Biography

1996

The band Tunes for the takin' was originally founded in april '96 by Klaus Michel (guit), Achim Wendling (dr), Dirk Bleisinger (bass). In summer '96 Catherine Klier (voc) joined the band. Three weeks after that, the first EP "Little Desires" was recorded.

 

 

1997

Pablo Lachmann (bass) joined in december '96. After the winning of a local contest and after playing about 30 appearances, the Longplayer-CD "Naked-Jealousy" was recorded. At the same time another contest hosted by SWF3 (national radiostation) was won. After that we played as support for BAP (german rock-band from Cologne), Fools Garden and Bell, Book & Candle.

 

1998

In february '98 the EP "La narration du film et la chanson de Noel" was released. In spring and summer '98 we played some club appearances and some Open Airs, with Blues Brothers 2000, Alan Parson Live Project, Brings (Rock from Cologne-once again!) and Cardiacs (from GB). A 7-Track EP, called "Birds and Aeroplanes" has been recorded, it contains songs of Bob Dylan, Led Zepplin, Tom Waits, Ron Sexsmith and David Bowie transformed into our own style. It was released September '98.

 

1999

In june Marco Steffen took the place of Achim Wendling on the drums. In august we've been in the studio, to record three Songs, which can be heard on MP3.com and played some gigs here in Germany. We've participated in the "Rondevouz" tribute sampler and recorded Lisa Germano's "Tomorrowing" for another Tribute-CD. In Dezember we've been in the studio again, to record another three songs, one of them is "For the beauty of Wynona", written by Daniel Lanois.

 

2000

We've released our EP Welcome in April 2000 and the the Daniel Lanois song we covered is relased on "The unbreakable chain", which is available in the US and on www.amazon.com. In Summer we played some shows (and one open air as suppurt for HIM and Clawfinger) and continued to record our new cd, which is finished and released in december.

 

2001

After the release of our album 'Unknown' in 2000 we got some great response from the german magazine Gitarre&Bass. They interviewed us and they did a review of our new CD. After playing some performances, we recorded another song in april, called 'La rue'. It possibly will be released on our next album, which is planned for 2002. In Summer Klaus Michel released his soloalbum 'Sketches', which mainly was recorded by Klaus and Pablo in Keidelheim. In the same time we wrote about 25 new songs for our next CD, the results of testing some of them on our live audience have been positive. :o) Daniel Rössen, our live mixing assistant moved to Munich and now Jochen Lanz took his place. Some of the auttum performances have been recorded on 16-Track and video for later releases.

 

2002

In early 2002 we released the selftitled Album 'Tunes for the takin'' containing 15 Songs, including 3 tracks recorded live. Paeng Distribution became our new distributor, which basically means, that our CDs are available at your local record store, at Amazon and their likes. Gitarre&Bass, beneath others, did a positive review of our album, claiming that we're definitively a cool band. ;o) You may say that the album sounds more matured and consistend in style than it's predecessors. Cathi became a mother in January, but we decided to continue as band and do numerous live shows which finally became the flash point for Cathi to leave the band. By the turn of the year the Tunes where without a singer, but the rest of us where confident to find a new one, which we finally did.

 

2003

After many rehearsals with different probands, Manuela Burgard joined the band. Her singing style, her abilities and her personality just fits our image. After one month we did a first show and after a few months we did a whole new CD called 'The night is long', which is recorded, with exception of one track, and mixed (once again) at Peter's studio in Neuwied. It contains 9 Tracks and covers the whole bandwidth that the music of Tunes for the takin' provides. The musical concept of the album reminds more of the album 'Unknown' than it's direct predecessor. And even if it's recorded in a similiar short period of time like the 2002 album, the tracks and the arrangements sound more spontaneous. After the release (once again on Paeng Distributions) we played about 15 shows, mainly in Rheinland-Pfalz, but some also in France. In late 2003 we started to record our next album.

Pablo Lachmann

© Tunes for the takin' / Pablo Lachmann