Barb's Weblog

The NW Flower and Garden Show was just wonderful!
That is my absolute favorite show of any we do! I didn't get a really good look at the gardens, but managed to get a walk-thru each morning on the way to the booth and on the way out each night. I wish I had a chance to linger but its a busy event, with lots of early mornings and late nights and not a lot of sleep in between. I don't think I could make it long at city life! Its so impossibly URBAN! Really fun, but guess I'm too old to do more than look at it.

Getting home was great, and monday morning I woke up to a heavy wet snow falling so beautifully, huge flakes like thick feathers drifting down and piling up. In the usual island fashion, they melted off in an hour or 2 and the sun was blinding. This week snowdrops, crocus and daffodils have all shown up in the beds and pots, so we know spring is here. Cold clear nights and sparkling days with a strong feel of spring. Ah, but I'm not fooled, I know as soon as the tulips bloom, a mighty wind will come and mash them flat, just like every year.

A couple weeks before Christmas I found out about a band that a friend was fascinated with,and since I was searching for the perfect gift for him, I went online and found some. I don't speak german but I ordered a couple best as I could guess, and when they came, I had to give them a spin to see what I thought.

Ohmigosh, I recognized them! It was wonderful! Reminiscent pf 70's and 80's techno industrial stuff, but so much more! Driving rhythm, classic and traditional leanings set to powerful metal, a sort of wild fierce sound but every song grabbed me with their surprises and beauty and perfect control and composing...I was hooked! It seemed familiar and new at once, and just listening to the music filled my thoughts with all sorts of amazing images. I looked them up online and found they composed my favorite movie soundtrack song from The Matrix...a theme song that stays with me even now, I can call it up anytime even now. Rammstein! I found out all sorts of interesting things about the band, their wild theatric, almost operatic style filled with fire and joy and deep wild feelings, their personalities, reading reviews, interviews, bios and all sorts of stuff. I had to see the dvds, hear more music, available very cheaply used with a little research... Then I had to know...the lyrics! More amazing than I could have guessed, tho I had definitely been seeing and feeling the same things as intended, but these are beautifully written songs, by intelligent educated men with lots of life experience and of philosophical, thoughtful bent. These lyrics are interesting stories and views into emotions, literature and the deep culture of their region. Tales worded in a language so much richer and evocative than songs I'm hearing here. I'm finding a fascination with the german language and medieval languages I recall from all my reading as a child...so rich and beautiful, and that similarity to our words, and also the huge lack in descriptive power our words have.

I'm hooked! It makes me extremely happy to listen, and since my life is often filled with stress and hard work, sometimes unpleasant work, its such a reward to have Rammstein to indulge in!I know I'm way to old to be one, but Rammstein Fan, I am. And Jimi, whose gift those first couple of cd's was for? I finally gave them to him, and we marvel daily at the great songs and share bits we dig up online...pictures of the band last week traveling from city to city, ways to enjoy them in concert without being able to go...wishes to see them, hopes that we are not too old to go! As if they'll be back to this country, one that doesn't happily allow such flaming theatrics to be performed, much less the images born from the songs... And Ralph? He likes it too! He was a huge Kraftwerk and Pink Floyd fan as a young man...some stuff just doesn't go away! Hes not so crazed as me, but then, WHO IS?

An image for you to see: Got Garden?

4:05 PM — e-mail me your comments