On Tour with Hellvar - Heiða's Diary # 7 & # 8

# 7

Woke up this morning in London, always a pleasant feeling. We had had a strangely packed day yesterday, with a new tattoo and a train-ride and London transport and dinner on the run and a jam session evening and a ride home in the London-by-night, special Franck-mobile, so bed and rest was extremely called for. 10 o’clock I woke to do yoga, and had killer breakfast, played some brass instruments and went for a walk. Kinda hanging around in Crystal Palace, and am gonna get back to Franck’s place in a minute and start finding my way up to Fulham. Tonight we play in the Southern Belle, very excited about that. 

# 8

Train-ride from London to Bedford was a trip! Listened to an album called “Ecstasy”, a solo-album by Lou Reed that is absolutely fantastic, and goes down very well in a train. Bedford turned out to be quite the rock’n’roll town. We got a great soundcheck, great soundwoman doing it, and we ended up hearing everything on stage and having a rocking powerful sound out!!! This helped to make it an excellent show, and the regulars at Danny’s Bar were even happy. Sold a few cd’s and T-shirts, had many many nice conversations, laughed a lot. Drove home in Steve’s van listening to Dub side of the moon, a great discovery. Tonight Hellvar rocks out in Kettering´s The Old Market Inn

Photos by Franck Alba 

On Tour with Hellvar - Heiða's Diary # 6

# 6

Leicester on a Tuesday-night is not the busiest night of the week, so we didn’t really get a lot of people to our gig. We did get a leatherclad punk in, tho, who loved Hellvar so much he bought all the cd’s we had to sell, 1 of each, 5 kinds. He is also coming to Reykjavik on the 31st of July, and I’m gonna teach him Icelandic. Good gig, all in all, nice sound. Went this morning and got a tattoo!!! Then took the train to London, and am now sitting with Elvar and our friend Franck, in his flat in Chrystal Palace. Jam session tonight, gig tomorrow in Fulham, London.

On Tour with Hellvar - Heiða's Diary # 4 & # 5

# 4

Indeed a lazy Sunday, off-day. Only time I went out today was to go to a real English Sunday roast in a real English family. It was wonderful. I read a bit, listened to a bit of radio, had a bath and dozed around the flat. Tomorrow we rehearse and then on Tuesday there is a gig in Leicester. 

# 5

Monday, Monday. Not a bad Monday at all. Woke up to go out for a walk at 09.00 AM. Had made a promise to myself, after having stayed inside almost the whole Sunday, to explore more of Kettering, and to find a café I could call my hangout, and where there would be excellent coffee and good vibes to write. Found it, it is called Cortados, and has spanish tapas, good coffee, nice tea-selection and great people. Love my new hangout, actually went there twice today. In between those two times I went to rehearsal with Hellvar. We added 4 songs to the mix. Now I’m all done with this Monday, gonna go read a book. See you in Leicester tomorrow night!

On Tour with Hellvar - Heiða's Diary # 3

I should be cool in a Hellvar T-shirt

# 3

Very varied mix of things today. After I slept in a little bit I went to the train-station to buy tickets for London next week. I sat down and wrote some poems. Had a sandwich, and as I was a good girl and finished my sandwich, I had a right to some desert (MaltEaster in the shape of a bunny rabbit, v.g.). I walked up to the old catholic church, and went in to get some proper goth-atmo. Must have worked because the first thing I saw when leaving the church was a small group of modern-time goths, with very weird and nice music coming out of bad speakers attached to someone’s phone. I tried following the group a bit to see where they would go, but I thought they spotted me so then I went to the local art gallery instead. Saw an exibit on Selfies, modern and old painting ones. great one, very well curated and both informative and entertaining. Got back, changed my chords, van came to pick us up. Loaded the van up, drove to Northampton /capital of goth in England, Bauhaus are from there. Loaded in, soundchecked, ate chinese, played,...

On Tour with Hellvar - Heiða's Diary # 1 and # 2

Heiða's Diary

# 1 

From 5 am to 5 pm we were either in a plane or in a car. We arrived  at Gatwick around noon, Andri, Bogi, Elvar and Heiða, and we found our instruments in one piece, thank you very much! We waited for Alexandra, coming from Stockholm, and when everyone had pissed and smoked and drank coffee and eaten and smoked and had more coffee, we left for the first part of the roadtrip….. Costa Coffee and Marks and Spenser’s are to England what McDonalds is to U.S.A: All over the highway to Hellvar.

# 2

Woke at 9, did a radio-interview. walked around Kettering got strings and David Bowie songbook with chords. Everybody looks nice and friendly and there is a market in the center and a lot of magic in the air. Northhamtonshire is blowing me away with beauty and peace. We ate at a nice café up the road, went to a rehearsal studio, got back, I went swimming and got laughed for showering naked, had indian food for dinner, went to a very lively pub in which we play a week from now. Laughed a lot, and got back the first of course. Rest of Hellvar are out there with all of Kettering doing some crazy things, and I’m quite happy being back at the house. Super charged day. Now I need a rest.