The history of the Baltic Badasses

The international rock phenomenon called The Baltic Badasses was conceived in the warped minds of Timo Hiltunen and Eero-Pekka Uotila in late 2000 when E-P decided to buy an electric guitar to become a rock star. Timo had been playing the guitar and other band instruments since the early 80's. Jukka Partanen was lured into the first training in E-P's basement on February 13, 2001 with the promise that bass players rule in the world of rock'n'roll (and that he could use Timo's brother's old bass and amp for free). This was the first time the band included two guitar players and a bass player. Timo was the only one able to play music at that time. Things haven't changed much since. The name Baltic Badasses was suggested by Scott Breitenwischer of Los Rauncheros (see the links section for more information of Los Rauncheros).

We had a couple of major shortcomings until Summer 2001: no drummer and no place to rehearse. Fortunately Timo was able to convince Kari Wilen to start playing the drums and Jukka was able to arrange a regular slot in the premises of the Nokia Music Club in Valimotie 13a.

Training in Valimotie 13a

This is where we had rehearsals once a week from summer 2001 to August 2002. The facility included a usable PA system and a drum kit which were essential since we had none of our own. As you can see, the place kind of restricted all funky movements, and hitting your head in the plumbing was a constant threat if you got too excited.

With these developments we were firmly set on our way to international rock stardom and The First Gig. Despite our short time training together and the unbelievable nervousness before the gig we were able to fool people into thinking we could play rock'n'roll and of course decided to continue. At this time we had already invested so much money in music gear that we could not back out either. We invested more and more time and money into the band and become independent of the music club equipment just in time for our third gig with the introduction of our own PA system.

After the third gig we ran into big trouble. Kari had to quit following a bizarre gardening accident (or was it that he had so much other activities, or did not want to make a public fool of himself anymore?). We were fortunate enough to get the help of Tommi Istolainen in order to be able to participate in the music club's annual band stand in May 2002 (thanks for filling in, Tommi!). After that it was clear that we needed a new drummer. We had tried to convince a friend of ours Risto Sipilä to join the Badasses right from the start and now he swallowed the hook, line and sinker so to speak. After about a month of training we were able to pull off our fifth gig. It was such fun that Risto was hooked and the Badasses were saved.

E-P and Timo cleaning up in the new training facilities in Hiomotie 8

The music club moved from the Valimotie 13a training facility to a new training room in Hiomotie 8 in August 2002. We are training there every Monday. The place is much better than the Valimotie room, and allows us to express ourselves in more ways than necessary, including snake-like twisting moves and other general foolishness. Check out the gig pages if you do not believe it: gig #6, gig #7, gig #8, gig #9, gig #10, gig #11.

Karaportti

In the fall of '03 the Hiomo training room was doomed. Fortunately the music club was able to get an even better training room in the Karaportti plant. Even the strictest security measures could not keep us from creating our "music". After the usual Christmas training hiatus The Baltic Badasses were able to wet their feet in the shiny new training room, which is the best we've used so far. Let the results speak for themselves: gig #12 with more to come shortly...

To be continued... (regardless of whether you'd like it or not)

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Jukka Partanen jtp@iki.fi