Open Wide::Coney Island Film Festival

It is my pleasure to announce that the music video for Open Wide has been chosen as an official selection of The Coney Island Film Festival.

Thank you to Rob Martin, everyone at Bizarre F.A.R.M., The Gender Offenders, Brian Maschka, Marc Carpentier, Kim Levering, Carrie Thomas, and Laura Oltman.


The festival is September 28th-30th.
More details to come..

Losing it for Art

This last week was full of excitement, stress and more coffee than any human stomach should have to endure. On Friday I sort of had a breakdown if that's what you would call it. Maybe it was a panic attack. I'm not sure.

On Saturday I officially lost my mind and was strapped into a straight jacket. I was thrown around by the nurses pictured here, at one point hitting my head hard against a wall. I realized why the cells are padded and just how hard it is to have mobility and sanity in the confines of a straight jacket.

I will never forget nurse Veronica or Nurse Betty or for that matter the hospital administrator with an iron fist. They thought they could keep me locked up, but they were wrong.

A note from Kim Levering

Kim Levering, Robert German, Julia Carl (taken at the Abbey in LA)
Valentine's Day 06

Have you ever had a friend that you didn't know that you had? Because you took advantage of a connection simply because the signal was so strong? I have... But these situations, real and otherwise, fantasy and what we want our realities to be, have shown me several things. I look forward and I can give no answers... I speculate. I speculate on cue. And it's the people that understand that fact, the ones who don't expect answers either, that you look to for conversation. Reason being? No answer is scripted. No future is planned. No outcome is what we want. And I respect this is in all of my closest friends. Now... I... can... Escape... with the best of them. Like I'm doing right now. But the sincerity of which I represent myself is this particular moment... and in it... I have a good friend. I am, at the very bottom line, so happy with that. I can say... that this is true... and nothing right now clouds my thinking other than this. Laugh.. go ahead. Cheesey yes... yes it is. Real to me. What about you right now? I'm happy and pleased with the genious who came up with the idea of cliche... because that's basically a snap shot right? Well... here's my snap shot, my cliche. And it probably doesn't mean that much because I have a head full of crazy... and tomorrow I'll look back at this and I'll laugh, and pretend that in this moment it wasn't real. But the cliche that I WAS speaking of is this... All we have is this moment... The future is a step forward, the past, a step behind... and sometimes can't see where I am. I feel fortunate that people, the ones, who see the direction in which I am going, in which they are going, can point out the obvious. And that doesn't happen all that often. This is what I'm thankful for... Robert is one of those people who just simply gets it. And for that, I'm grateful to even have the good fortune of meeting him. Stars align and stuff... blah.. Blah... blah. You'd want to know this guy too. Simply on the same page. Too much the same. Too recognizable. Too cool...


-A NOTE FROM ROBERT-

I met Kim Levering at a place called the Gowanus Lounge. It is the first place where I was able to pluck up the courage to get on stage and sing songs that I had written. I saw her sitting there, attentive, smiling. Her brother, Rich was bartending, or rather smoking a joint in the basement while poor Matt Katz, a fellow musician was teaching himself to mix drinks, quite unsure of where to put the money the customers were shoving at him... in fact quite unsure of what to charge for the drinks he was poorly concocting.

The Gowanus' open mic became a bit like a home to me and Kim and I grew to be good friends. She is a blessing to my life like many others who have graced me with their time and their beauty.

Had it not been for the encouragement of her and others I would not have gone from tentatively plucking my strings to confidently writing and playing what I feel. I am nothing without my friends. They are the ones who catch me when I fall and hug me when I succeed.

I believe that life, though sometimes strange and complicated, has a rhyme and it has a reason. People enter our lives for a purpose. We are given gifts in mysterious packaging. I appreciate all of the things that I am given. If I have 2 pennies in my pocket and nothing in the bank, I am still wealthy beyond what I could ever hope for.

I had previously blogged that there is a razor thin line that separates me from the homeless man. My friend Chris immediately emailed me to make me realize that the razor thin line I speak of stretches across this country like the great wall of china. You can see it from outer space. I have beautiful souls to catch me when I fall. I dedicate my music to these amazing individuals who stoke the fires of my soul.

SoHo, Chinatown, Brooklyn, Today

SOHO-Last evening I had drinks in SOHO with the lovely miss Kim Levering. It was such a beautiful evening so, we sat outside next to chattering French girls. Apparently we chose the intersection I now will think of as hotdog cart highway. Somewhere in the ballpark of ten hotdog carts passed by as we sat enjoying the perfect weather and disconnected conversation.
As we were sitting, we were approached by a small boy holding a piece of paper, followed by his father who was pushing a stroller. The very cute little boy handed the paper to kim who began to read... "I have 6 children to feed..."

Kim: You have 6 kids to feed? You're a little young to have 6 kids.

She reached into her pocketbook and pulled out a fistfull of change and handed it to the boy as the father looked on. It broke my heart to look at this little boy with his big brown eyes. I found myself filled with anger that I wanted to direct at the father. He was using his child to beg for him. He did not have the balls to beg himself. This poor child with his innocence, exploited by his father.

The little boy skipped over to the father, handed him the change, and then moved on to the next group of people on the street. The father followed, pushing the stroller. Coming down the block was a woman holding a child and pushing a stroller followed by twin girls wearing kicky red matching outfits. The twins like the boy were approaching people on the street with a similar note. The two scenes merged and there they were together, the two parents and the 6 children...strolling off into the sunset.

CHINATOWN-After our SoHo drinks, Kim and I walked down to chinatown, our hunger doing the steering. We passed the fishy smelling shops with unidentifiable sea creatures crawling around in their tanks and the crazy fruit carts parked outside with all kinds of fruit that look much like they were picked on mars and brought back to our planet for their exotic appeal. We settled at a Malaysian restaurant on Baxter street and shared a noodle dish.

Along comes a woman who looks about 80 wearing an outfit that can only be described as a Vietnamese rice picking uniform, hat and all. She is balancing bags on a broomstick over her back, which she is using to separate the different types of recyclables. Pure brilliance, she was. She looked as though she had worked hard all her life and that it would take a strong wind to ruffle her feathers. I don't know her, but I respect her. I also can't do this scene justice because it was more surreal than I can properly explain.

BROOKLYN

I ended my evening,hanging out with a group of friends, some of whom I haven't seen in quite a while. All in all it was a great day...gotta love New York :)

TODAY
This morning I chatted with my mother about everything and nothing including the fact that my grandmother is turning 85 this weekend.

I spoke with Carrie (Carrie Thomas, not my sister)about our weekend plans. She just updated her photos on her flickr site and I'm in love with this picture of the New York Skyline taken from a cab.

The lovely Carrie Thomas is a fellow Brooklynite and additionally she is a very talented writer, photographer, and Jacqueline of all trades. I think her photography really captures New York and the soul of her subjects and yet always has a sense of humor.

ooh... I was excited to discover this morning that Logo Online wrote a little snippet about the single. Yay! :)