Dead Guitars Tourdiary
Dead Guitars 2007 - Promo by Maier
Dead Guitars
Tourdiary der Dead Guitars, die vom 5. - 27.2.2008
The Mission als Support begleiten.
Geschrieben von Sänger Carlo Van Putten und im Orginal veröffentlicht auf ihrer MySpace Webseite.
Thanks Carlo!
Viel Spaß beim lesen...
29.02.2008
First & Last & Always-Tour Diary Dead Guitars by Carlo
First and last and always Home again…
Its quiet in this room, only the washing machine is making noise, somewhere in another room. So this was it eh? Where has the life gone and when did the party end?
What a wonderful venue in London! Love the place, not the crew there! We only had 4 songs to improve who we are and what we sound like. We gave it all, was it enough? I Don't know, you tell me. I felt great to stand on that stage. Saw The Chameleons on their resurrection Tour playing here. That was a memorable evening, after all those years of hiding in silence, they were back. And this time it was us, climbing on stage and do our set of 4 songs in 30 minutes. We arrived after a long travel from Utrecht via Calais to Dover. Hours of traffic, cigarette smoke and snoring bunks. When we arrived there were no stage hands to help us unloading the coach, no food or drinks backstage, just a tiny little backstage room (better than none but they have 9 rooms in there!!) I hunkered for a cheese sandwich or something eatable. Nothing, ok fair enough, we might not have send our catering rider, whatever. Who are we anyway? There was another band called the sisters of smurphy. It was a bit strange choice to let them play just before The Mission. To be honest with you, they reminded me a bit of the Sisters of Mercy J Must have been nice for Wayne to hear some of his golden oldies that night. After we came off stage a friend called me that she could not get in but heard me sing at least out in the foyer. That pissed me off really, we mixed her name and got it wrong on our list, Sorry I.v!!! sorry Meriem!! Too stupid really! The crew of the Shepherds Bush Empire are so rude, really! Never seen any worse. They ruined my evening by treating us like pigs, no towels, no food, luckily we got some beers, that we could not take out. We could no people take in , even if they were on our guest list. No smoking allowed, not allowed to sale our own merchandise! They want 25 % of the merchandise!!! That means that bands raise the prices of the merchandise and the result of that is that illegal sellers outside are selling their cheap crap to the fans. Great eh? The result of that was that we sold 1 cd! We drove all the way to London to sell 1 cd!! Get 100,- Pound for the show and been treated like dirt. I was close to beat some of them up really. What happened to Britain, the sex pistols, the revolution, the anti commercial attitude of music? Everywhere camera's, controlled area it says outside the building.When I went outside to fulfill my nicotine habit, someone said: "sorry sir, it's not allowed to smoke at our front door" Can you believe this???? Is this some experiment like in Aldous Huxley's "brave new world"? Or is it some test? Let's see how much control the English can bear?? That evening it must have been fifty times that people told me; "sorry sir, that's not allowed, sorry sir we can't let you do this or that"
I was a bit down afterwards, had a lovely conversation with friends in a bar and went to say goodbye to the missions. Saw the last minutes of their show. A lot of half naked strong shaped guys who were building up some towers of strength. Well, like in those good old days at New Model Army shows After the show Wayne said that he would love to produce the next album….if there ever will be a next. I do understand why most of the bands die anyway by now. A lack of respect, copy instead of buying, long, long away from a shower. Food that is not always the nicest. And the loneliness after the shows. The quietness after the tour and to do that year after year must kill some bands. Over and over we die, one after the other!
It might sound sad, it's not mend to be. It's just the come down after flying so high…every airplane must come down…some in pieces on the ground. Thanks to you all, who supported us. We send our love in exchange of your warm embrace. Thanks to our crew, The mission, and their crew…fans, friend and lovers. Tired as I write to you
Love & sleep
Carlo
26.02.2008
On our way to Utrecht…..
Dresden was a fantastic show, a bit difficult at the start and breath taking in the end! What a great gig really! Tired after selling merchandise I felt into my bed. I thought in the beginning that I would mess it up, because I started thinking during the first 2 songs. That’s fatal!! I closed my eyes again and carried on. And the band played excellent!
Cologne Rules !!! You know why!? We have had a late sound check and an early doors open ! That drove me mad and made me quiet aggressive. I hate it to have no time between the sound check and the gig! Also a camera crew for both bands arrived, thousands of questions, too many people on the guest list and in the back stage rooms. Usually no problem for us, but we are the guests ourselves and even if we helped The Mission a lot this tour, I don’t want to stand in their way and have their food eaten by our guests. But our friends understood that and went to a bar close by. But all that makes me feel stressed and I need to be focused on the show. Our sound check started at 19:10 !!! Doors open 19:30 !!! What the F… !!! My first JD had to go straight in. The second one would not take much time and follow soon…
But just on stage to check we heard that all the settings for the Mission on the monitor mixing desk were gone!! Some technical problem! We had 10 minutes to check and The Mission had to do the whole sound check again. Our only luck with that was that the doors would not open before 20:00 I felt sorry for the crowd who had to wait in the cold cologne evening. But selfish as a singer… I had some time to relax now in the coach! The whole show has been filmed and I hope we will see the result soon I guess it was a sold out gig and I think round about 1400 people were in. Those who were there know better than me how the show was, ask them I loved Cologne, not more not less…love is all you need!
Danke Köln !!
Hanging out in the back of the grey bus just watched Basquiat, love that film! Music, art, poetry, muses, betrayals, lost loves and suddenly the end, like an end always ends for people like him, the tragic of loneliness and a gap inside that no one seems to heal, or can fill in. History will repeat, over and over. My wonderful girl laying down next to me, she came yesterday to Cologne and will be around the rest of the tour, 2 more shows left to go. It’s weird how fare gone the first concerts are, while at the same time it seems so near by. As the singer of this wonderful band I only live for the moment of the concert, waking up early, excited, happy, restless or moody. The first thing that I check is my voice and takes some water to check if it is only sore from snoring or from the coach heating system. If it hurts I take a pastille, which I keep next to my bunk. Paranoid to loose my voice which would mean to cancel a show. The rest of the day passes by while waiting. You have to wait for the sound check, the toilettes, the showers, the catering, the mission, the doors to open, the show, the mission, and suddenly the merchandise. Most of the time I am in full control of myself, disciplined, very rock unroll really! Some prim Donna who’s wearing a scarf, wanting the warm showers, moaning about the air-conditioning and who goes to bed first of all. I don’t say this because Willemijn is here, it’s the truth! I never wanted to cancel a single concert. I know how many people work their asses off to make this happen! It’s worth it and I am so glad to be part of this! So I have to be straight and I can’t make any compromises.
Utrecht – Tivoli in the couch
The closer we get to the end, the less I care about my voice; I want to taste some rock and roll now! Dennis just showed us the slide show that he made on his laptop, along with our new song Isolation. It nearly drove tears in my eyes, watching all the memories of this tour in black and white and to listen to the words “I would like to save you and weave carpets of your mind, to make sure the connection’s right. I cant really explain what it is but I know that this tour
Tivoli The concert
This concert I frightened most to be honest! I always have the feeling if you play at home, it’s always a bit like; “come on Carlo, crawl on the table and sing one of your songs for us” I don’t mean this negative, but it’s like coming home, a place where your friends show up and you are connected in a different way with them as you are somewhere in Budapest. That always made me nervous. But we did it again to my opinion! You must know that I have seen many concerts in Holland and most of the time the support bands have been ignored. But if the Dutch people like you they will listen. Yesterday Tivoli was the best example for it. And they not only listened! I saw people sing along with us, who traveled all the way from England who are following The Mission. I saw an excitement in peoples eyes, the sound was amazing and clear, the audience moved along with our music. They clapped loud and were shouting and screaming. I saw familiar faces, new faces and unknown faces in the packed and crowded Tivoli. Peter and Sven Olaf (sorry for messing the name up Sven Olaf ) weren’t very happy with some things that happened, but you could not tell it musically. Everyone played tight and relaxed. Sometimes when things get wrong, you have to focus on yourself and create an own atmosphere in the mind. I always keep my eyes closed to get into the mood I want to be in and focus myself on the tune of my voice and the pronunciation of the words. Words are my mantra, I don’t have messages in my songs, I sing lines of fragments I wrote down in times they were important for me. If I sing these lines they bring me back to that moment of believe or disbelieve. When I crossed my fingers by silver cross river I saw my ex girlfriend Saskia with her boyfriend Pat. It was good to see her and they look very happy together. I saw so many people, Rob & Nicolette, Martin, Joke & Hans, Folkert, Mark, Alex & Maartje, Willemijn & Willemijn Sander, Ed and his wife, my brother Thomas,& Sarah, Daan & Neeren…and when I woke up this morning in my own cozy bed I started to recall the people I met yesterday. Thanks to those who send me such nice messages on the mobile! You all gave me a fantastic night and I felt like David Bowie who went shopping in the super marked. No fear from the first moment I walked on stage, mature, self confident and totally into the songs and melodies that surrounded me and I felt like diving into the melancholic waves and moods. It was a wonderful night! Went back after talking to friends, a bit drunk from the “100” beers they just put in your hand. Typisch Nederlands But I still loved every concert we did in its own way. I never had only one single gig I didn’t feel good about. I never had that before in my whole musical career! Utrecht bedankt voor gisteren!
Wayne signed some old Mission singles…on one it says “from one Jesus to another”….thanks king of kindness ;-)
At the moment everyone is hanging out here in our little house…making food , music & having showers, Patrick just entered the Guinness book of records with 1 hour and 15 minutes
Proud & blessed as I write to you all…shine on !!
XXX Carlo
23.02.2008
on our way to Dresden - tour Diary Dead Guitars
Aktuelle Stimmung: patient
Dear friends and fellow beer drinkers! :-)
Here we are in front of the Star Club in Dresden, now they call it beat Pol! Dont know why that is? The boys have had an after show party yesterday, but I already left at 2:10. After dancing to Joy Division, The Chameleons and New Order, guess it must have looked funny though! Someone told me this morning that my pants were hangin quiet low...hahahhahaha! The show was fantastic in Berlin! Vielen 1000 Dank für den wunderschönen Abend Berlin! Es war für uns echt schön für euch zu spielen. Wir hoffen bald zurückzukommen. das Essen war super lecker. Ich hoffe das man uns auch in meinem Land so herzlich empfängt! !000 Dank auch an Frank, Anika, und die Katrin für die Gastfreundschaft, das herrliche Essen und vor Allem die Wärme. Ich habe euch für Ewig in meinem Herzen geschlossen! Bleibt wie ihr seit, schön und voller Liebe!
Frank for President!!!
Sorry, i had to switch into German a bit. The Missions were fabulous yesterday and I was standing in the front watching half of the show...impressiv guys! I really going to miss this afterwards, the friendship the sharing of backstage rooms and the stealing of eachothers food and parking places :-) No really, up till now everything was miles better then i would have ever expected! Sometimes rereading my letters to you I got the slight feeling that it must bore you to death to read only possitive stuff.
Well this is all I can say about it..it's f... great out here! Thanks for sharing this with me..
Patient as I write to you...
King Carlo the second, king of the low lands
19.02.2008
19 Feb 2008, 09:00 it means something to me, oh Vienna Tour diary Dead Guitars
Aktuelle Stimmung: geliebt
Dearest friends, fans and other wonderful creatures,..:
I'm backstage here in Vienna, we are all sitting behind our desktop's reading our mails while The Mission just walk on and start with Amelia. We have separate backstage rooms today and it is good for both bands to have their own space every now and then, even if we really carry on well together. Wayne's voice is amazing all the time. He sings at his best. The audience liked us tonight. We ended with a line of Ultravox…"the feeling is gone only you and I … it means something to me, oh Vienna!!" I think Vienna is a cool place to play, the people of the venue are loyal, and really take care about us. Yesterday we played Budapest and it was a killing show! I really loved it there! Man what a place! It was on an old ship and everything was well organized and the people there treated us so well. The food was good; we have had warm showers and cold drinks. I would love to go back to that place one day to play a full set! The Missionaries are so nice to all of us, we never have anything to complain about. Also their wonderful crew are a helping hand whenever anything goes wrong. The crowd out here in Vienna was nice and gave us a warm welcome, thanks for that! Yesterday in Budapest is was mind blowing how the audience reacted to our set. Tonight we will travel all the way to Berlin to have a stop at Frank (our bus driver) his house. His wife will make us a proper meal and we are allowed to use his bath J Frank is a great bloke and we became friends from the start. One fine day I will start to miss this connection to everyone who helped us so much on this tour with their warm embrace, their love and their friendship. This will be a short update dear friends, because I'm a tired man just now. I'm emotionally overloaded with the good vibes that we have received from all of you out there. Keep us in mind as we are, fragile, emotional and yours! Thanks for the great time up till now!
In love with music as I write to you
XXX Carlo
18.02.2008
On our way to Budapest 18.02.2008
I woke up because I felt cold. Probably the heater has been forgotten to put on or we have no electricity. I ask Frank our driver to put it on again. After another hour in the cold I decided to go and have a nice warm shower. You never know in here when the next possibility will be for that kind of luxury. So we are here stranded yesterday at the Croatian border. Some looser in a uniform wouldn't let both bands into "his" country. You need some document about the equipment. And no one told us about it, at least we didn't need that document_ That's what they told us at the custom office in Germany. But here at the border they have their own rules, haven't they? They make you feel useless and that's where they get their kicks from. Many brainless people who wear a uniform might get some kind of a sexual kick out of the power games they play. I noticed that already when I had to land in Houston on my way to Mexico. "What's in that back sir?" My guitar sir.. "Are you sure sir" Off course I'm sure sir. Where do you want to go sir, are you sure sir? It drove me mad. I had to take all my stuff out and the guitar had to be checked, because they could not see the difference between a bomb and an equalizer of an electro acoustic. Yesterday we had the same kind of weirdo. What we needed to prove was that we didn't want to sell our instruments in Zagreb. Off course you drive all the way to Zagreb, with 2 coaches and 20 people to sell your bloody equipment, what a bird brain! Well it ended all by decisions made by others. We will have a day off and the missioners are going to play via hired equipment and their tour coach will stay outside the country. Our driver needed to have his 11 hour break, so that we have had to stop somewhere soon. That's how we ended on a camping space with a spa somewhere in Slovenia. And the dead guitars all have had a meeting by the pool J to be honest I was quiet pissed off, we could have play an acoustic support set, but to late now! We have been let down by some circumstances and somehow I don't want to be in a country where they can treat people like this. You never know if they let you out again. My Dutch passport never helps a lot anyway, we are all addicted to dope, grass and prostitutes eh? We might write a letter to the ambassador in Germany and the Netherlands, but its history by now anyway, sorry for those who wrote to us that they look forward to see us there. Hope you've had a great night with the mission. I have had a shower of nearly 45 minutes to wash off the frustration about a lost concert, about extra costs about the fear that we all have to pay a lot more than expected and only a few cd´s sold. I did shower of the frustration and cleaned my tired body, shaved off the 5 day beard, brushed my teeth and went back into the bus again. Here I am now, finished the coffee, the muesli and writing to you on my laptop while we drive the winding road to Budapest close to the Croatian border. Will this also be our farewell tour? Will this be a financial disaster? Will silver cross ever be on a next album? Go back to sleep van Putten!
Disappointed as I write to you
Love & health
Carlo
Ps. Rimini was a great show and I saw the Mission at their best.
Pps. Schaffi will leave today back to Germany. It's a shame, he's a great help and a good friend. We will all miss him.
15.02.2008
15 Feb 2008 on our way to Florence Tour Diary Dead Guitars
Hello again from here! Valentine a fragment of your life in mine, Valentine (Adrian Borland/white rose transmission) on a valentine's day in Roma, can it be more romantic? Yes it can be! If you are here with the one you love and not with some smelly, snoring friends hanging out in some backstage area. No its fun though, we are blessed with the weather out here, I mean it could have been snowing by the middle of February! After having a great time in Milan and our kick off in Italy, we are all a bunch of lucky bastards and everything seems to be on our side. The Mission flew from Valencia to Milan and we traveled with our huge titan grey travel bird, course, direction Italy. Close to Cannes I remembered that Arnoud said in Marseille something like, hey you pass my house on your way to Italy. I also remembered that Arnoud and I once been to Cannes. I asked Frank to stop at the next patrol station so that I can check if he is around. And 30 minutes later we are all there, in front of a fire place, on a cozy sofa, eating pizza, enjoying the cold drinks and sending music in the air, while the stars shone high above the wonderful old cottage made of stone somewhere in the south of France. What an unforgettable night that was! Some of you might think, so what? I've got that every day, well let me tell you, if you sit in here, even in a luxurious coach like this, you are happy after 10 days to have a nice toilet, a warm shower and most of all the hospitality of a good friend. Arnoud and Rob made this tour a lot more comfortable for all of us. Friends are friends, at home or abroad… The first thing that Derek said when I came in (one of Arnoud his sons) "I didn't recognize you, you look much older with your beard J Children are always so direct! Great! His little daughter who I have seen two years ago, immediately sat down next to me and apart from fetching herself some snacks, she stayed there the whole evening. She made me think, and then she made me smile again; she waited for a good night kiss and offered me to stay. No, uncle Carlo will sleep in the bus…so sweet!
Rainer (our sound engineer) just tells me that we are half way through after tomorrow. It feels more like 5 weeks that we've been on the road. I thought that I would hate to be on the road, but in fact I really enjoy it. I get into the trance of the day. The first days I always hung around in the clubs, waited for the sound check and started to get irritated whenever we were running late. But now we all go out to see a fragment of the area that we are in. In Paris we all went up sacre cueure and yesterday I went with Mark and Richy of The Mission to the colleseum in Rome. It was a wonderful day and I really like the band. We really get on well together and there is never a bad word falling. Mark is a brilliant guitar player who also played with Peter Murphy of Bauhaus and with Tricky. We had some coffee together, seen some history and culture highlights, we had some food and by the time we were back at the venue, its four o'clock and we know each other much better. I brought my dirty laundry to be washed and by the time I was back we started our sound check. I really liked the venue and the sound was great! We had our own backstage room. I am now responsible for the food, drinks and the back stage room. It's great that we all have our own role in this band and it works out fine. Also here in Rome I introduced myself to the club owner, asked for a separate room and some food and drinks. Everyone is happy and the people of the club are most friendly and willed to give us plenty drinks and food.
The concert later on was one of my favorites this tour. I guess there were 1000 people and we had a band playing before us. The guys were very friendly but I thought it was quiet strange to play a "wasteland" sample if you support the Mission. That would be if I would do a cover of "Tower of Strength" and put sunglasses on J Wayne watched our sound check and to be honest, I was a bit nervous. Yesterday I gave him a copy of the 700 miles album and I was happily surprised that he immediately had a listen to it. I mean to say that I have received lots of cd´s that I have had a listen to a few days later or maybe even more. My younger "brother" gave me a tape of his band Aestrid and I listened to it a couple of days later. (Great band by the way!) Wayne said that he liked the songs, very gentle, you sound like David Gilmore, which is a compliment, because I like Pink Floyd. Thanks Wayne! Patrick is doing fine; his ear infection seems to get better. A drummer with an ear infection is not very good anyway. I really like him especially when I turn around on stage and watch him playing his drum kit so passionately.. We smile at each other knowing its good and I carry on singing. These are the most special moments on stage, feeling the band.
Bueno Sera Roma, noi siamo : le chitarre muerte, come state?! With this opening line we started our set and the crowd was on our side from the first moment on. Peter had some technical problems (thanks to Dennis for solving that, that guy is everywhere..) I think this concert was a brilliant one. I mean we really built it up and the Mission finished it. That's how it should be anyway if you are the support band. The Italian people are quite quiet :-) anyway. But it was a great show in Roma and every time when I think it can't get any better, The Mission do better. It's nice to watch the band backstage standing relaxed with a glass of white wine (make that 3) and a cigarette. The two bands went out last night; I stayed in bed, sore throat, tired and fulfilled what a privilege, what an experience, what a wonderful life, thanks!
Happy as I write
Love and magic!
Carlo
12.02.2008
The spanish days - tour diary dead Guitars
Valencia 12.02.2008
Hello from Valencia.
Estamos muy contentos con el recibimiento que hemos recibidos aquí. No esperabamos tanto cariño de la gente. Nos llevamos un recuerdo muy bonito y my especial de este maravilloso país. (thanks Judith for translating this) Spain is a magical trip, Barcelona, Madrid, Malaga and tonight Valencia! Except from the fact that we were announced one hour later than we had to go on stage the gig in Barcelona was a terrific one. The venue was huge and we started with only 10 people upfront, by the way we finished our set about 700 people were in. Sorry Rob, Nicolette and Frank for travelling 1500 km to see our last song. Robert Mills is a well organized promoter. The backstage room in Barcelona was great comparing to the backstage room in Madrid. How clubs can put so much money in equipment and styling while they leave none for the backstage area. Really a brick shit house is more comfortable. It makes you feel like swine on tour part 4. But the people of the club were great and most friendly! In Madrid we played a fantastic set and the people there really loved us, well the pleasure was on our side! Muchas gracias Madrid !!
All I can say about Malaga is that there was a certain kind of magic in the air and we only played 3 songs, have had a 10 minutes sound check, the ceiling is painted by Pablo Picasso and the crowd was fucking great! I could not see them, but you've been heard Malaga! The reason why we have had a delay and a crazy day is that The Missionaries coach broke down and we had to travel all with one. Thanks Dennis and the mission's crew for their hard work to make this gig happen. Thanks to Judith again for translating work with the friendly guarda civil. Hope they will listen to our cd anyway :-)
On the way from Valencia to Milan 12.02.08
So here I am, on my own in the back of the tour bus writing, somewhere in France around Mompellier, wearing a scarf to keep the throat warm and watch the wonderful French landscape passing me by. I have had a great sleep and made my special micro wave toasts, Ask lesly & Lisa keijzer for the recipe J Usual I made them at Rob´s whenever I got hungry after a late nighter. Everyone is still asleep, but I woke up at 9:00. I don't know if they had any beers after the show in the bus, but I went to bed straight away. I suppose that I am more disciplined than ever in here. I mean we just have done 7 shows and there are 14 more to go. I just watched 21 grams, its one of my favorite movies of all time. I am more emotional too these days, I have got goose bums during all the shows, or maybe that's just because of the cold showers :-) The other day I watched Bobby Kennedy. Didn't know much about him, but red a lot about his brother who shot down by H. Lee Oswald, or that was what they made US believe. Its weird though, that whenever someone's got something to say, like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, JFK, John Lennon, they all got assasinated by some crazy mad blokes with guns, shot down by people who can't even speak proper. Well here I am again the conspiracy thinker I hear some say that I know out there. Well I do not search for the truth, I just try to keep myself aware and awake and hope that love and justice will rule at least, I just don't want to loose faith and sometimes I do. All these thoughts circle around my head while I sit down and landscapes passing by the windows at both sides underneath the south French morning sun. We have a new bus driver for one day, because it's a long way from Valencia to Madrid. We need 2 drivers for that distance. We'll have a day off tonight; I hope to get a proper meal and a warm shower! But hey, there is no reason to complain, my English is getting better, my German too and the new bus driver speaks Dutch too, so I can refresh all of that a bit in here. No to be honest, we all have a great time and its very luxurious to travel in a coach. Spain was great and we have made many new friends out there, that's for sure! The cd selling is not very good and we might not cover our costs, but hey who cares. I have had an interview with a wonderful woman in Malaga from a local radio station. We have had a great conversation and we figured out that if you lose something very dear, you are privileged, not pitied. At one point she asked me; why are you doing all this, and I have to say that I haven't had a straight answer. I really thought, yes why am I and why are we doing all this, take a financial risk to go on tour, do I just want to feed our ego because we think we are so talented? What is that strange force that makes you do this? I never asked myself why I am doing this I replied. I think if someone would have asked Jim Garrison why he started to look for the truth, he might not have been able to reply the question. The only thing is that I can think of is that when I heard Jeff Buckley, Mark Burgess, Adrian Borland, John Lennon, Jim Morrison or David Bowie it made me feel less lonely. I felt a yes, deep down inside of me. It gave me hope and strength and that I did choose the right direction, being on the right way. And even if this all ends in a financial disaster, even if this would be our last tour ever, there is something it was worth doing it for. We saw how impressed people were. Many came afterwards to us, some sung our songs along in Spain and France, we might not even be as good as the people I mentioned before, but we feel the same on stage. There is no competition in showing emotions. It's something you cannot put your finger on, you have to dig deeper underneath the surface, but what you'll find there might have to do with love, light and magic. I do hope we left something behind out there….
Watching the Who now in the coach and just left a parking place, have had a WARM shower! An old man just fell down on the pavement and I helped him to him up, heavy bloke, did the same thing once when I was with the Chameleons on tour and have had pain in my back for 5 days, but the smile on his face just now was worth helping him :-) Its Shaffi´s birthday today and I'm going to get myself a beer right now
Emotional & in having a birthday drink mood as I write to you
Love
Carlo
08.02.2008
In the Bikini - Barcelona 08.02.08 Tour Diary DG
So here we are in Bikini, after travelling the whole night. We passed Santa Christina, the place where I wrote most of the last White Rose Transmission album songs. Rob & Nicolette invited us in their wonderful house and made us a delicious breakfast. We really enjoyed that and it was a great change for all of us after spending most time in our magic tour bus. We are all well and still happy to see places that we might never be able to see if we wouldn't have the privilege to tour with The Mission. Marseille was great and we really did a good show. At least that was my opinion. Some out there might remember me as the weird singer who gave away free dead guitars buttons after the show J Patrick have had to play on Steve's left handed drum kit, because the venue was very small and the stage too. It was very generous of Steve to let us play on his drum kit. The people who run the club really looked after us with food, drinks and gave us the being noticed karma. Thanks to you all wonderful people from Marseille for giving us such a warm embrace and support. I couldn't hear myself that well on stage, so I had to force my voice a bit. It's nearly as dark as Wayne's voice usual is :-} I am still amazed how friendly everyone of The Mission is. We share the smallest backstage rooms and there's never any bad vibe at all. This really is a privilege and we are very happy about it. Also both bus drivers communicate very nice together and help each other out with advices and strategies for the road. The Mission just finished their sound check and it sounds great in here! We will be on soon so I have to stop writing to you. I am looking forward to the gig and the Spanish crowd! Some friends and fans will turn up tonight. We are ready for tonight!
Talk to you soon! Sore as I write J
Love & pastilles
Carlo
07.02.2008
On the road to Marseille 07.02.08
First we take Paris then we take Berlin and leave out Manhatten, no Berlin is later on, first we will visit Marseille! Our dear friends Arnoud and Anouk will come to see the show tonight, looking forward to meeting them. Yesterday we only had 4 songs to play, twenty minutes and it was amazing. The shortest set I've ever played in my life. We built the bridge with the audience straight away. I cant put this into words, it was magical and pure. Thanks to the wonderful crowd out there for giving us such a fantastic night. We just passed Lyon and the sun shines brightly through the huge windshield of the tour bus. In France they don't seem to have showers, ask Frank our driver, if he doesn't get one today we might have to cancel the tour J
We are all in a good mood after the show yesterday, half of the band is still in the bunks and Ralf just brought me a coffee. I love these moments, every small thing in the tour bus cosmos has a huge impact when you live so close together."Im a lucky man, the fire in my hand" [the verve] runs on my I-Pod, and I totally agree! We really get on well together with The Mission and their wonderful crew. I watched their show last night and I have never seen them better before. I mean somehow I have had a lack of interest in music from the eighties for several years and somehow I rarely listened to the bands that I knew from that time. But yesterday we watched The Cure on DVD in the van on our way to Paris and when I saw The Mission later on live I jumped up and down and sung all songs along with the crowd. I rediscovered their songs and loved their show. Suddenly I went to bed with a smile on my face surrounded by snoring beds…thanks also to Monique from La Loco for the generous hospitality! In dressing gown as I write J
Love & warm showers
King Carlotta
06.02.2008
On the road to Paris
6th February on the road to Paris.
It's six in the morning just woke up in the tour bus. First I have to figure out where I am, suddenly I recall and see myself walking around the venue with red bull vodka the night before. No I wasn't that drunk it is just an unusual place to wake up, feels like waking up in a coffin ? Our tour bus is very luxurious, and filled to the brim with our luggage and backline gear. ?This is real luxury to travel in..It's fitted out with loads of gadgests like flatscreens, DVD players and Playstations, we've even got Internet via satelite.so we're very happy to have this privilege. Frank our bus driver is a wonderful helping hand from Berlin and he does a good and proper job. We've been very lucky to hire Coach Service from Germany as they are fully booked for the rest of the year!
So we had our first gig yesterday and I must admit it was a great one! The sound on stage was just perfect and I'm so glad that we have such a good crew on board with our sound engineer Rainer, our stage manager Dennis and Schaffi "Jack of all trades" on board, because they're all doing a fabulous job with the sound and organisation. Everything was in place and it sounded great. The crowd liked us and we went off stage feeling quite satisfied.
Waregem is a small town with a huge square building it seemed to me, but what can I say, we only see the venues anyway. I didn't expect so many people, I guess about 800 people turned up in the end.
The Mission played a great set and the crowd loved them. The Mission are very relaxed about everything, no bull shit and bla, bla. They are friendly and very generous.Their manager George is a great bloke; wish we had one like him! Sofie from the catering service looked after us very well and she even brought us drinks on stage and supplied us with rations for on the road.. I'm afraid that won't happen very often on this tour. But, you never know, do you?
Dolores who does the merchandise for The Mission and Dead Guitars is also a very sweet person. So as you may have gathered, we have a great team around us. Spoke to Brett and Luna after the show and we had a great conversation about music, poetry, school and love, anything else that counts? Don't think so ? People who make me feel like home again. So here we are on our way to Moulin rouge or am I in the wrong bus now? No it's La Locomotive in Paris, but next door to the Moulin Rouge where once Henry Toulouse Lautrec inspired himself and painted his wonderful pictures. We can only play 20 minutes there tonight because of the curfew. I played there once with White Rose Transmission supporting The Chameleons and I remember that it was a nice venue. I love Paris anyway! Ok, that's it for now… uncle Carlo..s eyes are tired and he needs a coffee now. Don't forget to buy our cd..s otherwise this will be our farewell tour too ? Insane as I write..
Love & madness
Carlo