Actually, I didn't really plan to
see Kula Shaker already in Dusseldorf as I would have seen them
the next day in Hamburg anyway but I just couldn't wait and very
spontaneously decided to go to their Dusseldorf-gig as well!
Typically me, though...
But there was nothing to regret, certainly not, how could there
be something to regret when you go and see Kula Shaker?!
I arrived very early in the afternoon, only the roadies were
already there-and also two dutch fans. After a few minutes Kula
Shaker's tour bus arrived already as well! I didn't know that it
was their bus so I was totally amazed when Crispian came out of
the door suddenly! He greeted me with his lovely smile and went
into the club, I was just too stunned to think of asking him
something! And-oh my god, he was so gorgeous!:) He wore a blue
jeans-shirt and his black and white vest with this yellow badge
on it.
Alonza and Jay also smiled "hello" (I tried not to
laugh about Jay's trousers because they were SO funny!:) Flared
leg and too short... )Then Pauli jumped out of the bus carrying
many things with him (whatever that was!) and then I realized how
stupid I was for not going to them to -at least- ask them to sign
my photos!
But Pauli FORTUNATELY left the club after the soundcheck again
and a few minutes later Crispian and Alonza also came out because
they had an interview to do nearby the club! How happy I was! So
I went to Pauli who stood only a few metres away from me (talking
to a roadie) and asked him to sign one of my photos... He was
lovely and wanted to know my name to write it on the photo though
he thought the picture I had taken of him three months earlier
was "silly"(which is NOT true!!). I also gave him a
picture of him, Crispian and me which he found "very funny
(which it IS, both of them looking like mad men and me smiling
stupidly... :) )He was so enthusiastic about it that he asked me
if he could show it to Crispian and also let it sign by him!
Okay... so Pauli disturbed the T.V.-interview Crispian was doing
to show him the pic!!
After that, I waited besides the place where the interview took place together with a few other fans and Paul came back to us from time to time to have a chat or sign more stuff...he disfigured another pic of mine (the one of me and him) and drew himself a hairy chest because "I always wanted to have a hairy chest', like he said, and black eyes because "I always wanted to have dark eyes. Dark eyes are so beautiful!" 'Then he looked into my eyes and said:"YOu have dark eyes8" Ow,that was so sweet!:) He also drew himself thick eyebrows and explained:"You can turn anyone into Liam Gallagher!"(this part had been filmed by this german T.V~ station and they even showed it the next day! Me and Pauli on the telly...oh dear!
We talked a bit about british cars,
other british bands.. he actually ran from place to place the
whole time, jumping into the camera and finally climbing on a
three metre high stone wall!! Oh my god, I was so afraid that he
would fall down, he was really mad!!
Then Crispian and Alonza finished their interview and came to us
("Hello again!" Dodge said to me :) ) and Crispian
signed all of my pics! That was *S0* nice! He wrote comments on
them(like "zzzz" on a pic where he looked very sleepy,
or "I CAN SEE" where he had his eyes shut...)and it is
just *S0* lovely when he is smiling about the jokes he made!
We also took another photo together
or better to say: Crispian took it because he grabbed my camera
and took it himself (it turned out REALLY good actually it is
also very funny. I gave him an indian badge which I had bought
during my holiday in London at the "Hare
Krishna-festival" and he loved it a lot'. He asked where
exactly I got it and enumerated different places concerning such
festivals in London - and then he decided to put it on his
guitar.' I didn't believe him though, because I couldn't imagine
that he would really do that...
Only when Crispian and I reached the club(we were walking back to
it whereas we were talking) I realized that Alonza had been
walking behind us all the time and he found it really funny that
I was so busy looking at Crispian that I didn't see him at
all...LOL!
A few minutes later the doors opened and it wasn't long until I
would see my very favourite band again! I was so excited, I
already couldn't believe that I met them again and now I was also
meant to see them live again!
I must say I didn't like their support act "Furslide"
much but to be honest, that was also because I just didn't want
to see anything else than Kula Shaker! Furthermore, they had some
technic problems after Furslide so we had to wait even longer...
But THEN they finally appeared with an overwhelming "Hey
Dude" as the first song, it was just ... brilliant!!
UNBELIEVABLE, I never saw anything like that before! It is just
SO breathtaking how Crispian moves, you can't help yourself, you
just HAVE to stare at him!
"Hey Dude" was followed by one of my fave b-sides
"Hurry On Sundown" and then "303" which is
one of my favourites live cos it ROCKS, man!: )What a beginning!!
I can't remember the order of the songs but I remember that they
also played bits of "Narayan"(love it!) in the end of
"Into the deep", which makes it even more adorable, and
after that a lovely "I'm still here". I remember that
Crispian changed his guitar after that and took the blue one with
the peacock on it. He said:"This is a guitar and THIS is a
badge!" and pointed at MY badge, the one I gave him before
the gig!! I couldn't believe it, he had really put it on his
guitar, like he promised! I was SO amazed that I even didn't
really hear what he said after that, but I KNOW that it was
something about that he got it given today!! WOW, he talked about
ME!!! :)
...and then it came to the wonderful "Tattva", just
classic and REALLY magical, what more can I say?! You just can't
express it in words, you just have to enjoy it as much as you
only can. From the new album they of course also played
"Mystical Machine Gun", "Shower your love",
"Spawn of satan" (ROCKIN'! !), "Last
Farewell"(be.autiful!) and "Great Hosannah" which
was definetely one of my highlights, it's just *such* a wonderful
song, especially live! Also, they had "Sound of drums"
as the beginning of the encore - cool!
At one point, Alonza dragged a crew-member on stage because it
was his birthday and they wanted us to sing "Happy
Birthday" to him! Crispian introduced him as "This is
my mother... ", and he was really embarrassed to stand in
front of all those people.. .Funny!
The whole band seemed to be in such a brilliant mood anyway,
Crispian was full of power and sometimes even nearly fell off
stage because he tried to play his guitar with the
loudspeakerboxes(doh!), hanging dangerously unsave at the edge of
the stage. I stopped breathing!
Their last song was of course a song "that comes all the way
from India" -"Govinda"!!It was also totally
amazing of course, but I was actually more sad than happy at that
point because I knew that this would be their very last song... :
( But then, I also knew that I would only have to wait for less
than one day until I would see them again (as I saw them the next
day in Hamburg, too! :) ), so it wasn't that hard for me to leave
this gig...
They really seemed to have enjoyed playing in Dusseldorf a lot
(which was their first gig in Germany during this tour) because
they remained on stage for minutes after "Govinda", to
cheer the crowd up and to thank us again and again. Crispian
"went diving"-he lay down on stage and pretended to
swim and we also got "thumbs up" from him; Pauli and
Alonza threw drumsticks and waterbottles into the crowd whereas
Jay just applauded full of enthusiasm.
A few minutes later they disappeared and left back an absolutely
enthusiastic crowd in the "Tor 3", who was still
impressed by this so magical atmosphere the band had created
during their 80 minutes of performance...
Outside, I again waited for them but this time together with a
lot of other people and I thought that they would surely be
stressed when there are so many fans - but nothing like that!
They signed many things but I somehow missed to get Jay's and
Alonza's autograph again! : ( BUT I manageed to talk a bit to Mr
Mills and I told him how great it is that he really wears my
badge and he thanked me again. We also took another photo
together. The only persons who annoyed me a bit were those
hysteric girls who even told him that he is "S000
cute"!!
Bugger off! He tried to be nice and answered with an
"Awwww!" :) Pauli told us that they'd go straight to
bed when they arrived at the hotel (they went out in Dusseldorf
the day before already) and wished me a "good evening".
So this was my day with Kula Shaker - I must say probably the
best in my whole life!
- Andrea Zachrau -
This was my third gig of Kula
Shaker's current tour and I was still totally excited and
couldn't believe that I was really going to see them again! The
funny thing is, that me and my friend decided and arranged
everything to go to Berlin only the day before!
When we arrived at the club, the mighty Shakers weren't there yet
but they arrived in a little van a few hours later. It was quite
annoying at this club because they (the club, not the Kulas of
course!) had securities at the back doors who wouldn't let us
come close to them but Pauli fortunately already saw us when they
drove past us and came to us as soon as he had left the van! He
had recognised us at once!:)
He looked quite stressed and wasn't in a good mood at all so we
really appreciated it that he came to say hello to us anyway!
Even though he was in a hurry he talked to us for some minutes
and asked us how we got to Berlin. When we told him that we went
about 5 hours by train I had the feeling that he thought we must
be REALLY mad (which is somehow true... :)). He left us for the
soundcheck then. The others went straight into the club so that I
could hardly get a glimpse of them :(
The doors opened at 7 o'clock and this timc I enjoyed Furslide a
bit more and I think especially the singer was also surprised to
see us again! No wonder as this was the third time we saw them
within one week...
Again, Kula Shaker started off with a splendid "Hey
Dude" and I think they had the crowd going right from the
beginning though they were not as enthusiastic as those in
Dusseldorf the week before. I stood right at the front, quite
close to where Crispian's mike was set up and this time the stage
seemed to be much closer than in the other clubs which I, of
course, welcomed!:)It was so funny because there was a girl next
to me who was SO nervous because it was her very first Kula-gig
and she got totally excited when they finally stood (or sat! :))
in front of her! I could understand her so well!
Pauli was in a good mood again but Jay seemed to be a bit tired
and Crispian looked so ill and stressed! I was a bit worried
about him though my friend still believes that he was just high
or something but he looks diœœer~iiL then! After a few
songs he told us that he has voice problems and a "little
chest" and that he hopes that we don't mind that.. of course
we didn't, furthermore you didn't hear anything of that! You
could only see that he didn't feel that good because he didn't
jump around that much but still ROCKED of course!!!
They had quite the same setlist but
this time also played "Timeworm"!!! GREAT! I love that
song so much, it is S000 beautiful and I was so thankful that
they played it this time! So this was definetely my highlight of
this evening but there was also something which I won't forget in
my whole life because it is just *S0* special:)
After "Into the deep", Crispian changed his guitar and
then suddenly looked at me and said: "...so how are
YOU?!" I thought I must be dreaming or something and
couldn't believe that he was indeed talking to ME!! But nobody
else reacted and they all seemed to know that this was only meant
to be directed towards me! He stood there, smiling at me and held
his thumbs up! WOW!! Then I mumbled "great?!" and also
put my thumbs up! :) I still can't believe that this really
happened...S0 he remebered me, too and furthermore this happened
before he played the first song with the blue guitar on which my
badge still was!!:)
I would never have thought that Crispian would talk to ANYONE
during a gig because he just doesn't seem as if he really
realizes who is standing there or not, him being on stage just
seems like a mystical celebration!
Well.. after the little break before
the encore, Pauli came on stage carrying four indian
flower-chains with him (which they got from an indian temple as
it turned out later) and started to hand it out to the crowd. He
gave one of them to me and my friend! The rest of the gig was
pure celebration full of magic and indian feeling, especially
when it came to an rousing "Govinda".
Again, this gig was too soon finished... We hurried a bit to get
outside again because we HAD to meet them for one last time...It
was quite funny, because an indian monk joined us to wait for
them! The first one to be sighted running around near the
backdoor was Crispian and he of course invited the monk to come
in as soon as he got to know about his presence. But he still
didn't forget about us and promised to come back in a few minutes
- which he did! You would expect from ANY other bandmember of a
famous band that he would never apppear again but that's Kula
Shaker!! I really never ever met someone who was nearly as lovely
and nice as they are! Crispian came to me and wanted to say
something BUT THEN this foolish girl next to me asked him if he
could go and ask the others to come out as well (which they would
have done for sure anyway!) and so Crispian went inside
again!!!Grrr! And as it happens, he didn't come back... :(
At least, Jay and Alonza came out
after a few minutes and they were just so sweet! They told us
that they'd fly to Amsterdam that night and Jay promised us to
play "108 battles" at the "Rock am
Ring"-festival when we told him that we plan to go there,
too. Alonza signed my photo and Jay my PP&A-booklet, so I got
their autographs at last, too! Really strange that I didn't
manage to get them earlier as I already had about 10 from
Crispian and 5 from Pauli... he, by the way, somehow didn't
appear at all, Lonz and Jay said something that they would even
leave without him that night.
A few minutes later they had to leave us and their bus rushed to
reach their flight to Amsterdam.. bye, bye, guys...! I'm still
not back on earth when I think of what happened to me during that
week, it was just so great and I will never forget it in my whole
life!
- Andrea Zachrau -