Almost Famous

the buddymollys or molly and the others or molly and the enders or ... 

It might be music that actually brought Jeremy and I together. Exactly one year prior to our wedding date, a random conversation went like this:

Me: I just wrote words to a song, but I don’t have any music yet.

Jeremy: That’s crazy, I just wrote a tune, but don’t have any words yet. Come over tonight, we’ll put them together.

I’ll spare you the details of how that never actually happened, (we made another kind of music that night - wink). In fact, the buddymollys moniker was more about our relationship than an actual band – but we still liked to rock the ukes at random talent shows, camp-outs, bbqs and ski trips.

It was the latter where we picked up Michael Kreis - a fellow uker - to complete our trifecta of mediocrity. (Note: he’s way better than us).

At the advice of a friendly restaurant owner in town, we sent in an audition tape for acceptance into the Weiden Traümt.

The Weiden Traümt is a yearly festival where the pedestrian zone of our little town is overrun with 15 or so musical performances, and even more stalls with food and drink. Stores stay open late and herds of people partake in the hoopla. It's a happening Friday night in downtown Weiden. 

Our band photo and “ukulelenmusik” description managed to make a few advertisement spreads in neighboring German newspapers, as well as the centerfold of the program.

Spaß!

We practiced for a few weeks leading up to the performance, and narrowed down our set to 18 songs, which we then played over and over again during our six-hour gig.

We had three ukes of varying degrees, me on the baritone, Mike on the bass uke and Jerome holding down tradition on his tenor.

We didn’t expect much, but managed to gather quite a crowd. At one point about 100 folks were standing around clapping offbeat to our jam, and two people even asked if we had cds. (We, of course, do not). The lady running the fest said we were one of her favorite acts. She used the word "pleasant" to describe us. Win. 

Now, I’m not being modest when I say we’re not that great. Because, really, we’re not. But we are somewhat of a novelty here in Germany. And we’ll take it because we really have so much fun playing together. 

It also doesn’t hurt that we have our own “Mel” of Flight of the Conchords fame in one Pat Kummerererererer. He is, no doubt, our most dedicated fan. And hearing him cheer “Way to go Molly!” after every song, never gets old. Ever.

Crowd shot with super fan Pat Kummererererer bottom right.  

It was Pat that coined the term “Molly and the Others” which is what we refer to ourselves at times. That also transitioned into “Molly and the Enders” because while the beginning and middle of our songs are just OK, we always end well. Always.

On that same note, our night ended just as well. We had 52 euros in tips lining our uke case as we yelled “Prost!” to random passersby and congratulated each other for managing to pull this night off.

As our glasses clinked together, Pat was in the background yelling “Way to go Molly!”

It never gets old. Ever.

Below are a few musical samplings (mixed with random german conversations) via video from the evening - 1. a bit of Patsy; 2. who doesn't love Elvis, even if sang poorly; 3. for those who aren't sick of Wagon Wheel.