The melloboat was everything I expected it to be, and more. Saw two of my alltime favourite bands live (Opeth and Comus), met some friends from the forum, made some new friends, discovered new music, had a couple of walks through Stockholm (wonderful city, I’d probably love living there) and a short one in Helsinki… am I forgetting something? Oh yeah, the incredible amount of awesome live music! Truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

I’ve filmed a lot of this, so maybe you’ll get a glimpse of what you missed :) Anyway there’s already some great melloboat vids on youtube so check them out! Oh and check out these pics.

And if you want to read the report I wrote for dinodance, here it is:

before this festival i never thought i could have a live music overdose. tbh, anekdoten, opeth, trettioariga kriget, mats/morgan, bo hansson, comus, katatonia, piu, promise&monster, plankton - any of these would’ve made my night anytime. the fact that i saw them all in just 2 nights made it all so overwhelming.

anekdoten
a kickass start to the festival, raising the bar high for every band to come. standout performances for me were monolith, from within, and especially nucleus which was really dynamic and heavy. i filmed in for a ride, which featured a keyboard disfunction and it’s pretty cool to see how they recover from it

the colins of paradise
just saw the first song, and wasn’t impressed. but dan saw more of the show and he liked it, so

opeth
what can i say, i finally saw opeth the whole thing was a continuous rush, i didn’t realize how awesome it’d been until after the show. i was in the second row, it was one of the most brutal shows i’ve been to but i did my best to also film it. i wasn’t convinced by some of the parts in the new song tbh, but after watching it again i think it kicks ass and i can’t wait to hear it in the context of the album

trettioariga kriget
anyone who thought the night was over after opeth was fuckin WRONG. i knew these guys were good, i loved their last album, but they really blew me away. they fuckin lived and breathed music, sending away a wave of positive energy to the crowd - it was amazing. just when i thought they couldn’t possibly play an even more pwnful song, they did - and again and again.

mats morgan all star team
i was really tired by now, so i sat down to watch them. each and every one on stage was a brilliant musician and master of their instrument. they played like 15-20 minutes of sol niger within, it was amazing, very close to what you hear on the album
the definite highlight was the final song they all (mats, morgan, hielm bass player, mattias ia eklundh, fred thordendal and hollmer accordeon from samla mammas manna) played together, idk if it was composed for just this show or what, fact is it absolutely dominated.

went to sleep exhausted at about 4.30, the next day i visited helsinki and then saw

bo hansson
together with a drummor and a second organist who was also great. really cool show, although bo’s organ was fucked up, it was all barely hearable except for one note which was really high in volume bert said it was fine from where he was standing, oh well

natalie lorichs & axe
they also played with bass player, they all were fine but the songs were nothing special. we left halfway through to get a good spot for comus

comus
were fuckin out of this world. the footage ken filmed is cool, but doesn’t compare to the experience of being there, right in front between goring and colin pearson (i think that’s the violinist). they were all superb if not flawless, but my definite favourite was glenn goring, such amazing guitarwork and bongo bangin his solo part in the herald was heavenly.
favourite performances would probably be the herald and drip drip \m/

piu
a very promising young band, they were spontaneous and sincere. loved their show

promise&the monster
she was also amazing to see. i wasn’t as head-over-heels as kestral bertovo and hin but still it was quite special

katatonia
only caught the last like 5 songs, but they were great, i think better than in romania some months ago. and murder with mikael was another wonderful thing to witness

plankton
yet another unexpected surprise. you thought these guys were good in the studio? well live they’re 100 times better - kickass guitars, super solid rhythm section and the percussionist deserves a special mention. i especially loved one of the guitarists (the skinnier one with a beard), he had some of the most tasteful and captivating solo work i’ve ever seen

leaf hound
they were great, but a bit of a downer after plankton tbh. i guess if you’re more into this kind of music you would’ve loved them, to me it was just solid hard rock, with a bonus for per’s appearance in the end - he really spiced up the songs and had some kickass organ soloz

well that’s it, best festival of my life, don’t regret it for a second. too bad more of you didn’t come, you really missed out