The First Day Of My First Solo Tour!

I didn’t intend on booking a tour. It sort of fell into place. An SPT fan and friend, Madeleine, runs a gallery in Oslo, Norway (RAM) and had invited me to play (22nd August). Then my friend Ilmari (otherwise known as Imppu) asked if I would like to play a show in Lahti, Finland and at his wedding. Duh! Of course! Hello! Then Holland contacted me about two shows in early September. Mads, a musician-friend from Copenhagen, contacted me about playing a show on a rooftop. And, last but not least, my old friend Marc (from the band Sticky Bisquits) contacted me with a contact to the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh. All of a sudden, I had a wee tour going on: Lahti, Copenhagen, Oslo, Edinburgh and Amsterdam!

I have travelled to play shows in the last 3 years of this solo project. A show here, a show there. Here a show, there a show, everywhere a show show. However, I haven’t had a few weeks of shows in different cities strung together (otherwise known as a tour).

And last night was the kickoff show of my tour and it was wonderful. Imppu has organized shows for me before in Finland (I’ve played there twice before) and he always does a stellar job of getting the beautiful peeps out.

And they came out! In droves! They all seemed so happy to see me. After three songs, there was a nice bunch of people dancing in the front. I played more songs than usual, since I don’t know when I’ll be back in Finland. For makeup, I did a red and white blockey, geometrical design around my eye.

Minna Cooloo appeared onstage for the first encore, doing her song “Ei se haittaa” with me on keyboard. Then I polished off the night with the song I will have to do in every show for the rest of my days, “Shit’s Fucked”.

It was a wonderful evening. The crowd was amazing. They all participated so well (for anyone who’s seen my shows, they entail some crowd participation). They danced. They smiled. They bought my new CD as well as handmade postcards (with download codes on the back). There was a lot of love and I’m still riding on cloud nine today.

Today I was going to go with Minna to Helsinki, but I had to sort out too many details: sorting out lodgings in Edinburgh, buying a plane ticket to Berlin, responding to emails, promoting the shows, hanging my freshly-washed stage clothes on the line outside and more. Doing this project is work. Doing it well is a lot of work. I still wish I had more time to create new material, but such is life. That time will come.

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All of the dates for this tour are in the “shows” link. Please come if you’re in any of these countries. I’d be happy to see you.

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If you want to purchase my new EP, “Single And Seventeen” (or even just have a listen), go to http://stephenpaultaylor.bandcamp.com

I will tell you all of more adventures soon.
❤
Stephen

ps: Pics from the show!