Finally Snow!

After a rather murky and rainy December, snow finally arrived short after midnight of the first day of the new year. As my last day of new-years-holidays turned out to be a perfect cold and sunny winter day, me and a friend went out to Bymarka for a nice cross-country skiing trip. The beautiful sunshine also lured Odin, our local free-roaming pony, out of his shed. The trip of course included a waffles-and-hot-chocolate-stop at Skistua and some wilderness skiing along an unprepared forest trail.

 

Following the theme of my previous post, I ended the day with a nice gypsy-jazz concert with Leslie Dawn Knowles (violin), Mark Tetreault (tuba), and Skjalg Raaen (guitar) at Ila Brainnstasjon.
  

Autumn and Winter – The Concert Season

Now that the evenings are getting darker again, I spontaniously went to Digs/BEAR for a concert of 2/3 Harakiri to open the concert season. When I first saw them about two years ago at Verstedhallen, I was blown away by the intense stage-presence of the singer. Since then I have seen him a couple of times in various combinations at the Sunday-Jam-Session at Antikvariatet (of which he is the owner).
The setting at Digs/BEAR worked really well. They were playing inside the big front-window facing the street, much to the confusion of some passing pedestrians.


2/3 Harakiri @ Digs/BEAR      2/3 Harakiri @ Digs/BEAR
2/3 Harakiri @ Digs/BEAR

Saturday on a Sunday @ Antikvariatet

The first thing you see when you enter Antikvariatet is a relatively normal cosy pub. Only when you pass through the hall, which looks like it just leads to the rest-rooms, you’ll discover the back-room which is a very curious blend of library, living-room, and bar. This is where last Sunday’s concert and open-mic night took place.
First Edvardsen & Sønn, a really talented and entertaining duo of father and son (or son an father 😉 ), were playing the Blues. Later, the stage was open to anyone interested. And there were plenty! As each of them only played two or three songs, there was a great variety in styles. For the last songs, the singer got a mix of rather surprised musicians on stage. Together they performed an amazing interpretation of the classic ‘I Shall be Released’ (video below).

Edvardsen & Sønn   Lørdag på Søndag @ Antikvariatet
Lørdag på Søndag @ Antikvariatet   Lørdag på Søndag @ Antikvariatet
Lørdag på Søndag @ Antikvariatet   Lørdag på Søndag @ Antikvariatet

 

Happy New Year everyone!

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


Red Velvet @ Hoff-Art with “Spring Breakup” and “Susie Asado”

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.

 

[flv width=”600″ height=”370″]http://tim.jagenberg.info/files/2011/12/PTIM8597.mp4[/flv]

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