It's Friday and the first day of "Roserock 2004", the summer festival in Horten. Catgirl.no meets up with Tommy Akerholt, guitarist of Silver, for a little chat over a couple of beers in the sun.

Hey, and welcome to Horten!
Thanks.

Later tonight Silver will be playing at the main stage here. How do you like it so far?
I like it here. It's a nice area they have chosen with the canal and the woods. And the weather turned out good too, so it's gonna be a great show tonight. I'm looking forward to it.

Three weeks ago you played at the second largest stage at Roskilde Festival (The Arena) and I have to ask what everyone wants to know: What was it like?
Ah, it definately was the best concert of the year! It was just so insane with all those people. I wasn't really nervous though. Our drummer was SO nervous all through the concert, but the rest of us were more worried after the concert. We were all kinda: "Do you think it went well?". But it was great fun. We've been told that there were roughly 12.000 people at the concert. Probably most of them Norwegians at the festival. They are very good at supporting Norwegian bands at bigger festivals.

But surely there's been interest from abroad after all the good reviews you're getting?
Yeah, we did meet some foreign press while we were there. We did interviews with one from USA, and then some from Denmark and Sweden. But mostly it's Norwegian press that shows up.

Do you find it much different to play at a big stage like Arena than your average gig?
Yes, there's a big difference. Earlier we would probably have some problems "filling" the stage, but after doing the "Skool's Out Tour" (w/ Alice Cooper + Turbonegro ++.) we were better prepared for Roskilde. It worked perfectly as a warm-up gig for the bigger shows.

What kind of preparations are different on a bigger stage?
The stage itself with backdrops and other props need to be more carefully planned. It was important for us to get the interaction between us on stage to work well, so we practised a special set for Roskilde and made sure everyone knew their spot and space throughout the show. With no planning, things tend to go wrong and look stupid. I actually marked the floor with tape so I had some visuals to go by while playing. We played on a bigger stage than usual at Quart Festival too, but different from Roskilde, and that was also great. Big stages are more fun to play.

Quart was the only other concert after Roskilde?
No, we also did a concert in Tana before Quart. I had all these prejudice thoughts and mixed expectations about Tana*, but it was very different from what I imagined. Quite thought provocative place to be. Everywhere you went you would hear people talk Russian, and I guess most of the girls that come to Tana are simply looking for a better life, but not everyone finds that. So after dismissing most of my worries about the place the worst thing about the trip was actually the enormous mosquitos.

[*Tana is a small community in Finmark, way north in Norway, that has become infamous for all the russian women coming over the border looking for work. Some of them end up in prostitution, and that's what the newspapers write about.]

How's life on the road for you rock stars?
Ha ha. Not very fancy. We drive around in this van and it's ok. Once we were playing at a festival, I had the luxury of sleeping on the ground in someone's party tent. "Rockstars, my ass!" was the comment I got from a friend of ours [laughs].

Roskilde was great. They are such professionals! The media village was great with all the record companies having their own offices and wagons. You've seen it right? Our office had it's own beer tower. Free beer all day and at night there were parties everywhere with free drinks to the band..crazy. And just to play at Roskilde, along with so many great artists.

Did you get to meet anyone special backstage?
Yeah! We met Jonathan Davis, the singer in Korn. He was a really cool guy. We started talking and he was very polite and nice. We know some guys in a band over there [USA], and I just asked him if he knew them, and it turns out they hang out and play ping pong together. How about that?! We also met Pharrel from N.E.R.D, but he wasn't much up for talking with us.

Best memory from Roskilde?
Meeting Jonathan Davis. No, really my best memory from Roskilde...I would have to say are just how goddamn nice and professional all those people are. Whatever we needed of help or equipment you would ask for it and they'd fix it with a smile. I was very impressed.

The interview's over and we continue to drink our beers and listen to Susie Cain, Tommy has heard rumors that they're gonna do a cover of Silver and is anxious to hear it.

>> Official Silver website
>> Roserock 2004 Official photos from Silver concert

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