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I wish you all a great year 2012 and hope the Rolling-Stones were right for you:

You can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometimes you might find
You get what you need

Through the P-Magazin, a local events guide for Darmstadt, I discovered a new concert venue. The Hoff-Art Theater is well hidden in a former car garage in a backyard centrally located in Martinsviertel. They managed to squeeze a bar into the tiny entry room, from there you enter a cosy little amphi theatre with a red velvet curtain (hence the event name). The space in front of the curtain was just enough to fit all four members of the two bands, “Spring Breakup” from Yukon/Newfoundland, Canada and “Susie Asado” from Berlin, Germany.

Being in such a tiny and personal venue led to a very jam session like atmosphere, with a lot of communication between the bands and the audience. I especially loved “Spring Breakup” for their twisted humour (most lyrics about breakups and others unusual aspects of relationships) and their rough folky sound; banjo and ukulele work together very well. Also the instruments of “Susie Asado”, ukulele/guitar and violin, fit nicely and their experimental style of using the instruments created amazing results. The sometimes slightly bizarre and surrealistic lyrics of “Susie Asado” created an intriguing atmosphere. It was interesting to see, how she was using lyrics almost like an instrument (Tintenlumpenhand) switching languages mid sentence.
All-through the evening I enjoyed the lack of any percussion instruments (the knocking on a ukulele or violin aside), as these are usually over emphasized for my taste. A lot of music would sound better without a drum set, sorry. Also the relatively short set per band were nice. More bands with shorter sets offer more diversity for me.

It was really great concert evening and I will definitely visit that venue again!

Listening to Arlo Guthrie’s interpretation of “Amazing Grace” I stumbled of this great passage:

[10:02]
If the world was perfect, and everybody had money and everybody drove a BMW … nobody was homeless, nobody ever got sick, everything was wonderful, everybody was smart and everything – happy all the time – you’d have to go an awful long way out of your way to make a difference in this world. You’d have to do a whole hell of a lot to try and improve the way it was.
But in a world that sucks – like this one – you don’t have to do very much at all! There was never a time in the history of the world where you could do so little and get so much done. You could do more with a little smile – just hold somebody, say hello to somebody, or just feel good by yourself, even when you don’t feel like feeling good.

Very fitting just love his humour!