I made it!

So, I guess one-blog-a-day doesn't really work for me :D

But anyways... I made it! I flew out of Frankfurt on Friday morning and landed safely in Chicago. On 9/11 :D I didn't realize my flight was on 9/11 when I booked it, it was the cheapest date, like 100$ less than on any other day. But oh well, it really didn't bother me. And the flight was fine, I had a window seat and the seat next to me was empty = A whole lot of space to stretch out. I slept a lot during the flight, I actually slept through both of my meals :D But the guy who sat with me in the row took my food and placed it on the empty seat beside us so that I could eat it right after I woke up :D The food was... hmm yea well :D The first time they had some kind of fish which was really spicy and I didn't eat that. But there were potatoes with it and I ate those. And the second meal they served were sandwiches, so that was fine.
After we landed customs took a really really long time. And there was this man behind me who coughed the whole time we stood in line and never once put his hand in front of his mouth. I kind of tried to move away from him :D Well after customs I picked up my suitcase and met Sally at the Exit. Then we drove home, to their new house which is a little smaller than their old one but still nice, though a lot of stuff is wrong with it and they sued the company who build it and yadda yadda yadda... Then on Friday night we went over to Renee's house and visited her. Her and Justin got married in June and they have a new house too which is also really nice. They also have a yellow lab, Kacie, she is really cute :) BTW, Riley, the dachshund of the Smiths still remembers me! He got all excited when he first saw me :D

Well and yesterday we went to a birthday party at noon, visited Grandma Smith and later went grocery shopping and ate at Taco John's :) My favorite fast-food place on earth!
Sally is at church right now but she should be back soonish and then we will eat lunch and later we thought of going to the theater to watch a movie. But we don't know yet.

I don't have any pictures to put up yet but I'm sure I will have some soon!

OOOOOH and something else happened I'm really excited about!!
Tegan and Sara released new info on their books!! They are going to be called "ON, IN, AT" and will be available for pre-sale together with Sainthood on Sept. 28th!! I am definitely going to buy this package!! Books + Sainthood! :) YAY

Packing

So, I spent the whole day packing today and got my US dollars from the bank! I hope I didn't forget anything.
I used the Shaun Huberts way from Tegan and Sara's Trailer Talk to pack my suitcase, it's pretty awesome and saves a lot of space!

I'm leaving here at 4:45am to drive to Frankfurt and my flight takes off at 8:50am.
The flight takes 9hrs and I arrive at 10:50am in Chicago, the time difference is 7 hours.

I'm tired :D But I'm not going to sleep now, I hope I can sleep during the flight. Maybe I'll take a nap... NO, I won't wake up if I do :D Oh well...

The Return of the Sarah

Ok, I'm officially one of the worst blogger ever. BUT, there hasn't really been THAT much going on anyways haha... Tegan and Sara released the album artwork and track listing for SAINTHOOD, their 6th studio release and my most anticipated album this year, coming out on Oct. 27th and they just recently confirmed their tour dates for this fall. Count me in for AT LEAST the Cologne date! On a different but kind of similar note, I'm going on a vacation! YAY! I'm flying out of Frankfurt on Friday morning to Chicago where I'm going to meet up with my host mom Sally, who I stayed with in 2006 and 2007 during my exchange year. Pretty much one of the best years of my life! And I love my family there, they are so amazing. So I'm going to be visiting them and staying there for little over a week until the 23rd Sept. when I will fly from Chicago to......... Victoria, BC, Canada :D Now you might wonder, what I am doing there! Or maybe not if you know the Tegan and Sara tour schedule by heart. They are playing at Rifflandia on the 25th! With An Horse! DREAM!! AND I'M GOING!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!

Well, hence this reawakening of my blog. I'm going to try to blog everyday of my vacation, if possible with pictures.

Tomorrow, I shall return! Until then, farewell and may the force be with you!

SSPU on Letterman

I know I should post more. I have lots of stuff to talk about, just can't find the time to blog about it. This though, I have to plug.

The Silversun Pickups played Letterman yesterday with a shortened version of Panic Switch. They had to cut the song down to 3:30min because of TV airtime. It's still a great performance but Nikki looked really nervous! The end is funny too... Anyways, here you go:

IMPORTANT! New Tegan and Sara album title

The new Tegan and Sara album supposed to come out in October is called: "Sainthood"


Thanks to Kurt of .ca for the video.

Bruce Springsteen, Silversun Pickups, Radio, 3Way

Credit: t-klick

As an early birthday gift I got a ticket to see the Boss at the Commerzbank-Arena in Frankfurt on July 3rd. It was a fantastic concert, he played for almost 3 hours! An unforgettable night with an all ages crowd. I literally mean ALL ages. You could find gramps and grans, their adult children who then brought along their children. It was amazing seeing a merely 5 yr old boy sing the chorus of "Waitin' On A Sunny Day" (check out this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pfuAgVdsgE)

//

In other news, the Silversun Pickups
played a fantastic MTV Unplugged session a few weeks ago.

Silversun Pickups - New Music - More Music Videos

They played 6 songs and you can watch the full session here: SSPU MTV Unplugged
If you want this session on your iPod just like I did, you can download it here: http://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/msrtxt
Thanks to Kurt of .ca for that!

I also want to give a shout out to @JanayS (Rainbow Report), who introduced me to the radio station 89x which plays just the best of the best.

BTW, all you frequent AfterEllen readers know about the webseries "3Way". If you don't, you should check it out, it's hilarious. I hope it comes back soon but in the meantime they posted a full episode of "LadyCops"!

Ice Age 3

Ice Age 3 hits the theaters today! One advantage of working at a cinema is you get to see some movies before everyone else does. So after work yesterday some colleagues and I sat down to watch Ice Age 3.

I thought it was pretty cool and funny. The dinobabys were just too cute!
Some parts of the movie kinda reminded me of a movie from my childhood "The Land Before Time" with all the dinos and the "great valley"...

What really brings me back to watch Ice Age again is the little squirrel Scrat. Every time he jumps into the picture I laugh my ass off. The Scrat scenes are the best part of each of the Ice Age movies in my opinion and he did not disappoint in this new one. I just love that little fella.

Exams over / New Alexisonfire Album

I am finally done with my exams and can finally wrap my mind around other things than school. Not only am I done with exams but I'm also done with school, we got our last grades today, tomorrow we have our final rehearsal for our formal dance on Saturday and also preparing our senior prank for Wednesday. It's weird for me because I graduated once before two years ago... But that was a different country, different school system, different people, different everything. Anyways, I'm glad I'm done with this part of my life and happy to start this new chapter.

Music now.

NEW ALEXISONFIRE ALBUM!!


"Old Crows / Young Cardinals" is the title of the new Alexisonfire album which is going to hit shelves on June 23rd in North America and June 19th in Europe.
But you can already stream the full album on the labels page here:

http://webwheel.dinealonerecords.com/oldcrowsyoungcardinals/

I have listened to it once now and from what I can tell the album is going to become a new favorite of mine. Their sound has evolved over their past albums and the outcome pleases me. I'm going to pick up a hard copy asap.

So for now just check out their MySpace and follow them on their NEW official Twitter!

And check out the video to "Young Cardinals", the song I've been obsessing about for a month.

Pearl emerges...

New Bat For Lashes music video for Pearl's Dream!!
Watch it now!

Bat For Lashes - "Pearl's Dream"

Matt and Kim @ Werkstatt, Köln

So last Saturday Matt & Kim played at the Werkstatt in Cologne.


If you don't know who Matt & Kim are I strongly suggest you go and check them out right now. They are the incarnation of happiness. Watch their amazing video to Yea Yeah, the liberating video to Lesson Learned and the hit Daylight which is featured in a Bacardi commercial!!

They have released two albums, the self titled 'Matt & Kim' and their newest release 'Grand'.


It was my first time seeing them live and it was really amazing. They were supposed to hit the stage at 0:30am, which turned into 0:50am and they played for half an hour. Even though their set was so short (I think it was because of the time line of the club) it was still packed with lots of energy and it was a hell lot of fun. I was standing front and center with the other fans that actually knew them and were able to sing along.
The set list contained songs from both their albums. I can't remember all of the songs but they did play Cutdown, Good Ol' Fashion Nightmare, Cinders, It's A Fact, Yea Yeah, Silver Tiles and the last song was Daylight.

picture by Michael Mitulla

At the end of the half hour show the club was boiling hot and Matt, Kim and the crowd, me included, were dripping sweat. And I mean literally dripping, Matt in particular. Proof:

picture by Michael Mitulla

They left the stage and went right into the audience to talk to people. I got to talk to both of them for a while, told them I follow them on twitter and asked Kim if she got to visit any museums (she had said in a blog she wanted to go to as many museums as possible while in Europe) and she told me she was really bummed because she didn't go to any museums at all because they had been so busy with traveling, setting up and sound checking etc. We agreed that they had to come back to Germany, not just to play shows but to check out some museums too :D They both were really really nice and they signed my CD.


It probably was one of my favorite concerts this year. It was just so amazing, energetic and fun.
If you read reviews about Matt & Kim they almost every time write that Kim is always smiling while drumming. I can confirm this. Her smile is so contagious that it puts you in a good mood just from watching. It doesn't hurt that she is a total cutie too.


Both of them are extremely good looking. Man crush Matt:


They are probably the cutest and most amazing couple in the music industry.



They have 5 songs up for free (including Daylight and Yea Yeah) on their website.
Check them out on MySpace
and on Twitter.

Bat For Lashes @ Kulturkirche, Köln

I went to see Bat For Lashes play last night at the Kulturkirche in Cologne. The show was fantastic and I thought the location was pretty great too. It's a small, old church and the sound was pretty cool.

The show started with opener Marybell Katastrophy, the solo project from Marie Holjund of the Tiger Tunes.

I think they did ok but it was not my cup of tea. I did enjoy the performance though.

When MK finished, the stage was cleared and set up for B4L. Self decorated with angel figures with colorful shining wings, candles, chains of lights, a funny looking lamp and other weird stuff you could find at a garage sale, gave the stage an intimate and dreamy atmosphere.
Bat For Lashes a.k.a. Natasha Khan with live band Ben Christophers, Charlotte Hatherley and Sarah Jones entered the stage and started the show with "Glass" and "Sleep Alone", the first two tracks of B4L new album "Two Suns".
For the next song "Horse and I" live band member Charlotte Hatherley joined Natasha on the keyboard and playing other various instruments. I was able to capture a pretty decent video of this fantastic moment.

I'm still wondering what kind of an instrument it was that Charlotte used at 1:15.
The band used a lot of interesting instruments and especially Charlotte and Ben switched a lot between songs. But Natasha did too, when she wasn't singing and dancing she played the keyboard, auto harp and guitar, as well as tambourine and bells.
The music was great, the band knew what they were doing and it sounded amazing. Especially the great drumming of Sarah Jones stood out as well as her joined background vocals with the amazing Charlotte Hatherley.
But the best aspect of the show was definitely Natasha Khan's amazingly beautiful voice. Her vocal range is fantastic and she did not miss a tune.

picture by subtle_sarcasm

After finishing their main set they came out for two more encores. The first song of the encore was a stripped down version of "Prescilla" with Natasha alone on stage singing and playing auto harp. "Good Love", "Moon & Moon" and "Two Planets" completed the encore.
When they came out a second time the whole crowd was excited because they hadn't played their big hit "Daniel" yet. And that's what came. A powerful "Daniel" was the end of the ~70min set and Natasha and band left the stage waving and smiling.
I managed to get a set list and we waited outside for a while but they didn't come out, Natasha had said earlier that her mother was in attendance, so we figured they were busy and left.


It was a really fantastic concert and hearing Natasha sing her songs live added another dimension to it. I highly recommend her latest album "Two Suns" and to see her live if you get the chance.
Here she is with "Daniel" on Letterman:

LeftRightLeftRightLeft

Ever since I've heard "Yellow" for the first time I've been a Coldplay fan. Not a massive one but I enjoy and like their music. "Clocks" is still one of my all time favorite songs. As a late Christmas gift I got a ticket to one of their upcoming shows and I'm pretty stoked to see them play live.
Speaking of live... As a thank you to their fans they released the live album "LeftRightLeftRightLeft" as a free download this Friday on their official website. If you haven't yet, you should download it, it's really great and well... free!
Download it here: http://www.coldplay.com/lrlrl/lr.html

And you wanna camp out and I wanna fuck around

One of my favorite new bands is An Horse. Kate Cooper on guitar and vocals and Damon Cox on drums and vocals. They are from Australia and play great indie rock/pop with heartfelt lyrics. They released their full length album "Rearrange Beds" in early 2009 and it has become one of my all time favorite albums. I got introduced to them through Tegan and Sara, they toured with them last year in the U.S. and Australia and Sara Quin helped them with the recording of "Rearrange Beds" and doing A&R work.

They recently filmed a video for their song "Camp Out". It was shot in Vancouver, B.C. and directed by Angela Kendall.



The two are on tour right now playing some dates in Canada and the States and are coming over to Europe, England particularly, the end of June and July. For more info check their MySpace! Add them on Twitter too.

Here they are performing "Camp Out" on Letterman!

I celebrate the first

Just as Tegan and Sara are singing in their song "The First":

You'll have, you'll have to excuse me
Please please, please excuse me
You'll have, you'll have to excuse me
This will be my first time

This is my first blog post with many to come I hope. I'm not sure what I'll be talking about but usually I always have something to say. A lot of posts will probably be about music news, new music I discovered or old music I rediscovered. I'll see how it goes as I post more.

The name of this blog derives from the Incubus song "Wish You Were Here".

The world's a roller coaster and I am not strapped in.
Maybe I should hold with care, but my hands are busy in the air.

I love this song and this line in particular.

So, that's it for now. Take care.