mellody

U2 in front of the brandenburg gate... best part of the show so far imo. though i'm not particularly a fan of U2. but they're just a legend.

i want one of those walls, that's cool!

she's lovempls on here, fab costume in la+oakland!

haha love it how on the chat everyone keeps discussing whether gaga is in berlin or london, and she says she's in NY!

ah thanx... never heard of him or of that show, but he was nice to look at.

who was this guy (not the presenter, the other one...)? he's quite goodlooking!

i wouldn't blame him, seems like everyone there is drunk/drugged, and well, this show in general is just so not mika at all!

yup, i think backstreet boys weren't on the red carpet either, right? and now they're there.

maybe he just didn't feel like red carpet and went in through the back entrance or something. guess we might see it when best male nominations are read.

than you after how many beers? thanx anyway.

posted by lilli on the german forum: http://www.focus.de/kultur/musik/pop-phaenomen-mika-ich-bin-kein-bluff_aid_446323.html i'll just translate the interview, the beginning is just a little introduction, nothing new. sorry for any strange english, feel free to correct me if anything sounds totally stupid. FOCUS Online: Mika, your new album is called “The Boy Who Knew Too Much“. What exactly did you know too much? Mika: I was a boy who dealt with grown-up-problems very early. I've been working as a musician since I was 12 and that had a lot of influence on the way I see and value things in life. FOCUS Online: Would you say that you feel older compared to other 26-year-olds? Mika: Yes. Sometimes I feel really old compared to others of the same age, who see a lot of things more naively because they don't have this pressure. Because no-one expects anything special from them. But I also have the advantage of seeing life totally differently because of my creative job. As an artist you live out fantasies that are similar to those of a child. You do what you enjoy and are very happy if you're successful with it. So from that point of view I feel younger than many of my friends of the same age. Somehow the saying is true: You're always as young or old as you feel. FOCUS Online: Were you scared of the second album? Especially since you suddenly got famous over night and had to jump in at the deep end? Mika: I was. There is this known curse of the second album, and every artist is scared of it. If the first album was especially successful, there is an immense pressure from all sides. The record company of course wants to repeat this success and you don't want to deliver a worse job either than on your last album. This puts many musicians into a crisis, which can only result in a bad album because you make too many compromises. So I thought about what would really help me on and drew the following conclusion: It doesn't make sense to write songs that make my fans, my critics or my label happy. I have to write songs that first of all make me happy. Because only if i stand behind my work 100 percent, fans and critics can take me seriously. FOCUS Online: If you were aware of that, did you keep this danger in mind all the time? Did you think about what you could do to not fall into this trap? Mika: First of all, I listened to all the second albums of all kinds of artists and realized that the most important thing for me is to not think too much. For example, from the point of view of a grown-up there are a thousand reasons not to make a video like "We Are Golden". Many people see this as embarrassing, childish or just daft. But it's huge fun for me. If every time I would think for ages about which reasons speak against my work, I wouldn't be the person I am and I want to be. And especially I'd never get any results. FOCUS Online: So you're saying that many artists pretend to be someone they're not, to have success? Mika: Yes, because one doesn't let them be like they really are. Believe me, it's not always easy to be Mika, but I always told myself: Stay who you are, even if the critics slag off your work. I know that I polarize, because i bring up things that other people would never speak about. Behind this, there are often quite dark thoughts that you don't see on the first look, because I hide them behind this colourful clownish image. But it's this image that guarantees me the attention of my audience, who realizes on the second look: The guy actually has something to say. He doesn't just fool around because he couldn't find a proper job. FOCUS Online: Do your critics realize that as well? Mika: The criticism in my case isn't as bad as you could think. I've often been accused of being a bluff, someone who plays the clown because this niche isn't occupied by anyone else at the moment. but i'm not a bluff. but if you look at my critics - and i'm reading lots of them (interesting... didn't he say in another interview that he doesn't read much of what is written about him?) - you'll see that of 5 reviews I'm currently getting 4 positives and 1 negative. If they'd really see me as a polarizing, questionable piece of art, then the media feedback would surely be at least two and a half bad critics. So I'm not doing that badly.

i knew this sounded familiar. they copied this article: http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2544212 t4p anyway, great to get a picture with it!

well, maybe you get your chance on the german tour next year. where did you say you were going, was it stuttgart? the thread for it is here: http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20035, just add yourself on the RSVP list if you're going. not many answers in there yet, lol! but there are some people from the german forum coming as well, so we'd be happy to meet you there! he was quite tired and exhausted in baden-baden, because he just returned from USA/Mexico and has a bad jetlag, and he has to take painkillers for the show because of his hurt foot. so chances are good that you might catch him in a better mood on the german tour. he's always very sweet+lovely+polite to his fans, but there wasn't much time to chat in baden-baden, understandably.

auch hier nochmal herzlich willkommen im MFC! if you want to meet other german fans on here, that's the thread for it: http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13559&page=305 and, well, a lot of those who have been to any mika gigs, have met him, as he tries to meet his fans after the gigs as often as he can, so sweet of him! you'll find reports about the meetings in the gig report threads. for example, our reports about baden-baden are here: http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20287 (mine & kate's on page 9, mariposa's on page 12/13)

that smiley cracks me up every time i see it! it really should be included in the mfc smileys!

possible... and he might do some promo in germany. though i really hope he has a few days off, to rest his leg and get rid of his jetlag! it's a strange schedule actually, that he was in paris yesterday and will be there again on the 10th... couldn't they do that in one day (or 2 consecutive days)?! btw, he seems to be a bit tired of twitter nowadays... hope it's just because he's tired and all, and not because he's fed up with twitter, i always love reading his tweets! even if it's just a "YO!"

i knew that about the prizes like music+videos, which are not limited... but do we know for sure if it's also true for the limited prizes? if it is, then i'm wondering about that 150.000 points person, they would've gotten 2 of the big prizes by now but the mikasounds team still isn't sure whether they're cheating? about the comments, you can report them if they're inappropriate, and i think if this feature is used by many, the mikasounds team will be able to recognize which users keep writing nonsense to collect points. ok well i don't know how well this feature works, i have reported a smiley comment that was posted 10x, but haven't checked back whether they deleted it. it can work though, if they are watching it. well, it says somewhere on the site that they'll be checking where the person got the points from for the big prizes... so if they do their work properly, i don't think it'll work that someone buys 20 of the same t-shirt and gets all the magic numbers for it, as it is clearly stated that pooling the points is not allowed. about the pictures, at least they're aware of the problem meanwhile, as they've added another point to the image upload rules: 2. Images, whether photographs or pictures, should be produced by the person uploading them this wasn't there a few weeks ago, so let's hope they're working on the problem. i still think they should add the possibility to report pictures, like comments, so you can report it if someone's uploading your pix. as i said, i think the whole thing can work, they just need to get it right.

thanx for this! i remembered sth yasmine said while looking through the paintings for sorrow book... when she saw sasje's lady jane pic, she asked whether the guy on the pic was mika: i didn't get it at that moment and just said "i don't know", but as she seemed to find it very funny, i guess she meant his stalking tendencies, lol!

hey, a faves song thread i haven't posted on yet? lol. the order keeps changing and song nr. 5 as well, but atm, it is: 1. touches you 2. pick up off the floor 3. good gone girl 4. one foot boy 5. blame it on the girls (or rain or wag or dr john, depending on my mood. )

hi, pearlsRdiamonds, welcome to the forum! i think what sabine meant was that you can open an introduction thread here: http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=3 - so if you want, do it, but it was also great to read here how you got to go to the swr3 concert. i was there as well, the crazy girl in the pink dress in the front row, lol. if you have any questions about the forum, feel free to ask me. there are still tickets available for all the german gigs next year, so it should be no problem for you to get them. thanx so much for the AVIs, much better quality than the flv. and good to know that it was the stream that froze and not my player, i thought there was sth wrong with my player again, as it often does strange things. and as someone asked about youtube, don't think the streamed gig is on there, but i've uploaded my personal videos from the gig on youtube, for a list see the other gig thread (http://www.mikafanclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20287&page=14) the end of happy ending is also on there (but not the beginning of billy brown, sorry...).

hehe, i like this. about the cheating with tickets... i don't think it's a problem if occasionally you buy one for a friend and use their magic numbers or if you find out you can't go after all and have already used your codes... i mean, who cares about 5000 points more or less, if you need 500.000. it's just not fair if someone does it on purpose and buys tickets for every show or many tickets for the shows they're going to, in order to sell or not use them. of which the latter is also unfair towards those who might not be able to get tickets anymore if the show sells out. i agree that it's about money... but i think mika's plan is to get away from it, i don't think he wants it to be about money, but about those who support him most. ok this does involve money, as in travelling + buying tickets, cd's etc.. but first, his plan is to give magic numbers for MFC posts (for those who haven't read about this, he told me once when i met him). tbh, i'm not sure they can realize it, but that's what mika would like to see. and second, they've started giving away magic numbers as prizes for competitions, like the wag video comp. or the US competition (for which you only had to go to one gig to be able to win i think?)... if they do more stuff like that, also those who can't spend a lot of money will be able to get one of the bigger prizes. i agree, probably not the private gig... but that's something that'd still be the ultimate dream for someone who has already seen/met mika a zillion times. and you can't buy it with money alone, you also need to have patience and spend this money over several years (probably) until you get to the 500.000 points. AND be faster than most of the others who take part in the magic numbers system, as there'll only be 5 winners of the private gig, iirc. something i'm still wondering, do we know yet whether from the 100.000 points prizes on, you'll lose the points if you want the prize? it'd make sense, otherwise the winners of the private gig would get all the other stuff as well... and in case anyone's wondering: i'm not even in the top 10 (ok i'm close, but not yet... ), although i really travel a lot & upload many pix+videos... i think you also have to spend a lot of time on mikasounds.com, commenting all the pix+vids you can find, and tbh i prefer to spend my time on the forums.

aaand finally, here are my videos... some different perspectives from the swr3 stream, and also viewable without a flv player. i uploaded mainly the talking bits though, as i didn't record much of the songs and what i recorded of them was shaky, as i had lots of space to dance, lol. talk about painkillers/quiet audience before SITM/SITM intro (sorry missed a bit in between): first verse+chorus of pick up off the floor: (love it when he looks directly into my camera! )beginning of dr john (incl. talk/crowd singing): biotg crowd competition (really funny with jimmy+imma in the crowd, lol! ): mika mentions david's piano solo and parts of happy ending: talk about how foot injury happened and band introduction: lollipop intro drumming, with jimmy having fun with that bin and mika drumming on his brace: haha i only noticed that when talking about the quiet audience after saying "only kidding" he was like "right?" towards the audience, lol, so funny!

ok here are the concert pix by graciosa and by me: http://www.mikafanclub.de/bilder-badenbaden.php . videos in next post. some of my fave pix: i forgot to zoom out when i took this one - not cut, lol! the following pix are by graciosa:

i like the avi better as well... but there's freeware for flv, just download+install it: http://flv-player.softonic.de/download

ok well i did record what they aired on the radio tonight, some of the songs from yesterday's gig (about 1hr), but the online player kept leaving out a few seconds every now and then, so it's not that much fun to listen to... and watching the vids is probably better anyway. so in case anyone particulary wants this recording, let me know, then i'll upload it... but otherwise i won't bother, guess there are enough better recordings of this gig.