Haven’t got too much time or interest to update this blog recently, but this I’ll just have to share here. My latest haul in toys, statues, model kits and general Marvel awesomeness! Click to enlarge.

Kotobukiya Iron Man Mark IV 1/6 scale

I’ve never been much of a wine enthusiast, but every now and then I do enjoy red wine. My brother and his wife had a house party last weekend and I thought I’d bring a bottle of Motörhead Shiraz, but I couldn’t get it on time and now I have a full case of it, but not for too long… ;)

Motörhead Shiraz

Today’s been a busy day for our band Honey Hellraiser. We’ve told that our upcoming 5-song EP will be titled All Night Tonight and the cover will look like this. The original photo was taken by Riku Kankaro.

The tracklist is following: Mau Mau, Rollin’ Paper, Open Road, Another Round and Mega Man. Another Round can be heard at YleX’s Basement at http://ylex.yle.fi/kayttajat/psyanide/honey-hellraiser-another-round so check that out and please, leave your comment and share the page to everyone!

I’m not really gonna write a blog article this Sunday, but I’ll let pictures do the talking. Last night I was at Virgin Oil Co., Helsinki to see Lordi play live. I managed to snap a few more-than-decent photos, and here’s some of them for you to view. In other news, Sampsa came over today and I designed a backdrop for Stala & SO.‘s live shows, but I’ll show you that some other time. But check out the Lordi photos below!

So this Sunday in my blog posts, I decided I’d visit the good old video games again and this time especially the Metroid franchise. The madness kicked in once again a couple of weeks ago when I bought Metroid: Other M for the Wii. I had really high hopes for the game and it sure didn’t disappoint me. Even though the Prime-trilogy was unbelieveable, it was really nice to go back to more 2D-kind of shooter. Right away it felt like a true Metroid game. The reviews have been very round and like seven or eight points out of ten, mainly because of the story, but for me Other M was just insanely great. At first I thought I’d miss being able to move in the Prime-like first person view (when you point the Wii Remote at the screen) but it’s great that basically all the action happens in a more side-scrolling style. Also the bosses and “puzzles” were fresh and entertaining. The only down side I can think of is that the game was too short and it was somewhat easy to get a 100%. The story was interesting and well told via cut scenes and the gameplay itself, and I thought it was really cool, for once, to see a more human side of Samus. The story takes place right after Super Metroid (more of that game later) but before the events in Metroid Fusion. I’ve always wondered what happened between those two games, and now I got the answer. And it was great! Thank you Nintendo & Team Ninja! Gametrailers.com has a pretty comprehensive video review of the game here. Check it out!

The greatness of Metroid: Other M on Nintendo Wii

Like I’ve told earlier, the best video game ever made in my opinion is Super Metroid, originally for the SNES. It’s become sort of a tradition that every now and then I play it through. A few days ago I did it once again (first time with Wii’s Virtual Console) and the reason I’m able to do that without ever getting bored is that every time I get the same feeling as I did when I was a kid when I picked up the controller and landed on Planet Zebes for the first time over 15 years ago. Yes, the game can be very frustrating in some ways, mainly with all the wall jumping and shinesparking, but hey, that’s just part of the challenge and the way video games were designed back in the day. Suzy Jay always wonders how I’m able to enjoy games that look that “mushy” and unclear. But I always say that everything doesn’t need to be HD or anything and the gameplay, story and overall atmosphere are winners. After I finished Super Metroid it left me wanting more but I thought it was too soon to pick up the more recent titles again. The only games in the series I hadn’t played were the handheld ones (except for Metroid II: Return Of Samus for the original Game Boy) so I got myself Nintendo DS Lite. Why Lite you might ask? Why not the DSi or wait for the 3DS. Well, just to be able to play Game Boy Advance games, since the more newer models don’t support them. Then why not buy a GBA? Well, there’s those couple of spin-offy Metroid titles for DS also. Problem solved. Anyways, I got a white one and was really impressed by the design. It’s sort of Apple-esque but still truly Nintendo. I hadn’t played a handheld console by Nintendo since Game Boy Pocket and now I can’t help wondering why. Still, better late than never. The first game I dived into was Metroid: Zero Mission and hot damn it blew my mind. I’ve got it about a half way through but I’m ready to say it’s pretty much a perfect remake of the original NES Metroid. The speed, the gameplay, the graphics and the whole entertainment value are just simply outstanding. I guess it’s too late now but I really hope they had made a Zero Mission -like 32-bit remake of Metroid II also. As I write this I’m waiting for Metroid Fusion and Metroid Prime Hunters to arrive. I had to order them from the UK, because it’s really hard to find mint or near-mint, complete-in-box used old games of specific titles here in Finland. And after all, I’m also a collector :)

A white Nintendo DS Lite and a few Metroid games

OK then, enough of gaming. What’s happening with our band Honey Hellraiser…? The EP’s getting finished that’s for sure! The tracks have now been mixed and the mastering will be next Wednesday. We’re pretty excited about getting our first proper release out later this year. Last week’s Saturday we had our first official promo shoot and the photos look… well, let’s just say there’s gonna be some smoke, leather jackets, bandanas and mirroring pilot glasses involved… Pure dirty rock’n'roll! We also re-designed and changed our logos and other graphical stuff to more streamlined style. Gonna look absolutely cool on the upcoming EP’s cover, website and the backdrop on live gigs. There’s gonna be cool new T-shirts also. Remember, you can follow and get all the latest news and other stuff from us on our official Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/honeyhellraiserofficial.

Alrite, that’s it for today. I’m off to shoot some more Zebesian Zero Mission motherf***ers! See you next mission!

Alrighty dudes & dudettes! My previous entry to this blog left lots of people wondering if there’s gonna be a part two in all this and here it is, sort of. The second weekend with Honey Hellraiser at So Music Finland studios went extremely well! On the previous weekend we managed to get all the drums, basses and rhythm guitars recorded so now it was time for Mick and us to sing a few vocal tracks, and also record some more guitars, percussions, handclaps and other kinds of cool stuff. We completed the songs one at a time. One on Friday, two on Saturday and two on Sunday. That was really great way of working for us because after the day we instantly heard if a song needed anything else, and if not, then we moved on to next one. We were actually pretty blown away how good the songs ended up sounding. And this was just the recorded raw material. Not mixed or processed in any way. Hell, can’t really wait to hear the raw mixes Sampsa promised to send us next week. He was supposed to start the mixing last week, but something just came up, if you know what I mean… Anyways, the mixing’s scheduled to begin tomorrow and if the stars are aligned correctly, by the end of the week we’ll be listening the raw mixes and thinking of possible changes. I’m still not gonna reveal the recorded songs just yet, but you can follow us on our newly founded Facebook page. There’s gonna be an official competition soon about the upcoming EP, so become a fan to get all the updates first! But now I still have lots and lots of things to do. First of all we need to find us a photographer to shoot the promo pictures. We’ve already got a few in mind and their portfolios look really good, so that’s just picking the person and check the calendars. After that I’ll need to get designing the artwork for the cover and the booklet. Then we’ll need to get in touch with venues so we can organize a record release gig somewhere in Helsinki. And also, the Honey Hellraiser website needs to be completely redesigned and updated. And having some T-shirts and other merchandise wouldn’t hurt either since people are asking them all the time. So, simply put, that’s a load…

Me, Mick and Dirty Harri at SMF studios. Pic by Sampsa.

Dirty Harri in a quite tight situation...

In other news, a while ago Mick asked me and Dirty Harri to be the godfathers of his son and the christening was held a week ago Sunday. We made this cool little, not-so-traditional baby book for little Luka. I coated an empty book with denim and we put all kinds of cool rock ‘n’ roll memorabilia on it. The content was all like -When I turned 5, my hair was already this long: _____, but my dad’s hair was only this long: _____. It turned out really cool, soulful and very popular subject of wonderment at the party. And that’s not all! After the christening, Mick & Maiju got married so that was a nice big surprise. So my hats off to you guys, you’re the best!

So, what else is new. Lately, Suzy Jay and I’ve been having sort of an urge to do something to our home and yesterday we decided to go shopping for some home decor. We needed something nice for our kitchen, so we bought a new microwave, drapes, carpet and some candles. Yeah, I know, all this is not very rock’n'roll, but damn I love living in nice-looking apartment. Since the apartment is our own, we’ve been thinking of painting the wall on the right hand side, but we’ll see when and what’s gonna happen. View a photo of our kitchen below.

The heart of the home, some might say.

Nothing more to write at this time. Check back later and remember to Like Honey Hellraiser on Facebook, thanks!

Hello there once again fellow friends, fans & foes! I should write something about last weekend before the next one is up. So here it goes! Last Friday night we went to Mr. Sampsa Astala’s So Music Finland studio in Helsinki with our band, Honey Hellraiser, to record five new songs for our brand new EP released later this year. Well, some of the songs are a bit older than the others, but real fan-favourites nevertheless. I’m not gonna reveal the track listing just yet though ;) On Friday we started getting all the things together and ready for the recording sessions starting the next morning. After a few demo takes on the drums, we went to a grocery store and bought some hot chili wings, baguettes and nachos and stayed the night in at Dirty Harri’s place. Yeah, pretty rock’n'roll indeed… On Saturday morning we started recording the drum tracks and Dirty Harri did an awesome job playing the songs through. After five or so hours the drums were recorded and and it was time for us to drink some beer and hit Nosturi to see Lordi’s new album release gig. Mick drove back home and Suzy Jay joined us for the gig.

Dirty Harri giving some more cowbell

I hadn’t seen Lordi live in almost two years, so I was a bit excited to see them once again. All in all I’ve seen well over 100 Lordi shows during the years. Honestly, I was somewhat surprised how well they played. We had a great time watching them. It almost felt like back in the day… It was really nice of them to play songs like Monster Monster and Get Heavy. The new songs sounded also good, especially Loud And Loaded and the title track Babez For Breakfast. But yeah, I was a bit drunk but I managed to snap a few photos. Here’s a few of them:

This Is Heavy Metal!

Mr. Lordi, Mr. Amen & fingerplays from hell

Amen on his knees

Mr. Ox in all his glory and a pretty big gun

Le Megatohotin

After the gig we went to Bar Bäkkäri‘s Green Room for some afterparty, but I was already very tired and Sunday was gonna be my big day recording all the basses so pretty soon it was time to go back to the hotel and get some sleep. But it was extremely nice to see and meet the guys and co-workers from my previous lives again, thanks!

Next morning Mick picked me up and we drove back to the studio. We picked up also Dirty Harri on the way. During the day I managed to play all the bass tracks pretty easily and even surprised myself a few times. It took about an hour per song to complete. After the basses were recorded, Mick played the rhythm guitars to all songs. So tomorrow we’re gonna pick up where we left off and start with more guitars and later on the vocals. Somehow writing seems a bit hard for me just right now, so I’ll keep it short & simple. Stay tuned babez, more to come!

Mick finishing up the sessions

Ever since I decided to order the new iPhone 4 back in July, I’ve been wondering what to use to protect it from bumps, scratches and all that. I got my free black bumper from Apple’s iPhone 4 Case Program (hurry up, the program only lasts until September 30th) and it turned out to be pretty good product. It really does what advertised. But since it only covers the edges around the phone, I thought it would be nice for a while to personalize the design a bit more. A while ago I read about these cool little sticker-thingies you put on to your device. They’re called GelaSkins and use 3M’s adhesive for very easy applying. And they won’t leave any mark when you decide to peel them off. Anyways, a couple of weeks ago I noticed they had teamed up with a bunch of entertainment brands and the one that attracted me was, of course, Marvel. So I ordered two different sets of skins for my iPhone 4 and they arrived via UPS in a few days all the way from Canada. Many iPhone users will think something like “jeez that guy must be an idiot” but hey, this is my phone and I just like to have something more personal. No doubt I’ll take them off one day, but just now this pleases my eye. Check them out below:

Spider or the Man? by Marvel (Gelaskins)

Spidey rules all!

I also tried to play around with iPhone 4′s video camera and the iMovie application. Just to test the camera and stuff, I shot a short video, starring some of my toys and action figures. It was entirely shot, edited and shared with iPhone 4. But you can’t upload 720p video to YouTube until the next update, so I had to use an external app to do that, called 720tube. It’s free and all but it still compresses the video quite a bit, or at least that’s how the final uploaded video looks like. Anyhoo, check that video below, and be sure to check it out in HD!

Apple released iOS 4.1 last week and I think main thing in that for me, is going to be Game Center. Still not too much games supporting it, but it looks pretty promising. Just add psyanide to your GC friends if you want to play with me! And in iPad related suggestions, I gotta mentions this great RSS news reader with a simple and great visual interface, called Pulse News Reader. I guess everyone’s pretty much checked that out already since it was featured in one of Steve Jobs’ keynotes a while back. But I just found that and am really loving it!

Alrite so what else is new…? We had a couple of gigs last week and they were great. The first was this big company private party and we rocked the hell out of those suits! The next was right here in our home town, Karkkila, at Valuri. That went extremely well although at this time of year it was a bit chilly outside. And the next two weekends are gonna be quality time with the band also. Yes, The Honeys will be once again visiting So Music Finland‘s studios to record 5 new tracks for an EP to be released later this year. And boy have we got some cool songs for you. Some of them true fan live favourites and some brand new. Can’t wait to get playing them. But still a week to go, which is kinda hard since my work weeks get longer and longer. I’ve been working 50-60-hour weeks for 6 weeks in row now and I feel a bit tired already. Still at least 4 to go. All work and no play makes me a what? But can’t really complain, because I need the bonuses for my next tattoo that’s going to be Samus Aran portrait. Still thinking about it, but she’s gonna be wearing most likely the Metroid Prime era Phazon-enhanced varia suit. But that’s not gonna happen just yet. Maybe in a few weeks. But speaking of tattoos, my girlfriend Suzy Jay just got herself a new one. Kind of a semi-slutty Snow White. Looks really, really nice. Check the pic below.

Suzy Jay's latest ink

Next Saturday we’re gonna see Lordi’s gig in Nosturi, Helsinki. I’ve seen them live over 100 (yes, a hundred) times but not in almost two years. So that’s gonna be cool! I’ve also started to picture MonsterDiscoHell.Com, the official unofficial Lordi fansite, version 4.0 in my mind and I desperately need new photos. So I’ve got my camera with me on the gig. See you there dudes & dudettes!

Lazy Sundays turn to Mondays too soon, but I thought I should write something here, and realized the one thing I haven’t yet written about on this site is my love and enthusiasm for old video games and game systems. I started to once again think about them since I found this cool app for the iPad. It’s a digital British magazine called Retro Gamer. The publication convinced me so that now I’m planning to subscribe for the real deal, the physical magazine. I know, it’s £70/year/13 issues if you subscribe outside of UK, but where else could I read about this stuff. The layout of the magazine is nice and the articles are well written. And there’s over 100 pages per issue so you definitely get your money’s worth. The iPad/iPhone app is 1,59€ and includes the latest issue. New and back issues are 3,99€. Buy the app directly from AppStore.

Retro Gamer Magazine on iPad from PixelMags

But anyways, because we don’t have that much space in our apartment, I keep my collection elsewhere. The basement of my parent’s house is the vault for all things 80′s, everything cool and special from my childhood. Especially video games. I’ve been a gamer basically my whole life. The first home computer I had was Commodore 64. All the neighbourhood kids had one so we traded the games around and played together all day long. Back in the day I even programmed a few simple things with BASIC. Playing the games and all that was fun, but it never really got me until we got our own NES. The system came bundled with Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt with the Zapper. After that nothing took me, my younger brother and our late cousin, away from the TV set. Back then our favourites were Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game, Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, Blades of Steel, Super Mario Bros. 3 and many others. Most games we played, we played them until we got to the end. This was in late 80′s – early 90′s so there was no Internet to download walkthroughs, cheats or things like that. It was trial and error and some hints from the Finnish equivalent of Nintendo Power magazine, Nintendo-lehti. I still have all the issues of that magazine and also of the successor Super Power. On Christmas 1990 I got Game Boy and titles like of course Tetris, Super Mario Land, Kirby’s Dream Land and Donkey Kong Land blew my mind away anywhere I went.

Just some of my classic video game collection

Later on we also got Sega Mega Drive (Genesis in the U.S.) and some games. Of course the whole 16-bit thing was jaw-dropping and we played a hell of a lot of games like NHL ’94 and Mortal Kombat II, but if someone asked me what’s the best 16-bit game (and also the best game in general, ever) you’ve ever played, my answer would simply be Super Metroid for the SNES. That’s the game I still, without wanting to, compare every other game to. The story, vastness and the pure challenge was huge and extremely addictive. Too bad I currently don’t own SNES but I have the game on Wii’s Virtual Console and still play it every now and then. I absolutely love the more recent Metroid titles too, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption is in my opinion the best game on Wii and I just can not wait Other M to hit the shelves. Last Christmas I even got some really beautiful Metroid swag from Susanna, pictured below.

Samus Phazon Suit statue from First 4 Figures (SOLD OUT)

All the old systems I have are still 100% working and playable but since I don’t have them here at home, I cannot play them that often. My current gaming systems are Nintendo Wii, Sony Playstation 3 and Sony PSP. Some titles I also play on my MacBook Pro. Some of my favourite games from recent years are Super Mario Galaxy, Resident Evil 4, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Little Big Planet and Killzone 2. And now that I have iPad, I just love playing Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck’s Revenge on it. Seems like a pretty perfect platform for point-and-click adventures.

One of my all time favourite T-shirts. From EMP Merchandising

Alright, here’s my few dimes on gaming for now. TL;DR: I still love and play the games I loved and played over 20 years ago. And I didn’t even start telling you about my addiction to pinball machines. That’s a whole another story…

So, we’re back from our little summer vacation thing to the UK. Absolutely nothing has happened here in a week while we were away. I thought of writing another entry from London but our hotel’s Internet connections went down after the first night or so. But yeah, Susanna turned her shopping mode on the minute we landed. I didn’t buy that much things but I finally managed to get me an iPad! I picked up a 32GB Wi-Fi + 3G one since it was the only model in stock at Regent Street’s Apple Store. The device is awesome. So responsive and fast, just simply fun to use. After the iPad reveal in January, I was a bit sceptic about it but once you have the iPad  in your hands all the doubts are gone. Of course I’m still gonna use my MacBook Pro for all the work projects, Photoshopping and graphics and other creations but the iPad is really nice device for more casual interaction and consuming the content created. I also ordered me an iPhone 4 (32GB) since Sonera started selling them last Friday here in Finland, but no idea yet when I’ll get that one. No hurry, the old one (a white 16GB iPhone 3G) is still working fine…

Me and my friend Iron Man at Madame Tussauds

On Saturday we visited Madame Tussauds. When we arrived the official guide told us that the line to the entrance was over 3,5 hours! We decided that it would have been insane to queue that long so I went to find a Wi-Fi hotspot nearby and used my brand new iPad to buy the Priority Access Tickets online. After that, 5 minutes and we were inside. And now that I checked the prices, the tickets we bought online were actually a few pounds cheaper than the regular On the Day -tickets sold at the entrance. Anyways, we pretty much ran through the areas with the wax figures and all that. Some of them were kinda cool but not that interesting. For me the thing I waited and really wanted to see was this exclusive Marvel Super Heroes 4D -attraction. Before we left Finland I read something about it but wasn’t sure what was it all about. Don’t want to spoil anything too much but holy s**t was it probably the most entertaining, coolest and jaw-dropping 20 minutes I’ve ever spent. I felt like a child once again. The 3D effects were disturbingly realistic and the first time Wolverine released his adamantium claws, I’m not kidding, you could actually feel them lash your back from the back of the chair you were sitting in. And towards the end when Iron Man descends from the roof to hover above the audience, I actually had to raise the 3D glasses to check out was he really there or just a video clip projected on the wall of the dome. Jeez, I still get goosebumps when I think about it. All the explosions and fast-paced action ensured you used all your senses. Check it out if you get the opportunity. Too bad it absolutely cannot be seen anywhere else but there. But ten stars out of five, no questions asked!

SNIKT!

On our trip, we made some comparison between cheeseburgers. We ate them in a few restaurants during the week. Ed’s Easy Diner was really cool and probably pretty authentic 50′s diner with the neon lights outside, long counters, jukeboxes, balloons, laminated menus, the whole shebang! The food was great but I’d say that The Diner‘s cheeseburger was a bit better. The interior decor was also nice and the waiters and waitresses were pretty much into the whole thing which was nice. The burger at Garfunkel’s wasn’t all that legendary they mentioned. A basic bun and a beefburger you can get from any grill. But not bad at all. The last and now I can say maybe the best one was the bacon cheeseburger at T.G.I. Friday’s. First of all, even though it was mentioned in the menus, this was the only one that had real cheddar cheese in it. I dunno, hard to say… Hell, all were good, I just love a good burger. Period.

The sad thing was that the week went really fast and all good things and times must come to an end. But we’ve already started on planning our next excursion. We’ll see where we will eat our next damn good cheeseburgers. Psyanide over and out!

Big city, big city nights...