News Page May 2002: News from the St. Thomas world, and updates to this page in May 2002. This page is not an official source of information, if in doubt of accuracy of info please get in touch with webmaster of this page or the info source. Click here for latest news.

May 17th 2002 - Two sections that should be interesting have been added. Firstly, a lyrics section, due to popular demand. As of now, all songs on "I'm Coming Home" are featured, more lyrics will be added in the future. Please keep in mind that the lyrics are not the official ones, presented are more or less accurate interpretations of the lyrics done by the webmaster of this page. This means that errors or spelling mistakes are caused by myself, while the actual lyrics are all by Thomas Hansen. To all the people who have e-mailed me requesting the lyrics: I hope you enjoy these.

The second new section is a downloads section. It will feature St. Thomas files available for download, but never commercially available material. This means that if you want to hear "Mysteriou Walks," you will still have to spend some money on the actual CD. But, if you for instance have wanted to listen to the "Songs" seven inch, St. Thomas' debut EP from 1999, but have never been able to find a copy from the limited edition of two hundred copies, this might be your lucky day. All four songs from the EP are available. The material posted in the download section will change on an irregular basis, so grab these files while they are up.

Today, May 17th 2002, marks the European release of the "This Is Norway" compilation album featuring St. Thomas' "Cornerman." Reports have been submitted that this release is being celebrated all over Norway and even in certain Norwegian communities abroad today, with bands walking through city streets and playing popular Norwegian tunes, and thousands upon thousands of people gathering to eat ice cream, wave the Norwegian flag and celebrate the Norwegian music. With such a major release party, "This Is Norway" might be headed for the stars, which it definitely deserves to as it is a quality-packed collection of Norwegian pop tunes.

May 14th 2002 - St. Thomas played at Royal Albert Hall in London, England as the first Norwegian rock or pop artist ever. This event did not go unnoticed in Norwegian newspapers, Thomas even made the front page of VG with the very tabloid heading "Norwegian artist shocked: - Not enough beer in Royal Albert Hall" and a picture of Thomas with the line "Thirsty for beer: St. Thomas."

Read about it here, it was also mentioned in Dagbladet, here, and in Nettavisen, here. The concert at Royal Albert Hall was not the most enjoyable for Thomas and Espen, due to what Thomas referred to as "fuckin' politics" from the organizers, making Thomas feel they were being treated unfairly.

The three important reasons why Thomas was angry was that he was not allowed to share dressing room with Lambchop, as support act they were only given ten beers and had to pay three pounds for each extra beer, and Royal Albert Hall demanded twenty-five percent of the income from the CD sale at the venue.

In addition to this, St. Thomas was the first of two warm-up acts before Lambchop, they had to start very early, there were almost nobody in the audience, and they only played for twenty-five minutes, getting through six songs. To VG Thomas said he wanted to cancel the concert one hour before they were supposed to start, and that he was not sure he wanted to play the remaining nine concerts in the UK, as he has to "fight for food and drinks."

Co-incidentally, Rikke Rask who is reponsible for booking Nordic artists for the Danish Roskilde Festival held a press conference at Cafe Mono in Oslo recently, and commented on St. Thomas, who will be playing at the Roskilde Festival for the second year in a row:

"He is a really good liveartists. You Norwegians can say what you want," she commented, with reference to the negative press St. Thomas was getting in Norway when she was visiting the by:Larm festival, where St. Thomas played, earlier this year. "St. Thomas has been through such a development as an artist during this year that it feels natural to give him place one more time," she added.

Two more American reviews of "I'm Coming Home" has been added to the articles page, thanks to Phil Waldorf from Misra Records for forwarding these.

May 7th 2002 - Another American review of "I'm Coming Home" has been added to the articles page, this time from basement-life.com. Thanks Phil Waldorf at Misra Records for forwarding this one.

May 4th 2002 - Thomas has submitted another tour report, written at an Internet café in Manchester, England this afternoon. He writes that the venue they are playing at tonight, Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, takes as many as 1.800 people, and that their success is continuing. They have done three performances in England so far, and the response has been the same as other places; very good.

As Lambchop have increased their band from eight to thirteen members, Thomas and Espen are now doing their concerts all by themselves, which is going "surprisingly well" according to Thomas. "Our self esteem is on top, and we have never played better. The daily schedule is currently very good, we go to bed at around one and get up at nine, and we do not drink alcohol."

They have added two new songs to their set, "45 Seconds" and "A Long, Long Time." Thomas also writes that there was a two-page interview with him in the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladetlast Tuesday. He has not seen it himself, but has heard it was good. They have eleven concerts left to play, and Thomas ends the short report by saying he is looking forward to the Summer vacation, understandable enough after such a long time on the road.

Thanks a lot to Thomas Hansen for submitting this information.

The rare and much sought-after St. Thomas debut, "Songs," a seven inch released in a limited edition of two hundred copies in 1999, is set for re-release. Chances of getting ahold of a copy of the re-released version are not excessively high, though, as once again it will only be released in an edition of two hundred copies. It is set for release on June 10th, Krank Diskoz are in charge of the re-release.

Thanks a lot to Krank manager Filip Ring Andersen, who is also responsible for the name of the artist this page is devoted to, for the information.

There are some amazing black and white shots from the St. Thomas concert at Ancienne Belgique in Brussels, Belgium on April 14th shot by Laurent Orseau available here. Thanks to the fanpage st--thomas.com for the link.

May 2nd 2002 - I recently got a mail from Phil Waldorf of Misra Records with some interesting information about the American St. Thomas release. Misra Records are responsible for the American release, it is a small label, but they have some interesting artists who have gotten quite a bit of attention, and are distributed by a label group called Secretly Canadian. This means St. Thomas will be widely distributed nationwide in the US as well as in Canada, and will be available at all the major online retailers.

In addition to releasing "I'm Coming Home," "Mysterious Walks" will also see an American release, though it is unknown when. Music on the albums will remain the same, as will the artwork. "I'm Coming Home" was just sent to over two hundred college radio stations and will hopefully be getting lots of radio airplay in the coming weeks. It was also sent to a bit over one hundred writers, magazines, fanzines and websites, so hopefully it will also get some attention in the press.

There are plans of a St. Thomas tour in the fall, but the planning is in the preliminary stages so nothing concrete has come out of the planning so far. It is expecred that they will plan many conventional club shows, but they will also be doing radio appearances and such.

Expectations for the St. Thomas release are high, it is expected that St. Thomas will slowly build a wide fan base in America, and that over the coming months and years he will be getting lots of attention. But Waldorf admits that it is going to take a combination of things to make this happen, including word of mouth, radio airplay, press, concerts and fanzines, and this might take a while.

Thanks a lot to to Phil Waldorf for this information. He also sent along one of the first American reviews of "I'm Coming Home," which has been added to the articles section, or it can be read here. He will try to forward articles so that European readers of this page will get to know what the Americans think of St. Thomas.

In other news, Racing Junior have changed their official St. Thomas page, which can now be found here. And for those who are interested in a pre-release listening to St. Thomas' cover of "The Railroad" by Lee Hazlewood, hurry over to City Slang and join their MP3 Club, as the St. Thomas file is still available there, but probably not for a very long time.

Here is a short notice from Stefanie Wagner, who attended the St. Thomas concert at Fabrik in Hamburg, Germany on April 29th: "Excellent concert and I was more then happy to see a good and fairly peaceful audience compared to the concert a few weeks before in the Tanzhalle in Hamburg. The sound was good and the music was really moving."