Peter O. Bischoff - Anecdotes from Backstage

ANECDOTES

FROM BACKSTAGE

A musicbiz memoir

(David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Frank Zappa, etc.)

by Peter O. Bischoff

Thanks

The author would like to thank Lilian Bischoff, Andrea Bischoff, Birgit Hoffmann, Mike Wrage, Gaby Meyer, Tom Wendt, Inken Diercks, Gerd Gruß, Julie Federkiel, Hanns Landa, Ernst Kahl, and Michael Gilmour for the translation.

All photos are taken by Peter Bischoff personally or are noted in his possession if not differently.

Original edition August, 2013.

All rights reserved.

The work may only be reproduced - also partially - with the approval of the publishing company.

Layout Inken Diercks.

Copyright (c) 2017 Bärensong Musikverlag e.K.

Struenseestr.31

22767 Hamburg

backstagepass@t-online.de

www.bearsongpublishing.de

Orderno. BSV 004

ISBN 978-3-9815995-3-4

eBook-Herstellung und Auslieferung:

readbox publishing, Dortmund

www.readbox.net

Foreword

Chapter 1: I am a Berliner

Chapter 2: Berlin, the 50s

Chapter 3: The 60s

Chapter 4: The 70s

Chapter 5: Hamburg, the 80s

Chapter 6: The 90s

Chapter 7: The 2000s

Bibliography

Index Print Version

Foreword Jer Hogan

The infamous Reeperbahn and the vibrant music scene around it were the lure that drew me to Germany in the winter of 1985. It was twenty degrees minus when I got off the ferry down at the dock of Hamburg. With only a duffel bag and a guitar in my possession I was looking for adventure. Fate led me to Hamburg’s legendary live music club the Markthalle where I found work as a roadie. The manager of the Markthalle at that time was no lesser mortal than Peter Bischoff. This is where we met and our paths have crossed many times since then. When Peter left the Markthalle and moved on to become independent and to diversify he was unknowingly sowing the seeds for this book.

Through his vast engagement in the music scene, be it as a musician, roadie, DJ, concert agent, tour promoter, artist manager, music publisher, record label owner or now as an author, Peter Bischoff has been there and has captured moving moments as an eyewitness and through the lens of his camera. The best of both offerings are here for the grabs. This is a fast motion journey through the musical decades. Leaping back and forth from backstage scenes to practice room parties to personal encounters with the stars. Use the decade symbols at the top of each page as a guide or scan through the index to search for known names. Throughout this musical diary you will discover rare and yet unpublished photos from Peter’s personal archive. There is so much waiting here to be unveiled …

The Next Day (David Bowie)

Bowie asked me if Edgar was coming. It didn’t quite click with me back then in 1977 - my English was not much better than what I’d learned at school - but eventually it dawned on me that the English superstar was asking whether Edgar Froese of Tangerine Dream would be coming to the room. And why not, it was his rehearsal room - Adolf Hitler’s former film screening room in Berlin Tempelhof, part of the former UFA film studios near the airport. I would later rent the room next door (very cheaply, from the German Post Office) as storage and rehearsal space for my drumkit.

If someone had told me in the early 70s that I would visit Bowie at home, the door where opened by Iggy Pop, give german superstar Udo Lindenberg a ride in my Mercedes 200/8, publish a CD by Inga Rumpf, or have a delicious piece of cake brought to my desk by none other than Sarah Brightman, I would have told them they were crazy.

But, first things first…

Berlin (Lou Reed)

The main sources of my early musical education were 1950s radio and television programmes and my parents’ record collection. Dad liked Elvis while Mum preferred Perry Como - not to mention German hits by Bill Ramsey, Chris Howland and Billy Mo, and the German television dancers the Kessler Twins, Alice and Ellen. My favourite band at the time was Hazy Osterwald’s crazy combo, especially their English drummer. I eventually saw Hazy perform live many years later as a special guest with German pianist Joja Wendt. Unfortunately, he could no longer play trumpet - but was still very entertaining on the vibraphone

La Paloma (Hans Albers)

My parents took me to my first live performance at the Berlin Sportpalast in 1959. It was one of those kitsch affairs featuring a whole host of acts including chanteuse Brigitte Mira. The main attraction - of course - was actor Hans Albers. He sang one song, then another, before being presented with a bottle of wine - which he subsequently left behind for the orchestra. By this stage, his doctors had advised him to stay away from alcohol. Not that it did him much good, since it turned out to be one of his last performances. He died in 1960. La Paloma, farewell!

Kennedy in Berlin

When John F. Kennedy uttered the famous words “I am a Berliner”, I was standing in the crowds in front of Berlin City Hall with my father. The sentence is often taken out of context. What Kennedy actually said was: “All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words ‘Ich bin ein Berliner!’”

Later my father and I stood on the roof of our Aral petrol station - the oldest in Berlin - and watched the President’s convoy of cars pass by followed by strings of spotless police motorbikes.

We had tried to walk through the Brandenburg Gate to East Berlin two years earlier, on August 13th, 1961, but it proved absolutely impossible.

Let There Be Drums (Sandy Nelson)

I had always wanted to be a drummer and drove my parents to distraction until my big-hearted mother finally gave in. At the age of 16, she gave me my first drumkit. It was a fairly cheap piece of equipment from Tromsa, but it was mine, all mine!

Peter Bischoff 1969

Much to the amusement of our neighbours, I practiced in my room at home. We lived in a very ordinary building in Berlin Friedenau with incredibly thin walls. I never got round to taking any lessons but instead picked it up as best I could - learning by doing - and took part in music sessions wherever and whenever I could

If anyone needed a drummer - I was there. It usually went: “One, two, three… what song is this again?” At one such session, the bass player Ralph “Trotter” Schmidt (Interzone) turned to me and said, “It’s not really that important, but it would probably sound better if we all played, ehm.. together.”

I eventually got asked to sit in with the group Capitol because their original drummer Frank Hämmerle was unavailable. I ended up playing with a whole host of groups and thoroughly enjoying myself.

The first practice rooms I used were - surprise, surprise - neither easy to reach nor warm and dry. They were damp and musty and reeked of smoke - the groups we shared the rooms with invariably smoked vast quantities of dope either instead of practicing or in the hope it would help them become rich and famous at some point.I played at the famous Quasimodo club with my blues-rock trio The Witch, but never found much success outside Berlin as a musician.

I was just happy to find fellow musicians who could both play their instruments and turn up on time to a practice - having the discipline to actually run through our songs was another plus. I had to pull the plug on one guitarist because he simply would not stop doodling around long enough for the rest of the band to discuss what we were doing.