- im O-TON MIT EINEM BERICHT VON DER TOUR IN DEUTSCHLAND


Hello, and welcome to storytime with George. This quarter's story shall be called "I Really Should've Written This a Long Time Ago, Because Now It's Going To Be a Novel-Length Epic Poem, Only Without the Poetry Or Adventure." Think of it as TIME Magazine writes The Odyssey.


(...)

Michael headed for a hotel near the airport, and I drove back home to Ohio, losing that hour yet again on the way. And then . . .


GERMANY.

Christian interprets

Yep, it was time once more to return auf Deutschland. As always, we arrived there exhausted from the through-the-night flights. However, our good friend Christian Utpatel met us with all the sound equipment and plenty of water, and we headed out into the Fatherland. First night, we played the old faithful Uelzen, in the Kulturen Hall. Troy arrived before the concert by train, and we set up and played for a large assemblage of German friends.

Niederwiesan youts

The next night, we returned to play in one of our most-favorite German towns, Niederwiesa. As always, we made the journey up into the bell tower to survey the countryside. A rather large crowd came over and seemed to have as much fun as we did, which is a lot. Afterwards, we were treated to trays of unusual German snacks, and chatted with the youth group. In typical German fashion, we discussed politics and international relations. Quite interesting.

Bartender, a Lost And Found, bitte Weaving shop

The next town allowing us to play was Pforzheim. You wouldn't call it the prettiest town in Germany, but the folks were really wonderful, and treated us to a "LOST AND FOUND," which is a cocktail containing various juices and coconut. Quite good, actually. We stayed in town, and the next day I finally got to visit the town from which my ancestors emigrated. As best we can tell, they would've worked in this weaving factory.


Also while in Laichingen, we visited the local tourist trap called the Tiefenhoele. I guess tourist trap is an apt description, since it's a deep hole in the earth. Just little bit this side of creepy and claustrophobic, if you ask me. But when in Laichingen, do as the Baums do I guess.


The next day, we played another new town called Balhorn. Before the concert, Michael and Troy worked on their game. During the sound check, Michael wondered what the words behind him might mean. Had a really fun concert, and headed back to the Utpatels for food and rest. The next day, we drove to Kassel, in order to set up for a festival called the Christival, which constitutes our first festival outside the U.S. As you can see from these photos, when Christian kept talking about needing to "build up the booth," he wasn't kidding.


Then it was off to a radio interview with Anne, from the special Christival radio station. She decided to interview us outside, and some local youts can be seen peering down from the garage next door.


After the interview, we headed over to the Mainstage to catch the insanely popular opening act, Normal Generation. The best way to describe them is, picture a very early cast of 'N Sync with the Partridge Family choreographing dance moves behind them. Yeah, kind of different than festivals around your neighborhood, eh? Anyway, then we went back to the Utpatels for snacks and sleep until we returned to the Christival to play our first set.


Our initial appearance was on a street corner in the rain. Cool, huh? Turns out, the Germans are much more resilient than most Americans, and didn't seem to mind standing around in the cold rain to watch some American band play some tunes in English. It was a really fun set, and following us was some kind of techno Cheerleading For Jesus routine. I have to say, that was different.


Next up, we participated in something called the Christival Grand Prix. Though we brought our driving gloves just in case, it turned out to be more like Starsearch. There were about seven bands, and each had one of these containers up front. The idea is, after all the bands have finished their five-minute set, the audience comes forward a la Communion, and drops a ping-pong ball in the container for their favorite band. As you can imagine, being the last band would have distinct advantages. So, we went first. Michael brought out our secret weapon in order to boost our numbers. It didn't help. But then we headed out to our next and final Christival appearance, at the Brucken Schlag CafŽ.

Huh? The Brucken Schlag The Utpatels

Though the time was clear to most German folks, we had a bit of trouble figuring out when, exactly, we were supposed to play. Fortunately, Christian is a German man and thus speaks the language. He was able to interpret the sign for us, and we were on time for our set. Our time at the Brucken Schlag was by far our funnest set in Germany. We premiered our new song, Enschultigoong Sie Meine Schlecties Deutsch (i.e. Please Excuse My Bad German). It really is a funny song, to a German speaker, but would not make any sense at all to us English sprechers. So, after that little appearance, it was back to the Utpatels for snacks and sleep, until we headed for the Frankfurt airport.


(...)



Hoping all is well that ends well,


Georg (translation to English: George)