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I rejoined the Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls UK tour in Bristol last November, to see more pictures and read about it all, check out the blog on my website!

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I joined Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls (and Tim Omondson) for their first November UK dates last week. See pictures and read about it all HERE!

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I shot Of Monsters And Men at Sentrum Scene in Oslo a couple of weeks ago, see the pictures HERE!

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Someone made some great gifs off my video of Frank Turner and Tim Omundson in Southampton the other night! This is awesome :)

Timothy Omundson w/Frank Turner & the Sleeping Souls(x)

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I chatted to Freddie Cowan and Pete Robertson from The Vaccines during their visit to Oslo, Norway.

It turned into an interesting conversation about today's music industry and surviving as a musician, read the full interview HERE!

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Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls supported Die Toten Hosen in Zürich last month, check out some pictures from the event: HERE!

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Last spring I had a nice chat with To Kill A King’s vocalist Ralph Pelleymounter, the whole thing is up in English on Musikknyheter.no!

British band To Kill A King visited Norway and Oslo the week before Easter, for their first Norwegian headline show. The band, which have already been here once before supporting their buddies in Bastille, ended their European tour in Oslo. And when Musikknyheter met vocalist Ralph Pelleymounter for a chat earlier on gig day, he told us that it's been a good tour - at least so far:

- Germany and Switzerland in particular were amazing. We've been there four times now so people know the band. Amazing gigs. Especially in Germany where people brought balloons with chess pieces printed on them (A reference to the album cover) and glowsticks, big cardboard posters and stuff. We even did the waving thing which is cheesy but so much fun. We haven't got quite that far here yet though.

- The gigs here and in Stockholm are the ones we've been concerned about, because we've played everywhere else before and know what to expect. But yesterday was surprisingly ok. Not a lot of people, but good.

The last time To Kill A King visited Oslo, they were traveling with Bastille, and Pelleymounter tells us it's very different to be a headline act compared to being support: ... READ THE REST OF THE INTERVIEW HERE!

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The American punk rockers in Against Me!, recently visited Oslo and Rockefeller, for a gig which earned them 8/10 here at Musikknyheter. The band has been through some radical changes- especially vocalist Laura Jane Grace - but also the band's lineup. A couple of hours prior to the Oslo gig, we met Laura for a little chat about everything that's happened.

It's only just over a year since the band's latest - and extremely personal - album Transgender Dysphoria Blues, was released, and Laura explains that 2014 will always be remembered as one of the best years of her life. However, before the album was released, not everything seemed as promising:

- It was so bleak. We didn't know if the album would ever be finished. So when it was recorded and we knew it was gonna be released, it was just awesome, she grins. - Everything beyond that has been a bonus; gigs we've played etc, because we had no idea if it was actually going to happen.

Some of Laura's doubts about the destiny of Transgender Dysphoria Blues stems from the theme of the album. Laura, previously known as Tom Gabel, had just come out as transgender, and started the long and difficult road to becoming her real self: Laura Jane Grace. This is reflected in the songs on the album, which all talk about different aspects of growing up, the problems, despair and dreams of a transgender person. But despite Laura's doubts about how it would all be received, both the album, and the message that Tom would soon be Laura, was instantly accepted and respected world wide.

When the news about Laura Jane Grace broke, there were also a couple of puzzle pieces falling into place for the Against Me! fans; also songs on the bands previous albums had dealt with this, but no one realised until now, years later. Laura says she, up until Transgender Dysphoria Blues, always felt she had to censor herself, so even though the songs had the same topic and theme, it was always hidden. No one could know what she was really writing about...

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Read the full interview HERE!

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artist tips

don’t save as jpeg

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A week ago the boys in Frank Turner and The Sleeping Souls did their first ever gig in beautiful Royal Albert Hall. The gig was a part of the Teenage Cancer Trust series, and a good chance for the band to show off some new tunes for their London crowd.

We got there early in the day and I spent a couple of hours just being overwhelmed by actually BEING THERE! In ROYAL ALBERT HALL!! OMG!

Walking around the empty venue was beyond surreal, and an experience I'll never EVER forget.

(Read and see more pictures and videos from the gig and pre-gig HERE)

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Meeting Mew!

A couple of weeks ago, I broke one of my rules. I've always had this thing of not wanting to meet - and certainly not interview - my own idols and heroes. There are several reasons for this, but the most important ones are 1: The risk of making an absolute fool of myself in front of people I have all the respect for, and 2: They might be dicks. I really don't want my idols to turn out to be dicks. And ignorance, in this case, is bliss. So when I was asked - in less than 24 hours' notice - if I wanted to interview Mew, only my number one above any other absolute favourite band (i.e the only band whose logo I could ever imagine tattooing onto my body), my reply was, and I quote: "Djdjdjfjejzkdkwkdk uuuuuuuh... Help!!! Yes, but help, but yes?"

"We actually signed a contract in red pen when we first started playing, because we wanted it to look like blood!"

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Jonas Bjerre

Less than 24 hours later, I found myself nervously pacing Angst Bar in Oslo, waiting for vocalist Jonas Bjerre and guitarist Bo Madsen to finish the interview they were doing prior to mine. Analysing my own questions ("Are they good enough? Are they too geeky? Is it too obvious that I'm a fan? Is that lame??") when suddenly Mr. Madsen came around the corner, all smiles and greeting me. From thereon out, it was smooth sailing. The fact that they were 10 minutes late for my interview even became a good thing, as they asked if I - if I wasn't busy later - wanted to meet up after their remaining interviews and finish up MY interview before they left for Finland. 

All my fears of meeting these guys were unfounded. I've rarely ever met sweeter, nicer, funnier, more polite and cheekier bands. We discussed new and old music ("An Envoy To The Open Fields was the most difficult song we ever played live. We'd just be standing there counting looking ridiculous"), the return of Johan Wohlert ("He rang us one day and we just: «Don't think so buddy, you backed out! ...Ok, we'll think about it but don't get your hopes up!»", and the insanely long time between their albums ("I'll give you the release date for the next album right here and now! Exclusively! It will be...") 

When I met them the second time, Bo told me "I'm sorry, I've used up all my funny now", which turned out to not be true at all. We talked about friends' mutual friends ("Black Dick? We always called him Dickward"), and I got to do a mini photo-shoot as well as get a video of them plugging the interview and the website it's featured on. Score!

To read the whole thing, and to get the answer to when the next album will be out, check out Musikknyheter.no! Worry not, it is in English!

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Beautiful shots from Oxford, the last gig on the UK tour with Frank Turner, from Alyssa Nilsen Photography!

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Gerard Way, live at Vulkan Arena in Oslo, Norway. See more pictures from the gig here!

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I did an interview and mini photo shoot with Honningbarna last week! Read the full interview here!  (English version here!)

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New blog post up, from Frank Turner's end of tour gig in Oxford, ft A LOT of toilet paper and a Koo Koo stage invasion! HERE!

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New blogpost from Frank Turner's gig in Cambridge HERE!. Also ft. Koo Koo Kanga Roo!

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New blogposts with pictures, videos and the boys' backstage shenanigans from On Blackheath and St. Albans are up! Cambridge coming soon.