Tour Diary – Catching up in Koblenz
Hey everyone. As promised, I'm doing a wee catch up blog to get us from Mannheim up till the current date. I've lost track of the days now too so, um, this one doesn't have days on it. Ok, after the last blog we've played shows in Coburg, Muhldorf and Pforzheim. We also chilled out in Heidelberg and Frankfurt. It's a whole bunch of Germany to take in and in such a short time. I'll do my best to try and remember what the hell we did in all these places. Lets start...
The Coburg Samba Festival is one of the biggest of its type in Europe apparently. For Darryn and Riduan it was a really big deal. They have been honing their samba chops for years and now they would have a chance to show their stuff on a really clued up audience. Our performance at Coburg was awesome if I may say so. We played really well and busted our asses. The crowd was up for it too as we were pretty much the only non-samba group (meaning we had guitars and stuff and played music that wasn't Brazilian). Our stage was in a square surrounded by old buildings but the festival filled up almost the whole old town of Coburg. It's a beautiful city eh. Very well preserved with nice fountains and statues all over the place. It was weird to see all the Brazilian flags, havaianas, coxinha's and other Brazilian things everywhere in this medieval, Bavarian town. The only let down, and it was a big one for me, was that the crew on our stage was not very helpful... at all. Maybe it was the fact that it's a samba festival and they're not used to having bands such as ours but the treatment we got was pretty poor anyway. I'm not gonna speak for everyone in the band, but for me, I felt quite disrespected. Here's the scenario, when you play at a festival you have to be pretty quick getting your gear on and off. If you're lucky enough to get a sound check you need to put tape down where all the instruments and stuff were. If you're sharing an amp, you might write down your settings so you get the right sound etc. The bit between you coming off and the next band coming on is called changeover. Now usually changeover has to be as fast as possible. It makes sense, you want the stage to keep playing without lots of stops. Most stages will have a stage manager who amongst other things needs to keep things running smoothly, including changeover. Our changeover lasted for about 10 seconds!! The next band had about 40 people and they almost immediately rocked on to the stage without the chance to pack our gear down. We all have expensive, precious gear and it is nearly impossible to remove it with other people, especially 40 odd people, clattering around you so you can't move. The announcer even introduced the band ready for them to play while we still had our gear on the stage. Aside from the fact that for me alone, my gear would be worth around $6000 and I don't want it damaged, we had just played a great show and common courtesy would be to allow the band to get their stuff off in an orderly manner. Suffice to say, I was pissed!!! I've been doing this stuff for over a decade and never had something like that happen. It put a damper on what should have been a great festival and soured the great feeling we had with the audience minutes before. I don't like to complain about things like this usually as some musicians can get a bit diva-ish if you let them, but this was a real cock up and personally hurt me. When you play right you should be emotionally drained after a show, so a bit of understanding from the crew goes a long way.
Anyway, I've spent too long bitching about that. It really was a cool night otherwise and it was such a fun, enthusiastic audience. I'll try keep that as the memories from Coburg.
Muhldorf erased all the crew stuff immediately. Rocking up to the venue we were met by three likely lads that looked like they were more accustomed to being backstage at a Pantera gig. But you know those rock roadies are on to it man. We breezed through sound check, met up with our backline guy Mark and eased into a few bevvies. Our German booking agent Stefanie was there also with another one of her artists, Nomfusi. If you get a chance you should check her out. She's an great South African singer that is bringing her voice to Europe. Here's a link to her website http://www.nomfusi.com/
Muhldorf is an unassuming little town near the Austrian border until you enter the old city. Maybe it was the time of day we got there but it looks like a film set. Everything was spotless, all the buildings looked freshly painted, even the late afternoon sun seemed like it was from a lighting rig hitting just the right angle to enhance the backdrop. The venue was located in the schloss (the German word for castle that you get really used to here) under a canopy. It was a stinking hot day but thankfully we were the grateful recipients of onstage fans. As small a detail that may seem, it is siiiiiiicccccckkk when you get them. As the sweatiest man in the band, it sure makes a difference having fresh, cold air blown at you constantly. Oooooo. Please always give me a fan :)
Oh yeah, it is a damn hot summer in Europe this year. Even the UK is cranking it. Almost all the other years we've been here it's been cold and rainy so it's an awesome feeling to be in the sun all the time, particularly coming from the NZ winter.
Again Muhldorf gave us an excellent response. All the crowds have been great here in Germany. We will be sad to go, that's for sure.
The last show we had on this 6 day stretch of the tour was in Pforzheim. I gotta give great thanks to the promoter, crew, bar staff and opening act at this show. They were all very nice to us and did their utmost to make us feel at home. Unfortunately, these were pretty much the only people at the show. Maybe it was because it was Sunday, or the venue or perhaps we just can't pull a crowd (nah) but we regretably didn't get to meet too many of the people of Pforzheim. I think in reality it was a bit of bad luck. Hopefully, for everyone involved, if we cross paths again lets make it a biggie!!
This all capped off a very tiring, but rewarding, run of shows. There was a ton of travel, lots of tired minds and bodies but we got to meet and play for heaps of awesome people. Lets hope we can see you all again next year.
Before the next bunch of gigs (and the next blog incidentally) we had a coupla days off in Frankfurt with a quick detour to Heidelberg. Off days are not that fun to describe but I'll give you a mini run down:
Heidelberg very pretty but too many tourists
Frankfurt big and corporate looking
Met nice lady that did our washing, just like mum
Epic walk to the supposedly, cool, student area of Frankfurt. Didn't find it
Did find one of our most loyal fans, Shelly :)
Yum Chinese food
Scary junkies shooting up on the street
Rest, Sleep, TV
Frankfurt is too big to judge on a few walks. We really didn't scratch the surface, but, it is a lot nicer than you may have been led to believe. Aesthetically anyway. Down by the river there are a lot of social areas, parks, basketball courts and cycle lanes. It was pretty cool. It's no Berlin but it's not bad, not bad at all.
Ok guys, I'll wrap it up. I'm actually way behind in this but it will get done. I promise. Next up we have Koblenz, Lorrach and Freiberg. Check back here soon.
Love ya's
Alex and B2KDA