Kasalla

A short story about Kasalla

The ideas that two guys have around a kitchen table at 2 a.m. after a long party are not always really good. But what ex-"Peilomat" guitarist and songwriter Flo Peil and singer Bastian Campmann were planning became something: Kasalla.

Together with old and new companions Ena Schwiers, Sebi Wagner and Nils Plum, they jumped into the rehearsal room with the plan to combine the music they love with lyrics in their native language. Now, 10 years later, the crazy idea has really grown up.

Not least thanks to the chart success of their 2017 album "Mer sin eins". The band's fourth studio album went straight from 0 to number 5 in the German album charts, giving the band not only the first top ten ranking of their career, but also the highest chart entry for a Cologne band since BAP in 1981. The Cologne band's success story was crowned with another mega-highlight in 2018, as they were nominated for the German music award ECHO.

A story that seems even more surreal and fast-paced in a city like Cologne. Because the music scene there by the river and the cathedral is very intense, diverse and concentrated. Like the entire German pop landscape - compressed onto a beer mat.

"There are dozens of bands in Cologne that play dialect and can make a living from it, nobody believes you elsewhere when you tell them that," says singer Bastian Campmann. Such a lively, active dialect scene bordering on rock and pop is hard to imagine in other German conurbations. A phenomenon that would not be possible without carnival. What it actually means to be a member of a band whose music is an integral part of the repertoire of the fifth season is hard to imagine elsewhere. "During the carnival season, you play two hundred (!) times in just six weeks, that's around ten gigs a day," says drummer Nils Plum, outlining the workload between the beginning of January and mid-February, "but that also means you reach an incredible number of people".

The biggest live event so far, however, took place on September 9 and 10, 2016 to celebrate the band's fifth birthday. The first date in the LANXESS Arena, the city's largest venue with a capacity of 13,000, was sold out in no time at all, so Kasalla had to schedule a second date at the same venue. In the end, 26,000 (!) fans celebrated with the band on both days - and the musical guests of honor Gentleman, Carolin Kebekus and Von Brücken.

But the quintet has also become a veritable crowd-puller in the rest of Germany over the past four years. After performing in small clubs and pubs in front of 100 to 200 people on their first "excursion further afield" in 2014, the Cologne-based band has been regularly scratching the thousands mark nationally since the German tour in spring 2016.

regularly reaches the thousand capacity mark. Tours in fall 2017 and spring 2019 took the five boys to Switzerland and Austria for the first time, in addition to the territory they had already covered. A total of nineteen, almost all sold-out, stops were on the itinerary.

It's obvious that they can't (just) be scattered exiles from Cologne. "Of course there are Rhineland enclaves everywhere," says bassist Sebi Wagner, "but things have developed in such a way that sixty or seventy percent of people are now not connected to the Rhineland." Appearances on TV shows such as Ina Müller's ARD late-night show "Inas Nacht" (2013), ARD MoMa (2017) and ZDF "Volle Kanne" (2018) have taken the band even further afield.

The band's fourth studio album "Mer Sin Eins" was released on September 8, 2017. It is the follow-up to the longplayer "Stadt met K", which was released in February 2015 and reached number twelve in the Official German Charts. The mission was clear this time too. "We want to show people that the dialect doesn't impose any restrictions on the music on Ufftata - but rather expands the possibilities for making music," says guitarist Flo Peil, and the plan worked. As with its predecessors, "Mer Sin Eins" once again focuses on musical diversity. The band moves confidently and with playful ease between the genres of chanson, folk, electro and funk. "Our core business is and remains rock, of course, even with this record," emphasizes keyboardist Ena Schwiers. And of course the Cologne language. The dialect: the common thread that holds everything together.

And this common thread also works in unfamiliar, unexpected musical waters. The band proved this impressively in 2019 with two concerts in the venerable Philharmonie Köln that sold out in record time. With lovingly arranged versions and an orchestra, Kasalla were able to show a completely different side of themselves: "Nit esu laut"

After the Cologne Arena, the band's next, biggest and ultimate adventure took place in 2020: A concert in the RheinEnergieStadion. Over 37,000 tickets had already been sold - then a virus got in the way. Fortunately, however, an alternative date was found for the time after the silence: Kasalla will now celebrate their 10th anniversary on 17.6.2022 in the sold-out FC soccer stadium - and with their new studio album, which will be released just in time for the band's biggest concert.

Until then, Kasalla will be toasting their milestone birthday with a best-of album, which was released on 19.11. "10 years of Kasalla" - with all the hits of the 5 guys and some completely rearranged versions that once again move between styles. For example, the sad, beautiful, powerful rock ballad "Ich jonn kapott" with orchestra becomes a movie for the ears and "Pommes & Champagner" takes you back to the 1920s as a swing version.

In addition to looking back at what has happened in the past decade, there is also another current single, "Rudeldiere", which gets to the heart of how many people feel in the current situation. People are not made to be alone! Humans

are pack animals. They don't want to howl loudly at the moon alone. "There is one ? - We are many!"

This pack met K still has a lot planned!