In this section (Music, Michael Schenker, UFO):

Michael Schenker/UFO

2000-11, UFO in Germany (concert reviews and pictures)

2004-12-17, Michael Schenker with Siggi Schwarz in Germany (picture gallery)

2009-09-11, Michael Schenker Group at Zwolle/NL (pictures)

2009-11-28, UFO at Reitwein/DE (pictures)

Links

Music

Music was very important all my life since I listened to the Pink Floyd releases "Animals" and "Wish You Were Here" that my sister owned (I persuaded her later to cede them me). Also "The Wall" was an important release to me. A bit later I recovered Hardrock/Heavy Metal music in the early eighties. I listened to the "Monday Evening Rock Show" broadcasted by BFBS every week where John Bennet presented new releases along with classics, taping what I liked. In 1983 I noticed Michael Schenker for the first time. This is a bit surprising since I live in Hannover all my life and the hometown of the Schenker family (Sarstedt) is only a few kilometers from Hannover. John Bennet played tracks like "Ready To Rock" and "Captain Nemo" and I liked them very much. At that time I didn't really like the UFO tracks he played ("Young Blood" is one track I remember) and I didn't discover the older UFO tracks with Schenker yet. Thus I became more a die-hard MSG fan at that time.

Unfortunately I missed to see MSG and UFO in concert at that time (I did not even saw the legendary "Rock Pop in Concert" on the German television) and then both groups disappeared from the Rock'n'Roll-circus for several years.

Anyway I kept buying all the records I found. I was very much impressed by "Strangers In The Night", "Force It", "Phenomenon" and the first MSG-album. This is not at all unusual but I rarely find UFO-fans who also like the first two records called "1" and "Flying" as well. "Boogie For George" - hits the German charts in 1971 - was regularly played in a disco in Hannover ("Röhre") even in the late 80s. This track and all the stuff from "Flying" and the "Japan Live" really turned me on (and still does).

Now I am more a "die hard" UFO than MSG fan. I didn't like most of the tracks Schenker did record with Robin McAuley in the late 80s and early 90s and I am also not a fan of acoustic tracks. I prefer distortion sound.

After listening to music all the time the wish raised to play guitar myself. I bought a cheap Flying V copy (Sunrise) and started to practice. Later I switched to a Gibson Flying V and an ENGL amplifier (see picture). Nowadays I manage to play some of my favorite tracks ("Rock Bottom", "Hot'N'Ready", "Lights Out", ...) but my playing is still poor.