It all started with the promo work for my new CD (available online worldwide on June 17th, in case you forgot). I’m doing everything guerilla-style, but it hit me that the way in which I did my promo activities were the same every single day. I wake up, do breakfast, turn on my computer, check all my sites in a certain order, etc. Every activity has it’s  order, but that everything was identical in the execution freaked me out a little.

It then hit me that exactly one year ago this week, I started production on my new CD. Although the work that was done was different then today (recording versus promotion), the methodology was exactly the same (insert “Twilight Zone” music here). 

After completing my promo tasks for the day I decided to call my long time friend Felix to ask his advice about a certain business situation I currently have. We then started talking about the general state of the music business, specifically how in America the trend is the “Eurodance” sound that was big in the early 90′s. Felix was one of the most successful Eurodance producers of the time, and so it was with a great dose of sarcasm and irony that we both noted how for years German producers have copied the sounds and styles coming out of the US, and now the Americans are copying the styles from the Germans.

After that somewhat spooky revelation, I decided to treat myself to a movie to get my mind off of work “Hangover 2″. Sick movie. The good thing about the movie was, it was truly hilarious, although a little gross in some places. What struck me in a more negative way was how similar it was to the first film. In fact, in terms of the plot line, it was exactly the same as “Hangover 1″. Déjà vu all over again.

Is the feeling of déjà vu a “glitch in the system” (a term coined in the movie “The Matrix”), or a lack of attention to detail? Sometimes I’m not so sure if there’s a big difference between the two.

Gig 1: May 20 – Session Werk, Walldorf

I’ve performed in many, many venues in Germany over the last 15 years or so; from bars, clubs and restaurants, to city and village festivals, to huge open-air concerts with thousands of people. From seaside hangouts to ski resorts in the Alps, I’ve played almost everywhere, especially in Baden-Württemberg (where I live), which makes it hard to believe that there are quite a few venues that I have never performed in. One such place was the bar belonging to the well-known music store Session Music, located in Walldorf, near Heidelberg. I’d been asked to perform there with the house band off and on for five years, but I never had time until recently, when friend and colleague Stefan Breuer asked me to perform there with his band. The emcee of the the night was another colleague, a singer named Gonzo. I knew most of the musicians in the house band from other bands that I’d performed with, but this was the first time I played with this particular formation, and we had no time to rehearse together, which made me a little nervous. The interesting thing to me was how full the club was (it’s a huge venue), despite being hot outside, a holiday and the UEFA Cup Finals being on TV.

Gig 2: May 21 – King Kamehameha Club, Frankfurt am Main

My spot. I LOVE this club, Especially in the summer. It was packed (as usual), and this particular night there were three front singers, which is rare. Considering that it was also very warm outside on this evening (even at eleven o’clock) and there are four other clubs on the same street as the KingKa, having so many people on that night was truly amazing. Again, it’s a testament to the hard work we put into making Thursday night a success.

Gig 3: May 22 – Restaurant Nizza, Frankfurt am Main

Change of pace (or so I thought): A wedding reception in a fancy restaurant on the banks of the Main River. A rather small gathering, only about 50 to 60 guests, all extremely stylish, with the ladies in their gowns and the men in either suits or tuxedos. What they lacked in comfort, however, they more than made up for in endurance, partying well into the early morning, way after we had finished our show (the father of the bride was particularly amusing). Even at 3:00 AM, the weather was still warm enough to engage in various outdoor activities.

Gig 4: May 23 – City Festival, Bad Homburg

My favorite gig of my little tour; a duo gig in one of the town squares of Bad Homburg, just me on vocals and my colleague Jan Stürmer on acoustic guitar. Very relaxed yet very challenging; our job was to entertain a large group of spectators (up to a thousand people at any given time) over a three hour time span using just our voices and a single instrument. That is music-making in it’s purest form, and we were successful in our mission.

Gig 5: May 24 – Radio RPR1 Family Festival, Bingen

After having performed four days in a row, I was exhausted. The last thing my body needed was to perform outside on the hottest day of the year. Being the soldier that I am, however, that’s exactly what I did. My final show of the week was in Bingen, a city on the banks of the Rhine River. It was 33° Celsius (91° Fahrenheit) outside, which is very hot by german standards. The bad part: we had to perform four sets during the day, starting at 1:30 in the afternoon. The festival was not very well attended, perhaps due to the extreme heat.

Summer Madness

What all five shows had in common was the effect the excellent weather had on people’s ability to enjoy themselves. Sunshine and warm temperatures are known to activate feelings of happiness and pleasure in humans; it’s no coincidence that more alcohol is sold, more concerts are attended, and more relationships are either begun or made permanent through marriage in the warm-weather months than the cold-weather months.

Unfortunately, it also tends to deactivate our sense of fashion, especially color coordination, in many cases. In that respect, summer-like weather also deactivates our sense of shame, which can be a blessing or a curse, depending on your point of view. I’ve been witness to people dressing in ways I’ve only laughed about on really bad sketch comedy shows or soft porn movies on cable TV. Simply AMAZING.

So, what have I learned from my latest road trip?

1. NEVER book a hotel room in a big city on the side of the building facing the street.

2. If you’re confident in your abilities, it doesn’t matter if new to a situation or not.

3. The warmer it is outside, the more willing people are to make total fools of themselves.

4. The passage of time is relative when you’re in good spirits.

5. Just because it’s warm outside doesn’t mean that the party’s dead inside.

6. Take time to appreciate not only what you do, but where you do it.

7. Sandals and socks are NOT CUTE.

8. Big t-shirts and sport leggings are WORSE.

9. If you’re going to wear a sleeveless top and sport leggings, at least be in shape.

10. Just when you think you’ve done it all, you quickly realize that you haven’t.

Judging by what I’ve experienced on this latest road trip, it’s going to be a very interesting summer indeed.

Thankfully, my gigs on Thursday and Friday were a blast. The gig in the KingKa (our nickname for the King Kamehameha Club) was awesome as usual, especially considering that the club has been packed on Thursday night every week for the past 8 years; we worked hard to gain such a following, and it’s paying dividends; Thursday is the busiest night of the week for the club thanks to the band, and many of the higher paying gigs I perform all over Germany are a direct result of my appearances at the KingKa.

Friday I played at the Essen Convention Center (known in german as the “Messe”) for an event sponsored by the German Federation of Fitness Studios, known as the DSSV (Deutsche Sportstudio Verband), I was hired as the guest singer for the Freddy Wonder Combo, one of the busiest show bands in south Germany, with whom I performed last year in Wuppertal, together with a 40-piece orchestra. Of course I was stressed out, being that I had only performed once before with this band and we didn’t rehearse, but one of the advantages of playing within multiple pro musician circles is that we all end up having the same repertoire, thus making it easier to perform concerts without having to practice.

This band knows how to get a party going, so performing with them was a lot of fun, and ultimately less stressful for me. Especially entertaining was watching the bandleader Freddy drink beer out of the female lead singer’s shoe. The corniest thing I’ve seen on stage this year so far, and the crowd went crazy for it. I even saw a few people in the audience that I met years ago at other shows in other parts of the country, which is always a highlight for me in my travels. Of course there were very good looking people in the audience, but given that the majority of the crowd either worked at or owned fitness studios, it was hardly a surprise. Tight pants everywhere.

After the two very successful gigs, I arrived at the hotel and got what I had been longing for since the beginning of my gig blitz: a good night’s sleep.

So, what did I learn from the last two gigs?

1. I like trains a lot more than I thought I did.

2. I have a new appreciation for the phrase, “if you build it, they will come.”

3. Even in bad economic times, (most) people still just want to have a good time.

4. Nothing is more satisfying than watching total strangers dancing together on top of bars and tables Coyote Ugly style.

5. Half shirts or tops that show off the midsection should be banned for some people.

6. People who can dance love to show off that they can dance.

7. People who can’t dance love to show off that they can’t dance.

8. Guys with huge muscles don’t look as cool as I thought they did when I was younger.

9. Women with huge muscles (unfortunately) look even worse.

10. I really need to visit Spain more often.

11. Sleep is the most unappreciated human necessity. EVER.

Believe me, as an independent musician/songwriter/producer, I have absolutely no love for the tactics of the major labels and film studios, the RIAA or the MPAA regarding piracy; I’ve always believed that Apple’s approach to the piracy issue -offering good value for money, thus making the urge to pirate content less great- is the right approach. However, I have even less tolerance for people who believe in their hearts that using sites such as TPB or P2P networks to STEAL content is OK, because it’s not. People who create such IP invest a lot of time, energy and money into their craft and deserve to get paid for it, regardless of whether or not the content gets to the end user via major labels, big movie studios, or large software houses.

Those who use sites like TPB believing that by doing so they are “sticking it to ‘The Man’” don’t realize that in the end it’s the thousands of content creators who end up getting screwed. Granted, there are a few content creators who use such networks to promote their content, but the vast majority of content creators who do control their own copyrights are more affected by piracy than most piracy advocates seem to think.

Perhaps this “intellectual property should be free” mentality stems from the age-old notion that creating something of artistic or entertainment value doesn’t constitute having a “real job”. Creating intellectual property is a job just like any other, and people who create such content deserve to get paid for it. Not everyone can be a stockbroker, a scientist, or even work at McDonald’s; if everyone could be an artist or programmer, then everyone probably would be, since (at least in my experience) most human beings would like to enjoy the job that they do, and I really enjoy my job. It is this context that I’m happy that the Pirate Bay guys were found guilty.

The problem is that nowadays, in the case of intellectual property, people want everything for free; cheap can only compete with free to a certain point. As phenomenal as Apple’s iTunes Store’s sales have been so far, they’re still being dwarfed by piracy via file sharing. Even if songs, movies and software were being sold at a quarter of the prices they’re going for currently, the majority would still steal, because most folks have been conditioned to think that piracy is perfectly fine.

The fact of the matter is: theft is theft, and the guys from The Pirate Bay got what they deserved, in my opinion.

Read the full article HERE.