The Great M'era Luna Write Up Post 2012

This weekend I was sitting in Hildesheim airfield where one weekend a year the music is fabulous and the mead flows free. Yep, it's that time of year again: M'era Luna o'clock! I've got to say I had high hopes for this year, not only was the line up full of wonderful bands I'd yet to see play live, but I'd also recently had a tax rebate which means SHOPPING! Ahem. Unfortunately I'd also been sicker than the dead bird in the Monty Python sketch, and sadly this ickiness combined with late night travelling and rather too much alcohol resulted in me throwing up somewhere in Belgium and having to ditch my t-shirt. It's become a bit of a tradition for something to go wrong in the process of me getting to Germany, hasn't it? Last year it was the four hour wait at the Eurotunnel, and the year before that I very almost left one day early. Oh well. Thankfully some of the lovely Goths on a Bus helped me get myself together so by the time we reached the supermarket for our customary supplies of kegs and novelty beer cans, I was fine.

Unlike last year, we managed to make it into Hildesheim on time. Not just on time, in fact, but to the minute that the Guv'nor had estimated. All hail the Guv and his mad organisational skills!

We arrived early enough to miss the bulk of the wrist-band-queue and to claim a large area of campsite for ourselves, our tents and our enormous, ominous black gazebo before settling down for a few (dozen) beers and venturing down to the pagan market for mead and SHOPPING! Sorry, I will get that out of my system eventually. I in my infinite wisdom had forgotten to pack a jumper, so the M'era Luna hoodie I bought was an essential, alright? It's just everything else that wasn't.

After spending slightly too much money and wandering back to the tents for a lengthy conversation, I gave in and went to bed, ready to wake up bright and not-very-early on Saturday to catch my first band of the festival, Hiemataerde, a group who dress as Knights Templar and play electronica. I thoroughly enjoyed their set, you can't go wrong with jumping up and down and clapping swords together.

It's the return of the blurry photos! This time with added blokes with shields.

The mixture of armour and electro was... admittedly a bit gimmicky, but musically they were fairly interesting and they put on quite a show. I'll definitely be looking out for some of their records.

I wasn't overly bothered about the next couple of bands, Roterfeld and Megaherz, and it was impossibly hot so I took the time to wander around the festival area shopping places (SHOPPING!), picking up a few CDs, a much needed parasol and last year's festival DVD from those nice people at Sonic Seducer (I wish I could understand German, I always end up buying the magazine and flicking through looking at the pictures.) My wanderings and drinkings were interrupted at least four times by various photographers who seemed to like my outfit, and as shallow as it sounds I was pretty chuffed with that. After all the years of teasing and bullying that my eclectic dress-sense has brought me, I felt oddly justified. But M'era Luna is like that. You can wear what you like, you can do what you like and people will either compliment you, join you or at least leave you to it. Without wanting to sound too schmaltzy, it's pretty much everything I like about the scene condensed down to one weekend (with a few added loonies thrown in for good measure, but I'll talk about some of them later!)

The next band I caught was Leztze Instanz, a cheerfully rocky Neofolk outfit who also went in for a lot of jumping up and down. Jumping up and down was pretty much the order of the day.

Bloke with violin!

Bloke with cello! Never let it be said that Goth bands don't use enough stringed instruments

And a crowd of goths rocking along to Leztze Instaz. Love the bunny ears.

This is the only video I managed to get this year. Mainly because I couldn't work out where the video function was. I only got this by sheer fluke.

Next up were Diary of Dreams, who are a... Goth rock band, I guess, but honestly if you haven't heard of them by now, you're on the wrong blog. They were fantastic. Although the played the UK a few months ago, I'd somehow managed not to catch them live before but now I'm definitely going to be keeping a look out for them again, their set was superb. 

Adrian doing the rock star thing

After they finished, and the roadies spent a good few minutes turning on all the smoke machines, it was time for the Fields of the Nephilim, and if I need to tell you who they are you're definitely in the wrong place. The Nephs are another of those bands that I have somehow managed not to see, and to be honest I hadn't realised how...eccentric some of their fanbase are. It hadn't occured to me that people might mosh to the Nephs. I mean, I would've thought their stuff was a bit slow for moshing, but apparently not. I found myself a few rows back from the front, directly behind a very enthusiastic gentleman with a portrait of Carl McCoy tattooed on his back and a very large flag, and next to a very heavily tattooed chap wearing a baseball cap and a leather skirt and not a lot else. And half way through the set Mr Leather Skirt decided it would be appropriate to hitch up said leather skirt, so I spent the rest of the show trying not to look to my left for fear of catching sight of his arse again.

I took a lot of photos of the Nephs.

Anyway, the Nephs themselves were great. Carl appeared to be having a sulk (and I would too, I mean, the Nephs used to headline festivals like this) so it took a good few songs for things to really get going but by the last few tracks I was almost as excited as the chap with the flag. And I'm pleased to report that Moonchild is as much fun live as it is on record. 

Carl McCoy doing one of his rock'n'roll poses

Carl taking the mic stand for a walk

Oh no, everyone can see the amps! Quick, more dry ice!

And Carl taking the mic for another walk. 

Looking back on these, I'm starting to wonder whether someone glued his right hand to the microphone.

After dancing slightly too enthusiastically to Moonchild, it was time for a quick sit-down before Subway to Sally hit the stage. If you're not familiar with them, they're a Mittelalter band who really really like setting fire to things. They're one of the bands that I affectionately like to describe as "explosions and bagpipes". Musically they're a lot of fun, but the real fun is in watching huge plumes of flame leap twenty feet in the air. Don't believe me? Here's an assortment of pictures of Subway and fire.

Fiery wing thingies

Fiery... um... fire

Fiery backdrops

Still not enough fire? 

 Here have MORE!

After they had nicely grilled most of the audience, I thought I'd better get something to eat. Next up on the main stage was...

Lacbo. Oh alright, Placebo. 

Now you may remember that Placebo finished up the festival in 2010 and made a horrible racket because their sound technician was apparently insane. Thankfully this year they appear to have ditched the mad technician in favour of one who actually knows what he (or she) is doing so I could actually hear Brian's voice this time. Now I've got to be honest, I really liked them when I was younger so their earlier stuff has a lot of nostalgia value for me but I'm not quite so keen on the new material. Unfortunately for me, around half the set was newer stuff, though they did play Every Me, Every You. Oh the sixth form memories! 

Unfortunately the stark lighting and the fact that I couldn't be bothered to move further forward meant that even the best of my photos of them look something like this 

 Although I did get one that looks like this

but that's someone's back so I don't even know who it is. It might be Brian. Let's say it is.

Anyway, when they finished, I made my way back to my tent where I was greeted with the prospect of gunfire tea (tea with rum in it, or, more accurately, rum with a bit of tea in it. So strong it can make certain somebodies fall asleep before even reaching the inside of their tent). 

The first act I caught on Sunday was Lahannya, a British singer-songstress and her band of the same name. Her stuff is a bit metally for my tastes, but catchy all the same. Plus she has bright blue hair which is always good.

Next up were Lacrimas Profundere who were also good but not really to my taste. Their singer looks suspiciously like Russel Brand, too.

"Oh my gawd! Look! Someone's wearing blue jeans!" (Obligatory Johnny the Homicidal Maniac quote)

After yet another blitz of the merchandise stalls (and the CD stalls, and the jewelry stalls, and...SHOPPING!) it was time to lurk by the stage to catch Faun, a charming and very catchy neofolk band. Maybe it's because I'm pagan, but I'm getting quite fond of all these neofolk/Mittelalter bands, I have to say. Folk instruments are greatly underused in rock'n'roll.

All my photos of Faun seem to involve that chap with the drum.

Except this one, where someone else has the drum and the chap has... another drum.

Unfortunately I had to dash off before the end of Faun's set because I simply had to catch The Beauty of Gemina. This was the third time I've seen them, having seen them both at last year's M'era Luna and at a gig at Slimes in February. They're swiftly becoming one of my favourite bands; catchy tunes with moody, gloomy vocals and impenetrable lyrics. I just love them. To prevent a repeat of last year's soggy performance, this year they were playing in the Hangar stage, and though the sticky heat in there was a bit much the darkness really suited their music. Their set wasn't that different to the one from February: a smattering of tracks from the new album Iscariot Blues and a few favourites from their previous albums, including This Time, Shadow Dancer and, my favourite, Rumours. 

Unlike me, my camera doesn't like the dark. So here are some very blurry pictures of the Beauty of Gemina. Or the Blurry of Gemina. Or something.

Michael Seele seems to have a new jacket. But he still looks like an anime Boris Johnson. Thankfully he doesn't sound like an anime Boris Johnson. I have no idea what an anime Boris Johnson would sound like. I can't stop saying anime Boris Johnson. Anime Boris Johnson! Gah!

After their criminally short set finished, it was time for more SHOPPING! (yes I still think that's funny, so there) as I wasn't overly bothered about the next few bands. I carried on shopping (SHOPPING!) until I ran out of hands to carry things, which made for a good excuse to pop back to the tents to drop off stuff, have a sit down and a beer before stomping back to the festival area to see New Model Army.

Now, again, the Army are one of those bands I've been meaning to get tickets for for years but I've always either missed them or wussed out because I have a mortal dread of mosh pits. So because I'm a total wussy pansy girl, I stayed away from the front but could thankfully see the band fairly well. They put on a good show, although I'm reliably informed they didn't sound quite as powerful as usual, and Justin Sullivan seemed a bit...spaced out. "We write a lot of songs about stuff." Um, thanks Justin that's really insightful. 

New Model Army. Writing songs about stuff since 1980.

And here's the Army singing a song about stuff.

I actually have a lot more photos of the Army, but it seems my camera dislikes strong evening sunlight almost as much as it dislikes darkness.

After a disappointingly short set (although a set that included Here Comes the War so it wasn't that disappointing) the Army finished leaving just enough time to grab a snack before another of my favourite "bagpipes and explosions" acts took the stage, In Extremo. In Extremo's pyrotechnics make other bands' pyros look like a box of damp fireworks. They make Rammstein look like a bunch of kids with sparklers. They have things like this:

And to put things in context, I was standing very far back and yet every time a pyro went off I felt a nice warm glow like someone had just turned up the radiator. In fact, this is how far back I was

Pretty far. Anyway, In Extremo put on a suitably impressive and insane set. Musically, they're a mixture of metal and Mittelalter, complete with harps and hurdy-gurdies and bouncy guitar solos. Very catchy, largely fairly upbeat, more fun than a bag full of kittens. They're a lot of fun to watch too, not only did they have jets of flame around the size of a two-storey building, they also had fountains of sparks, pillar-box red flames, loud explosions, epilepsy-inducing lights and spent a lot of time processing around the stage playing bagpipes. So here, of course are a lot more pictures of In Extremo's amazing pyros.

Fire!

More fire!

Even more fire!

FIRE!

And here's some more fire!

Dancing fire!

Unnatural-looking pillar-box red fire!

More dancing jets of fire!

Even more dancing jets of fire!

Oh my gods, I am unbelievably proud of this photo. Look at the fire! Look at it!

Alas the flaming goodness had to end eventually, if just to preserve the unfortunate sunburnt souls in the front few rows. So it was time to head to the medieval market to stuff my face with knob rot... sorry... knobi-brot and drink a few farewell cups of my favourite alcoholic beverage on the planet, Wikingerblut (yummy cherry mead) before heading back to the tents to tidy up a bit and try to sleep over the sound of a certain Scottish somebody singing very loudly until about three in the morning. I don't know what it is about singing The Irish Rover at stupid o'clock while drunk off their arses but there's a surprising number of people I know who end up doing it. I wonder if anyone has ever sung that song sober....

Monday morning was a painfully early start to pack up the tents (and I still have no idea how to fold up that wretched tent. One day I'll work it out. One day...) and pile everything back onto the coaches. And then wait for the last few tired bus goths to work their way out of the campsite. 

Aside from trudging around the supermarket to stock up on bratwurst and staggering around the duty free, I pretty much slept for the entire homeward journey. I have no idea where this sudden tiredness came from. On the plus side it meant I wasn't sick, on the downside it meant I didn't really get to say goodbye to everyone. 

And now I'm back in sunny Oxford, slowly finding homes for my new belongings and trying to catch up with as many gothy friends as possible because coming back to the "real world" where people don't know what Goth is is very hard work. I had to pop into work yesterday and had to explain what industrial is to a man from Nokia. *sigh* Is it M'era Luna time again yet?

As always, a big thank you to all the lovely Goths on a Bus. Special thanks to Ade the Guv'nor for organising it all and getting us there on the exact minute he'd planned; Big Alan and the nefarious Doctor Garside for the campsite company and gunfire tea; Shaggy for the gazebo (sorry "big erection"); Julie-Anne and Jack for North bus herding (and late night renditions of folk songs); Morgan for helping me un-gross myself when I was sick; and of course Gordon and Tom the bus drivers for getting us there and back again....again. 

All under our mighty battle cry: Fire, tits and elbows!

If I don't see you before next year, I will definitely see you all on the bus this time next year. ASP are playing again, I can't wait! 

Stuff and Things

I'm heading off on the Goth Bus later today, so expect this year's Great M'era Luna Write Up very, very soon.

To keep you busy while I'm gothing around Germany in platform New Rocks, here's a little something I've been working on for the last few months. Divine Intervention is a nine page comic about old gods and pop culture. So if you want to see Hermes break the fourth wall, Hades and Persephone (nearly) have a domestic, Anubis start a Chthonic Deities' Anti-Defamation League, Loki talk too much, Odin be unimpressed, and Set be very, very scary, check it out.

Or don't. It's not like I spent ages on it or anything *pouty face*

Only joking. See you soon.

Crafty Books for Crafty Goths

Everyone knows goths love craft and DIY, but what happens when you need inspiration or want to learn a new skill? Why, you need gothy crafty books, of course! So here are my handy-dandy reviews of the ookiest, spookiest craft books in my collection.

If you knit, you need to own a copy of Domiknitrix by Jennifer Stafford. If you don't knit, but you want to learn, you need it too. Why? Well, it has probably the best instructional section I've ever seen, with an exhaustive 93 pages of directions, advice and tips all beautifully illustrated with large, clear photos. It's worth tracking down a copy for that alone. As for the projects, there's a mixture of jumpers, vests, coats and accessories that are fine for daily wear and street wear, quirky enough to be suitable for alternative folks but easy to dress down for trendier, more mainstream knitters. But be warned, Domiknitrix's "easy" or "beginner" patterns can be fairly tricky and take some concentration, this is not a book for those wanting very basic patterns. If you're learning, it might be worth buying the book for it's instructions and leaving the projects for a little later. If, on the other hand, you're a competent knitter looking for a real challenge, try your hand at the beautiful but murderous bonus pattern (which you can download for free if you've bought the book) though some experience knitters may be frustrated with the extent of the how-to section.

If you're looking for something simpler to start you off Punk Knits by Share Ross is worth a look. As you might expect from the title, the patterns are inspired by the DIY ethic of punk. Written by someone who clearly knows the scene, and illustrated with fun typography and cheerful pictures of tattooed rock'n'rollers wearing the finished projects, each pattern takes inspiration from a particular band or musician. As for the patterns themselves, there's a mixture of eye-catching ones (like the pixie shrug and a bold anarchy A pillow), to fun and quirky ones (like a giant felted top hat or soft but spiky dog collar choker), to some that are largely unwearable (knitted skirts... hmm). Definitely worth a look for beginners looking to spice up their knitting and full of quirky inspiration, but might be a bit too easy for more experienced knitters.

If you're willing to splash out the cash on some fairly pricey yarns, Pretty in Punk by Alice Benevides and Jaqueline Milles is a selection of 25 jumpers, bags, arm-warmers, scarves and (unfortunately) skirts, inspired by the punk, goth and mod subcultures. It's worth buying for the fantastic mohawk hats alone. The downside is that a lot of the patterns call for fairly good quality yarns to give the right effect, which kind of undermines the cheap and cheerful, DIY ethic of punk to me, but there you go.

If you fancy knitting yourself some new friends, Gothic Knits by Fiona McDonald is a charming collection of gothic and horror-movie-inspired knitted dolls. The patterns themselves are fairly easy to knit up, but you'll need patience and a little concentration to make up the dolls. Some basic embroidery skills will come in handy too. Still, the dolls are very cute; one looks suspiciously like Ollie Wisdom.

Another book that you just need, even if you don't use the patterns, is Anticraft by Renee Rigdon and Zabet Stewart. Based on the blog of the same name, it's a mixture of knitting projects, crochet pieces, with a bit of beading, sewing, cross-stitch and cooking thrown in, all interspersed with comic strips and fun asides. I love the humour of this book. The projects themselves are interesting and inspiring, including a duck tape corset, cross-stitch graffiti, crocheted fishnet gloves and a skirt inspired by the Wheel of the Year. The only downside, for me, is that I really need to learn to crochet.

If you want to try your hand at jewelry making, I recommend checking out Gothic Jewelry by Harriet Smith. Most of the projects are kitsch, deathrock-friendly pieces (ie a brooch that looks like it's bleeding, a necklace that says "Aaaargh!" in dripping B-movie font, and earrings inspired by Sweeny Todd) but there are a few more elegant, classically gothic designs there too (like a gothic cross, a lace corsage and a skull choker). However, what's best about this book is the sheer variety of different techniques it uses. It might get a bit pricey if you're planning on working your way through all of the projects in the books, you'll need a lot of different tools and media, but if you're a beginner it will probably teach you something new. It's one of those books that's more inspired by the subculture than coming from it, but not bad.

If you're looking for something you can use to make dinky, spooky gifts, Creepy Cute Crochet and Super Scary Crochet are both full of adorable amigurumi creatures that look adorable. No idea what the patterns are like, as I say, I haven't really gotten the hang of the craft but every time I stumble across a copy in a book store I wish I could. If you want to learn to cross stitch but want some more... unusual samplers, look no further than the hilarious Subversive Cross Stitch is full of mild looking samplers with ironic, snarky legends that are very very funny. Again, might be a bit too simple for experiences stitchers, but for a lacky like me, it's perfect.

Lastly, and not very gothically, Knits for Nerds is perfect for the geekier of us, full of patterns inspired by Star Wars, Star Trek, Firefly, Doctor Who and Lord of the Rings. Some of the fantasy-based patterns can easily be gothed up with a darker colour scheme and the nerdy goth will be pleased to know there are patterns inspired by the works of Neil Gaiman and Jhonen Vasquez too. There's also a cute little zombie doll and some stripy socks based on Tank Girl. Simple but a lot of fun.

Android Apps for the technologically minded pagan

Sorry I haven't posted for a while, I'm lazy.

So, as you may or may not know, I now have a job selling phones to people so I eventually bit the bullet and bought myself a smart phone (so called because it's slightly more intelligent than most of the people selling them!). It's an Android, by which I mean it's software is made by Google, not that it's a humanoid robot (I don't suppose I'd need a smart phone if I could carry Commander Data around with me).

I'm rambling. Anyway, being a flaky neopagan one of the first things I started looking for on the Google Play store was an app to help me out with my witchy goings-on and there's a surprising amount of useful apps out there. There's also an awful lot of terrible "love spell" apps and cheesy airbrushed wallpapers, but let's ignore those. So, since it's Midsummer and I'm feeling witchy, here are some of my android findings for all you techno-pagans out there.

First up, and probably the most handy I've found so far is Pagan Calendar. Run by those helpful people from the website of the same name, the Pagan Calendar app helps you to keep track of Celtic Fire Festivals, Celtic months, Graeco-Roman feast days, Asatru holidays, and a smattering of interesting anniversaries. You can either bring up a list of 20 or so upcoming events from all of the lists, or go through the full lists thematically. Clicking on an individual event tells you a bit more about it. It's pretty much all text so it uses absolutely minimal data. The only downside is, as it's an American site, you might have to do a bit of maths to fit it to your locality.

For those who are looking for some simple on-the-go divination, Galaxy Tarot isn't exactly as in depth a tarot reading you're ever going to get but it loads and runs quite smoothly. The free version has a single card mode, three spreads and a "browse" mode where you can have a look at the full deck. It uses the Rider Waite deck and gives some basic interpretations. Not particularly detailed, but not bad for a free app and handy for divination while commuting... or whatever. You also have the option to turn on reversed readings, a "card of the day" widget for your home screen, and a cute shuffling animation (you can shake your phone to shuffle the cards! Eeee!)

For more fortune-telling goodness, Divination - Rune of Odin is a nice, if simplistic, rune app. There are loads of rune apps on the marketplace, but most are very slow or just send you to a website. Rune of Odin still isn't exactly the quickest app in the world, but it runs better than the other free apps I've tried for this. You only have the option to draw one rune in the free version, but the interpretations are pretty detailed (and, comparing with my books, fairly accurate, unlike some) so with a bit of thought it's fairly easy to find an answer to your queries from it.

Now for some more practical apps. First up, Simple Moon Phase Widget. This thing is so handy. The app itself gives you a chart of the upcoming moon phases on a day-by-day basis organised like a calendar, plus there's a discrete main-screen widget that shows what the moon will look like that night. Plus you have the option to switch between the northern and southern hemisphere (handy if you travel, and doubly handy for ensuring your phone is giving you the right info).

The last two apps I'm going to mention here aren't specifically for pagans, but they do come in handy. Tiny Compass is so called because it doesn't take up much space and it's really useful for on-the-go circle casting and spellcrafting (you know, for those fussy spells that insist on you facing east and chanting or what-have you) or if you just can't remember whether your room is south facing.

Last up, and a bit on the silly side, is Candle Free, a digital candle. Stupid, yes, but useful for emergency spells, for places that don't allow naked flames, and for those annoying landlords that don't allow candles. It's not very bright, but being able to blow out the fake flame by blowing into the mic is a cute touch. Oh, and you can change the colour of the flame to bright green or dark blue or dayglo pink if you really want to.

I'll leave you with something irrelevant to phones, but fitting for the season; a video of pagan folk band Omnia, who you might remember me mentioning after last year's M'era Luna (they were the ones with the telescopic didgeridoo)

EDIT:

I have a few more discoveries I thought I'd share with you. Pagan Radio Basic allows you to stream from the Pagan Radio Network, a lovely online station that plays pagan-friendly music by people like Omnia, ASP, Inkubus Sukkubus, Corvus Corvax, Unto Ashes, Tanzwut and Dead Can Dance, with a lot more besides. The free version of the app allows you to stream a low quality version but there's also a paid app that'll let you have something a little clearer. The app itself is fairly basic, you can check the station's schedule and browse frequently played songs. There's a bit that's supposed to tell you what's playing, but I haven't seen it change in the few weeks I've been using it. The musical choices are excellent, however, perfect background noise for ritual work, spells or just reading your favourite myths.

Galaxy Tone, who made the Tarot app I talked about earlier, have also made a healing crystal encyclopedia Galaxy Crystals Lite and a Rune app, Galaxy Runes Lite. Again for both of these there are paid versions that add a few more crystals and spreads respectively. I'll be honest I haven't used the crystal one much, but the rune one I find myself using daily thanks to a daily rune widget you can put on your main screen. Simple readings but great for familiarising yourself with the elder futhark. As with the Tarot app there are plenty of settings to fiddle with: you can choose whether or not to include the modern "wyrd" stone and whether you want to include reversed readings. 

Palm Reading is effectively a "little book of palm reading", but not bad for beginners or those wanting to show off at parties.

The Night Sky Lite is a handy app that uses your phone's GPS and date systems to show you what constellations are in the sky around you (even during the day, just to confuse things). Interesting and useful for direction-specific ritual work.

eChing Lite is a cheeky modernised version of the I-Ching. The hexagrams are designed to look like the little Android mascot and have basic, easy-to-understand readings.

Lastly, Pocket Voodoo is a fun little app for venting your frustrations without hexing someone. It's a virtual voodoo doll which you can toss about, pull apart and impale. If you're willing to follow some adverts, you can unlock further bits an pieces, like a gun, a cigarette lighter and customisable features to add to the doll. It also has some spells that you can supposedly use with the doll. Completely pointless but oddly gratifying.

Norse mythology has never been so adorable

All these trailers for the new Marvel comics movie, the Avengers, make me long for a proper film based on Norse myths. Honestly, try looking for one, there aren't many. You're pretty much limited to Erik the Viking and various takes on the Ring Cycle and that's it. Well, thankfully I stumbled on something a bit more interesting; a Danish animated film from 1986 called Valhalla. It's based on a series of comics that are loosely based on Norse myths and it's clappy-hands-and-make-squeaky-noises adorable. Or rather, it is if you like trickster myths and good old-fashioned animations. It follows two cute but somewhat gullible Viking kids who get caught up in the misadventures of Thor and Loki, and the whole thing's up on youtube with English subtitles. Hurrah!




There. Don't you feel all warm and fuzzy inside now? Admittedly the ending feels a little rushed (are the kids stuck in Asgard? How did the little troll thing escape?) but that might have something to do with the film going grossly over budget (apparently it cost over 40 million kroner. Ouch) and effectively bankrupting the company that made it. Which is a shame, because according to Wikipedia, the film was a hit and it would have been fun to see a few more myths get filtered through that charming old-school animation style.

I do like the implication that standing out in the rain is some sort of invitation for an Aesir sleepover, though. Hmm.... if standing around in thunderstorms is all you need to do to get to drink with the gods, I'd better stock up on mead.

Oh and happy Beltane/May Day/whatever-you-want-to-call-it everyone! Hopefully the rain won't spoil too many bonfires... and if it does, well, blame Thor!