Tour diary: Europe 2000

2021 Introduction: Late 2000 we did the longest and probably most important tour of our career. We were handpicked by Napalm Death to be their main support during seven weeks in Europe. A dream come true for a young band heavily inspired by Napalm Death.

We had released “Human 2.0” the same year and the tour helped us to spread our name for sure. And we, i.e. I, wrote a tour diary during the seven weeks. Keep in mind that this was in 2000 and the Internet access was a rarity. We had to rely on finding Internet cafés to spend some pre-EURO bills and coins to get an hour to read emails and write these diary entries.

Nasum.com was a more or less static HTML based website at the time, but I had managed to do a little CMS to be able to post entries to a database and dynamically change the diary page.

I have polished the language slightly to this posting and added some photos from the archives to spice things up. Other than that, it is as it was written 20+ years ago…

- Anders

Tour diary: In Europe with Napalm Death, October 23 and December 12 2000

First post: October 24

Yesterday was the first show on the tour, a six-band thing with us and Napalm Death as headliners, supported by Inside Conflict, Blockheads, Ananda and Nostromo. Thank you all for all the gifts we got, really nice of you.

The show was OK, I guess. We're always a bit rusty the first couple of shows, but it could have been a lot worse. We tried out a new set list that didn't really work to 100%, and tonight - in Paris - we'll try another one. The Paris club (La Locomotive) looks really, really cool. The ultimate rock club. Too bad you have to soundcheck 8 in the morning (so, we didn't soundcheck!)!!!

The first days of travelling has been alright. The first night the bus was extremely hot. Something was wrong, so we woke up all sweaty and icky, but the second night it was better. Let's hope it will stay so because otherwise we'll suffer a lot during these 7 weeks of touring.

Tomorrow we have two days of travelling down to Granada in Spain, so I guess it's time to bring out the books and the CD:s by then...

Bye for now!

Second post: October 29

We are in Spain and we are about to get on stage in Sevilla in just a few minutes. These last days have been really crazy! After the show in Paris the 24th we had two travel days which Jez (the tour manager) described as "two days of hell"... Well, at noon on the 25th our bus broke down somewhere in the south of France. It was just a fuel hose that had broken down. A 15 minute job to fix, according to our driver Paul.

But since we were in France there were big troubles... We had to tow the bus a few kilometers (which cost us a lot of money)... Well, during the towing the towing truck destroyed the radiator and many important parts of the bus, so to make a long story short: we have no bus for another week!

We stayed at an "in the middle of nowhere"-place in France for two days waiting for news about how to get to Granada in Spain (14-15 hours away), until they fixed two small vans and a truck for the equipment. We missed the show in Granada (it was moved to the 30th - a day off) and our drivers drove for 14 hours in a row! Total punk tour!!!

But now we are in sunny Spain and travel bad but stay at nice hotels... A few more days, then we have our beloved bus back! Can't wait!!!


Third post: November 2

We're still in Spain and we still have no clue about the bus. The shows in Spain have been very different from each other. Apparently, the Spanish audience didn't know that we were playing here, because the posters say only Napalm Death + support. That sucks big time!

But the audience in Sevilla went totally crazy and that was a blast! Probably one of the best audiences we've ever had! Thank you! But the next day, in Granada, the audience was the complete opposite... Very confusing.

Tonight we're doing a show in Barcelona at a club that is supposed to be very, very hot (the drummer from Gluecifer fainted during their fourth song...) so we'll see what happens.

A few more days in Spain then it's time for France and Italy during next week...

Fourth post: November 6

The last show in Spain is done! Earlier tonight we played in Oviedo in front of a couple of hundreds of Spanish maniacs and it was a good closure for the time in Spain.

The crowds have been very different from place to place, the best one in Sevilla for sure, but big thanks to all the Spanish fans that have come and seen us play and bought our stuff!

We finally have a new bus, but it's only temporary. We will have our real bus back soon.

Tomorrow (or today if you prefer) we will have a day off in Toulouse, France, and that will be very nice.

See you again soon!


Fifth post: November 13

A long time since the last update... We have been in "no computer country" for quite a while.

Let’s see now... We did two shows in France, Toulouse and Lyon. Le Bikini in Toulouse was a cool place and we got a really nice meal for a change... thanks a lot for that. The show was cool as well.

The Z7 club in Pratteln, Switzerland was HUGE and to top the pleasure, the local crew all had mullets... ah, always a pleasure. And the Swiss are wealthy people - they shopped around a lot at the merchandise stand (mostly Napalm Death stuff, but anyways...)...

After that we had three crazy shows in Italy. The Italian crowds are wild for sure. The stage barriers at the show in Milano were bent beyond recognition after Napalm Death's show...

Now we're in Czech Republic on a day off. It will be interesting to see how the Czech crowd are... And then it's time for Germany... Always interesting...

We have a lot of merchandise left... please, please, show visitors - buy our tour t-shirt...

Until next time - grindcore is STILL no joke...

Sixth post: November 14

You might have seen it somewhere - the dreadful piece of clothing that never should have been made... I'm of course talking about the YELLOW "Human 2.0" t-shirt!

The story is: Someone in the Czech Republic asked Relapse if he could make 100 Nasum t-shirts, and they said yes. We got 6 copies and nearly died! The t-shirt is awful - ugly yellow cloth with a STRETCHED print of the front and back cover of the CD. It's terrible!

Please keep in mind that this t-shirt was not issued by anyone in Nasum! We would never do such an ugly t-shirt! There's a green version out there as well, and we don't think that just 100 copies were printed... Doesn't seem that way. Please don't buy it!

In Italy we saw a bootleg t-shirt with the "inhale/exhale" design that was pretty cool. Buy that one instead!

In 40 minutes or so, we're doing our first show in Czech, so it's time to leave the wonderful world of computers once again...

Seventh post: November 21

We've had a day off in Hannover spending it with the Relapse Europe staff and with the guys in The Dillinger Escape Plan and Botch that just happened to play here on our day off!

Imagine that - a day off from the tour bus (which we have gotten back now, thank you very much!) and we end up on ANOTHER tour bus and at ANOTHER venue! :)

The guys in the bands were totally cool though and they both did killer shows, so if their tour get somewhere near you - do check them out!

Our first four German shows have been OK, although Anders has been living in hell the last weeks due to a severe case of broken cymbalus, but he got new ones today.

The show in Offenbach was a total success merchandise wise! We want more of that - we have way too much merchandise! And speaking of merchandise, we have some new shit in our booth now - new copies of the Warhate-split (which means that Relapse has printed new ones), and "inhale/exhale" t-shirts in sizes M, L and XL, which look a little bit different than they should... The 7" EP:s are going fast, so they can be gone in just a few days...

Anyway, there's three weeks left of tour so we'll keep on doing our shit! Until next time...

Eight post: November 23

Germany seems to be the land without Internet café’s, but today we actually found one! Wow - there is justice in this world!!!

Yesterday we played in Osnabrück at a venue that was decorated old Egypt style with sphinx' and all that kind of shit. The perfect club for Nile to do a show, except that the place probably is a little bit too small for a band like Nile. Anyway - the show was good, and we were finally able to play our complete set, which was nice because the last couple of shows we've been forced to cut down our set due to curfews, delays and other shit. The pain you have to suffer when you’re the middle band (if you didn't know all the German shows also includes the British band Brutal Deluxe).

We're in eastern Germany now for a couple of days, then a quick stop in Switzerland on Sunday (a return of the mullet-crew maybe?) and then it's a few more German dates... Ah, what the fuck - you have the tour dates on this page!



Ninth post: November 29

Less than two weeks left of the tour now and I guess everyone more or less are pretty tired of all this. Sure, it's still fun to play and everything, but touring life makes you very tired...

Only three shows left in Germany. Germany has been very nice for us. Our past experiences in Germany (i.e. the second Nasum show ever back in 1995, and the Fuck the Commerce III thing) wasn't really that good. I mean, everything was OK with the arrangements, but our playing was pretty, pretty bad (although many people come up to us now and say that FTC was killer...), so it feels nice to finally do some good shows in Germany.

The Remise club in Wil, CH, was a really cool place and they gave us really good food, which we've actually had all the tour, with some minor exceptions...

The last show in Luxembourg will be moved to somewhere in Holland. There's some kind of fuck up there, so if you planned to visit that show - forget it! :)

Also the two last shows on the tour will be slightly different from the others... Unfortunately, Jesper has to go back to Sweden a couple of days earlier due to tests for an education he's been applying to for the last four years, so you can expect some well-known "special guests" on the last two shows... Be there or be somewhere else...

Tenth post: December 6

We're approaching the end of the tour, which is nice. It's been quite fun all the time, but this kind of life is pretty tiering, and everyone is more or less on their knees now, pushing forth the last drop of energy to complete the tour...

The final show in the very south of Germany was a really good one and we met some of the guys in Fleshcrawl, long time friends of Anders.

Then we had three shows in France, where we were supported by the ultra nice guys in Nostromo (which by the way is a killer band - check them out!) and that was a blast. On the last show in Lille, all of the guys in Nostromo + some other guy came up on stage in a break in "Tested" completely naked with just a sock on their private parts, RHCP style! We burst out in laughter and was both totally surprised and entertained by this odd event! Thank you guys, hope we meet again!

And now, there's only Holland and Belgium (as you know the last show is moved from Luxembourg to Hoorn, Holland) left to "conquer"... and then we are on our way back home to do another show in Sweden, Gothenburg to be exact, the 15th of December...

This might be the last post in the diary, which is written during the tour, there will be a closing post later on. Thanks to everyone who has been reading this. We hope you enjoyed it!

Eleventh and last post: December 14

Well, we're back to "normal" life in Sweden again after a very long and hard, but fun tour! The last shows became a bit different as stated. Jesper left us in the morning of the 10th and at night we played a somewhat customized set with Shane Embury from Napalm Death playing 9 or 10 songs, with a slight finale with the Terrorizer cover "Dead Shall Rise", also starring Jesse Pintado on guitar. After that we ended the set with four songs with Mitch Dickinson (ex Unseen Terror and Heresy) - ND's drum and swag guy doing the bass. Thanks a lot guys!


The last show (starring the same line up) was a bit strange. It was moved from Luxembourg to Hoorn, Holland and not that many people showed up and there were big troubles with the PA and monitors. Kind of an anti-climax really.

So this is it - we'd like to take this opportunity to officially thank some people that was involved in the tour: Napalm Death - Shane, Jesse, Barney, Mitch and Danny of course, the crew - Mitch D, Risky Russ Russell, Steve Firth and Jez Hale, and also the members in Nostromo and My Minds Mine + their crews for being cool people. And also, big thanks to those who actually have spent time reading this diary!

HELP ME FUND THE VAULT AND THE RARE NASUM

I have a lot of Nasum "vaults". There are the digital vaults, harddrives, CD-R's and whatever that contains some stuff. And then there are the analog vaults. Boxes filled with documents and notes and boxes filled with tapes containing rehearsals and rare stuff. I'd be more than happy to share this with the fans, but I need some funds to take time of from work to really do all that boring excavating that's needed to find and document everything.

I have put together a GoFundMe page for this: gofundme.com/the-rare-nasum and any donation is appreciated. You can also support this cause by buying The Rare Nasum stuff at Bandcamp. Or you can make a donation without going through GoFundMe or Bandcamp - just contact me at nasum@nasum.com. Everything that comes in via these channels are ear marked for a future massive excavation.

I really hope you can help me to preserve The Nasum Vault for the world. Thanks!

- Anders Jakobson.