All members (bar Helge) are involved in some sort of side project, and they concentrated on these in their break time. In 2007, the members of Kaizers Orchestra took a break from playing live. The book was also sold during their 2006 "Grand Finale Tour", a tour which included the bassist, Øyvind, painting a picture throughout the concerts and selling it at the end. At the book signing in Oslo to promote its release over 400 copies of the 3,000 first editions of the book had been sold. It is close to 300 pages and include almost 150 pictures documenting the 2005 Maestro tour. A book, written in Nynorsk by Geir Zahl's older brother Jan, called Kontroll på kontinentet was released 18 October 2006. Their 5 and 6 October 2005 performances at Vega, in Copenhagen, Denmark, were recorded for a live DVD, titled Viva La Vega, and double CD, Live at Vega. In connection with the release of Maestro, Kaizers Orchestra signed an international record deal with Universal Germany, taking them from one of the smallest labels to one of the biggest. The third album, Maestro, was released on 15 August 2005 in Norway and Europe. The second album, Evig pint, was released in February 2003. Ompa til du dør also made Kaizers Orchestra the highest-selling rock debut to be released in the Norwegian language. The album won a Spellemannpris (Norwegian Grammy) for "best rock album", as well as two Alarm-awards (underground version of Spellemannprisen). It was critically acclaimed and became a success, first in Norway, later in Denmark and the Netherlands. Their first album, Ompa til du dør, was released on this label in September 2001. Kaizers Orchestra's sound and creative use of instruments was noticed by the small, Scandinavian label Broilerfarm. During by:Larm, a Norwegian festival focusing on up-and-coming artists, the band's songs were played frequently on the radio. In 2000, Kaizers Orchestra recorded the Kaizers Orchestra EP, containing four songs: "Bastard", "Bøn fra helvete", "Katastrofen" and "Dekk bord". Kaizer took me in/He is the proud owner of the world's heaviest siamese cat") and the song's overall crowd response became a source of inspiration for Ottesen, and after gnom dissolved after disappointing record sales, he formed Kaizers Orchestra. However, they were known well in the area around Stavanger in Norway, having played as the local band Blod, snått & juling, and one of the songs they wrote after Mys called "Bastard" got good crowd response. Of its 1000 copies, only 500 or so were sold the first year. In 1998, childhood friends Janove Ottesen and Geir Zahl released their only album by their band gnom called Mys.