3.7 Dresden
We make the 6.5 hour drive to Dresden. Audis and BMWs fly by at 120+ mph in the left
lane as we chug along in our Sprinter van.
The entire population understands The System. Fast cars left, slow cars right. If you are driving 130 mph and a Porsche
driving 140 mph is approaching behind you, you move the hell over. Why this logical and basic system cannot be
grasped by American drivers is beyond my comprehension. I always wonder why that guy camped out going
60 in the far left lane does not understand that there is a reason why everyone
is pissed off when they pass him on the right.
By somehow not understanding the very basic building blocks of the
traffic system, he would have to be mystified why everyone is so hostile on the
road for apparently no reason. Not
here. If you go too slowly in the left,
you get a ticket with a healthy fine. We
need the Polizei over here to straighten some shit out on our highways.
We pass abandoned guard towers and electronic listening
stations for the old GDR. We are now in
what was the old East Germany. Large
expanses of flat country like Indiana are broken up by crumbling smokestacks
and busted cinderblocks, remnants of the old “Worker’s Paradise”. In what was the old West Germany almost
everyone speaks English to some degree.
Here in the east, almost no older people do, and even the younger people
have less fluency. However, I am sure
most senior citizens could knock your socks off with Russian phrases and
Communist songs.
As we drive, Leo designs what he has envisioned as his next
tattoo, interlocking pretzels on his wrist like a cuff. Without warning Leo’s head pops up from his
tattoo sketching and he asks, “Greg… Are we playing that same club that served
us all the white food?” No Leo. Wrong club.
Wrong city. Despite having been
to Dresden several times, one of Europe’s and certainly one of Germany’s
prettiest cities, he has no memory of it.
This is the price one pays for being high all the time. The guy has seen some amazing things, but can’t
recall or organize them in his mind. He
has confused Rock Station in the industrial wasteland of Halle with magnificent
Dresden, a city where he has strolled the palaces and art galleries of The
Zwinger three times. It is like
confusing Toledo with San Francisco.
Well, maybe it will stick this time…
We play Rozi’s, a club that is part of an even bigger
complex. There has been an amazing
amount of forethought and style put forth in the Hamburg themed club. Booths line the wall, and each one has a
different theme. There is a boxing one
with enormous photo of Max Schmelling. A
booth with angels is next to a booth with an S&M booth complete with
hooded dom mannequin and rack with rubber dildos nailed on. A St. Pauli flag flies in the back corner with
vintage photos of past glories on the pitch.
The whole place is an homage to Hamburg, down to the stubby bottles of
Astra beer served as the house brew.
This all relates back to when Dresden was a sister city to Hamburg in
the old Iron Curtain days.
We get a pretty good meal at Helmut’s, the steakhouse in the
front of the complex. The menu is in a
weird combination of English and German.
“Gnudeslich snitzel with Hell Fries.
Wondabrusstrsimen. Fuck yes to
the rock and roll!” It’s something like that…
The heavily tattooed waitress takes our order and disappears never to be
seen again. I make a phone call for an
interview with Jeff Niesel at Scene Magazine for our upcoming CD Release gig at
the Beachland. Leo scores a steak, which
he is eating like his last meal. I go to
the clean Spartan dressing room and knock out the set list.
The show itself is forgettable. I think I have played Dresden twice, once
with the Daredevils and once with the Cowslingers. One time we ripped the fucking roof off the
place. The other time people stared at
us like we were zoo animals. The show
tonight is unfortunately the latter.
Typically the East Germans are more reserved than their western breatheran. This is crazy though. A decent crowd of people have paid ten euros
each to stare emotionlessly. I try to
get them closer, and only one pierced girl makes her way up. The rest react as if I am speaking a foreign
language, which of course I am. The show
ends with polite claps.
The girl that stood up front is a very heavy girl that turns
out to be from England. She is with her
friend Helen, a cute brunette with a bob cut and peppy white tennis shoes. They are both very drunk, as are all English
people that I have ever met while traveling in Europe. If you see pasty people stumbling around
making inappropriate noise and looking like they might barf on you at any
second, they are English tourists. I
thank the girls for their support, and they are quick to tell me their story. The heavy girl is a lesbian on the prowl. According to Helen, (insert prim English
accent here) “She lit rally snogs moh girls than anyone I have evah seen.” . Helen then informs me she is a bisexual in a
long term relationship with a woman, “but now it is a bit boring really”. We have known each other for 17 seconds, so I
can see why she would want to unburden herself and let me in on what is going
on in her life. I think she has designs
on Sugar, who is a beacon for the lesbian community like some sort of sexual
lighthouse. Sugar has received more play
from women in the last ten days than I have in the last two decades of
touring. It’s a bit depressing to dwell
on my complete lack of desirability to the opposite sex, so it's time for a drink.
Leo and I ask Kitty the bartender for a shot of something
local. She produces four shots for us,
none of which look complimentary in the slightest. There is no fucking way I am doing all four
of these. Visions of myself barfing
through the night lead me to narrowing in on a couple of them. The choices are something red that looks like
a cherry kirsch thing, something creamy served in a tiny ice cream cone, a
green horrible looking liquid, and a licoricey pastis shot. I do the licoricey thing and the ice cream
cup, which is very girly but totally delightful. Leo does all four in succession. Of course.
I get Sugar’s attention, who by this time has had Helen
attach herself to her side. They both
come over and Helen immediately knocks over the green shot with her enormous
beer mug she is waving around. She then
leans down on the bar and playfully extends her tongue to lick up the spilled
liquor announcing, “just like I like to lick pussy” before exploding in a
gleeful cackle. Hey-o! I look around and I finally notice that there
are plenty of other women without the company of men. Wait a minute… How did I end up at a lesbian rockabilly
cowboy punk show halfway across the globe?
Marcus the promoter pays me out in the office and we discuss
St. Pauli. I’ll tell you what; this St.
Pauli thing is the ticket to instant camaraderie. Marcus, a really nice guy, explains how this
bar has come to be a magnet for soccer hooligan trouble. St. Pauli is a team that represents the far
left of left wing. Dresden, on the other
hand, is to the far right. Often “far
right” can be a code word for neo-Nazi or a set of ideas that dance close to
the edge of what most of Germany considers fascism. Europe has so many more political
connotations with everything, especially with soccer. It would be like if you were a Houston Texans
fan that meant you were also a member of the John Birch Society. Frankly, it’s kind of stupid to have these
two things mixed up, but it is what it is…
The deal is that if Dresden wins one of their two annual matches vs. St
Pauli, there is no problem. If St. Pauli
wins, a bunch of thugs come to Rozi’s and try to break the place up and beat up
people. It would be interesting to be a
tourist and randomly walk in here after a St Pauli win over Dresden. “Look honey.
A big crowd of fellas just came in!
Let’s go try out our German phrases on them! Gutentag!” Cut to bottle crashing on the side of the head.
Marcus gives me a bunch of St Pauli stickers and club
t-shirts. I make the short walk to our
Mexican themed Bed and Breakfast, leaving the lesbian dance party behind.
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