King Tuff
Wohlwillstraße, 2012
“How are you doing?”, asks a young man passing by King Tuff in the nightly streets of Hamburg. Vermont-bred and now L.A.-based Kyle Thomas is obviously taken by surprise. How often do you bump into a fan like this? Even though this was an enjoyable incident in the brimming street, King Tuff wants to make sure that there won’t be people staring at him while doing a solo-acoustic performance. This man plays massive rock shows, yet proves to be shy and reluctant when performing offstage in public. So we’re heading for some quieter and brighter spot and although Kyle again shows his highly sensitive side (“I don’t want to disturb the flower lady. It might be akward, don’t you think?”), we finally push him into the flower shop, where he politely introduces himself and even jokes with the shop owner. A supersensitive rock artist who is doing a delicate acoustic performance amidst a sea of flowers supervised by an elderly flower lady – a rather unusual setting! In line with this special situation King Tuff keeps singing: “I’m going deeper to the unusual world.” The flower lady honors the performance with a “Wuff!” and then explains that this was not her style of music, even though she somewhat enjoyed it. When she mentions that it was too soft to her and that she prefers hard rock, King Tuff smilingly invites her to his rock show.
- Camera
- Michael Luger
- Sound Recording
- Sarah Brugner
- Post production
- Sarah Brugner
Wohlwillstraße
In the heart of St. Pauli, between the bustling Reeperbahn and Schanzenviertel, lies Wohlwillstraße with a rather rural charm. Running from Clemens-Schultz-Straße to Thadenstraße it starts as a small cobbled street and gets broader at its end. The tree-lined street is home to various small-sized shops, bars and cafés like Lockengelöt (where you get new products made out of garbage), Kandie Shop (selling sweets, old-school ghettoblasters and more) or Kleine Pause (a Bistro that is said to have some of the best snacks – French fries, burgers, hot dogs – in town). At the very end of the street amidst some green space lies the great venue Grüner Jäger. So no wonder that Wohlwillstraße has become a popular hang out spot in the neighbourhood: Animated, but not too busy! Relaxed, yet still something going on! The street even has its own fb page.