Well, we had been planning a special shoot for months and it was originally supposed to be a Muscle Car Photoshoot with loads of rubber and guns…..

Then the model we had booked couldn`t  make the shoot, so we had to find another Model mega quick…

We said:
"Oh Shite".......
Enter Madlen, she said:
"Count me in 100%"
We said:
"Thanks Madlen, you saved the day......."

Then we get to the location and the Muscle cars are all in the wrong garage……. Errr…..Shit happens…..
However,  in the workshop where we wanted to shoot, an amazing 1924 Dodge Roadster Hot Rod was parked and waiting, with "SHOOT ME" written all over it.

Frank, the Boss at Special Cars, said "I thought you´d want to shoot the Hot Rod"….
In fact, he had a point, the Dodge looked really mean - it had seats with skull covers on it AND a skull mounted on the gear change.

To top it all, this dark machine had been christened  "Día de los Muertos"  (The Day of the Dead)….

So, OK, the Hot Rod was rolled into position, our Model, Madlen was made over by our make-up genius Jacky Blo and we took some test shots and ……WOOOOOAAAAH! just check that look!

In fact Madlen looked so cool with the Dodge, that I took way too many shots and spent about two weeks of my spare time working them all up for the BerlinBonez web site........
Anyway, WTF, it worked out mega cool, thanks to Frank, Madlen, Jacky and Miss Demeanour......

Check out all the pics from this shooting here:
Hot Rod / Cool Goddess

Check out all the cool Automobiles that Frank has to offer (and to rent) at Special Cars Berlin here:
Special Cars

What to do Saturday night in Berlin? ... Actually not really a problem in a city with more bars and clubs than I’ve had hot breakfasts. However I was banished from the flat last night and instructed by she who must be obeyed to come back "late"... So where to hang? Berlin’s best-known Rock and Roll nightclub "White Trash" is just round the corner, and I couldn’t be arsed to Google around checking what else might be on offer - So White Trash it was. 

Last night they were hosting THE REBELS OF TIJUANA from France and Berlin’s very own EAT LIPSTICK DJ TEAM.

THE REBELS OF TIJUANA

Les Garçons von THE REBELS OF TIJUANA hit the stage and cracked straight into a mega tight set showcasing their special brand of  60´s style yé-yé pop. The crowd loved these dudes and I lost count of the encores.. The set was spiced up by a guest appearance from one of the elegant Go-Go ladies from the EAT LIPSTICK DJ TEAM, giving the whole thing a typical Berlin flavour and proving Franco-German relations are in fact perfectly intact, despite the European debt crisis!

Check out the Rebels here on my space:  http://www.myspace.com/therebelsoftijuana

Next up the EAT LIPSTICK DJ TEAM hit the stage for a wild night of performance exotica featuring their very special version of "Paranoid".....

EAT LIPSTICK are (according to their Facebook Page):

ANITA DRINK :(Fashion Diva, Stage Diver, Vocals)

CLEA CUTTHROAT: (Fetish Vixen, Dancing Queen, Vocals)

THE SHREDDER:(The whole fucking band)

But last night they had a couple of delectable Go-Go Divas to make for a Mega Glam Spectacular!

Check out Eat Lipstick here on my space:  http://www.myspace.com/eatlipstick/music

Thanks to the White Trash team for yet another beer infested Good Taste Fest!.

BRIGHT is the absolute Mecca for all fans of streetwear and street culture. Since the trade show takes place in our home town, we thought it was time to take a peek at whats going on down there...
The whole thing takes place in a huge seventies building that , bizzarley enough, used to be an HQ building of the East German Secret Police, the STASI. If you´re into megalomanic monstrous pre-fab washed concrete buildings, then Normannenstrasse 19 is a must visit location for you when in the Hauptstadt. If you´re in Berlin when BRIGHT is on (twice a year) then you can kill two birds with one stone.

The Show takes place in a huge seventies building that , bizzarley enough, used to be an HQ building of the East German Secret Police, the STASI. If you´re into megalomanic monstrous pre-fab washed concrete buildings, then Normannenstrasse 19 is a must visit location for you when in the Hauptstadt. If you´re in Berlin when BRIGHT is on (twice a year) then you can kill two birds with one stone.

Whilst the glitzy "Bread & Butter" show in Berlin deals with the commercial side of general "liesure wear" (don´t you just love that phrase?) BRIGHT is much more about the fringes where street culture crosses over with atists and retail. Loads of more or less underground labels and skateboard pushers hang out there for a three day grunge-fest based around clothes you cant buy in a department store.

Parallel to the show theres a major skateboard contest "Above the Line"that was sponsored by "Relentless" this year.
Once the official contest is over and the glittery prizes have been awarded to the Pros. the field is opened for all and Berlin´s rolling teenage (or middle aged in some casses) dirt bags take centre stage doing their level best to get air borne on a small wooden plank with wheels on it.........that´s cool.....

Here´s the link to the OFFICIAL BRIGHT WEB SITE if you feel like checking it out.
Who knows, mybee next time, we´ll put up a stand and join in the grunge.

Its been silent for a while on the BerlinBonez Blog…Reason is we were hanging out in the US, spending a couple of weeks in Florida. Now you might think Florida is famous for gated communities full of conservative old age pensioners and in fact it IS. On the other hand I didn´t see any gated communities and the reason for the high numbers of  older people hanging out there is that the weather is Sun Sun Sun all year round and well, I can certainly relate to that.

In fact taking two weeks vacation and just cruising around with no particular place to go turned up some cool things to see and yes, great beaches (even without hitting the Keys).

One of my favourite places we got to see just by seeing a voucher in an advert at a diner was “Muscle Car City” at Punta Gorda.  Now, I´m a big fan of alternative energy and anything else that helps preserve our environment, but show me a big fat chrome clad American muscle car and certain logic circuits in my brain just get bypassed and I go into a trance like state of wonder and desire…..

“Muscle Car City” was then a bit like a mechanized high-octane acid trip for me, and it was difficult to get me out of the place. When I did come out I had that look in my eyes that said “I want one, I want one I, want one – and I want it NOW!” In fact if had had to choose one of these big OTT gas-guzzlers to take home I probably wouldn´t have been able to reach a decision in under a week or so. If pressed, however, I might well have gone for a black 1963 Corvette (yes they have most cars in different colours too…)

Muscle Car City is a private collection, put together by a guy called Rick Treworgy, who obviously has dedicated a large part of his life to collecting and restoring these relics of a time when men were men and women were , well, women I guess and more importantly gasoline was a throw away commodity powering the US economy into the stratosphere – thanks Rick. I wonder if, one day there will be an electric muscle car – who knows?

To make the trip extra cool, I was wearing a BerlinBonez “Manik Mechanix” T-Shirt (coincidence – I swear..) and the guy at the cash desk said “nice shirt-that looks cool”. Moments like that are very special.

Check out the Muscle Car City website here.

Just sometimes fate leads you along a path to something really cool.....
I was googling around checking out the Berlin Street Artist El Bocho (check the link here it´s a must).
El Boch does a character called "Little Lucy" - Lucy is, in my humble opinion, MEGA.

Anyway, Google, being what it is, guided me, via Amazon, to a band called "Gasmac Gilmore" who are , according to WIKI, originaly from Vienna and, strangely enough have an album called ( you guessed it, right? ) "Little Lucy". Eager to find out if there´s a connection, I headed off to U-Tube to check them out - and found this video which, I humbly suggest, is almost as MEGA as dear "Little Lucy" herself.
So, as non English speaking waiters the world over say, "ENJOY".....

 I just took a ride
in a silver machine
and I'm still feeling mean…..
(Hawkwind)

Berlin has some of the grooviest buildings around. Especially lovers of the 1970s can find all manner of weird and way out locations to check out.

I was out and about in Berlin's Wild West the other day and found myself outside the Berlin ICC. This is one of my favourite buildings in Berlin and so I popped in again to soak up the atmos…….

The ICC is a congress machine that lurks next to the city autobahn like a psychedelic Star Ship waiting to take guests on a cruise to the other side of the galaxy.

Built at the end of the seventies this masterpiece, which pretty near deserves the title “Gesamtkunstwerk”, has survived the years unmolested by “improvements”.





Walking up to this Leviathon can feel a bit like being in a scene from “blade runner” and there are funky tunnels that you half expect to see James Bond running out of persued by hundreds of guys in orange jump suits firing sub machine guns.

The enormous interiors are full of period patterned carpet, neon deco-lighting and funky information boards that would certainly not be out of place on the star ship enterprise. Everything is individually designed and styled and nothing just “off the shelf”. Even the toilets are a mini art work on their own.

Of course like most real works of art, the ICC has plenty of people who would like to see the back of it. There are repeated plans to rip it down and replace it with some bland new “functional, economic, and flexible alternative” (probably like the endlessly dreary and gross “0-2 Arena” here – and what a pile of sh*te that building is..)

You can get in and wander around on most days when there’s a trade fair ("Messe Berlin") on. So if you are in town, take the S-Bahn to “Westkreuz” station and check this mind bending space cruiser out, before the Maniacs and Philistines get their way.. …..

Link to Wiki for info (german)

Link to a very 70s film made about the ICC at the time it was built