The idea of a daily post in our blog was not only very ambitious it was also very naïve. First of all, I am lazy as f*** and second, there is not much to write about; the times have calmed. While there were escapades and adventures every full hour at the beginning of the tour, we settled by now for a quiet live between tea mugs and heated blankets. Most of the times it is quiet. The only disturbance of the silence if coming from Benni in his wing chair. His knees covered with a stuffy blanket, he is asking for an Austrian Canton with nine letters for his crossword puzzle without expecting an answer. Hendrik is puffing his pipe while staring in the fireplace with glassy eyes. The daily highlight is the evening tea, where we are looking at last month’s photos and indulge in reminiscences. Except Tim, his memory has faded and was washed away by one too many pints, so that he is only sitting in the corner, playing with dough and babbling something about the red power ranger. How did it get so far?
Last week’s center of our attention was county Clare at the west coast of Ireland, Homeland of the Cliffs of Moher. Not far from those, there is a little musician’s sanctuary called “Egan’s”. This pub, in my humble opinion, is the best place on earth.
When I am lying in my death bed, breathing my final breaths, somebody should drag me out of there, fly me to Clare (if I am not already there), place me at Egan’s bar and shove me a pint in my hand. I hereby kindly ask the barkeeper Sean to excuse in advance the inconvenience caused by a dead body. Speaking of Sean: this guy deserves a medal. He knew us for about twenty seconds and already offered us his place to stay at. We happily accepted his offer. And stayed for the whole week. Thanks Sean! His place became the headquarters for our new quest to play at every pub in Lahinch, the surfer’s paradise around the corner. Yes people go surfing at the Irish coast.
Even though Lahinch is just a village, the high Irish pub-per-capita ratio leads to solid three bars in the main street. And we were victorious, all of them can consider themselves as strainfully trained now.
On our thirst for success we headed to Galway to challenge ourselves with a new way of raising the band budget: busking. (Street musicians are a common view there. Which means, that there is also a hard competition for the busiest spots. All you fully amplified chart cover interpreters who defile hundreds of meters of bar street with trash pop, I hope you read this and feel ashamed.) The outcome was mediocre. The weather was unsteady, but the people generous. The local party scene proved to be too distressing for us, our worn out bodies demanded some rest. And we found it. We were invited to Denise’s place in Donegal, five hours to the north. Denise is a superb and passionate fiddle player. After we nearly killed our beloved ride on the narrow path up the hills to her house, we transformed her crib to a roots music-recording studio. Including authentic farmhouse reverb.
We recorded two full days. The fiddle amidst us was magical. We created masterpieces and listened to the recordings over and over again.
And suddenly Denise left. She left a void behind. We were paralyzed, the spirit was gone and we fell in lethargy. So here we are now, still in Denise’s house, watching our bodies decay and our memories fade. Will we ever recover from our loss? Stay tuned!