So I promised a gig post! There was a lovely KAJ concert at Allas Pool in Helsingfors last night, and I wanted to stay with my impressions for a bit -
I liked the venue so much! I hadn't been there before, but there was plenty of air and room, it's great to be by the sea, and I was happy to find a spot where I could see the whole stage and not get pushed around.
(the venue; South Harbour to the right with Tähtitorninmäki, Observatory Hill, in the background there)
And I'm not a film buff by any means, but one favourite old Finnish film series is the Komisario Palmu detective movies, where the streets and feels of the city are an essential part of the vibe. So in one of those, Tähdet kertovat, Komisario Palmu ("Look to the Stars, Inspector Palmu"), a body is found on the Observatory Hill, with the victim's telescope 🔭 abandoned nearby, but it's not trained at the stars but at the city across the harbour - right at where Allas is, nowadays. Amused me to realise that.
(Still from the film. 1962, dir. Matti Kassila, Matti Ranin in shot, photo from areena.yle.fi)
Getting sidetracked, sorry... The thing about KAJ concerts is the way the trust those three have in each other and how well they know one another, that's what shines through and carries the audience, too. There can be technical mishaps and stumblings and they never hurt the whole, and that sort of professionalism is such a joy to watch. If anything, they make slight hitches into a part of the show. They manage to make the experience one of love and of light, laughter and friendship. It's fantastic.
It's a tightly structured set that moves at great speed that they're doing. High tempo, high energy. Festival gig. It works, for the most part. I love the more acoustic numbers at the beginning - Taco hej is my happy place - and the new songs fit well into the whole.
The pa wasn't great, unfortunately (no surprises there, though), Text-TV in particular was near incomprehensible from where I was standing. Mosquito is kind of the weakest point of the set - there's something about the vocal effects that doesn't work as well as it should, and someone was out of tune for a while.
Around me, it felt like everyone was singing along to the entire gig from beginning to end, and that was great. All a big Allsång. It seemed like KAJ were a bit surprised that everyone knew the lyrics to Heimani i skick, and Pa to ta na kako and Taco hej were particularly loud in the audience, lovely.
I haven't been to many KAJ gigs (can't travel atm) but of the three I have seen, this was hands down the best one.
On that note, I also think this is most likely my last KAJ concert. At least for a long while. There's the travelling issue, but I also can't really do the queuing and standing aspects of gigs any longer. I dislike it strongly that queuing for hours is portrayed as the only possible way to attend concerts. And just more generally, too. People will do fandom differently, and that's a feature, not a bug. I wish that were more widely accepted.
They sing well and the professionalism and the fun they have on stage, those are the things that stay with you. Warmly recommended, but there are things about concert culture as a whole I hope could be discussed more.
Kevin's "okay" in Economy PLUS during Axel's part (my beloved Kaxel hello <3) is almost as beautiful as Kevin's "hello" in Ängeln i e-posten, and both make my knees weak
List of things that Duck loves, based on one gig that she's taken ages to watch from start to finish:
KAJ
silly geese doing their thing
Jakob being like this™
Jakob being a pesky mosquito
This and that
The TEXT-TV dance
Jakob jumping around
Jakob handing a KAJ dollar to someone at the barricade (kind of wish that was me) Then again, I would be dead
Did I mention Jakob? I'm pretty sure I did
Axel just doing his own thing while the other two are perfectly synced up and following the choreography
When Jakob speaks in Finnish, no matter how little or how much
Fabbo (the combination of a white shirt + pants and a leather vest looks illegally good)
Alla pojkar å flickor å partyfreakar
Fabbo staying for Karaoke
Bastubröder
Singing along to Bara Bada Bastu as if I'd been there
yousharknotpass
tangentwithtanner
baratheonpilled
snowghoul
theartofmadeline
dailybridgerton
