The Fourth Day

The ride to Leipzig was pretty nice. Along the way, we picked up a hitch-hiker named Christian. He was an 18-year-old student from Hamburg on a weekend jaunt to nowhere in particular. His English was bad, and I started to realize that 3 weeks of sporadic German CD-ROM perusing wasn't enough.We verbally limped along, he was nice, it was fun.

Leipzig is the second largest city in Eastern Germany (after Berlin), so there's alot of vitality and culture. There's a wide mixture of architectural styles, reflecting the various cultures that have evolved over the last several hunderd years, with a heavy communist-bloc era overtone. You can walk down a single street and see examples of each style on the same block.
Right acros the street from these 19th century buildings are abandonded Communist-era factories, offices and shelters. You can just make out the sillhouettes (sp?) of (from right) Jerry, Noli, Stosh and Travis on the far left.
The poster on the right is promoting my good friends Dem Brooklyn Bums who had been here 2 weeks prior. The posters on the left is for us. Dem Bums own the rehearsal studio 4 blocks from my apartment back home that I practice in all the time. The next night, we stayed in the same hostel they did.

We played our show at a squat, which is an abandoned building or area that is takn over by local teens and young adults. This place, called the LiWi club, used to be a fallout shelter built in the 1950's. The buildings are falling apart since the government has ignored them for so long. And since they have that cold, spare style of Communist East Germany, their decrepitude makes the buildings look like they've been thru a nuclear holocaust. The kids are trying to rebuild life here once again, and make sure the culture that evolves won't permit the kind of oppression or inhumanity that built these structures. Their spirit is reflected in what they do inside the buildings, as well as some intense murals and graffiiti outside.

We were playing with a punk band that night, and my ideas of punk were always of Sid Vicious and violence and anarchy and heroin. There was not any of this self-destructive or devisive spirit among the people we met. Rastas (called "Krusties"), hippies, skinheads and punks all hung out together. This club hosts swing bands, ska bands, punk, metal. But no techno.
Travis, you're so hot. You rock, dude.
Even after spending every waking and sleeping moment together, we still have something to talk about.

Alot of the people that were there that night, as well as all the pople that worked there, live in the other abandoned buildings conjoined on this street. They made dinner for the 2 bands (tofu, potato pancakes, cucumbers), which was actually quite good, gave us free beer. We played a good show that night, a few big mistakes, but really good energy, and the crowd seemed into it.

We hung out for a long time afterwards, and crashed at the samllest, cheapest hotel I've ever seen. For about $20 a night, we got a double room that had the toilet in the shower. There was no toilet seat, but there was a squegee. I'll let you figure that out.
This is part of the entrance way at the Liwi club. The oustide is falling apart, but the squatters are doing their best to make it the way they want it.
More of the same corridor.
This is the opposite wall from the first picture. The saying means "art is a waffle". Uh, OK.

The tour is still really up in the air, and we found out the next morning (Monday) that we suddenly have two, maybe three days off. We're going to spend Monday in Leipzig, and take Jerry out for his birthday. Tomorrow, we'll spend the night in Berlin, then I don't know what's happening. Noli and Freddie are really working hard to fill up these empty gigs, so we'll see what happens.

Feel free to e-mail either me or the rest of the band at shambo_p@yahoo.com. We'd love to hear from you.

Best,
Shambo