Music invasion in Tartu

Background info

Do you know what’s the worst for a music scene?

When it’s not active, no concerts, no releases, and life is only filled with the monotony of everyday work.

Unlike Tallinn, Tartu is a small town of around 93.000 inhabitants and around 2,5h from the nearest airport. Which is situated, as you may have guessed, in Tallinn.

Therefore, we don’t have that many opportunities to lure artists to our domicile because: a) who is willing to take such a detour and b) why would you go to Tartu if you can have a gig – but with more visitors and less expenses – in the capital?

Due to the aforementioned reasons, organizing gigs in Tartu is somewhat of a financial risk and those few people who organize it have also limited funds. You may remember Sander’s iconic saying in the Tartu Under The Horns documentary:

“Making music in Tartu is like […] playing in front of the same drunk 20 dudes for as long as you make the band.”

But if no gigs happen, there will be even less people interested in Metal music and therefore also fewer bands. This is also a shoutout to the 20 drunken dudes who have supported our shows – you rule!

So i decided, that instead of complaining, i could change the situation myself. Usually around 2-3 extreme Metal concerts take place per year, with more or less the same bands performing. Well, that part is difficult to change because we’re chronically lacking bands. How can we make things more interesting?

(Only later I discovered that our friends from Sügis Productions have started to use Tartu as tour stop for some of the bands they are promoting. If they continue with their good job, I might organize even less because the whole point is to have more concerts, not compete with others about the visitors. Unfortunately, one of our concerts overlaps (on the 28th October) but since the styles are quite different, it maybe won’t even make a difference. At least I hope so. )

The idea

Anyways, instead of having one concert, I thought it might be more interesting to have three concerts, each with an own theme. Why? Because I would like to bring a bit more love for detail to the scene, and having too many styles thrown into the mix just does not make a good evening, at least from the musical perspective.

The idea is simple – three bands, three music styles, three concerts. 

It was also important to me that none of the bands was chosen “just because we have to”. Some bands I originally had in mind weren’t able to perform, but that’s okay because luckily we have more than 3 decent bands in Estonia (unlike many might believe).

I have put special attention to the opening bands, which are very interesting – each in their own way. Can highly recommend to come early and not miss them!

Location

It is the first time for me to organize concerts in Genialistide Klubi. Usually we use the “Rock&Roll” establishment but some of the bands and myself wanted to try out something different. Let’s see how it goes and if we will continue organizing there or going back to the roots.

In any case, after the shows we will certainly meet up at the “Underground” bar, where you can tell me your thoughts about the location in person.

Naming of the concerts

After contemplating with my fellow Pergerus mates, we came up with three unique names for each concert. The names are also a hint to the style of music which can be expected on the respective evening.

But let’s go a bit more into detail. The bands are concealed on purpose. Not because you couldn’t anyways guess who they might be but because I wanted to put a focus on each band announcement, so they would get the attention on WHY we chose them. More of that below.

You may even spot posters with all band names in town before they are announced, so psssst…