Hi!


Well my new album I Like You is finished and is due to be released at the end of September. In the meantime...

My long time HGH buddy Håkon Gebhardt and I have decided to record an album of original tunes for kids, so this week we started.
We're recording our first tracks at Gebhardt's Das Boot studio and it's a blast!! We've played schools for a few years now so we feel we know what the kids might get a kick out of.

The Oranje koffiehuis in Arnheim is a great little dive with no stage, no monitors but a small corner next to the toilets designated as the playing field... As Father Seb would say "perfect"  I enjoyed myself playing through my mini amp that I carry with me if the venue can't provide an amplifier. 

Seb & I, getting our shit together...

 

My Koffiehuis mini stack, I bring my glasses along to see it.



A New fan Richard Dreves just posted a Youtube flick of my solo version of Appetite

Here is the Oranje version of Country Chris

 

I had a good time in The Camelot in Nijmegen, nice town, good people and the last concert of the season for the gang of promoters. A couple of them Nick and Marta also run a small alternative concert promotion site called Red Shoe Sessions, that I plan on checking out some time. After the show the speakers were taken down and a pool table was put in place, what a team!



De Overkant in Wageningen was especially sweet with a great listening audience that inspired me to play for a couple of hours. I made a bunch of new friends, the arranger Sander had his shit together and Maaike and Michiel opened up their home to me down the street for a good nights sleep and to top things of, the local paper had my pretty face on the front page for good promotion. Looking for a place to eat in Wageningen? try Vreemde Streken.

Playing with a fan at De Overkant

 I'm in the middle of my tour of The Netherlands and had a gig in Nijmegen at The Camelot last night. Things are going well, traveling by train and meeting some great people.
I'm heading to Wageningen today which I find hard to say in Dutch, oh that place is the usual reaction to my pronunciation... On the first leg of the tour I commuted from my friend Sebastiano Varini's (Father Seb) house in Koog Ann Zaan which is just north of Amsterdam. I've also hung out with Betti and Neils who are a sweet couple, they are old Motorpsycho fans that named their adorable children after my touring companions Håkon Gebhardt and Marit Bjartnes. The kids, Mette Marit and Thor Håkon are taking english lessons from me  ...tbc.

Links to pictures taken in The Netherlands

Betti, Neils & Me



Father Seb



Train windows

I was a big fan of Gil Scott Heron, I have most of his old LP's and have seen him live several times. I even worked with him once but for some reason I can't include him in weekyleaks as I can't find the tape...His whereabouts drifted out of my consciousness until about three years ago when I deliberately tried to find out what he was up to, I downloaded as many recent articles on him as possible which was pretty dismal reading and inspired by the reading sat down to write him a song, I wasn't happy with the song, I found it too weak for the subject matter so I threw it away. I liked the main theme though which is dedicating a library in his name, I mean all presidents get one, even the illiterate ones. The GSH Library.
I spent some time in NYC in late 2009 and managed to see him in concert along with Kari, I was writing material for my new album and we were both thrilled to find out he was actually performing again. He started the concert at the B.B. King Blues Club ( to quote my old friend the late great Rock Bottom; A Denny's with music) by saying, I bet you folks didn't think I'd show up!  He was witty, entertaining and did some great songs but he was most definately just Pieces Of The Man he used to be. 
I also got to see him last year at Rockefeller in Oslo and that was my last GSH concert after seeing him several times around Boston in the 80's, I think I saw him at Dinky Dawson's club, The Channel the first time. GSH always asked for The Fender Rhodes Suitcase model when performing. I love these pianos and I found one for my producer Lars Horntveth last year that he bought. Susanne Sundfør who sings on a couple of songs on my upcoming album also uses one, and yes it's all over my new album as well. Anyhow, enough digressions, Gil Scott Heron was at his best brilliant and has always been an inspiration. No one could get a political message across like he could and even the most grim satire could have you in stiches.

A flyer I kept from NYC. 

Here's the song I scrapped, I meant well but it just got to mushy...

GSH


They threw a man in jail

For a handshake on the street

A promise he let slide

One he couldn't keep

 

Observe an older male

Belittled in his tracks

Explosive brilliance

Of political attack

 

Eloquent and sharp

He held his dagger straight

He'd force us to laugh

At tragedies at hand

 

They threw a man in jail

Pieces of his mind

Were scattered on the wall

Graffiti from the can

 

They threw a man in jail

For hiding in the dust

For such a petty crime

We let his genius rust

 

Every  President

Even those who can not read

Receive a library in their name

With a pardon if they're shamed

 

What kind of abuse

Do we jail a smart ass for?

Substances of choice

Or substances of war?

 

Hereby I propose

To build a library

In Gil Scott Herons name

A poets sanctuary

This has been a good week, I've spent time finalizing a deal with the record label Strømland that will release my new album "I Like You" in late September.
Strømland is a subsidiary of Smalltown Supersound and a joint venture run by Joakim Haugland & Hans Peter Lindstrøm.

I have also spent more time collaborating with Ida Jenshus on new songs for her next album due sometime next year.
We wrote a couple of great songs together last week up in Trondheim, one which she performed on Thursday at the annual Gramart summer concert.
Ida won a prize on Thursday and was all over the news. The prize is called Bendiksenprisen named after the Norwegian composer Arne Joachim Bendiksen. 

 
Listening to new song ideas...



Blue nails on the Wurlitzer



Another Sunny day in Oslo

Ida has a couple of Norwegian Grammy's under her belt, I had the pleasure of collaborating with this great songwriter on her last effort No Guarantees as well. 

I made time this morning to screw the wall boards back in place after doing the annual anti rust treatment with chainsaw oil.
I need a clean space for backline as I plan on driving from Oslo down to Halden on Saturday with amps, guitars and my Wurlitzer piano. 
The left wallboard I decorated about 10 years ago with old live posters from my bands Home Groan and HGH. The right wall board is decorated with old adds from Life Magazine from around 1940, mostly cars...
 

 
I just finished writing two songs for NRK Barnas Super Show (TV for kids) . I went by the producer Thomas Tofte at Propeller Recordings today to lay guide vocals on the songs. Jeg snakker kattespråk (I Speak Cat Language) & Myggen (The Mosquito). I laid three part comb harmonies on the last song alternating with "light metal" aluminum , plastic, and wax paper comb reeds.
It got to the point my lips went numb and I started to feel sympathy for real horn players. The songs will be broadcast as videos sometime this fall on NRK 1.

 

It's that time of the year, after spending Saturday on a pedal power demo, I decided to spend Sunday bringing my 1961 Volvo 210 out of winter hibernation.
She started purring in no time and the 45 km back to Oslo was pure bliss.
My gig in Halden on Saturday May 21 will our first call of duty this year.

Photos!

It's May Day again and as usual the world is in turmoil.
Hard fought for workers rights are being discarded all over the world in the pretense of saving a global economy crippled by unregulated banking, housing speculation, astronomical executive bonuses, systematic tax evasion and disastrous military operations.
The ongoing environmental crisis is no longer receiving necessary attention and civil rights we took for granted in many democracies are being taken away from us as clocks are being turned back to darker times with surprisingly little protest. 
Meanwhile CNN sent 400 reporters to cover The Royal Wedding and we gleefully sit around with bags over our heads.


Hey Revolution Now!


Free song, enjoy!