Short version

Emotional and intensive pop songs, influenced by Pink Floyd and Coldplay up to Massive Attack… sometimes richly instrumented, then again reduced to the essential; sometimes electric and next time a little more acoustic...

Botany Bay are full of musical surprises. Impulsive, dynamic, not really tangible but at the same time present. With the accomplished use of musical instruments, sophisticated arrangements and breathtaking beautiful vocals and melodies, Botany Bay are touching the souls of their constantly growing fan base, on record as well as live on stage.

 

After one album and one EP, Botany Bay have become a constant part of the free music scene and are offering their music free of charge under a Creative Commons license on the internet... with more than ten thousands of downloads and podcast hits like “Voices”, “Feel” and “The Crow Song”.

Long version

1995

In the summer of 1995, Stephan Kleinert (then keyboardist and producer of the Karlsruhe based experimental pop group Ubik Paint) felt that he needed more space to realize his own musical ideas. Since Stephan’s visions of intelligent pop songs didn’t integrate too well with the Ubik Paint context – after all, Ubik Paint was primarily based on improvisation and experimentation –, Botany Bay was founded as a side project.

  In those early days, the band consisted of Stephan (playing almost all instruments) and Ina Blum* (who did the lead vocals).

  Ina was an old acquaintance, who had done sessions together with Stephan since 1992. They had recorded four songs when Stephan began to notice irritating changes in Ina. Sometimes she would stare into the void for minutes without blinking, or talk like she wasn’t herself, at all. When Stephan discovered the reason this strange behaviour it was already too late: Ina had joined Scientology during her first term of studying economics in Berlin. She had been alone and unoriented in Berlin and so had become an easy prey for a criminal psycho-cult. Her drastic changes were the result of so-called “auditing” sessions (Scientology-speak for brainwashing), pseudo-withdrawal treatments and other Scientology malpractice.

   Stephan was devestated, but the damage was already done and there was no way of bringing Ina back to the real world. His attempts to do so eventually led to Ina abandoning all contact with him (a well known Scientology strategy: Isolate the victims from everyone trying to help them).

*name changed for obvious reasons

  In 1996, a replacement for Ina was found via an advertisement in a local newspaper: Katrin Schmidt, the new Botany Bay lead vocalist, had no previous band experience, but mastered the task of re-recording Ina’s vocal parts with excellence, as well as adding her own interpretation to the already recorded four songs.

  What’s more, Stephan (who had by then become an active member of Germany’s anti-Scientology movement) and Katrin slowly transformed what started out as a loose collection of songs into a concept album, dealing with psychological dependence, religion, sects and the human need to believe and to be believed in.

  In the summer of 1997, “Tales Of The Bitter Seed” was, at last, released on the Ubisonic label. The album had been recorded at The Workshop in Karlsruhe (an idyllic ivy-covered barn which housed a small recording studio and admittedly the occasional rat) with the help of Stephan’s colleagues from Ubik Paint, yet sounded totally different from Ubik Paint’s offerings.

“Tales Of The Bitter Seed” was a mix of deep pop songs, fragile classical arrangements and elements borrowed from dark wave and electronic music, all interconnected thematically and musically... and it was a flaming manifesto against Scientology. By use of “unusual” instruments like harmonium and melodica, “Tales Of The Bitter Seed” defined a rather unique sound without being inaccessable.

  Unfortunately, three factors kept Botany Bay’s debut album from achieving more success than getting some praise from the local newspapers. #1, Ubik Paint were recording their second album “Love Bank”, which kept Stephan quite occupied. #2, Stephan had begun studying computational linguistics in Heidelberg, which kept him even more occupied, and #3, Katrin had gotten pregnant, so plans to do live performances and other promotion had to be cancelled.

  Dissatisfied with the meager success of “Tales...”, Stephan spent the following years recording music with Ubik Paint. In 1998, Stephan’s then girlfriend introduced him to vocalist Laura Dietrich. Stephan  recorded three promising demos with her, keeping the posibilty of a second Botany Bay album in the back of his head. But as Ubik Paint still was Stephan’s primary project, there was no time to follow up on the idea.

  In 2001, Ubik Paint self-destructed with the release of their 3rd album “Waiting For The Rain”; a short time later, Stephan relocated to Heidelberg (a move he says he’ll regret till the end of his days) to further his studies. The loss of friends and musicians (Ubik Paint had been both and were all going into different directions after the split), the loss of familiar surroundings plus increasing personal problems reduced Stephan’s musical output to zero for the next two years.

2003

  Still there was the problem of a proper recording studio: No longer having the luxury of an ivy-covered barn in the backyard, Stephan was forced to look for a new location to set up his gear.

   The first of several attempts to set up something at least resembling a studio was made at the storehouse adjacent to the “halle_02” (a then reasonably hip storehouse-turned-nightclub in Heidelberg). But although the landlords of the “halle_02”, one Hannes Seibold in particular, were used to stylize themselves as Heidelberg’s generous grand patrons of new art, they had no qualms exchanging the cylinder lock when Botany Bay and the other bands made it clear that were not prepared to pay the whopping 250€ a month that Hannes suddenly wanted – for a cramped, filthy little room without any sanitation or heating.

   Locking out Botany Bay (and locking in their instruments) threw the project back several months, as did the ensuing search for a new home. How beautiful and easy it all had been in Karlsruhe was to become a recurring theme of the new album – and, incidentally, of Stephan’s conversation.

2004

  The bohémian atmosphere of Dilsberg in general and the Café Pippifax in particular suited Botany Bay perfectly well. Although the jam sessions themselves had little to do with Botany Bay, they became a rich source of inspiration, with many of the new songs having their roots in a particular lick developed on one of those sessions.

2005

  Another big difference to the situation in Karlsruhe soon became apparent: When working with Ubik Paint in Karlsruhe, everyone involved had been completely devoted to making the project happen. In Heidelberg, Stephan had to literally beg his guest musicians to at least show up at the studio, which was a far cry from realizing themselves in the project.

   Since Laura was living in Berlin at the time while Stephan was still in Heidelberg, there was limited time for recording sessions. By using the internet to send pieces of recordings back and forth, Botany Bay managed to bridge the gap to some extent, although it was clear that much more came out of the infrequent “real world” sessions.

  Around this time, Botany Bay started to publish some of their new songs on garageband.com. Although never charting very high in the mainstream, Botany Bay earned numerous “Reviewer’s Picks Awards” in the categories Best Production, Best Female Vocals, Best Programming and Best Mood, as well as two Track Of The Day awards.

2006

  The project really took off when Laura moved from Berlin to Aachen to accept a teaching post. This move brought along the benefits of some 300 kilometers less distance between the two, as well as a children’s choir at Botany Bay’s disposal.

  By September 2006, Stephan’s studies of computational linguistics were finally finished. Writing his thesis and preparing for his final exams again had taken some speed out of Botany Bay and, as it soon turned out, looking for a job in Heidelberg was an equally unpleasant experience as trying to find musicians or a studio.

   In November 2006, Botany Bay released their first video clip, “Feel” on the internet. The movie featured Laura and Stephan performing the song over a suitably edited version of Ub Iwerks’ 1938 animation classic “The Brave Tin Soldier”.

2007

  Stephan’s move diminished the distance between him and Laura to a mere one hundred kilometres. After taking some time to settle down and familiarising himself with his new work, it was time to complete “Grounded”.

  It took Laura and Stephan one more month to iron out the last remaining issues in “Grounded”. At the end of May, roughly five years of work were finally completed, as they held the first pre-master of “Grounded” in their hands.

To shorten the wait for the official release of “Grounded”, Laura and Stephan recorded a new single, “Voices”, in August 2007, as well as producing a new video clip. “Voices” featured, for the first time, a duet between the two, as well as hard rock and electronica elements. Written by Stephan and Laura with lyrics by Bettina Böhme (who is the then-girlfriend who actually introduced Stephan to Laura, in case you’re still following), "Voices" was a major success on the Swiss community blog starfrosch.ch and charted #3 on podparade.de.

 

The release event of “Grounded” (including an acoustic live set) finally took place on October 6th, 2007, at the „Kulturfenster“ in Heidelberg, to standing ovations.

  At the same time, the album became available for ordering and free download on jamendo.com and archive.org.

   By July 2009, the complete album had been downloaded over 20.000 times from both platforms. Additionally, individual tracks were downloaded over 15000 times from Jamendo and last.fm. Combined with the CD sales and hard-to-track downloads from other sites, and considering that “Tales Of The Bitter Seed” sold a meager 120 copies, “Grounded” has – so far –been a resounding success for Botany Bay.

2008

  Just one more Botany Bay gig took place at the Be Bop in Aachen, before the harsh reality of two demanding fulltime jobs and no sponsorship from any big rich record company put a stop to Laura and Stephan’s ambitious plans to do more live gigs in order to promote “Grounded”.

While “Grounded” had been mostly Stephan’s concept and creation, the new tracks were much more of a co-operation, with Laura doing her fair share of song writing and playing.

  Two new singles, “Inhale” and “The Real World” were released via last.fm and Botany Bay’s blog.

  

2009

  Workload and other obstacles nonwithstanding, Laura and Stephan realized that the time had finally come to go out and get their music heard. So in March 2009 they took a break from recording and started touring the Cologne/Aachen/Bonn area.

  Realizing that they looked somewhat lost amidst racks of keyboards, computers and sequencers, in July 2009, Laura and Stephan teamed up with guitarist Wolfgang Springob, playing old and new material to ever-growing audiences, including one gig as the winners of the Free! Music! Contest! in Wiesbaden.

   Their last 2009 concert took place at the Blue Shell Club in Cologne, where they played to an audience of over 300 people – a dramatic change considering their beginnings as an absolute insider tip. A live video of Botany Bay performing “Inhale” at the Blue Shell was released later in 2009.

  But not all was well.

  Throughout 2009, tensions had been growing between Laura and Stephan. Eventually, the stress of organizing live gigs, several failed attempts to procure a professional management (in order to get at least minimum coverage in the mainstream media, who are still ignoring Botany Bay), the fact that there had been 10€ worth of donations for over 30000 free downloads, and the gargantuan expenditure of time (remember, both still had to work full time in order to make music in the little spare time that was left) aggravated their growing personal differences until the point where it was to late.

   In December 2009, Laura left Botany Bay by mutual agreement. Together with Wolfgang Springob and several new guest musicians, Stephan continued working on the already recorded tracks and demos for the planned 3rd album, releasing the programatically titled mini album "Stupid Summer Dreams" in March 2010. With many songs mirroring the personal problems and differences of the then ex-duo, "Stupid Summer Dreams" remains one of Botany Bay's darkest musicial offerings to date.

2010

  The single's B side, Oh, Robbie, is actually a live demo, uncut and unprocessed – the song was regularly used by Stephan in the casting for a new singer (which consisted of 14 candidates in a little over 3 months); the released version is the second take, recorded during the casting, only half an hour after Stefanie had heard the piano instrumental for the first time in her life.

   Her performance of this song, combined with an overall feeling of really good chemistry, eventually lead to Stefanie winning the casting hands-down.

   At the moment, Stefanie and Stephan, once again aided by Wolfgang Springob and for the first time Felix Klöckner (b, g) are recording new material. Whether the new songs will be presented live on stage, or in the form of an EP or as a full length album is not yet decided...