The Monsters - Zupfiklatschi Tour 2004

Thursday, 21.10. Berne (CH) - Paris (F)
Guess we are getting old. The tourbus was pure luxury: 9 seats accommodating 5 lads, GPS (aka Lisi), CD Player and a turbodiesel engine coming from BenzTown. Nice! The drive to Paris took ages and was very expensive as we been using the french motorway.
Last, but not least we arrived in Paris. The "La Java Club" is located in the 20th arrondissement and is actually serving as a 50-ies style tango club. Upon entering you feel as being in Algeria, with all these pipe smoking youngsters in the entry hall. Our support band were the "Four Slicks". This first gig of the tour didn't go down as one of the best, as the FuzzFX and the PA weren't up to scratch. Simple disco equipment with the mixing desk behind the drums, and no subwoofers, plus a noise limiter... (aargh!!)

Friday, 22.10. Paris (F) - Utrecht (NL)
From charming Paris straight into the Belgium traffic nightmare. Well, getting through the cities of Brussels and Antwerp on a friday afternoon, we should've known better. But, we made it and arrived at the DB's. Very nice place and this is where we played the first time with the "Double Agents" from Australia, and also met Markus - their tourmanager - again.
The gig was a treat as we had to play three encores. But it soon dawned on us that we would again not have enough merchandise with us. Spent the rest of the night at the bar, where the dutch version of Rick Rubin was pampering us with the dutch version of Jägermeister - cheers! No problem finding enough room to crash out, as we had 2000 square meters for ourselves.

Saturday, 23.10. Utrecht (NL) - Amsterdam (NL)
A short drive of only 25 miles. So we took to the opportunity to visit Claudia on the way.
The venue was located between canals in an old locktower. The club itself was in the basement, 70feet above, on the top floor, the owners had their appartement - wow! One of the best PA's we ever played on; two speaker cabinets from the 60-ies and three bulbs from ancient times. But that didn't stop us from having a rocking show. Blood, sweat and tears to say the least, and the audience was going mental - thank you so much.
Spent the night in a bungalow on a nearby camping site!! Only problem was the check-out time... 10:00am... ha, no worries, we only went to bed at 06:30am...

Sunday, 24.10. Amsterdam (NL) - Groningen (NL)
Got up at 10 and went to the venue to get our equipment, but there is the DJ coming out of the club and Ryan is still jamming... So we opted for some breakfast in the red light district and sightseeing around the Dam.
Upon arrival in Groningen, we couldn't believe what we saw; the venue was in an abandoned roman catholic hospital occupied by around 250 people. Our shelter for the night was in a chapel - BeatMan sleeping on the altar, Amen!
After enjoying the delicious food, even the Aussies found their way to Groningen - wonder what they did in Amsterdam? The gig was fast and loud as we enjoyed our new found friends from last night.

Monday, 25.10. Groningen (NL) - Hamburg (D)
So long Holland - Guten Tag Germany. Venue: Hafenklang, next door from the famous Fish-Market.
"Motorama" from Italy were supporting us. Two full-on-rocking-italian-chicks, drums and guitar! Go see them! (note from the editor: not really sure, if it's meant as to go LOOK at them...)
Sold out gig on a Monday night! Great! We had a lot of fun playing. After the concert we went to a "AfterShowParty"!!!! In a club called Komet ( there you go, you don't have to be called Madonna to do that!) Once there, we met BBQ (excellent One-Man-Band) and the drummer of our brazilian friends "Thee Butchers Orchestra". What exactly he was doing in Hamburg he couldn't recall tho'... A whole lot of "Saurer" and Pumi was treated with "Laphroaig"! Big props to everyone for this great night... especially Jan and our own Jan for working the bar.

Tuesday, 26.10. Hamburg (D) - Berlin (D)
Just what we needed after that night. Cold water showers! Enjoyed this in the "Hotel Kogel" where we also enjoyed Timo's dog doing the HelsinkiTrick - nice one!!
Berlin - Wienerstrasse - Wild At Hart: Another night with the "Double Agents"! Brilliant food!! The gig was hell-ish: 240 people, 50°celsius (note from the editor: yeah, right! ) , and no oxygen on stage. Which looked great thanks to Dirk's roses. Superb athmosphere and the definite proof there wasn't enough merchandise... on our way to the hotel with the usual kebab stop, the Australians decided to keep partying. Markus came with us, as he had to fix the flat tyre on their tourbus in the morning, this being the 3rd bus in two weeks...

Wednesday, 27.10. Berlin (D) - Dresden (DDR)
Hi Falk, good to see you again! We played in a club named ?Scheune", a really wicked place. 200 folks turned up to see us and "Tittenbonus" play. The highlight of the night was some fireworks provided by a fan - we are thinking about including this in our shows, but then again we are not StadiaRockers (note from the editor: not YET!) A whole lotta party after the gig with Falk, Zombie and the "Dresdener Musik-Mafia" until the club management showed us politely where our beds for the night were...

Thursday, 28.10. Dresden (DDR) - Chemnitz (DDR)
Breakfast with Falk in the "Rammstein-Cafe", aaarghh. Ah well, the internet was free tho'..
A quick journey to Karl-Marx-Stadt, where we had to go to Marx's monument to take some band pictures.
The venue: "Atomino" - small but cool - as was the food. Unfortunately no support act. So we had to get the audience ready ourselves. But this was no problem including some dance lessons from the BeatMan. We had loads of fun.
Ha, this was the works! This is touring! Spent the night in 5-Star-Hotel, really good! Falk came to the interview and even had Jan's jacket with him, which got left behind two years ago...

Friday, 29.10. Chemnitz (DDR) - München (D)
This was rather unusual. Two hours early at the "Monofaktur" where they still had the piano player rehearsing... sightseeing before soundcheck! That was done at only half the volume, as the inhouse technician would have pissed himself with fear... We had dinner in a typical beer cellar eating "Haxen". Back at the club - sold out, again -   "The Amoks" were opening, "Double Agents" were up next and then it was "The Monsters" at their finest. The stage was set in the middle of the room, so it wasn't just BeatMan and Janosh at the forefront, for once Tibu and Jan were able to be in contact with the audience...afterwards people were storming the merch stand ripping stuff out of each others hands! This was also our last gig with our friends from DownUnder - Jägermeister was for free and the rest is nobody's business!

Saturday, 30.10. München (D) - Frankfurt (D)
Rumour has it that there are people thinking they saw some really fucked up musicians lurking the streets in Munich's midday sun despite some Weisswurst...
The O25 Club in Frankfurt was brilliant, and despite the early showtime there were about 140 people there - not bad for a last minute gig! The band was rather tired (see Munich) but was just about able to play the encores the audience demanded (note from the editor: that's rock'n'roll for ye!) . After that, it was the "Karaokemonsters" and some stunned locals who imagined tour life a bit differently (note from the editor: it's all a myth, baby...)

Sunday, 31.10. Frankfurt (D) - Speyer (D) - Stuttgart (D)
Speyer? Sure! We take the opportunity to visit the Dickau`s. Thanks alot for tea and cookies!
Stuttgart, Landespavillion, Halloween, it`s good to be there. Pumi fucked up the bass monitor while doing the soundcheck, sorry! Robin and Anja had a full plate on their hands, as the gig was sold out (again!) "The Masons" were opening the night and got the audience steaming - nice one to take over. Had a blast despite some twats trying to ruin the party with their aggressive behaviour - remember, we are a dance band! Big props go out to Angie and Andy for the ever returning food and board offer. Thanx!

Big hug and thanks to Mark Born Bad, The Four Slicks, Jeroen, The Double Agents, Markus, Björn, Claudia, Ramses, Jan (Hamburg), Komet, BBQ, Lea, Uli (Berlin), Falk, Tittenbonus, Motorama, Jan (Chemnitz), Falko, Ayhan, Uli (FFM), Andy, Mark Slowboat, Family Dickau, Robin, Jens and everybody we met!

I wanna see real pics. Shitty posters!
I liked it soooo much! I might as well read the tourreport from south- and northamerica!