15.07.2010, State of the Brotherhood by the Wolfman
"Summer, summer, summertime -
Time to sit back and unwind." (Will Smith)

Well, I guess it's my turn now.
I just received an email called "Reminder" - and jumped straight out of bed: "REMINDER"?! What's happening? Is there a one o'clock game today and I have forgotten to fill-in my bet? But…no! The World Cup is over.
Hmm…the email is from Sonja, the "first halftime" of SoTi, our internet girls. OK. The "State of the Brotherhood" report is due and it's my turn to write it. I boldly click "Answer" and start typing: "Hey Sonja and Tina! Thanks for your mail. As you know, we're having our summer holidays at the moment (Jamie is surfing down in the south of France, Joey is sort of having his "pregnancy break" at home in Sweden and I'm a little exhausted from the heat and this long World Cup Tournament). So, there is really nothing to report! And one should only write NEWS if there actually are any, right? : Cheers, …"
I stop dead. OH NO.
Was it me who had generously swept that very argument aside at the last band meeting, uttering: "But it's very important that there is always stuff happening on the website! Plus, there's always NEWS!"
OK - think, Wolfman, think. Of course there is news, but possibly also still a way out? What if it was "classified information", too private or too embarrassing to reveal?
"Hi Wolff, no information is too personal or too embarrassing for the SOTB report, so feel free..." - is Joey's spontaneous reply on Skype.
Well, alright. Here we go:

New Tour Bus
The new, white Mercedes Sprinter has been a trusty servant to us so far and - as mentioned - is "on tour" at the moment with his master Jamie (plus Jamie's girlfriend, little brother - yes, even littler than the "little brother" himself - and an even more littler son) in the south of France. "On Surf tour" to be more exact! But this wasn't the hottest news item, yet.

New Mac Book
I've got myself a new laptop. Wow - this one starts up in only 30 seconds (instead of 30 minutes like the old one). An Apple with complementary LOGIC STUDIO software. And a midi keyboard. Now I can compete again in our (band internal) battle of the home studios! So far, though, I have primarily used the computer for "Keep-my-football-bets-up-to-date" and less for "Record-hits-for-the-Obsessions". But this still wasn't the hottest news item. You're ready to hear it? Really? OK. GO.

New Baby Girl
"All hail princess Silvia Carnwath of Sweden!!!"
On July 7th, 2010 Joe's and Sara's second marvelous daughter was born in Uppsala, Sweden. So far I've only got a look at her through Skype - but I'd say the two have done really good work again! Oh man, so sweet and so tiny. Maybe we shouldn't be giving Joey so many off-days?! Like rabbits, I tell you...
Another fun little detail is that Silvia bears the same name as the Queen of Sweden. German-born Queen Silvia is the only "trump card", I can always play in the eternal battle with our Swedish Producer Lasse. He likes to humiliate us on a daily basis with our "German roots": Bratwurst, Marschmusik etc..
He even made his (world-famous) Colleague Max Martin memorize that the name of our band is "G-E-R-M-A-N-I-A". Ach, I can't wait until Lasse meets little Silvia…

New Life
This has nothing to do with music now, but I must admit that the World Cup 2010 has given my life a nice and pleasant structure in the last 4 weeks.
I guess, I'm alone with this in the band. Sweden didn't even qualify and England and the U.S. were knocked out in the Eighth finals, which Joey wasn't too happy about. And Jamie more or less agrees with Duncan's view, that "football fans are a bunch of strange men getting in touch with their ancestors".
But what can I say, the daily "get-up, keep-football-bets-up-to-date, watch-one-o'clock-game, check-football-bets, get-angry, watch-four-o'clock-game, check-football-bets, get-angry, watch-eight-thirty-game, check-football-bets, get-angry, watch-after-game-reports, sum-up-today's-football-bets, get angry" - all this has given me a somewhat warm feeling of achievement, like "Man, I've really got a few things done today."
What am I supposed to do all day now? Well, maybe "Record-hits-for-the-Obsessions".

New Wembley Goal
Surprisingly, English newspapers didn't really protest that much after the - clearly false - decision of the referees. Instead, "We got Müllered" sounded almost admiring, like a compliment to the young "New German Football".
One might say that Thomas Müller has done at least as much for the DFB Team's reputation around the globe as "Pulpo-Paule" (a.k.a. Paul, the psychic octopus) has done for the reputation of eight-legged marine oracles world-wide!
And the Vuvuzelas? (My buddy Hans said the other day: "To me, the constant whining about them was much more annoying than the little bugles themselves!")

Now that their song has quieted down to silence, I miss them.
Cheers,
Wolfman

14.06.2010, State of the Brotherhood by Joe
At our last band meeting, Wolff pointed out that we were not doing a very good job of keeping people informed with what the band is doing, so he has set up a chain of command which has resulted in Sonja being responsible for telling me that I am responsible for writing this month's "State of the Brotherhood" report.
So here you go:

People have been asking what happened to our "The Obsessions" original songs project. Well, after the release, promotion and subsequent sales figures of our last album, I came to the conclusion that, unlike the proverbial chicken and egg, there IS a natural progression that needs to be followed when it come to releasing CDs. I believe that the order of events has to run like this:

Step one. Write song that someone thinks is good enough to record
Step two. Make recording that someone thinks is good enough to release
Step three. Release song that someone thinks is good enough to promote
Step four. Bask in the glory of playing your hits to an adoring public all over the world
Step five. Buy mansion in the hollywood hills with guitar shaped swimming pool, then die, fat and bloated on a gold plated toilet.

Maybe our mistake in the past has been spending too much time looking for real-estate agents in California while ignoring steps 1-3!

Luckily, in March we signed a deal with a publishing company who believe that step 1 is well within our reach. The good news is that they are sure that all we need to move on to step 2 is a catchy 3 minute single that captures the essence of the band. The bad news is that they are sure that none of the 9 songs that I have spent every free day this year writing and demoing in my home studio are THAT single!

More from me next time Sonja calls to tell me my number is up!
Joe

12.03.2010
OBSESSIONS SIGN PUBLISHING DEAL
"Here's to future world domination!" :)
The Obsessions have just signed a publishing contract with AMV Talpa - who are impressed by the songs and quality of our last album.Now, they might well get us a good record deal within the next six months!
In the meantime, keep your eyes and ears open: Songs from "The Obsessions" in movies, computer games and...uh...as customer telephone waiting loops are also very possible! ;) Cheers ("pling!"),

30.01.2010
Thanks do Danni from the Rockhouse Sisters for putting together her personal best-of video from our short gigs on SAT.1 breakfast television after the CD release last year:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfKWC5eAdTk

16.01.2010
A long long time ago...we can still remember how that diary used to make us smile....After more than month of abstinence, you can now read a new diary entry on the diary section! Have fun!

01.01.2010