I went down to Munich last night to see CHVRCHES. It's actually my 2nd time seeing them. They played at the music festival I went to in Singapore and Australia. I watched their set in Singapore, but only saw half of the first song in Australia. Their set overlapped with Daughter, who I planned to see (hardest decision of the day), and they had sound problems at the beginning so ended up starting late. They put on a pretty great show in general, though it was a bit disappointing last night, if I'm being honest. I know they've only got one album (a great album), but they played for 1 hour. 1 hour and 5 minutes, including encore. It was kind of ridiculous. And the crowd was really shitty. Generally German crowds are pretty good, but not last night. Everyone was really quiet, nobody was really dancing or anything. It was really strange. I felt bad for Lauren Mayberry, cause she's adorable and I just want to make her happy. They did have some pretty awesome lighting going on, though.
Anyway, last night's concert is not what I'm here to talk about. Before the concert I went to see my friends the Mangs. I also spent the weekend with them. I know them from Japan. They were living in Iwaki at the same time as me, and before and after as well, but Andreas is originally from Germany, so they've since moved back here and live in Munich with their kids. One of which, Henry, is my best friend. He's 3, but we get along really well. We like to play with Legos. Obviously. Who doesn't? Their daughter Anna didn't used to like me, she always gave me weird looks like she didn't trust me. Now she smiles and lets me hold her without crying, even for extended periods of time. When we're together she does most of the playing, and it's generally focused on my ears and beard, or flicking my bottom lip with her finger.
I spend the weekend with them pretty often. I'd say at least once a month when I'm in Germany I go down to see them, either for the full weekend, or just for an evening or something. And when I go for concerts I generally stop in and have dinner with them first. Our weekends are usually pretty relaxed. We'll go out for a few hours to the park or a museum or whatever, but there's only so much you can do with little kids, and only so long we can be out and about before they start complaining. Which is when we head home to play with Legos again. So generally nothing too eventful, but it's always really nice to go down and hang out with them. It seems like wherever I go I find these families that adopt me, and it feels like I'm just hanging out with my family when I'm down with them for a weekend, which is really nice.
This weekend was pretty eventful, though. In addition to Anna now liking me, we went and saw baby Polar Bears at the Munich Zoo. The weather was supposed to be really shitty all weekend, and for the most part it was, but Saturday morning it was nice, so we managed to go see them. As did like 16,000 other people or something, according to German news. But then, there are 4 month old twin polar bears, so can you blame everyone for going to see them? They were bigger than I expected, like the size of a small/medium sized dog, but their adorableness lived up to all my expectations.
Sunday was when the real fun happened, though. Normally if I go to Munich for the weekend I get a ride with a colleague instead of taking a car on my own. Then he'll drive me back with him on Monday morning, which involved getting up very early. I decided this weekend that I would head back up Sunday night and get a good night's sleep instead of waking up really early on Monday morning, so the Mangs decided they'd drive me up. They'd been meaning to come see Schrobenhausen (which they now tell me is cuter than most tiny German country towns, and better maintained, so that makes me feel better about being here), so this was the perfect chance. And we took the opportunity to go to Schrobenhausen's premiere (and only) tourist attraction: The European Asparagus Museum.
I've been meaning to go, because how could I miss the opportunity to go see something so ridiculous? Schrobenhausen is the asparagus capital of Germany, so it makes sense they'd have it here I guess. The place is, as one would expect, very tiny. But I did learn a lot about asparagus. I knew it was a delicious vegetable, but I did not realize how much people actually loved it historically. In fact, they loved it so much that it was the focus of many works of art, including a couple by Manet. And there are special serving dishes for asparagus. It was also considered impolite to eat asparagus with a fork and knife, so these special finger tong things were designed specifically for eating asparagus. Even Mr. Faberge, of Faberge egg fame, made a special solid-silver, gold-plated set of special asparagus utensils for the Russian Tsar. It's kind of ridiculous how far this love for asparagus used to go, but I do really want a couple pairs of asparagus tongs...
Ok, enough about me. I was debating between a couple of artists to talk about today. I had been thinking I'd do Milagres, which I said last time I might do, and I still intend to do, but instead I'm going to talk about Lo-Fang. You should still go listen to Milagres, though, because this is the second time I've mentioned them and they are great.
Anyway, I found Lo-Fang a few weeks ago, don't remember how. It's weird for me with Lo-Fang, because I really like him, but at the same time I'm kind of torn on him. I love his music, I think it's great, but there's something about it at the same time that just doesn't sound right to me. I think it might be his vocals, which are nice, but maybe they just don't seem to fit? I'm not sure. But none of this has stopped me from listening to his debut album, Blue Film, a lot. And thinking it's good enough that I need to share it with you. Because it is really good. So I don't know what my problem is. But I like him. I promise.
I'd say the closest thing I can think of is maybe Woodkid, but he's much better than Woodkid. There's a lot of great instrumentation on the album, and great use of strings together with synthetic elements which I love. I think it's done in a really unique and tasteful way. His first single, #88, is one of my favorite tracks on the album, and right from the beginning you can hear what I'm talking about.
I love the way he combines the picked strings with whatever that synthetic sort of rippy, stringy thing is supposed to be. I love that thing/sound. And then you get to the beat, and I love it even more. Great percussion and details. I'm a sucker for handclaps, which he uses really subtly. I just love every little detail about this song.
I think my favorite track on the album is Permutations, the closer. I've talked before about how I love a good opening track to an album, and a good closing track is important too. This is a great closing track. The only thing I don't like about it is that it ends a bit abruptly, then the album starts over with Look Away, which is a very different feel from this and doesn't really flow together well. But the song itself is fantastic.
It's also worth nothing that Lo-Fang apparently performed all the instruments on the album, which is pretty impressive to me considering that there seem to be a lot of them. There are a few songs on the album which are a bit weird to me. He does a cover of Boris, by BOY, a band I really like, and I think he does a great cover, but again, there's something weird about it to me. I also think it's weird that he has a cover of You're the One That I Want from Grease. Not what I would expect from this guy. But regardless, the album is great, and the more I listen the more I like it. So you should go listen to more. It seems a bit hard to find some of his stuff online, but it's all on Spotify. Or you can just buy it. It's worth it.
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| Me and my best friend Henry on the first day of Spring |
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| Anna likes me! (even if she doesn't look like it) |
This weekend was pretty eventful, though. In addition to Anna now liking me, we went and saw baby Polar Bears at the Munich Zoo. The weather was supposed to be really shitty all weekend, and for the most part it was, but Saturday morning it was nice, so we managed to go see them. As did like 16,000 other people or something, according to German news. But then, there are 4 month old twin polar bears, so can you blame everyone for going to see them? They were bigger than I expected, like the size of a small/medium sized dog, but their adorableness lived up to all my expectations.
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| Eisbären |
I've been meaning to go, because how could I miss the opportunity to go see something so ridiculous? Schrobenhausen is the asparagus capital of Germany, so it makes sense they'd have it here I guess. The place is, as one would expect, very tiny. But I did learn a lot about asparagus. I knew it was a delicious vegetable, but I did not realize how much people actually loved it historically. In fact, they loved it so much that it was the focus of many works of art, including a couple by Manet. And there are special serving dishes for asparagus. It was also considered impolite to eat asparagus with a fork and knife, so these special finger tong things were designed specifically for eating asparagus. Even Mr. Faberge, of Faberge egg fame, made a special solid-silver, gold-plated set of special asparagus utensils for the Russian Tsar. It's kind of ridiculous how far this love for asparagus used to go, but I do really want a couple pairs of asparagus tongs...
Ok, enough about me. I was debating between a couple of artists to talk about today. I had been thinking I'd do Milagres, which I said last time I might do, and I still intend to do, but instead I'm going to talk about Lo-Fang. You should still go listen to Milagres, though, because this is the second time I've mentioned them and they are great.
Anyway, I found Lo-Fang a few weeks ago, don't remember how. It's weird for me with Lo-Fang, because I really like him, but at the same time I'm kind of torn on him. I love his music, I think it's great, but there's something about it at the same time that just doesn't sound right to me. I think it might be his vocals, which are nice, but maybe they just don't seem to fit? I'm not sure. But none of this has stopped me from listening to his debut album, Blue Film, a lot. And thinking it's good enough that I need to share it with you. Because it is really good. So I don't know what my problem is. But I like him. I promise.
I'd say the closest thing I can think of is maybe Woodkid, but he's much better than Woodkid. There's a lot of great instrumentation on the album, and great use of strings together with synthetic elements which I love. I think it's done in a really unique and tasteful way. His first single, #88, is one of my favorite tracks on the album, and right from the beginning you can hear what I'm talking about.
I love the way he combines the picked strings with whatever that synthetic sort of rippy, stringy thing is supposed to be. I love that thing/sound. And then you get to the beat, and I love it even more. Great percussion and details. I'm a sucker for handclaps, which he uses really subtly. I just love every little detail about this song.
I think my favorite track on the album is Permutations, the closer. I've talked before about how I love a good opening track to an album, and a good closing track is important too. This is a great closing track. The only thing I don't like about it is that it ends a bit abruptly, then the album starts over with Look Away, which is a very different feel from this and doesn't really flow together well. But the song itself is fantastic.
It's also worth nothing that Lo-Fang apparently performed all the instruments on the album, which is pretty impressive to me considering that there seem to be a lot of them. There are a few songs on the album which are a bit weird to me. He does a cover of Boris, by BOY, a band I really like, and I think he does a great cover, but again, there's something weird about it to me. I also think it's weird that he has a cover of You're the One That I Want from Grease. Not what I would expect from this guy. But regardless, the album is great, and the more I listen the more I like it. So you should go listen to more. It seems a bit hard to find some of his stuff online, but it's all on Spotify. Or you can just buy it. It's worth it.
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