossover success.
The army had made me a superstud. Elvis´ spirit possessed me in Christmas eve while I was being medicated in the military hospital. The diagnosis was gout and I was being treated with codein, fructose, laxatives and ethanol. And hypnosis, of course.
I´d learned to sing excactly like the King and since that I´ve had an admirable following among elderly ladies. (I´m the reason to most of the numerous Elvis observations since the King´s passing). So I was the perfect match to the other guys who were so young and fresh, adored by those lovely student girls. I even did karate on stage, breaking bricks and stuff.
HOLD ON, I´M EATING
The trouble was that I hated Black Sabbath - I hated nearly all good music back then. I had my own group "Eino´s Rendezvous", claiming we were a musical meltpot with "The sound of the Beatles, the energy of the Stones and the touch of the Hurriganes" (the latter was THE Finnish rock band of the 70´s). Much later it occurred to me that the name is pronounced like "Anus Rendezvous".
We actually played 12-bar boogie. Boogie is O.K. but we played boogie TERRIBLY. Bad versions of standards, some cliched originals like "My baby left me because I´m a homo" and pointless instrumentals, occasionally with a funny title a´la "All you need is Hegel". (This was supposed to be a joke at Hessu and his studies in philosophy).
KAMA SUTRA
Hessu´s then girlfriend Susanna is a fan of Nico (of the Velvet Underground fame), by the way, and from Mikkeli, my hometown. She once told that I was known in Mikkeli as "Crazy-Eikka". I never knew it before that.
I´d figured out Hessu´s hair caused his charisma and I planned to cut it violently or in his sleep so Susanna would give him up (I was envious of Susanna like everybody else). I never did that, but Hessu much later confessed his hair had a lot do with his self-esteem. Remember Samson and Delilah in the Bible?
He gave up the long hair in the early nineties when he´d graduated. I thought he wanted to look a bit more adult as he got a part-time teaching job in the University, but Hessu told me he wanted to look like KOJAK.
Eino´s Rendezvous didn´t do much to win Susanna for me, however.
I´d fallen in love with McCartney´s looks in the "Let it be" -movie, and the only thing I presupposed from the band members was A FULL BEARD. Quite naturally we had many extremely bad players.
Full beard was fashionable in the local gay community those days, practically a trademark. Finland was a very homophobic place back then, particularly a peasantville like Jyväskylä. So no heterosexual wore a beard as everybody was afraid it might stigmatize them.
JERKING OFF AT THE YMCA
Except me. I knew nothing about this, and as I wanted musicians with a full beard, everybody thought it was going to be a gay lib group a´la Village People. Almost all the players were gay. Practical in that the group was self-contained sexually, no need to hunt groupies. The downside was that some of the guys never stopped debauching with each other backstage, and on gigs they were totally fainted.
Eventually I had to impose the "30 minutes rule": no sex in the last 30 minutes before the show so the guys would have some time to collect themselves together. Quite understandably a few guys left the group immediately. Rock´n´roll is about sex after all.
Besides the real life soap opera the best thing about "Rendezvous" was our famous stage raps a´la "Fame is like a narcotic - once you get a taste you want more", "Our drummer treats his fans like his Vagitrim balls" or "This song tells about putting everything you can find into your mouth".
WEDDING BELLS
We played shorter and shorter songs so there would be more time for the raps. Eventually we played no songs at all. This was very practical in that we didn´t need guitars and amps and drums and other shit. Also we could drink as much as we wanted to.
FBS thought I was the man for them. IF only my musical taste was a bit more like theirs (and if I knew how to play ...) They believed I had an admirable sense of humour - they didn´t know all this Rendezvous stupidity had happened accidentally.
REASON TO PANIC
So one night Petri invited me to Ilokivi pub and made me drink huge amounts of beer and wine. We got extremely pissed, got thrown out of the pub and went to Petri´s home (in an abandoned house). I passed out on his couch.
Morning came, or maybe afternoon, and I woke up - to Hawkwind´s "Brainstorm", playing VEEEEERRRY loud - and I´d been tied to the couch! APOPLEXY!
My head was aching from the last night´s gargantual drinking and I was feeling crappy in every way. And the guys kept on playing "Doremi fasol latido" by Hawkwind and "Paranoid" by Black Sabbath, from their split-single with Status Quo, for several hours.
I finally told them "I just haven´t taken my time and listened to this kind of music, but now that I hear it, I think I like it." Of course this was a lie, but I had to do it to get out of the horrible brainwash.
I thought I´d made it, but the worst was yet to come. I got home, went to the toilet (ever seen a man throw up?), saw myself in the mirror and HUH ??? My beard was away and gone - I only had a moustache! There was no way I could play with Rendezvous looking like Geezer Butler!
THE SPIRITUAL AND HEALING EFFECTS OF MUSIC
Finnish Black Sabbath was better than nothing, so I had to humble myself and join them. I lived for music, after all. I always liked SHOCK ROCK a´la Bowie, Danny and Hector, and thought Finn Sabs had the same glam/horror show quality.
But I hated the music, so I insisted we forget Sabbath and play KISS instead. The guys threatened to renew the Hawkwind/Black Sabbath treatment and I gave up.
Eventually I learned to like Black Sabbath´s music and even the FBS guys. So later when they wanted me for Worms, I was ready and willing.
peräsmiehen synty #4, the birth of fartman #4.