Tu ma Kassette!

Here's to the old art of compiling mixtapes!

“The making of a great compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do and takes ages longer than it might seem. You gotta kick off with a killer, to grab attention. Then you got to take it up a notch, but you don’t wanna blow your wad, so then you got to cool it off a notch. There are a lot of rules.” – Nick Hornby (High Fidelity)


My "Heart Of Hearts" playlist:

SIDE A

Heart Of Stone (The Raveonettes)
It's My Own Cheating Heart That Makes Me Cry (Glasvegas)
Wooden Heart (The Duke Spirit)
A Ballad For The Bleeding Hearts (Howling Bells)
I Want To Be The Boy To Warm Your Mother's Heart (The White Stripes)
In My Mind, In My Words And In My Heart (The Dolly Rocker Movement)
Heartbeats (The Knife)
Sinking Hearts (The Organ)
Quiet Heart (Kent)
Blackboots Blackhearts (Sweet Jane)
Heart + Soul (Black Rebel Motorcycle Club)

SIDE B

Heart Of Hearts (!!!)
Oh, Sweetheart (Shout Out Louds)
Irish Blood, English Heart (Morrissey)
Stop Crying Your Heart Out (Oasis)
Take This Heart (IV Thieves)
Werewolf Heart (Dead Man's Bones)
How My Heart Behaves (Feist)
That Beating Heart (Maximo Park)
Pull My Heart Away (Jack Penate)
Cheated Hearts Acoustic (Yeah Yeah Yeahs)
I Will Possess Your Heart (Death Cab For Cutie)

Interview with Paul Smith (Maxïmo Park)

“The comforting ache of the summer holidays…“. That hits the mark. The image that is being presented to me while I’m on my way to the interview with Paul Smith, frontman of Maxïmo Park and jumping jack / dervish / human bouncy ball (if I may be so bold to borrow the term from a friend), fits this opening line of The Kids Are Sick Again perfectly. I’m being surrounded by lightly clad people, who, armed with blankets and cooling bags, are cleaving their way into Hamburg’s Stadtpark in order to render homage to the northern-German sunbeams. In addition to this already idyllic view there are musical scraps in the air, which sound remarkably like a soundcheck taking place in the open air theatre. That’s it. The tepid summer air carries Books From Boxes to my ears and there you go: the smile on my face can only be dispersed with difficulty. After waiting some time in the “backstage BBQ area” I finally meet a genial, good-humoured Paul, who, as one knows about him, knows how to twist one around his finger by applying his talkative temper and his cute Geordie accent (I’ll only say the way he pronounces “a double bluff” in I Want You To Stay – that throws an Anglicist into raptures...) Read here what he reports about the gig in Japan, the writing of songs and his former job as a teacher.

www.popzine.de

The Rakes Interview

They’ve always had a soft spot for Germany. Only think of the cute “Da sind wir Helden!” in Strasbourg or Alan Donohues surprisingly advanced knowledge of German (talking about potatoes in your pocket), which he presented us during our last interview (see the interview from 2007). Apart from that the band’s blog recently features a list of “Greatest Germans”, which does not only include Goethe and Schiller, but additionally German comedian Helge Schneider (which most probably has a great deal to do with guitarist Matthew’s German girlfriend).

For the recording of their latest album Klang! the London based Rakes also left their refuge of the English capital and settled down in Berlin’s Planet Roc Studions, surrounded by their seemingly well-liked GDR-peachiness. In his talk with Popzine guitarist Matthew reports on the new album, guys coming home horny from the gym and the need of always keeping open for everything.

www.popzine.de

Interview with The Black Angels

I also had the great chance of interviewing Alex and Christian of The Black Angels on the same day.

Check out the interview here:

www.popzine.de

The Black Angels (December 12, Werkstatt Cologne)

BRMC European Tour 2008 Diary – Day 5: Groningen (24/06/08)

All of a sudden, the last day of our little tour has come. It means saying goodbye to Amsterdam, which I have really come to like these past two days, and saying hello to Groningen. Erm, which actually turns out to be more complicated than I imagined…
The train tickets we’ve bought and the printed information for our journey tell us to catch the train to Amersfoort and to change into the train to Groningen there. Time between arriving in Amersfoort and leaving again to Groningen according to schedule: six minutes. Luckily, the train actually arrives on time in Amersfoort. Of course, there’s no lift, so it means manhandling our suitcases up the endless-seeming stairs (and me with my huge, stuffed bird suitcase, congratulations…), crossing the bridge leading to the other track and manhandling the bloody suitcases down again. But, we do it in time and we still have four minutes till the train to Groningen departs, neehaaa! The announcement on the monitor says something like “Voor: Groningen, achter: Leeuwarden” and considering the fact that I actually did a Dutch course at university for three terms, I’m pretty sure this must mean something like “To Groningen over Leeuwarden”. Well… Seems like I was ill in the lesson our teacher told the little story about the Dutch preposition “achter”. As we find out approximately an hour later, when the lovely Dutch conductor asks for our tickets, it rather means “back, behind” and the back part of the train, into which we just jumped when the train arrived at the station, is going to Leeuwarden, while the front part of the train was detached some stations ago and is going to Groningen. Without us! Lost in translation, in a mix of Dutch and English, the conductor and I try to find out how to get our little group to Groningen in time. We’re supposed to get out at the next station, take the next train back to Meppel and from there to Groningen. In the right part of the train of course.
Thus, it means getting out at a little Dutch village called Steenwijk before we can continue our journey, experiencing strange Dutch animals making strange sounds. If the sun wasn’t shining I’d say being lost in this village that seems to consist of three houses and the one track train station would be scary. But, hey, let’s stay positive. This way you get to experience the Netherlands.
After this small detour we reach Groningen, however, although there’s not that much time for relaxing or even having a look at the surroundings now. It’s more down to taking a shower and getting ready for the last show tonight. We meet Mia in front of De Oosterpoort, head for some Mexican food and then back to the venue, which is a kind of cultural centre and has its concert hall hidden somewhere in the complex, so it’s no surprise there’s nobody out on the street. When it comes to the crowd, tonight resembles Frankfurt a bit. There are about twenty people when the doors open and it only gets fuller slowly, the main proportion of the audience consisting of middle aged, already slightly bald men, who seem to take this show as a means of reviving their old rock n roll days again. And this, unfortunately, is reflected in the spirit of the audience.
The Brothers Movement are there to open again tonight and although they are playing a great set again, there seems to be something like a “civility gap” between the stage and the audience. It’s the stage, us fans occupying the first row and then a gap of about two metres. Hm. People in Groningen seem to be a bit shy, maybe…
And this somehow also continues throughout the set of BRMC, the audience stays to be rather restrained and doesn’t get really warmed up, that’s at least the impression I have. Hardly understandable from my perspective, but that’s what happens. Anyhow, we try to let this not spoil our last evening on this tour and thus enjoy a set of:

666 Conducer
Berlin
Weapon Of Choice
Ain’t No Easy Way
Red Eyes And Tears
Six Barrel Shotgun
Stop
Salvation
Heart + Soul
Mercy
Shuffle Your Feet
River Styx
Need Some Air
American X
Punk Song

Pretend
Took Out A Loan
Steal A Ride
Spread Your Love

Another time the show starts off with a phenomenal 666 Conducer, another time Robert has to cheat by reading the additional lyrics of Six Barrel Shotgun from a note on the monitor, another time Salvation and Heart + Soul blow our minds, another time we clap along to Shuffle Your Feet and shake everything we’ve got to Steal A Ride. Robert introduces Mercy by saying that, as they had never played in Groningen before, this was a song to make friends, starts off and leaves us standing there, trying to deny ourselves the tears. Yes, we’re getting a bit emotional here on our last night of the tour. A final time we know the true promise of hearing Pretend and rock out to Punk Song and Spread Your Love. The only thing I’m missing tonight is Peter playing some acoustic songs and hearing All You Do Is Talk another time. But finally, even this show is over and thus, with the last accord of Spread Your Love, our BRMC tour comes to an end.
Unfortunately, there’s also no one of the band coming out to talk to the fans tonight, although all of us would have liked to say goodbye. There’s even no chance of sitting down and having a nice chat after the show as people are literally thrown out of the venue. Thus, there’s nothing else to do than to go and look for some shop that might sell something to eat, but even the McDonald’s is closed. Therefore we end up at a gas station, eating sandwiches and baguettes on the cold floor and I decide to buy a huge pot of Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream, which we share sisterly, in order to prevent upcoming post-show depressions. It’s a bit unspectacular, this end of our tour… But as I have said so many times before: we’re spoilt and probably expect too much.
All in all I have to say that these past two weeks have been phenomenal. I met so many lovely people, shared some great laughs, saw five spectacular shows and got the chance to interview Peter again, thus I think there is no reason for being sad. If one thing’s for sure, then that there will be a next BRMC tour to look forward to. A big Thank You to my sister Melanie, who made it possible for me to actually do this tour, and to Natascha and Kirsty, our companions on the road. We had such a great time. Let’s hope we’ll get the chance to do such a tour again soon, as we try and we try, but we can’t get enough…

BRMC European Tour 2008 Diary – Day 4: Amsterdam (23/06/08)

Yes, it’s approximately four hours sleep we get that night and early the next morning we’re off to the station in Düsseldorf to catch our 09:35 am train to Amsterdam. Cuddled into our seats of our cabin we try to compensate our lack of sleep, but anyhow there’s too much to talk about.
We arrive in our very fancy hotel (Hotel V Fredriksplein, highly recommendable) by midday, lay siege to our rooms, and then start with a nice, relaxed Sunday in Amsterdam before there will be rock n roll again tomorrow. We have something to eat, meet up with Claudia, make a beautiful boat trip through the “grachten” of Amsterdam and finish the day with eating pizza or pasta and having a drink at a snug bar with Claudia and Aileen. As the Paradiso is within reach of our hotels and the bars and restaurants at Leidseplein, we walk past the venue for about a dozen of times, every time phantasizing about what the show’s going to be like tomorrow.
The next morning we still want to see something of the city, but whereas shopping usually is one of my favourite things to do, even a H&M and an English book shop can’t get me into raptures today. People who know me will know: this IS a bad sign. My head is totally occupied by wondering about when Grant, the tour manager, is finally going to call me up and tell me when the interview is taking place. Yes, the interview. After I had the great chance of interviewing Peter on the last tour in November, this time I couldn’t resist but to ask for an interview appointment again and this is what you get: not being able to enjoy a shopping tour in Amsterdam with your friends because you keep looking at your mobile phone every five seconds and almost want to force it to ring by looking at it.
When we get back to Leidseplein for a snack I still don’t know anything about possible interviews to happen. After an hour of trying to call up Grant, going over the street to the Paradiso and looking if there’s someone to talk to but finding no one, we funnily enough run into Peter while we are looking for a supermarket and he can assure me that Grant might call me up any second and that the interview is definitely going to take place. About five minutes later I get the longingly expected call and all of a sudden life is good again.
Thus, it means getting to the Paradiso at six o’clock and me ending up with Peter in the basement for a nice chat about all kinds of different things, some of them having to do with mobile phones, silly country songs, boots and knee-high socks and not seeing daylight again for about an hour later, leaving my sister wondering about when I’m going to turn up again finally, as doors are supposed to open at seven but I still have her ticket in my handbag. But I get back in time, luckily being able to find my way out of the dungeon of the Paradiso again by following a red line on the floor. Inner tom-tom again.

You can find the interview on www.popzine.de, by the way.

At about seven doors open, this time letting quite an appropriate crowd of people flow in and enter the places in the front row. This night, however, we decide against standing at the front, because the stage is particularly high and as we’re quite short, it would rather mean to be watching the guys’ boots than the show for us if we stood there. And we want to avoid a stiff neck, of course. Therefore, we either gather at the top of some stairs at the side of the hall, next to a column and beneath the balcony, or on the balcony, where we can perfectly admire the beautiful scenery, mostly caused by the colourful glass panes the Paradiso has, because it used to be a church.
This time The Brothers Movement are finally around and they start off the evening with a great show. Whereas usually I can’t wait until the support is finally over, I’m actually sad their set is finished after half an hour and I would love to listen to them longer. It’s a pity they don’t have any CDs with them, I would have loved to get some of their older stuff when they still used to be Mainline. Anyway, one can be looking forward to their album coming out in fall then.
So, apart from the fact that I got to interview Peter that day, I have to say that this show is my Top 1 in the list of shows on this tour. Heart + Soul and Salvation are definitely some of the highlights this night, just as Peter playing a very new song we all have never heard before. Unfortunately, he either didn’t mention the title or I simply didn’t get it. Anyway, it’s acoustic, it’s beautiful and I really can’t wait until all these new songs already flying around are finally captured on a CD. Having spoken to Peter about extended versions of some of their songs during the interview, it’s great to hear two of those extended versions tonight, one of them being this very hot version of Six Barrel Shotgun to which they have added a very groovy part and Rob singing additional lyrics, which is almost unbearably great until it finally has its climax in the “Save yourself, cause I need some stimulation, baby!” Again, do they have a license for that?!
Finally, when they play All You Do Is Talk, I’m kind of happy that Peter fucks up the lyrics at some point, as this really prevents me from starting to cry because of the beauty of the moment. Wow.
This night in Amsterdam sees another outside set, although I have to say that at some points I really think people overdo it a bit. It’s great to listen to the guys playing, it’s great they are so lovely and have time for their fans, but when it comes to the bus driver complaining that people should get away from his bus, because they are squashed to it and he’s afraid that it will get damages and people almost just jump into the bus to be close to the guys, that really freaks me out. Please, a little bit of decency. Same goes with hords of people running after the guys, after they have called it a day and probably just want to go and relax a little. But, yeah, I know, it’s a fine line…
After all it’s great to see that everything around Leidseplein has become BRMC country with fans running around and getting to know people from all over the world. However, even in Amsterdam it’s kind of hard to find some kind of bar that’s open on a Monday night. Finally we’re successful, but after one Heineken we have to call it a day. Too much excitement for 24 hours. And there’s still Groningen to come tomorrow.