“Music for brains and bums” is how Blümchenknicker (Flowerbender) describe their music collective. ‘Band’ is too small a word for so large a group.
With nicknames like ‘Fiddle Frenzy’ on violin, and ‘Mr Noisy’ on Bhodran. They are certainly not your everyday German Folk Band, but, like flowers they are certainly a colorful bunch. Ideal music for a sunny Saturday with a cool glass of beer beside the lake in fact. Only before I arrive at Kunstgarten I have to take cover in the bus shelter at the Post-tower for twenty minutes as it pours like the proverbial cats and dogs.
Kazoo/trumpet playing at it’s best
I actually do take the bus back home but get back off after two stops when I see the sun has come out.
So when I set muddy foot on wet grass it’s my second visit to Kunstgarten of the evening when I arrive to see lots of people standing around the stage. Maybe its not such a bad thing to have a bit of rain before the show? With seats to wet to sit on, bums want to remain dry, and are indeed more likely to wave to a good beat.
Music doesn’t get more ‘laid back’ than this!
Bender Corleone Flowers and his large band of what often seems like a rag-bag of instrumental compilation are doing a good job of providing the beat. I think the first song I caught even referenced rain, how topical can a band be? The weather has obviously taken them all by surprise though as each is clad in what looks like their best Sunday underwear. New man on bluesharp Ramos Rodrigues has to regularly hoist his vest over his head because the set list is written on his chest (a new approach by bands to end the thievery of said set lists I wonder?)
The songs themselves are worth listening to lyrically: Mr Bender Flowers (possibly not his real name) is the only Catholic onstage he announces, but as the singer and main songwriter he has a bit to say about religion:
“Herr, wir haben gesündigt, und das nicht zum ersten mal. Morgen bereuen wir gründlich, aber heute ist das egal!” – ‘Rheinische Beichte’
In “Glaubensfrage” The question of religious belief is answered by the refrain “Was wurde Jesus tun? Jesus wurde tanzen!…”
So back to my earlier promise to explain the band name (and aim possibly) I ask a man who I believe goes under the name of ‘Mr Pure Sax’ and who is the best kazoo on the end of a trumpet player I have ever heard. “A flower appears to be beautiful, but maybe appearance is deceptive. we bend the flower, to take a look inside. a different perspective…” At least that’s what I thought he meant. But then German and English do not always translate. What does translate though is this bands boundless energy and enthusiasm. They will be bounding onto the stage again at Alter Zoll on 9 August. Free entrance and if it rains, you will get wet. Life is that simple when you take its intricacies apart. Flowers learn to bend with the rain, lesson learned.