Admin Mona Wagner
AdminForum Replies Created
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Thanks Howard! At the moment we’re using every spare minute to work on new music and videos but we could put together a bloopers reel at some point later down the line …
🙂
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I can totally relate, Mike! I got a red drum set the same year that Lisa got her guitar, which is something I’ll never forget! The parcel was huge, of course, and as soon as I spotted it next to the tree, I got butterflies in my stomach!
I found the clip of me opening the parcel, it was Christmas of 2004. I was 10 years old at the time …
What I remember about this drum set even more specifically, was when Dad and I assembled it the day after. There was an overwhelming amount of screws, drumheads and hardware for a 10-year old, and I was so in awe when the whole thing finally stood there. For me, Dad was an absolute genius for knowing how to assemble it!
One other present I can remember freaking out about was when we were surprised with the fact that we were going to the USA for the first time. That must have been Christmas 2006!
Michaela and Dad put the flight tickets under the tree. It didn’t look like much – two white envelopes. But when we opened them we just about lost our marbles. 🙂
By then we’ve become a little obsessed about America and what we imagined it to be like. Together with a school friend of ours I would study the American map, memorize all state names and fun trivia. Again, little did we know that the videos we would end up filming there a year later, would mark the beginning of our video/YouTube journey.
Mona
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Hi Jung!
Sorry that I didn’t reply to this question much earlier. Halloween has long come and gone now but I’d still like to answer your questions. Thanks for your patience! 😉
When we were kids, Halloween was just beginning to catch on in Europe. Prior to the 90’s it wasn’t really celebrated in Austria but with the influence of American culture rising, “Trick or Treating” and Halloween parties started popping up when we were in primary school.
I presume people were simply adopting what they saw on television so that’s what we did – we dressed up as witches or ghosts and would walk around our village asking for candy and then return to whoever was hosting the party and eat it all! How we didn’t get sick is a miracle to me, but 8-year olds have surprisingly strong stomachs when it comes to sugar 😀
Personally, I’ve always loved Halloween simply for the fact that I really enjoy dressing up and putting on crazy makeup 😉 Both of us have only ever dressed as something scary. It’s only recently that I’ve found out that in America, the UK (and maybe Canada too?) people don’t necessarily stick to just “spooky” costumes anymore. Apparently it can be anything these days?
We actually have a separate holiday in Austria when we dress up, which has a much longer tradition. It’s called Fasching (carnival) and we celebrated it every year in our village when we were kids. I think the “Fasching Season” starts on the 11.11. (November) at 11.11am and ends the night before Ash Wednesday in February (I think). To be honest, I’ve never completely understood the origins and exact rituals and I think they vary greatly from region to region.
But I remember that the village would organise a get together every year where all the kids would dress up in different costumes. We’d play musical chairs, cops and robbers, hide and seek … all the classics.
I dug out a picture of when I went as a parrot and Lisa went as a cat (2002)!
🙂
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Hi Angelo!
I usually use regular Hohner “Blues Harp MS”s for most common keys, I think it’s also what I used for the Starman recording. There are a couple of Marine Bands and Pro Harps in my collection but the regular ones with the wooden core sound perfect in my opinion so I tend to stick to those.
I have been playing a bit more on them recently and have been messing around with new sounds, so I’m thinking about playing one in an upcoming Duo Session early next year. 🙂
Have a groovy evening,
Mona -
Hi Tony,
Welcome to the MLT Club, we’re glad you joined us! We had a nose around your website – it seems like you’ve had an exciting, music-filled life in different shapes and forms, that’s wonderful.
We’ll try and tune in to a show one week! Thanks a lot for playing our music and those of other independent artists. If ever you’ve got a particular show lined up for which you’d like us to tweet out the streaming link, please shoot us an email or send us a tweet! 🙂
We appreciate the support and hope you’ll enjoy your time here!
Groovy greetings from all of us!
Mona
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Hi Paul, hi David!
We are so sorry you never read your birthday email, what a bummer!
We just checked our “sent” folder and saw that we did send out a birthday surprise to both of you on the right day, so maybe it landed in your spam folder? Could you please check and let us know?
For both of you we sent it to the email address that you use to access the Club.
If many people get their special email in the junk/spam folder we’ll definitely have to figure out what to do about it!
What a shame that our birthday surprise didn’t work out but thank you so much for mentioning it here so we are aware of it. If you can’t locate the missing email we’ll resend it to you straight away – hopefully it will still make you smile. 🙂
Lots of groovy peace & love from us (and now, a belated Happy Birthday!),
Mona & Lisa -
Servus, Jürgen!
I will keep my reply in English so everyone else can read along, too, but it’s really nice to hear you are from Germany! I had never heard of Moers but I just googled it – the closest we’ve ever been to was Cologne when we took a trip many years ago to see Paul McCartney live in concert …and check out “Musikkeller Dorsten” for our red Vintage Höfner bass and Framus …).
Speaking of Paul … The Beatles brought a lot of us here together, so you are in very good company! 🙂 Lisa and I for once, probably would not be musicians today, if it wasn’t for us falling in love with their music in our teens. What a legacy!
I loved your post, thank you so much for all of the very kind words and the insight in your life.
Have a groovy time here and thank you for the support,
Mona
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Hi Steve!
That was quite the journey of how you ended up here but we couldn’t be happier to welcome you to the Club and are glad you made it! 😉
We thoroughly enjoy reading things like that, it gives us an idea of what happens way before people ever decide to click “send” on a message or buy one of our albums. The fun real-life details!
As much as we love covering our favourite music, writing songs is what it truly comes down to for us (and what you’ll get to hear much more of next year) so we extra appreciate your words about those. ♥
Thanks for helping us make beautiful things by joining the MLT Club!
Stay groovy,
Mona & Lisa -
Hi Angelo! Yes, I’m sure 🙂
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Hi David,
That made our day, thank you for taking the time and saying hi (and your reply to the birthday post!)! Once the Christmas albums are sent out and the new release has calmed down, we’ll immediately take up working on ORANGE 2.0 again (that’s not actually the title, but we don’t have one yet ;-)) so we are as excited about the new record as you are.
To know that others across the world are going about their day, listening to our music is an incredibly rewarding feeling ♥
Lots of peace & love to Arizona,
Mona & Lisa -
Thanks, Mike!
We actually transpose quite a lot of covers to a different key. Especially if we play songs that were sung by men originally, which is the majority of the tunes we pick.
With Beatles it’s kind of funny … they had such a huge range and were comfortable singing in so many different keys that some of their songs suit our voices perfectly while others don’t work at all.
So we often have to change them until they are comfortable for us.
There isn’t really “one” key that always works for sure, it always depends on the melody.I hope you’re having a groovy day! 🙂
Mona -
That would probably have been one of the Steve Harley gigs. I think the biggest show we played with him must have been the Glastonbury show or one of the other open-air festivals like the Wickham festival, with thousands of people attending and watching. We don’t really have an exact number but our estimation is “lots” 🙂
We’re looking forward to Halloween, too! With all the Christmas album business going on, we probably won’t have time to do anything crazy this year, but we’ll think of some spooky pics to post.
After all, it’s still one of our favourite holidays of the year! 😉
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Hi John!
What a touching, interesting welcome post, thanks a lot for that!
It’s funny to us how so many people find us specifically because of the “Drive My Car” Cover, a video we never expected to do so well. Now it’s our 2nd most watched video and introduces thousands to our music each day … life is bizarre sometimes.
We are glad you came across it and decided to stay, and we can only say thank you for the kind compliments and your support here through joining the club.
We are very sorry to hear that you and your family have been struggling with health problems. Hopefully, things are on the up and we’ll keep trying to help create endorphins with our music as best as we can. It’s magical sometimes what a simple song can do to one’s mood and outlook.
All four of us send all the best, a big “hello” and an even bigger “thank you”.
Mona
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Hi Angelo!
Thank you, our legs have recovered by now and the bruises have faded! 😉
The Maton 12-string is an EM425C/12 and the 6-string is an EBG808CL “Performer”. Those model descriptions are a mouthful hehe. We love them both!
The black guitar in the “Knockin On Heaven’s Door” is a Line 6 “Variax acoustic 700”. We actually haven’t used it since that performance but it’s a guitar that can model and emulate various different tunings and sounds at the click of a button. For that particular song, we made it sound like a 12-string guitar.
They are no longer in production but are actually pretty cool, especially if you’re on a budget and want many different sounds (sitar, 12-string, nylon, western, …) all in one instrument.
Have a groovy rest of your weekend,
Mona -
After the filming of this video, I sued Lisa for aggravated battery and dragged her through a 2-year-long legal battle. She sued me back for my terrible sense of humor which I in turn blame on the brain trauma she inflicted on me that day. We eventually settled outside of court over some coffee and a sticky toffee pudding and she promised to never hit me with a hammer on the head again (yes, it was a real one).
Thankfully, all is well now.
😉