the cold takes hold...

by Pete

Saturday December 9 2006

I guess that it was only a matter of time until the fifth plague arrived, but I don’t think that any of us expected to emerge with quite such a vengeance. We have both been under the weather for a couple of weeks now with what seemed like relatively stock standard head colds. I came down with it a couple of days before Karl and am more or less on the mend now, but he just wasn’t getting any better so finally went to the doctor yesterday. Apparently after some thorough testing using some shiny and intrusive equipment she was sufficiently unimpressed with his situation to enforce a night’s rest. And after my experience with pneumonia while on tour a few years back, we aren’t up for taking any chances with such things. The problem, or should I say problems, with being sick on tour is that you never really stop moving. The groundhog day of van> soundcheck> dinner> show> accommodation> van> etc> never actually stops. Apart from the fact that you then need to perform every night - which naturally drains its fair share of energy - the real killer for in my mind has always been loading the van at the end of the night. Consider that we usually need to take 15 – 25 separate items, whether they be instruments or boxes of merchandise, into the venue each night, and most of them are heavy, and most venues seem to have a multitude of stairs. Anyway, the result is that you are invariably drenched with sweat at the end of the night right before the cold van ride to wherever you happen to be sleeping, and when you are sick that is a recipe for disaster.
So for only the second time in our 10 years we had to cancel a show due to sickness. Our previous shows in Innsbruck have always been great, and the people there always really cool – so we are very sorry we couldn’t make it this time. We are still trying to juggle our dates at the end of this run, and perhaps we will get there still on this tour.
Of all places to have an unplanned rest day, Munich was a lucky place to be. It is the home of Hausmusik – our European label – so we were able to hang out in the offices and get some stuff done, and then in the evening at home with the family. It was kinda fun for me to spend time with Wolfgang’s three year old girl who speaks both German and Italian. Her Italian vocabulary, and certainly her grammar, is probably just slightly better than mine, so it was interesting trying to keep up with her conversation, and doing my best not to appear like a stupid giant that doesn’t quite talk properly! More incredible was to watch her switching between German and Italian depending on whether she was talking to her mum/us and her dad – even though they both speak both. Who knows what goes inside those little heads of theirs!
Since we woke this morning there has been a steady drizzle – sometimes frozen. Yesterday we were wearing tshirts outside, so clearly the schizophrenic weather has extended this far north also. As I type we are hurtling up the autobahn to Berlin for the show tonight. The show should be fun, and it will be great to be in Berlin again. We have only been there for one show before, and hence less than a day. Andre from Herman Dune might be coming along, so it will be great to see him again, and I’m sure that there will be no shortage of Berlin hipsters for us to meet and hang out with.