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RoadNotes: New Wet Kojak

New Wet Kojak's music is known for its languid but beautiful soundscapes, combined with a flow of catchy one-liners like "Spank the DJ, start the riot". To support the release of their latest album 'Do Things', the Kojak rented a van and cuised through Europe. Poetical vocalist Scott McCloud reports: "When in Rome, Do Things..."

Tekst: Scott McCloud

Publicatiedatum: 05 juni 2000

The longest wettest NWK dousing of Europe to date commenced on a Wednesday night in May: live for VPRO Radio in Amsterdam. Nice cafe style environment was conducive to the Nasty International mood. NWK ran thru several tracks and basically "rehearsed" live for the radio...
We Dealt with all the rented gear, etc. Overall the next night's real live show at The Paradiso in Amsterdam set the mood for the whole tour. Late nights, etc. Amsterdam was a good show. Pretty good. Met a guy from Croatia who had all the LP's and was about as drunk as I was by the end of the night. He gave me a stack of his CD's and off we went to Belgium.

First stop was the Cactus Club in Brugges (The Venice of Belgium, so I have heard)... Small turnout, enthusiastic response. This would prove to be the rule for most of the tour. After Brugges we settled into our Belgian "homebase" of Antwerp at the Monty. Big booming room. Despite Zita Swoon playing for free in the center of town, we had a nice wet crowd. Rounded out the night at the Cafe Tabac, a frequent stop for NWK when in Antwerp. On to Brussels and the AB Club. Surely one of the finest venues in Europe, the show was highlight of the tour. There was no supporting act so NWK played two short sets with a "smoking-break" intermission in which we treated the crowd to some re-mix versions of none other than ourselves, NWK. It might be noted that while on tour NWK solely listens to ourselves in the van. We often make remixes of our songs for our ears only, to listen to. (On this tour, however, all we had was a cassette of Dr. Octagon, which stayed in constant rotation: "Earth People, New York & California, Earth People, I was born in Jupiter") Brussels is now a favored wet city for NWK.

Onwards down into Paris for a mellow night at the Divan Du Monde. A mellow night, it being a Monday. Its always a shame to be leaving Paris, so we bowed our heads and headed into the Tunnel to the UK. To quickly despense with England: Brighton was the worst show of the tour (ie basically the crowd was not having it*) Nottingham was fine in a nice pub, and London was London. Dazed and a bit frayed, we departed for the long trek down to Bordeaux. Bordeaux was another highlight. A very wet crowd at the excellent le Jimmy rock club... we went to a cavernous underground bar afterward, which was truly one of the coolest bars I have ever been to. We all departed Bordeaux vowing to re-locate the band there as soon as possible. With one of our Italian shows having been cancelled we had plenty of time to make the trip to Italy for our next string of shows.

We stayed in Arles France, which I highly recommend, the first night, and then in a small town on the Italian Riveria (the touring life in Europe is pretty tough*). Finally arriving in Mestre (right outside Venice) we played in a small bar with a circular stage, to a packed house. Another highlight. The CD's we had brought with us now highly depleted, we headed down to Rome. When in Rome, Do Things* We played at Brancleone in Rome, and were so late arriving that we saw virtually nothing of the city. Next stop, Slovenia. NWK arrived in Ljubjana to meet our escort to the show (which was outside of town). We drove small backroads (amazing scenery) out to the smaller town of Velenje, and up the the stage which was outdoors on the grounds of a 17th Century Castle. Amazing. A free concert/festival. New Model Army was to headline the next night. NWK played together with the great slovenian band Psycho-Path and hung out.

Onwards to Linz, Austria, we played another festival, this one taking place at stages both outdoors and in various venues around town. We played the Stattwerkstatt, to one of the best crowds of the tour. We spent the rest of the evening sampling beers sitting outside as the Danube flowed by, talking about the political climate in Austria at the moment. Some bands have been boycotting Austria, but NWK understands, the manuevers of some right wing fanatics do not speak for a whole country. Anyway, we met several old friends and made some fast new ones.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/achtergrond/new-wet-kojak/roadnotes-new-wet-kojak/497/
Meer New Wet Kojak op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/new-wet-kojak