Into the Tree! Into the Treeee!

This Sunday I will play my hometown of Antwerp. And I will be doing more than that. I will be returning to the place where, by now quite a few years ago, I started playing live again after, again, quite a few years.

Yes, I Did have a previous life as a musician. I was not always a sole man walking into the venue holding three guitar cases. I used to perform, heavily eye lined, with ‘A Forest’ of hair (couldn’t resist the pun) that would put Robert Smith’s to shame, flaunting hot fuchsia and black as my main stage outfit’s colors, apart from the bright white boxing shoes (‘dance like a butterfly, sting like a bee’). I had an altogether different persona when hitting the stage in the prevous century. We were six then, we were going to conquer the world and we were musically so in love with each other that the memory of it is like a gem on my life’s timeline, burning, even today, with the chemistry of what was.

Still, nostalgia is not my thing at all. Not all was better in the past and not all was worse. Flipping out on music Was worse for sure. One gruesome day the light just went out, in one instant, actually, although I did not know it at the time. I guess any aspiring musician hits that wall at some point. You victimize yourself until the jar breaks, everything flows out and there is no repair kit to grab for. I’ll tell you a secret. I had totally closed the door on making music (apart from playing blues in C minor with 6 fingers on my synth, safely under my headphones). I made theatre for years, because people asked me to and on the inside I went ‘why not?’. The wrong motivation, I know now. And deep within I knew then too.

I met my wife in theatre. She thought she was marrying an actor. I thought so too, until on our wedding party we sang a duet and a friend of mine asked whether I felt like playing live at Antwerp’s ‘Zuiderzinnen Festival’. I paused, said yes and, well, the rest is history of the future I am living now.

So after ten years of theatre or so, one fateful day I headed to a place called ‘De Nieuwe Linde’ at the southern tip of the city where I performed live again, all alone this time. I was hooked from measure one. I won’t try to describe what it felt like to truly come back into my own after so many years, to experience my very soul coming home, the pure exhilirating joy that emerges out of the deep. But it happened there, at ‘De Nieuwe Linde’. Over the years I got to know Dirk and Lin, the owners. They are both walking bundles of love and support, I would find out.

So on Sunday I will joyfully return to my roots, the roots of the linden tree, where, really, FLOATSTONE was born, although at that point the name was still strictly reserved for my  email address. It will not be my first return there, but when I think of the difference between the fuchsia and black clad lead singer of old and the guitar man who first performed at De Linde I feel the difference between that last guy and the musician playing there on Sunday is even bigger.
You are all very welcome there.

My Last Stand

Two gigs this weekend. That is just great. Playing one after the next is what playing live music is all about really. It gets  and keeps you in the flow of your energy. Always gives opportunities to refine tonight on what you learned last night.

Saturday it is off to Brussels at ‘Aux 12 Chaises’. If you don’t know what that means grab a chair and try a translation app. I have never played there before which makes for adventure from the moment I get to the door. Sounds like a tiny place, no? So if you wanna be sure of a seat, come early. You’ll get the extra treat of watching me set up, a ritual in itself. Apart from the fact that it is an ever changing ritual, of course, depending on the circumstances, I have become quite adept at fitting 3 guitars and myself on, say, 1,5 square meters. ‘Don’t wag your tail, you’ll topple the sanseveria in the window.’ I used to be the lead singer in a band that actually played some big (well, medium) sized stages and I enjoyed that a lot. Becoming a one man band takes one to smaller venues, for now (he said hopefully). But I still want to move around a lot when I play.

So recently I have (finally!) acquired myself a head mic, a thingy that fits on your ears and has a tiny mic next to your mouth. Its designers seem to assume that they gave the gizmo the color of human skin – I think it rather resembles pinkish toilet paper – it has been a joy. Actually that is putting it Way too mildly. Liberation, that’s what it is. 

The one object I truly loathe in music is the microphone stand. Never mind the easily ‘trip-overeable’ guitar cables, the absent (or shrieking, for that matter) monitor speakers, go ahead, pour on those (urgh, red!) spot lights that turn my guitar’s fret board into a murky sea of invisibility, but please, not the hell of the microphone stand.

It will pivot away from you during your most emotional note like someone trying to avoid a kiss and its hinge will make it take a bow so the mic hits you in the teeth just when you want to sing and it just stands there, smirking at you when, eyes closed, you start singing the next refrain completely next to the mic instead of in it. But, really, these are minor problems. The One Major Issue I have with the microphone stand is simply: its very Presence on Stage. Whenever I want to start singing I have to go to it. So when I get deeply into some groove that is so very into the Moment I have to keep some internal controller going who tells me I need to move back to the damn thing in order to be heard when I start the next verse. How into the Moment can one be, then? And if I am playing something on my guitar that is so difficult that I feel the need to see where my fingers are and I want to sing at the same time, I am forced to crane my neck, look down out of the corner of my eye sockets while my lobsided lips are trying to keep in contact with the mic to get my voice out. Apart from giving me cramps it makes me look like I am the victim of some strange seizure, which, in a way, I am at that point.
So here is to the head mic. Even if it makes me look a bit like Lieutenant Uhura (one finger on ear: ‘Still no contact, captain.’) it gives me true artistic bodily intergrity playing live. Feel free to come and judge its color for yourself.

Have Guitar, Will Travel.

Welcome, dear reader. If it is your first time here, feel free to browse the Archives for the charted past of the making of my debut CD and the subsequent US mini-tour last year. If on the other hand you are returning to this place after a quite spell: welcome back.

In two weeks I will be off for a month long trip through the southern states of the US. I will be playing gigs, solo and with my, by now, Friend, Jimmy Robinson and others. I also hope to be recording tracks in a fine New Orleans studio. I am looking forward to new adventures, meeting a wide range of people, high way hypnosis, an in depth survey of roadside eating establishments and the inevitable spice of life: unforeseen circumstances.

There is a certain charm in returning to a place you have been before. I will be doing quite a lot of that in the time to come. First place on the list is here, this blog. I signed in and saw a picture of me and some Texan bikers, taken in Austin about a year ago(!). Austin is one place I will Not be returning to, this year. On the other hand, loads of brand new destinations are slowly showing their silhouette on the horizon.

So it has been a while since I blogged here. How have I been? Pretty good, thank you. Response to ‘Meet FLOATSTONE’ ranged from satisfying to frustrating, from harsh to euphoric, from pedantic to awed. I consider it a worthy step along a worthwhile path. The learning process was immense, both in practical, personal and intra-personal knowledge. I have it under the belt. The second CD is in the making, in a different kind of process, a direct result of making the first one and what experience it has brought me.

So if you wanna take that ride with me, be my guest. I am leaving on a jet plane. But not yet, first there are a few more ‘warm-up’ concerts close by, one of which will bring me back to the place where, in fact, it all started (again) years ago. I cherish the chance.

If you already are a follower of this blog, wipe the crumbs off the seat and buckle up (if you feel safer that way). If you are new and want to join the Ride, you can make a wordpress account and go to https://meetfloatstone.wordpress.com to get a seat OR you can send me a mail at floatstone@gmail.com so I can let you know when a new post has been published.

Until soon, I hope.
Peace.

PS. Why the mouse? Patience, reader, patience…