Monday, November 19, 2007

Germany looks so much better in black and white
















Things have all gone very European. We are in Germany for a week or so. It means consistency, if nothing else. We will consistently be putting on shows in disused slaughter houses or factories made of solid concrete. We will consistently be fed meals made predominantly of meat (not so bad, actually) and things will be grim. Munich was cold and dark for the most part, even on the inside.















Our friend Renate, who works for the promoter here in Germany has been out with us as well. She looks after us during the German shows and has been riding along with us in the death tube. As an entry fee she always takes along a bag of kinder eggs for the crew. It soothes the savages.















The chocolate is terrible, and sometimes the toys are totally crap, but as they say on the mighty boosh, every once and a while you get a disassembled hoovercraft and life is good.















Berlin, East, Rain. Better in Black and white.
















I was briefly fascinated by the building across the street from the Columbiahalle in Berlin. Rumor has it that the building, which surrounds an airport was briefly Gestapo headquarters and that the site became Hitler's private airport. I'm not sure if much, if any of this is true, but the place was a fortress, to be sure.



























It turns out that the airport (Templehof ) was a big part of the Berlin Airlift, but the building surrounding it, composing what is called Eagle Square, is one of the largest buildings in the world. It was good and foggy on the day, but this picture is pretty amazing.















The whole place was designed to look like a bird in flight.




















Hence all the Eagles.















There is some debate about whether to close the airport or not, which I think this flyer may be alluding to, or maybe not.
























It was nice to be out for a bit. It seems that I have been retreating indoors the colder it gets. I needed a little break from the daily grind of the rock show. When I came back everyone was huddled around a laptop in catering. Italy was playing Scotland in a world cup qualifying match. There are three Scots on our crew at the moment and the Blonde Redhead twins are from Milan, so it made for an interesting time. Actually there was neither harm nor foul (even though Italy won) as everyone watched the game without incident. I told them that Scotland should have kicked a field goal and that none of them knew anything about football.















Blonde Redhead, hard at work.















The last two days I have been in Koln. It is a really cool city with tons of Christmas markets and a chocolate museum. Unfortunately all of these magical things are closed on Sundays. No matter. It gave me some time to rest up in a nice hotel.
















By the time I made it outside the sun was already on it's way down. I walked over to the Dom cathedral, an amazing old, gothic church on the banks of The Rhine. Construction began in 1248, and somehow it survived world war II. They also make a wicked pretzel out front.




























Danger German ingenuity.















Harley does his best to keep things cheerful for the rest of us.
















Until then....












A Lack of Color