Traestockfestivalen - The Penniless People of Bulgaria

The Penniless People of Bulgaria (tent)

The Penniless People are West Side's only Finnish band and seemed a bit out of place last year. After their big European tour they'd earned a place in the tent, and though the audience was a bit thin on the ground, we liked them. Less Buzzcocksy than we'd expected from the spring's single `Motorhead', but that was perhaps why they didn't play it. Instead we got a nice substantial helping of chunky but melodic US-style rock. Other people play this sort of thing too, of course, but the Penniless Finns distinguish themselves with some clever three-way harmonies, and enough tempo changes to keep your interest up. They also had a nice line in trilingual inter-song patter - was that song really called `Pippi Longstocking and a Thousand Flying Tomatoes'?

Later, we find Kimmo and Mikko from the Penniless People mingling with the masses near the main stage. How do you like the festival? we ask.

- Well... I've been drinking Jägermeister, says Kimmo, grinning.

Clearly he doesn't care about his homeland's already bad reputation for such things. He shows us his illicit blue plastic bottle, filled with something that tastes suspiciously like alcohol. But, yes, the festival...

- We're waiting for Bob Hund, Kimmo says. The two of us are really big fans of Bob Hund. We've got all Bob Hund's records. We're the only Finns who do. I've asked for their records in Finnish record shops, and it's a totally unknown name.

So what do you think of the rest of the Finnish music scene?

- It's quite techno, Mikko says, the Finnish music scene...

Do you feel a part of it at all?

- Well, no, says Mikko.
- Maybe we are more Swedish, Kimmo suggests. I personally am a big fan of Sweden. Mikko's quite a patriot, a Finnish patriot...

Do you like some Swedish bands then?

- I like Sweden.

Oh alright. But this is a bit odd to hear, coming from a Finn. Everything about Sweden? It turns out Kimmo has a confession to make.

- Can't say. But I've got to say: I hate Kent. When we were on our European tour and we were in Sweden, we got a day off when we were in Norrköping and then we heard that there was the most famous Swedish band that we'd never heard before, a band called Kent. And we were in a discotheque, there were like about 500 people, all going like this `Kent! Kent!'. Just wimpy pop!

- It was terrible!, Mikko adds.

Fortunately, the rest of the European tour was much better.

- It was great, we had a great time, Kimmo says. The best venues were in Holland and Germany. They were really marvellous in Holland. We were two weeks in France, but I think they don't know how to rock. They don't know how to go to war, and they don't know how to rock... My friend said that!

We steer away from sensitive international politics to Mikko's snazzy Kiss t-shirt, and then back to indie bands. The Penniless People had been playing at Ilosaarirock in Joensuu the week before, and had been more impressed by the Swedes this time.

- There was a very big Swedish band there called the Wannadies. They were definitely the best band.

So we finally reveal that we're representing Scan-Indie, and it turns out that Kimmo has been doing a bit of surfing in the right places, even if he hasn't quite got the name right yet.

- I've been to the Swedish Independent page, the black page... I've been there, ten times!

[The Penniless People of Bulgaria Home page]

(interview: Robert and Kimmo) Robert Cumming, robertcu@bredband.net