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Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Last Cup of Sorrow - Pt 2 backstage w FNM


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Best fucking sandwich ever (don't mind my paper cup for the champagne)


So... where was I?

Right, Faith No More just ended their (possibly) last show ever with a stirring rendition of "The Real Thing." Ironic, for me, considering it was the first song I ever heard them played live.

Svetlana and I made our way up past the stage and to the area where the trailers and dressing rooms were kept. I was just glowing, positively glowing, from having watched the whole epic performance from the sidestage.

We waited around, S's bag of goodies at her feet. Their dressing room was just around the corner. I heard someone yell (Patton, obviously) and then someone exclaim "let's get 'er!"

Tim walks past us, gives us the squidgey eye, "You guys are trouble. Double trouble."

"Us?" I exclaim, "We are just innocent ladies."

Anyway, two seconds later Bill comes running out around the corner and says, "All right, present time!"

We pick up the bag and make our way around the corner to the dressing room.

Bill goes to open the door. S, from past experiences, knew that it might be good to check if everyone is decent.

He opens the door, quickly closes it. Maybe not. Someone inside yells, "No, it's fine, come in."

So we go inside and it's not fine. I mean, everyone is dressed except for Patton who is in the middle of pulling on his pants/underwear, I don't even know because my first instinct was to quickly avert my eyes. I know, I didn't think I would be that prudish in that sort of opportunity but there ya go. I looked away, my brain barely got a chance to process what I saw. What an intro!

Anyway, awkwardness aside, we go in and everyone is super excited about S's presents. She plunks the bag in the middle of the floor.

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I slowly follow, in slow motion it feels like, just from how surreal it all is. I gingerly sit on the corner of the couch beside Puffy and Roddy and watch S start to dish out the presents. I was pinching myself earlier when I was watching the show but now I wanted to do it again, just make sure it was in fact The Real Thing, that I was here, in their dressing room... you know, just hanging out. Like... wtf?

My inner workings of my disbelieving mind aside, I got ready in photo mode as S presented her gifts to the gang (btw, I did run this and the photos by Bill to make sure it was OK and I have permission, so no need to worry, if Bill says it's cool, it's the coolest of cool :).

For Tim:
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A stuffed version of The Real Thing Vodka. Also doubles as a weapon to hit Mike when he's misbehaving.

For Roddy:
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A keyboard. Fucking rad.

For Jon:
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One awesome guitar.

For Billy:
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A bodacious bass!

For Puffy:
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A Puffy Drum!

Last but certainly not least... For Mike...
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He's worried about what it is (scared, more like it)
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It better not be a horse's head...
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And it's a dead horse's head, complete with an X for an eye - homage to The Godfather (Italian, you know).

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But he likes it anyway... doubles as a pillow!

Time for my gift! Koskenkorva Salmiakki liquor...

Tim is NOT impressed "Will I like it? As long as it doesn't taste like licorice."
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Patton and I in unison, "Well then you'll love it!"

(it's salty licorice flavoured booze) :P

Roddy is equally scared, and he should be...
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But I have no problem. At least, I'm brave enough to take the first gulp.
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Then I pass it on to Patton since he's obviously had the liquor before and doesn't have that much of a problem with it. Meanwhile I'm coughing up a storm (that shit is STRONG).
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Seconds later I am raiding their food tray and munching on Finnish bread. I remembered I hadn't even eaten dinner that night and that huge shot of licorice booze was making me woozy.

Patton, the food gourmand eyes me, "you know we have real food you can eat."

That they did. Anyway, S and I just hung around, drinking champagne, beer, Salmiakki, eating their ubiquitous peanut M&M's and Kinder Surprises.

It was just us and the band. Unbelievable.

We all talked, drank, laughed for almost two hours. They are just the best group of guys ever, nevermind the fact that they happen to comprise of my favourite band in the world. Each one of them is unique, thoughtful and earnest.

We talked about the band's experiences on the road, my Finnish citizenship, Coachella, Random Youtube videos, Russia, I taught Jon and Mike how to swear in Finnish (Mike: "Hey Tim! You are a Vittu Perkela!!"), talked about how much the band loved Finland, we talked about... tattoos... *ahem* I showed Roddy and Bill my tattoo, they were excited and took pictures of it with their cameras... Mike got involved. Hilarity ensued, etc.

Later we were outside and Puffy stumbled upon the FNM2.0 blog and the whole band watched, for the first time, the video footage of Patton doing his Forestglade jump on to the drum kit.



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Puffy's first response was to laugh his ass off. Patton's first response was to cover his face with his hands, "Oh my god, I'm so terrible."

Spent a good a few minutes reasurring him that he wasn't terrible. After all, Puffy was fine - so fine that he had taken his laptop away and was watching the incident over and over again and laughing - meanwhile, Mike was the one with scratches and bruises on his arms and wrists thanks to his tumble ("cymbals are really sharp!").

Anyway, 'twas a rad night. I mean, raddest of the rad. It was amazing, stupendous, fantastic, or as in Finnish, it was was Loistava! To just be one of the gang, for one night... beyond my wildest dreams.

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And in the end, I walked away with their monkey (well, Roddy said I could take him). Yes, there was a monkey in their dressing room (according the festival staff they requested a monkey that "doesn't shit everywhere but that eats shit" - I am sure something got lost in translation). I spent some time trying to work the fucker ("Are you raping that thing?" asked Mike) but alas I failed just as the band had failed. Monkey was a dud.

Wasn't until the next day that I realized Mojo (yes, that's his name now) had a magnetic banana, and, well... this is what happens:


There ya go FNM. I figured it out! Mojo lives and he is glorious!

Good times*

*understatement of the decade

27 comments:

Snapper said...

Brilliant!:))))

Sean Zandberg said...

You lucky duck! Congrats on the experience!

Megan said...

Yay for part 2! The picture with with you and Roddy is a great one. I love Patton's face in the one with S (I assume?)... priceless.

jbabhsg said...

Lusty:

You're so lucky! It's so awesome that you were there. I've been reading all you Patton related posts and I've enjoyed them quite a bit.

I just have a question for you: how they interacted with each other? are they friendly with each other or just polite? Did they treat each other like family o more like coworkers? Just curious...

FinFan said...

Bet you didn't ask Tim if Porn were ever going to make another album. It was just you and the band backstage because Finnish people just do not do that sort of thing. I have been to many shows in Finland and it is always the same, great fans, but once the show is over away they go.

Wanderlusting said...

FinFan - well Svetlana and I were both invited months before as friends of the band. That's the only reason we were there with them,.

That said, security around the venue was very tight, so even if Finnish fans were hanging around they would have been told to go away. Hell, I couldn't even get close before my backstage pass was located, and I was media.

But you're right, from my perspective the Finns were very enthusiastic during the show but respectful afterward. Probably why the band had nothing but positive things to say about Finland and its people!

Anonymous said...

Wow. Just.... WOW.

Kate (kittie444@hotmail.com)

Wanderlusting said...

Jbabhsg:

They seemed like a bunch of old mates, really. Everyone was in a great mood and got along really well. I was lucky to experience that.

Marta from With Love... said...

That is soooo awesome... what a fantastic experience :)

FinFan said...

I'll take terwasnapsi over Koskenkorva Samiakki any day! ; ) Hope Tomahawk gets going again now that FNM is over.

Annie Spandex said...

Unbelievable! I'm so happy for you! :D And that monkey is hilarious

Anonymous said...

WOW. Just... WOW. I'm REELING from this story, and also of your Mondo Cane re-telling. You are one lucky, lucky girl. Again, I love your writing, and I'm so glad you posted everything here, including the pics, which were hilarious. Pretty much exactly what I would think a FNM hang-out would entail... one question: what was "the Patton tattoo incident???" Do tell...

Again, I've followed your blog from the FNM 2.0 board, and it was such a treat to read about your experiences. They all seem like such nice guys. *sniffle* So sad it may all be over!

Anonymous said...

Thank you for sharing this.
Sounds like a lot of fun.

The monkey is pretty funny also.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for sharing this.
Sounds like a lot of fun.

The monkey is pretty funny also.

Did you happen to ask Jon what he does when he's not performing with FNM?

Wanderlusting said...

Anon - I didn't. I should have and I remember thinking so because I was curious but he actually asked me a lot of questions lol. Jon is a very direct, very kind guy so I happily flapped my yap.

I did end up asking the band a lot of things, about what they are doing with the Warfield footage, suits, how they liked Coachella, etc but it barely touched on the 14787582 questions I had ready to go.

In the end I just shut my brain off and relaxed* :)

*looked like I was relaxing, was actually freaking out :P

♥ Cara Mia ♥ said...

what a fab post! love them....great pics!

Melissa of The Ramblin' Man said...

You have too much fun. Thank god.

Cupcake Blonde said...

I am just grinning ear to ear as I read this because I am so happy for you! This is a once in a lifetime experience!! And your stories have been so detailed I feel like I was there with you. Congrats on living out a dream. :)

Candycane said...

Wow thats amazing .. I have only been backstage once to meet one of my old fave bands (Feeder) but this looks like you were one of them and got to hang out - I would love that!

Sal xXx

Agata said...

You realy made your dream come true. I'm happy for you but also jealous as hell ;)

Jorge Mario Sánchez said...

Congratulations, Lusty. What a great experience. FNM is my favourite band since 1993, so I can imagine how great it was to hang out with the guys just after their last show. I was really happy when I knew they were going to reunite, and now my heart is broken. Seriously. But that's life, I guess.

Keep on with your blog, it's very nice, I will come often.

Anika said...

Haha love the last asterisk!

Have missed your blog, but I'm back and will go through all that I've missed.

Glad to see you're still that crazy girl (in the best way!).....hope all is well :)

Memphis said...

Somehow I've always pictured you hanging out with movie stars and rock stars and just being cool about it. I wouldn't be surprised if one day I put in a DVD of a famous movie I've been wanting to see, and there you are playing a major part. You just have something about you that says "star" I think. Congrats on all of this, by the way. This is really awesome!

Michael said...

Wow, you're fucking nuts!

Wanderlusting said...

LOL Michael.... in my comment moderation I couldn't see your icon so it just said that a Mike called me fucking nuts... had me going for a second!

I V Y said...

oh awesome! coca cola :D

my food blog. my flog. said...

Great post! Thanks for sharing! I saw FNM at Coachella this year, and am seeing Mondo Cane in SF next week!

long live good music! :)

i found your blog thru FNM 2.0. keep up the great work!