once more with feeling

So I finally went to the USA. And although I have been dreaming about New York and San Francisco for many years now, my first trip brought me to Maui, Los Angeles and Lake Tahoe instead.
America. Where everything is bigger, is more. But it was especially that bigger and more of the city of angels that overwhelmed me a bit too much and left me feeling lost. Being back home now for nearly two weeks, I realized that I’m really not gonna miss a few things: hot pants in combination with UGG boots, salads for 7 bucks vs two tacos for 50 cents, people smoking weed while driving, the ugly dollar, the most boring highways of all times, my phone not working there, too many people in too little space, having to add taxes to the prices displayed in the supermarket (i really suck at calculating in my head), the very strange humor, the saddest supermarket of all times aka costco, driving in California, parking in California, the cinema prices, the fact that 10 cents are smaller than 5 cents, busses where the bus driver just steps out of the bus in the middle of nowhere because she’s arguing with a customer, being asked for an ID when you just sit on the bar without even ordering alcohol, and many other tiny things that I just can’t remember right now.
However, there of course is stuff I’m missing: burritos, food that actually really is hot when it says “hot”, diet dr. pepper, the lakers, 25 degrees at the end of December, urban outfitters, cheap gas, Korean BBQ, the ocean, bigass supermarkets openend 24/7, grabbing your Glock and shooting all your anger away at the shooting range, and SiriusXM.
Some of you non-Americans might wonder now – Sirius who? SiriusXM is a satellite radio station with 140+ channels. You have to pay for it, but it definitely more worth than paying for ORF here in Austria. There are tons of music, news, sports and other entertainment channels – I mean hello, they even have a 24/7 Pearl Jam channel. So when we were driving around (and since LA is 8 hours from Lake Tahoe we were driving a fucking lot), we always listened to Alt Nation, the alternative rock channel. And through this channel, I discovered my latest favorite band: Awolnation.
Awolnation is not that new – the electronic rock band fronted by Aaron Bruno already released an EP in 2010 and their first record “Megalithic Symphony” in March 2011 at Red Bull Records. So when coming back home with this new discovery, I quickly realized that I might be a little too late for calling it a “new discovery” – they have actually been booked for a gig at Arena Wien on February 14th, also known as what-can-I-do-to-avoid-Valentine’s-Day day (and what is there better to do to avoid Valentine’s Day than going to a concert, right?).
Now, here’s the latest video from Awolnation, “Not Your Fault”, followed by some pictures of my journey. And after watching the video and going through my pictures, you’ll have to play the “Megalithic Mayhem” videogame – a game for and with Awolnation and an awesome 8-bit version of “Not Your Fault”.

Find my sun in the dark side
of my shadow.

Last week, I was in Paris. It was my third time, although that doesn’t mean too much: the first time was for my 6th birthday, and as you may expect already I spent my time at the Disneyland and was pretty pissed when I was dragged into the city for one afternoon. My second trip to the city of love was with 19 years or so, and again my childish heart drew me towards Mickey and Minnie, so again I only had one day in the city – not even nearly enough to capture the incredible amplitude and diversity of Paris.

This time, it was different. Coming from Gare du Nord and making my way by foot to meet my lovely couchsurfing host, I already saw everything that Paris is famous for: starting off with bistros, boulangeries, patisseries, bars with people enjoying a café, continuing with musical sites such as La Cigale and Le Trianon, and a short glimpse at Sacre Coeur through the side streets. Then, the boulevard turns into heaven for lonely men with one sex shop / live show venue after another, only interrupted by kebap and sandwich places. Finally, my walk culminates with the movie-like scenery of Moulin Rouge, where tourists gather in front to catch a picture with them and the mill in the background.
To round it off, I end my evening just like I’d expect to be a usual evening in a French mid-twenties household to be like: with interesting conversations about music and life, with red wine, olives, self-rolled cigarettes in a little and overprices but totally lovely flat.

The following two days were filled with meetings, conferences and concerts, since the main purpose of my trip to Paris was a music conference. It was an incredibly experience to represent our company abroad for the first time, and I’ve discovered some really good bands about which I’m gonna tell you another time. And until that, you can enjoy the few pictures I made during my last couple of hours in this amazing city where love meets lust and pomp meets poverty, wherever you look.

In the absence of your love
And in the absence of human touch
I have decided I’m throwing my arms around
Around Paris because only stone and steel accept my love.

San Francisco was the first city I fell in love with. I was pretty young back then, and it was all the fault of John Stamos, Bob Saget and the Olsen twins. I still remember watching the intro of Full House, seeing the Golden Gate Bridge, the cable cars and the rows of cute little houses and dreaming about going there one day. I think it was my mum who even gave me a city guide of San Francisco for my birthday – the one that’s still sitting in my bookshelf, waiting for me to finally take it to the city it belongs to and to show me the marvellousness of it.
Over the years, I started to fall in love with other cities from the US as well – and as with SF, I can only blame the movies. Because of Serendipity and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, I will have to go to the big apple right before Christmas. There are pictures in my head of ice-skating at Rockefeller Center, of walking through the snowy streets and staring like a little child at the shop windows decorated with carousels and Santas and reindeers, of standing in front of the most amazing christmas tree in the world with the Swarovski Star on it. And then there were Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Ocean’s Eleven, where Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt told me how to behave while in the city of sin.
This year, I will finally make it to the land of unlimited possibilities, and I will start right where all people trying to live their dreams start: Los Angeles, home of the Lakers, of the Hollywood Boulevard and Venice Beach. I will find out how wrong or right my picture about the land and its inhabitants is, I will probably dismiss some stereotypes but also build up new ones. I will see how typical the “typical American” is, and I will live the westcoast lifestyle for a little while.

Portugal. The Man just released a video for the song “So American” of their latest record “In the Mountain in the Cloud”. It shows the band doing random things we might see as typical American: hanging out in the sun, having a barbecue with burgers, drinking beer and whiskey. The band from Alaska will come back to Austria for shows in Salzburg, Vienna and Linz at the end of November. I highly recommend you to go see them live – John Gourley’s high-pitched, falsetto, angel-like voice will leave you breathless.

You are the one they call Jesus Christ,
who didn’t know no rock and roll.
There may not be a heaven
or a place in which to send you,
but you know in the end
there’s a madness in us all.

I guess you can blame your parents for nearly anything, right? This is why I’m gonna blame my mum for my desire to travel, to get away from home, to see the world, to experience as much as I can. I still have all the pictures of us in Italy, I have vague memories of Sweden and a diary of our trip to France. And also now, as all her children have grown up and moved out, she is constantly on the road, visiting places I’m incredibly jealous of. No worries mum – I am more than happy to have this desire in me; it has brought me to the most incredible places on earth already. Travelling and my experiences while doing so has influenced me so much – it has contributed to a large extent to who I am today.
As much as I enjoy seeing the whole world, as much of a pain in the ass is it to have travelling as your passion. Shortages in time and money only allow me to get away for a couple of weeks every year, and I keep delaying my plan to do a journey around the world year after year. I just keep looking at the Facebook App with the pins sparsely spread on the Google Map, wondering when I’ll ever manage to see all of the beauty that is still waiting for me.

And so I’m sitting in my room today, planning my next trip full with anticipation (I’ll let you know soon enough abouth the when and where), listening to this song, whose title says it all.

Kent Odessa – Getaway
Getaway by Kent Odessa

The last Tuesday of April, around 11 pm. I finally found the way from the airport to the city center, now I’m pulling my suitcase through the long corridors of the metro system. I just arrived, but the city already gives me the first hints of what to expect the next days: diversity. An Asian food stall beneath McDonald’s & Burger King, Dukin’ Donuts, a kebap stall, some pizza and Currywurst. The customers: people like me with their heavy bags trying to find some food on the way to the hotel, a bunch of punks finally being able to buy another can of beer as result of their beggary, the business man who probably just has his first meal of the day except for coffee, the girl with the blue wig and her boyfriend – a dracula look-alike, without the teeth but with white nailpolish.

I’m in Berlin. Finally some days off. Just me, myself and I. Something I didn’t have in a long time. Actually, it’s the first time I’m going somewhere alone since I went to Spain when I was around 18 years old. And this is a little story about this trip.

At the first glance, I wasn’t very impressed. The whole city seemed to be under construction, there were tourist traps and beggars following you with every step you made. I probably made the mistake trying to at least see some of the historic stuff, so I made my way from the Reichstag to Friedrichstraße to reach Checkpoint Charlie. After passing one shopping temple after the other, I ended up at this supposed-to-be very important place where all that’s left is a huge photoshopped Diesel advertisement of a girl in her underpants overlooks a city beach with cocktails, next to some students dressed up in uniforms play guards and collecting 5 euros from the tourists to pose for a picture.

After I had my first Currywurst on the street in the sunshine, I knew things would get better. And they did. I walked along Oranienburgerstraße and came across the Ramones museum/cafe. So I sat there for an hour, drank coffee under the signatures & pictures of all those rock stars and started reading “Just Kids”, a book of Patti Smith about her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe which The Thermals recommended in the interview I had with them.
And as if reading the book that a band told me about in a place where that band already was wasn’t awesome enough, I stood in front of a huge poster of Robert a few meters past the cafe. An exhibition of his work. There were his flowers, the bodies & sculptures, the portraits, the S&M pictures with cocks and ropes and leather suits and piss. There was Patti, Annie Leibovitz, Grace Jones and Andy Warhol. The moment I entered the exhibition I was caught in his world, and I couldn’t leave it for the next couple of days.

Patti’s story influenced the rest of my trip. I know, I’m not living in the 1970s and I didn’t stay at Hotel Chelsea, I left out the drug part and (sadly) didn’t meet any famous people. But I walked around all day with my chucks, my leather jacket and my sunglasses, stopping at little cafés for coffee and beer, spent hours in second hand vinyl & book stores, listened to street musicians and drank too much (hey, that’s part of rock’n'roll).
There are some wonderful places I found on my way:
Tacheles, a shabby building that has been saved from the demolition and is now a place for random artists displaying their stuff behind every door.
Pfefferbett Hostel, the place I stayed. It’s pretty cheap, a good location and you meet wonderful people there. It might end with waking up and wondering why the guy from above you on the bunk bed is suddenly sleeping on the floor, but well… Also, if you’re there, cross the street to Chagall and have some Soljanka there. Ole from diver recommended this place – it’s also just some meters away from the “birthplace” of their band.
At Babanbè on Oranienplatz you get a Banh Mi of awesomeness, which totally put me back in time to last September and my trip to Vietnam.
At Konnopke under the metro station Eberswalder Straße you get one of the best (if not THE best) Currywurst of the town. And it’s only € 1.70 if I remember correctly.
More food? Then check out Morgenrot on Kastanienallee, it’s a collective where you get a vegan breakfast buffet. They also have some events in the evenings and the sun shines directly on their little tables outside.
Kastanienallee is generally THE place to be: little shops with nice clothes, record stores and hipsters having their coffee on the streets. Also, there is the Kochhaus next to Konnopke, a very interesting food supermarket: they display a couple of dishes with all ingredients and a flyer with the recipe, and you can buy every ingredient depending on for how many people you’re cooking. As in: if you only cook for yourself, you can also just buy one tiny tomato, four mushrooms and one garlic clove.
C/O Berlin is the place where the Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition was, maybe they have something interesting if you go there.
There are also some nice shops on Alte Schönhauser Straße. When I was there, I ran into a group of teenager tourists, to whom the guide was just explaining that we were standing right in front of the building where the Beatsteaks wrote (and I think also recorded) their first record 48/49, which is obviously called like that because it’s the street number of that house.
Last tip: walk around. 95% of the stuff I found was not planned – I just came across it. Experience this city. That’s the best thing you can do.

And as if it was planned, I finished the last pages of “Just Kids” during the flight back to Austria. Reading about Robert’s death, the words of his last conversation with Patti, her promise to write this book – I was sitting there, fighting the tears.
And then it was over. Back to reality. No Hotel Chelsea, no CBGB – back to the time where Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin are long dead. Back to here and now.

-fin-