I’ve been doing music since I was about ten. And, although I’m sounding like Phil Collins now, it all started with a drum kit. I played for three years, driving my parents mad. I then suddenly stopped playing drums and traded my kit for a C64. The next 3 years I was gambling, swapping, cracking computer games. But with the end of my puberty and the arrival of the Amiga Computer I left the computer business and got back to the music. I would play quite a funky beat, but at the age of 16 I knew drumming wouldn’t be enough for my artistic ego. There was pain in my heart and longing in my eyes. I knew I had to start to write songs. Songs that would express what I felt. It sounds cheesy, but like Momus says in one of his songs, „so many clichees have sentimental truth“.
It must have been 1985/86 or so that I was fascinated with british Bands like The Smiths, Madness, The Colourfield, Aztec Camera. But at the same time I loved what was coming from America too: Scott Miller’s Game Theory, Hüsker Du, Three O’Clock, The Rain Parade.
Learning to play guitar seemed the right choice at that time. But the most influential instrument in that era must have been my 4-track-recorder. With that machine it was possible to emulate a whole band with just one person. I put about 400 songs and fragments to tape the following years. I learned to play keyboards and most of all I started using my voice.
Though thru my twenties I constantly produced music it never occured to me to do music for a living. I was and am working as as a journalist mostly for tv. Writing & Recording songs was a hobby for me at most times. But around 1999 the urge to put out a record grew. So, with no record label behind me label I decided to produce a 4-track-ep by myself. I recruted a band of friends, borrowed some money and booked a studio for a week. The outcome was GIRLS USE DEODORANT THESE DAYS, which was released shortly after on Firestation Records. It got quite some good reviews and sold well in Japan. There was only one problem: no live line-up. The guys that had recorded the record with me, were becomingfathers and teachers. I was back with my -now digital- four-track. It must have been at that time that I started to do music for pictures. It started with Jingles for a tv-show, background music for pornmovies, everything where I could compose music for pictures. In 2002 I got together with André Abshagen to do a soundtrack for a science-fiction-movie for kids. Abshagen then also produced the title track for the second ep TOO MUCH SPACE TO WALK AWAY. The single was reviewed very well and got some airplay, but sales were a bit low for a potential hit single.
In 2004/2005 I did more and more music for films letting the avocadoclub sleep. It must have been early in 2005 that I felt the urge again to put out a new record. And this time, this I knew, it better had to be an album.
As my tv-royalties had paid off quite well I was able to buy myself shares of a Studio here in berlin. Suddenly, I wasn’t forced anymore to limit my time in the studio for budget reasons, I had as much studio time as I wanted.
The work for EVERYBODY’S WRONG began. Over the next 6 months I put down the tracks mostly by myself, with a few guest appearances here and there. And, what can I say? I sorted out mediocore songs and filtered songs till I found I had a good pop-record. And I think that’s what I did. But there was something missing: a band feeling. I was tired of my Ivory Tower. I asked Martin Petersdorf if he would join the avocadoclub as a drummer. He eventually said yes and we found the other bandmembers pretty quickly. We started rehearsals december 2005. March 2006 saw the avocadoclub back on the road again.
"Too much space to walk away" which became the radio-single for the longplay-debut "Everybody's Wrong" became a little hit this time, staying on top of the Berlin Radio-1-Airplay-Charts for three weeks. The Album got reviewed very well and even sales were quite satisfying this time.
In the beginning of 2007 we had already played some liveshows in Germany, and new songs popped up in my head, so the work for the new album began. Having done most of my previous music by myself I wanted to change ways in the studio. So, instead of multitracking and overdubbing everything by myself, I got in the studio with Drummer Daniel Grindstead who nowadays plays with the Band Monoland but also used to be drumming in what was my first band as a singer: The Pale Puppets.
So, currently things are worked out in the studio, to get the second album on tape. We hope for a release sometime next Spring. Stay tuned. (last updated 11/14/07)
Bendrik Muhs
