Dale Murray and Christina Martin: Germany & The Essentials Tour Debrief

Fresh off their Germany tour, Christina Martin and Dale Murray sit down to unpack the realities of touring life — the highs, the hard moments, the hilarious stories, and what it means to keep evolving after 20 years of recording and touring music together.

From food poisoning and financial breakdowns to beautiful audiences, creative growth, unforgettable friendships, German saunas, and future plans, this episode is an honest and heartfelt behind-the-scenes look at independent artist life on the road.

A conversation about music, burnout, trust, community, and making room for new things.

Transcript

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Christina (00:00.206)
Hi, welcome to a chat with heart podcast. I'm your host, Christina Martin. I'm a singer songwriter. I live on a dirt road in rural Nova Scotia with my best friend, Dale, and our Calico cat, Olivia. This podcast is totally just a chill chat with her. As soon as you tune in here, I consider you one of my little heartbeat listeners. I love sharing these personal stories and recording these episodes are great practice for me to try and calm the fuck down.

just be myself. If we just talk about it We can shut away, we can break a day off day If we just talk about it We can cut away, we can make a better day

Christina (00:55.438)
Hey everybody, it's been a beat. You know why? Because we were on tour. Welcome back to a chat with heart. I've been missing this podcast, doing this podcast, chatting with my friends one-on-one. Today, it's just going to be Dale and me, fresh off our Germany tour, chatting about the highs, weird moments, beautiful audiences, and whether touring still feels worthwhile after all of these years.

Yeah, spoiler alert, touring musician life is definitely not for the faint of heart, even when things go remarkably well. But hey, I want to shine a light on a real highlight for me recently outside of the tour, which was singing on a gorgeous song written and recorded by my friend Heinz Rebellious. Heinz lives in Osnabrück, Germany, and he's one of those deeply creative lifelong artists who seems to have done everything.

musician, journalist, guitar expert, producer, songwriter, organizer, storyteller. Over the years, he's played in all kinds of bands and projects, worked as a music journalist and editor for major guitar magazines, and even worked with the prestigious Duesenberg guitar folks. We first met Heinz years ago when he was organizing a songwriter series in Osnabrück called Grölsch Song Night.

And we stayed in touch after that over time, becoming genuine friends. We even lived at him and his wife's secret. We lived at their house, kind of like as a home base when we were touring in Germany one year. And he is actually the person who connected Dale and I with Duesenberg guitars back in 2013, which is how...

We got this endorsement from Duesenberg and we've been playing their amazing guitars. We love them so much. And so it felt really cool all these years later to be invited to sing on Heinz's new song that he wrote called Don't Blow Off the Dust. So the song itself came from this tiny ordinary moment. Someone sang Don't Blow Off the Dust during a guitar building project. And Heinz turned this into something much bigger about

Christina (03:20.242)
carrying our stories and scars and experiences with pride instead of trying to erase them. The song has this beautiful road trip Americana feel to it. And honestly singing it was, it just felt really joyful. It wasn't hard or difficult. It felt like a really wonderful fit. It's the kind of song that when I sing it, I really fucking wish I had written it myself.

But I'm glad that Heinz wrote it and honestly it's a privilege and a pleasure to lend my voice to such a cool song by a wonderful human that I really admire. And Dale also is featured on the song playing a pedal steel and we're gonna play a little clip here in a moment, just a taste, because I really want you to go listen online and support Heinz and his other work. Okay, so now that I'm home, I'm...

I'm hoping to get back into more conversations with people I love for the podcast and back into a writing rhythm too. Dale and I are working on new material in the studio. For the first time in a long time, I'm trying out not having deadlines and seeing what happens creatively when I just leave more space in my life. That's kind of what I've been working towards for the last few years. And I could feel a change like in me.

my nervous system and my work and my, I guess, just enjoyment of life, really. And if I, in this episode or at any point, you you're speaking with me, maybe outside of the podcast, if I sound a little uncertain about touring these days, it's because I think, you know, I'm making room for some, for new things. And touring takes a lot of energy away from making new things, in my experience.

It has given a lot of inspiration in the past, but also the world is a different place than it was five years ago in many regards, and I'm a different person, and I think uncertainty is very normal right now. So I'm just basically, I think, know, expressing my own uncertainties about things. And touring is certainly one of those, but I know music is...

Christina (05:42.592)
and will always be a part of my path and performing too. love, I really love singing and performing and I love entertaining. Yeah, but instead of chasing my dreams, I want to sit back and see what comes my way for a while, while I'm kind of honing my craft. And honestly, I have, I don't have a lot of recharging to do still. I'm, I'm excited about that. And

Before we dive into this podcast, again, I do have a show coming up May 29th at the Shipyard in Summerside PEI. That's a Friday night. And of course, we'd love to see you there. We don't get over to the island enough. It's such a beautiful place to play and visit. So Prince of Rhode Island, May 29th. Get your tickets at ChristinaMartin.net. Okay, here's our chat, Dale, Marie and I about Germany, music, exhaustion, inspiration, friendship, everything in between.

And here's a little bit of Heinz R. Bellius' song, Don't Blow Off the Dust, which I had the absolute pleasure of singing on.

My soul takes a look

Christina (07:07.47)
you

Christina (07:37.294)
Okay. Hi babe. Hi. Wow. Here we are home. Home from about a three week tour in Germany. And wanted us to get together. I wanted us to make some time for each other. Because we never do that. You know, have some one-on-one time. Dispel some of the myths of touring.

Dale (07:58.817)
No.

Christina (08:06.158)
talk about where we're at, what we were, what, why were we gone? Why did we go on tour in Germany? Why Germany? All those things. have a bunch of questions here for us and me and you. okay. First of all, how does it feel to be home?

Dale (08:17.294)
Yes.

Dale (08:27.158)
It feels really good. I still wake up in the morning and I don't know where I am. So I think part of me is still on the road. My brain.

Christina (08:41.356)
I had a dream last night that right before this tour that we just got back from, you were having some ear issues. had a plugged up ear.

Dale (08:49.972)
This was in your dream.

Christina (08:52.234)
No, I'm just giving some background to the listeners. okay. So my dream last night though, somebody, we were like on the tour and you're still having this issue. somebody gave me this German made device that had like a long needle in it that was supposed to clean out your ear. And it looked pretty big. Like I was like, there's no fucking way Dale's going to let me put that in his ear. But they were like, it was like, I think our friend Thomas, who's a psychiatric doctor.

Dale (09:18.392)
God, this leftover from the war?

Christina (09:20.66)
I don't know. No, it looked pretty high tech. I was like, he's like, guaranteed this will not pierce his eardrum. Because that's your, that was your main concern when I was going in to try to clear up your ear. And it was, it looked like a little kind of cleansing robot thing. And I just sort of have this vague memory of the dream last night, how I kind of went up to you and was like trying to convince you to let me put this in your ear.

and how satisfying that would be if it just completely unplugged your ear.

Dale (09:53.646)
How devastating if it actually punctured.

Christina (09:57.39)
So I guess what I'm saying is I too am still having these... I'm like in sleep, I'm like pre-tour worries. It's as if we're still on the tour. But we're home safe and sound.

Dale (10:12.024)
We're definitely still, I'm still on German time in that time zone for sure. because I wake up really early and I cannot stay up past nine o'clock.

Christina (10:27.202)
Yeah, we've been going to bed really early here. That'll pass. That will pass. One of the questions that I know our parents always ask us when we get back, actually, my mother asks me like five million times is, was this tour worth it? Was it worth it? I think she means financially. For me, I think, was it worth it emotionally, artistically?

Okay, so I'm going to ask you that question and your answer. You can answer like whatever, whether was it worth it financially? And yes or no is also a perfectly fine answer.

Dale (11:10.656)
financially? You're specifically asking...

Christina (11:13.678)
I'm asking you because how it works is I pay you the tour and then when you're on tour everything's taken care of. Was it worth it for you financially? Sure.

Dale (11:17.912)
Yeah.

Dale (11:24.118)
Yeah, it was fine, not my first... It's not my first thought about when we go on tour is the finances because...

Christina (11:39.0)
Lucky you. It's like my, it's my biggest.

Dale (11:42.862)
You have to more than I do because you're, it's your organizing everything. I think it just in general, it, for me, it was definitely worthwhile. Like I love going out. think I said this to you on the way back in the airport that I always feel like a better person when I get out into the world and do this thing. That was, course, there were definitely times during the tour that I was like,

Christina (11:51.406)
But,

Dale (12:11.668)
get me home right now. But overall, I think I said that I like I feel like a like a better person when I when I I done that and then come home. Yeah, I feel like a different person. There's

Christina (12:28.6)
Do you think that a bit of that, I do want to go back to the, parts of the tour where you like get me home now. But what part of, when you come back and you feel like I'm a better person for having done this, is it something about going out and actually just doing work? Like you're working in this field that you have always, you've always worked in and you're how lucky, can you elaborate a little bit about what?

Dale (12:54.99)
I feel grateful to be able to go do this. Touring is never easy, but the way we get to do it is pretty great, just the two of us. So I feel grateful about getting to do it.

I get we get to meet a lot of our friends.

Christina (13:28.31)
Yeah, we did see a lot of really cool friends and like friends like our friends here too that it's like we might not see them for a while, but when we do, it's like, you know, picking right up. Yeah, for sure.

Dale (13:40.718)
So that's a nice feeling. And having the people at the shows tell us how much they enjoyed it and how, you know, it's maybe made their day better or their week or whatever, know, like getting the feedback is nice. And you're doing that ongoing, like, you know, night after night.

Christina (14:08.44)
Tell me about some of the moments on tour where you were like, get me the fuck home.

Dale (14:18.873)
I think there was only one day that I was like, okay, that this is enough. I think anybody in this position would feel the same way.

Christina (14:30.382)
Let me preface this by saying most of the tour I was like, my God, I can't wait to go home. And that's just like, I'll elaborate that on my own personal view of touring for me right now later. But like, was kind of, you know, sort of just me, like the whole tour, like I wasn't trying to be, I wasn't being negative. I was just being like honest. Like, yeah, this is all going really well, but like, I can't help it. still, I still...

wish I were somewhere else. Like I found it hard to be present for me personally on this tour. was very, um, and it was like, I guess a lot of anyway, I won't get into it right now, but I will later. But I was alone in that feeling. Whereas I wasn't hearing it from you and I didn't need to hear it from you, but then this thing happened and you were like, fucking hate touring.

Dale (15:25.646)
I try not to, even if I feel it, like I was pretty low energy and it takes a lot of energy to be on the road and be around people. I mean, we're both introverts. I'm an extreme introvert. I charge up when I'm alone and get run down when I'm around a lot of people, even though I love people. But,

Yeah, so just not having the energy that you want to have when you're doing a show every night. But then I try not to complain about that because again, I feel grateful to be able to do it. yeah, the only day that I felt like, okay, I can't do this anymore. Sorry. I know what's coming.

Christina (16:18.414)
Don't laugh.

Dale (16:21.262)
I ended up getting food poisoning in Berlin. We had a nice day, a nice day off, had a couple of days off and then had a show day and then had another day off and we went, you know, visited some friends and just had a nice day and then went for a late dinner at this place that looked really great. was in old, in Spandau, in the kind of middle town.

in West Berlin. And I don't know, we looked at the restaurant and it looked great. Yeah, and it tasted great. But in the back of my mind, I ordered this kind Pad Thai type dish with chicken. And in the back of my mind, I remember looking at the menu and going, I shouldn't get the chicken.

Christina (17:02.167)
It was great.

Dale (17:20.235)
she didn't get the chicken. And then I was like, man, but I don't want this. I don't want that. Ended up getting the chicken. And then we went home and whatever went to sleep. And I woke up early in the morning and I was like, something doesn't feel right. And then, you know, within half an hour, was like, I'm definitely something is wrong. I think I've, cause I had had food poisoning.

on the road once before, when I was on the road with you and with Cuff the Duke in Edmonton. which funny, because I almost had the same dish in Edmonton that I had in Berlin. so anyway, I knew what this was when, so I think I woke you up early and I said, I think I have food poisoning. And we were supposed to go to Kiel that from Berlin to Kiel to play a show.

I knew that wasn't going to happen. Like, there just wasn't happening. I was lying on the bathroom floor in this really nice hotel in Berlin.

Christina (18:19.436)
Yeah

Christina (18:26.262)
Yeah, you were mostly in the bathroom on the floor and then in bed for a few minutes here and there.

Dale (18:34.19)
If I could, yeah. I, so the, the, the real thing that was, was making me anxious was I knew that we had to check out of this hotel and you'd check to see if there was a room available, which there wasn't. And I was like, how is this, how is this going to happen? Like, how am going to get from one hotel to another? We didn't have another hotel. We definitely can't go to the gig. I can't be in the car for more than 10, 15 minutes.

Christina (19:01.782)
The hotel was completely booked that we were in and I told them you were sick, there's nothing we can do. Luckily I did find a hotel, eight minute drive from ours that was wonderful, like super awesome. Yes. And in a beautiful park area, not that you cared about any of

Dale (19:18.134)
No, but that made me, the anxiety, cause the anxiety that I had being sick in this hotel, knowing that we had to get out and not knowing where to go and not knowing how that was going to happen was making everything worse. And that's when I was like, I need to, I wish I was home right now. This sucks. Then you were able to find, yeah, find this, this place 15, it was about eight minutes away. so I knew from, from the time I leave this hotel room,

till we get to the new hotel room is gonna be like 15, 20 minutes. And I was like, I think that's doable. And it ended up being doable. And once I got there, I was like, I feel bad, but at least I feel secure in that I know I can just stay here and recoup. And because I had food poisoning before, knew, know, generally it's like a day and then you're okay the next day, which I was. I was able to play the show.

Christina (20:12.942)
I had a great day off. I felt bad for, so our friends and super fans in Keele, Michael and Betty had organized a show for us. had about 60 some, 65 plus people and rented a venue and, you know, I felt bad that they had to cancel it and there were some expenses as well. And so I didn't, it didn't bother me. I mean, I bothered.

Dale (20:14.926)
You had a day off, but we had to-

Dale (20:39.957)
Pardon me, I feel terrible.

Christina (20:41.522)
I mean, I knew and they were so understanding, everybody knows, and we're at an age where we're just not going to take the chance. There's no way we're going to risk your health and comfort.

Dale (20:55.022)
There wasn't even a question, it was impossible. I could not have done it.

Christina (20:58.944)
And so, yeah, and then, I mean, there was one other show canceled on the tour and we were surprised that it was canceled because it's usually a full house. But that being said, we've always played this show in the past on Easter weekend. It was kind of like our thing. And so this was not Easter weekend. And in Germany, there are a lot of different holidays and like when the weather's nice, like people make plans in advance and there it's anyway, the point of my story is we had to cancel the show in Blaubud and

But a lot of those people came to the show in Dachau the next night. And at that point in the tour as well, like I was really fatigued vocally and you know, I've been taking care of myself. Like it just doesn't matter. Like what I learned from this tour is, for me, think two days on one day off is much better than three days and then, you know, four nights. Cause we were doing four, five shows in a row and luckily we had a few cancellations and

because I was really struggling and I wasn't sick or anything. It was just...

Dale (22:02.23)
I think people have to know too, because I don't think a lot of bands do this when they're on tour. They usually have an opening act, they end up playing, you know, 50 minutes to an hour and then maybe an encore at the most. But we do all our shows on our own. So we end up really playing over two hours every single night.

Christina (22:24.206)
singing, playing guitar, talking during the show, two hours at the break, pre-show, post-show talking. It's just a lot. not, not all bands have, you know, to do that much, but, um, it's a lot for me anyway. Maybe some people it's, um, a non-issue, but for myself, I feel like it's a, and it creates a sense of kind of dread, know, dreading the next day if it's a show day. And I just like look forward to the days off and speaking of days off.

One of the smart things I think that I did not plan for on this tour, knowing myself was, we had a couple of days off at a hotel before the tour started. And then at the end of the tour, we went back to that same hotel to rest and recharge. And, you know, I can't, I cannot recommend this, enough because like we needed a couple of days to basically

wrap up the tour stuff. We had some errands to run. We had to kind of take care of our gear. One of the goals for this tour was to go and get the gear that we have in storage there and to get rid of all of our merch. Like I was basically, this was interesting. We made more money from merch, from donations from people than just selling CDs. We gave everybody as many free CDs as they wanted.

And we just asked like, we said, you don't have to, but if you want to leave a donation and hey, make it for our cat Olivia. So people would come up and be like, this is for Olivia. And we made more money than we have in a long time selling merch because people just don't buy CDs as much anymore. And even vinyl, depending on what region you're in, we did sell out of the few vinyl that we still had over in Germany, you know, like vinyl, vinyl sales for me anyway, are.

Not amazing. And, so that was a surprise. doing the whole, you know, just pay what you can. that's a tip for artists listening. And especially if you have like loads of CDs, you just want to offload, like, like just get rid of, I was, I'm still waiting for like a, some kind of a fine from the country, like from Germany, because I went to like,

Christina (24:51.534)
I just walked, went for walks and like dumped CDs on windshields and in bike baskets. And I tried handing them out to people, but like most people I think thought I was asking for money. And so just said, no, no, thank you. And they didn't want to take, and also like people are like a CD, what? Like, um, you know, it was sort of confusing for people. I just left them where people might, I didn't even care if they put them in the garbage. I just didn't have the heart to put my own CDs in the garbage.

But they all are gone now. They're all somewhere in, I can tell you the regions where we did this Berlin, Spandau and Innenstadt by Checkpoint Charlie, specifically in that area. Everybody who had a bike around the end of April parked down in the Innenstadt near Checkpoint Charlie has, is probably taken home my CD. Where else? Delbruck.

Dale (25:49.247)
I'm Delbert.

Christina (25:50.446)
at specific parking lot, in any case. What about artistically? Like, it worth it? How do you, cause what we were, we were promoting, we were celebrating, we are celebrating 20 years of making music together. We put together this new compilation album with one new single called The Breeze. And so a total of 20 of these songs that we've worked on together since, you know, 2007, six, whatever.

And so we're playing a lot. The only new song we were playing really was the Bree.

Dale (26:24.834)
Yeah, we played a couple off of Storm, but even then Storm came out three years ago and we've played those songs quite a bit. yeah, think it was a good way to kind of look at our career and pick the songs that have stuck around the longest. then, you know, it doesn't mean that we won't ever play these songs again, but we've...

Christina (26:54.19)
We've played them a I mean, I do feel like it's time for something, for me to do something, you know, new and fresh, really just to make new music and whatever that looks like. you know, my, I think my thirst for playing live will either come back or it won't. And I think that just depends on the, you know, the music and whatnot. But I have a very little desire right now.

to

to play, you know, some of the old things. Maybe like if we went out with the band and picked a bunch of like our favorite band versions of songs, you know, that would be fun cause we're playing with other people too. But like you and I together have played a lot of these songs, a lot and it's.

Dale (27:43.416)
point well 20 years worth of shows.

Christina (27:46.924)
Yeah, I definitely came home with this feeling of like...

Dale (27:51.692)
What's next?

Christina (27:52.544)
Yeah, what's next? Like optimism, for sure. And I knew we, you you commit to something and you have to follow through with it. And, and it's, like I said, it all went really well. but I, there was a part of me that was like not entirely, it was struggling with being, you know, present, but.

Dale (28:14.666)
Yeah. I think I was the same too. Like there, there were a couple nights where it was hard to keep focused enough to really play well. And then there was a couple nights that I just didn't think about anything and had a really great night too.

Christina (28:33.774)
Do you have, I could tell you which of mine were my favorite shows and I know, I think I know why. Do you want me to tell you? Yeah, please. Okay, well the first and the last and the reasons for that were we were rested, like my voice was rested and you know, the first show of the tour, there's an excitement. also like, you know, the first night I think was the best in terms of lighting and atmosphere.

The sound. KGB, the sound, like everything was perfect and really great audience. so, you know, and then I just started to get tired. And then the last show was the day after we had canceled Kiehl's. So I had like a whole day to rest and then we just had a two hour drive to Uka Munda, which ended up being a full room. And I was kind of, I was really pumped to see

Silvio and, Uta and Catherine again, who were the organizers. And cause last time we were there at 2023, we had a great hang after the show and had just some really good laughs. And we talked about like former Eastern Germany and DDR times. And so we ended the tour with them and it was just more great. It was more awesome laughs. And, yeah, I felt rested. And so my voice felt good.

Dale (30:02.974)
It's funny because the last show was really good for me too, playing wise. And I think it was because I had just, it was the first day that I was starting to feel like feeling better from the food poisoning, but still wonky enough that I was like, am I going to make it through this show? So I didn't think about the audience at all. I didn't think about my playing. just was thinking, I just have to be up here. And there's a couple of points where I

It was like, kind of lost my balance because I was still in my bed. But I was playing so well because I wasn't thinking about it. I wasn't thinking about what the audience was thinking about us and which that really, there was a couple of shows, especially Berlin, which I thought that people were listening, like we knew, yeah, we recorded it and filmed it. So that was...

That was one thing that, you you, you start thinking about red light syndrome. It's, usually it doesn't throw me off, but I think for some reason that night it did a bit.

Christina (31:04.066)
like see.

Christina (31:14.072)
said it, we did hear the tracks back and I were using everything I believe.

Dale (31:16.108)
Yeah, I'm ex-

Dale (31:21.804)
Yeah, it wasn't terrible at all. just, you know, there's some nights you just really feel like you got it in some days. It feels like a struggle,

Christina (31:30.316)
So if I said, we're going on tour tomorrow, we've been asked to do these three weeks, would you do it?

Dale (31:40.29)
Yeah, I would do it. Okay. Yeah, I would do it. I would always do it, but...

hmm.

Christina (31:49.752)
Good to know. I personally, I have no desire to plan anything, that doesn't mean we're not going to go anywhere or tour anywhere or do shows. Like, that's not what I'm saying. I think some people think that. It's just that, you know, it's just the right opportunity has to present itself. And like, I think I'm pickier. I don't know about you in what I say yes to and what I put my energy into pursuing, I suppose.

Dale (32:18.798)
I think I'm getting more picky about that for sure.

Christina (32:24.108)
Well, a lot of people ask, including my mother, about like sort of the, much money did we actually make?

Dale (32:37.004)
Are you going to divulge?

Christina (32:38.028)
I'm going to divulge. I think it's helpful for people to know what were the biggest expenses. I don't know what people think. I don't know if people think artists are just broke all the time or if they think they're rich after they come back from tour. A big question for me is like, is this sustainable always? are there any hidden costs and that kind of thing? Because I've been booking, managing...

You know, my own tours now since 2008. And so I do have a lot of experience with this and my budgets are usually pretty darn close. I've got my tour expenses here and I'm going to go through them for this tour. And I'm going to tell you and you, the listeners, exactly where we landed profit wise. Okay. So.

When we go on tour out of province, especially overseas, I always buy RBC insurance. By the way, no one's paying me to say this, but I do just always go to RBC insurance, call them up. And since I have a RBC Avion infinite credit card, that includes a certain amount of days, I think it's 15 days, of medical insurance and some other insurances. I can't remember all.

So anyway, I only had to pay for the top up for the two of us. So, um, I was off by my initial estimate. Um, but it only costs 90, 90 bucks for that, for the two of us, which for 24, 25 days is not bad at all. Now the tour vehicle, cause we always rent a car. I, I, I, I'm not going to get into this cause it's kind of a boring story, but I will mention that I initially rented a way too big van and when we picked it up.

I then realized that the card I booked it on was, did not have insurance on it, to cover, know, third party liability or whatever. And so I basically can't, had to cancel that van. It turns out we didn't even need a van. still, we had a lot of gear and stuff, but it all fit in the exact same car we drive here, which is a Volkswagen sport, a sport wagon. Anyway, so the tour of vehicle cost.

Christina (35:03.662)
Uh, well, there was a one day, um, fee I had to pay 343 Canadian for this one expensive day. But at the end of it, the, the, um, uh, the car ended up costing a 20, was it? $2,600 about. So, you know, for 25 days, that's, that's not totally horrible. And the fuel I thought was going to cost like 1500 bucks. We ended up only paying 742.

Dale (35:31.702)
But and this is weird because it the fuel is just so expensive. So I think you just maybe you calculated for what we normally go three months as opposed for three weeks.

Christina (35:44.854)
Yeah, exactly. hotels, I, I estimated about $4,000. Well, we ended up spending about $5,100 on hotels. which still isn't that bad when you break it down. and we didn't, we didn't sheep out cause, we wanted to stay in like super, you know, clean and comfortable places. didn't get the most expensive hotels, but we did stay at some nice hotels.

for our own comfort and well-being and they had great food and whatever. Some of had spas. Some of them had spas, which we needed.

Dale (36:20.546)
Yes, we needed that. And the breakfasts, always the free breakfast, which is good because it keeps us going.

Christina (36:28.878)
Yeah, that's right. That's another place where you basically get the hotel. I booked all hotels that included a really good breakfast. So the flights only cost us, I thought they would cost us 3000. They only cost us 22, like 2300 bucks. Parking costs a little bit more, like parking, taxis, ground travel. I thought it was going to be 300, ended up being 444. Baggage and flights, I thought it was going to be 800 because we had all these guitars and stuff, but...

lo and behold it only ended up being about half of that, little under half.

Dale (37:03.402)
You can't plan for that, know, because it's just arbitrary, it seems.

Christina (37:08.824)
Well, that's what I didn't, I didn't know. We also didn't know we ended up, one of my friends is shipping home, one of my guitars for me, and selling two of our amps over there. So we didn't know how much.

Dale (37:23.118)
I've also traveled with my pedal steel and have paid more than what we paid for the three extra bags or whatever we had. you never know.

Christina (37:34.414)
Now this is a place I don't cheap out on. I paid us each $100 per diem a day because things are expensive there. And also paid us each $300 a show, including the days when we had to cancel. Cause like, that's not our fault. It's not your fault. I think, you you should be paid. This is like having a sick day. it was, think $6,100 that-

We each got paid to be gone for like a month. And I mean, that's like, that's a decent monthly salary, you know, for a month. So it's not like that's going to carry us on forever and ever, but like we worked our asses off for that month. Um, that doesn't include paying myself for like, um, I'll tell you where I paid myself, but I didn't pay myself for promo and all that stuff. That was just, but I did pay myself 15 % booking fee.

Christina (38:34.35)
Yeah, cause I booked some of these shows. Okay. Next, there was a canceled show fee. We had to pay for the rent. It was $252. My agent, Thomas Roar, who booked a bunch of these shows and did a great job, paid him $874. That was 15 % of the shows he booked. I paid myself $1,300 for the shows I booked. Digital posters cost $200. I thought they would cost 400. So that came down. And then some printing of marketing materials.

$79 as opposed to my original estimate of $400. And then I gave away about 1200 or more CDs that were just donated. And I didn't include the cost of those, but I certainly could. Okay. So here's the thing, the total expenses for the tour, $26,733. Now we received a create a grant for 50 % of those expenses from the creative industries fund of the province of Nova Scotia. So they gave me.

$13,366. Okay. Then we made the tour revenue was $13,400. That's how much we earned from the shows, from just 10 shows, which was the best revenue earned on a tour, a Europe tour for us per show ever. Typically we earn more than that on a show here in Canada, but in Europe, it's been really hard to...

see those numbers increase in the past. And so we did actually see a lot of growth there per show. And then the merch and the donations was 5,200. So in the end, after all those expenses I mentioned paying ourselves, my company, Come Undone Records, earned a profit of $5,300. $5,300. And that was good because we came home and realized we have...

$2,000 that we have to pay for something on our car to be repaired. And that's the company car. that's minus two. And then, know, obviously I've been carrying debt and trying to pay down company debt. So not a hugely profitable, but definitely a profitable tour. Like we didn't just break even. The company took home $5,300 and all that money is definitely accounted for already. that's, I'm very...

Christina (40:56.27)
pleased with that, like financially. Was that boring? I don't know. I mean, people ask us all the time, so I figured I'd fucking break it down. Sure. You know? Yeah. And those expenses that I mentioned are pretty standard for almost, might I add that we decided not to spend money on marketing because in the past it has not made a difference. It's these shows that we do are largely, they're...

The promotion is done by the venues and if they don't do their job, we're fucked. And no amount of like anything in Rolling Stone, DE or anything like ever seems to make a difference. Facebook marketing, none of that. We don't give any money to these massive conglomerates or whatever that I don't believe it works for me, not with the budgets we would have to spend anyway.

Dale (41:49.09)
Yeah. And honestly, I don't even know if like postering in big cities helps, maybe in the smaller towns because everybody kind of sees them. But yeah, but like Berlin, I don't think it helped.

Christina (42:00.27)
Yeah. So I think that's actually really cool that we spent, usually we would spend like $8,000 on marketing. And, know, like oftentimes we get, we do get a lot, the thing that publicity can bring is like, gives you, you know, some beautiful quotes that you can share that helps spread the word and whatnot.

I think it's maybe more impressive for like someone in another country to read that you have a review in the UK or in Germany. And some of the magazines, like in the UK, still have a really big like fellowship, fellowship? Follow-shif- following. And they pay attention and they do actually come out because of what they read. But, you know, it doesn't...

work like that in every market. And anyway, so the point of my story is I'm really proud we did this well without having to spend that marketing. That was encouraging to me because it's been such a Debbie Downer, like how can I tour if I don't have money for marketing? Cause I don't have that money anymore, you know, cause we're not making as much with merch and not booking as many shows sometimes. I'm just trying to think if, if there were any big financial mistakes that were made on this, like,

Dale (43:25.454)
Well, there was some close that close calls that were rectified pretty early. Like the, like you said, the van that would have been expensive and kind of not, not needed. Uh, it would have been a pain in the ass to have this big van trying to park in some of the places that we were parking.

Christina (43:46.454)
Yeah, not like I had accidentally left my infinite avion visa at home. Luckily, we just got you a card, like that second card. we ended up you used your infinite avion.

Dale (44:01.222)
Otherwise we would have had to buy the insurance through the rental company.

Christina (44:08.334)
would have cost me like another $1,500, $2,000. Which is what we were, we were kind of, I was like throwing my hands up because it was the first day I was tired and I was like, I guess I'm gonna have to pay this extra money if I want to use this credit card, blah, blah. This guy Oliver at the Europe car in Lipstadt saved our fucking asses. yeah, thanks to, I know he's probably not going to listen to this, but thanks Oliver at the Lipstadt Europe car for.

You know, being able to cancel the first booking and then booking us the cheaper car with the same car we brought from Frankfurt to Lipschitz. Anyway.

Dale (44:45.614)
Yeah, you don't see that in companies often because they had us for the amount that they had us. And he was like, no, we were working for you. Like, we're going to get you the best deal, even though we already made the deal. already pay. But yeah, he did save us a lot of money.

Christina (45:02.092)
Yeah, he was cool.

Okay, here's some weird tour questions for you. What city felt instantly like home on this tour?

Dale (45:16.168)
Dachau always does, even though we didn't, we didn't get a lot of time to, we were only kind of in and out because we were staying out of town. But as soon as you get there and then see all the familiar faces and the familiar streets and, yeah, that always feels, at home.

Christina (45:37.134)
Because we lived there too, we did an artist residency for six months, then we went back for another.

Dale (45:42.734)
We almost spent, we almost lived there a year, really, over the years. Hi Kai. Hi Kai.

Christina (45:50.004)
He's the promoter and our good friend that brought us to Dachau so many times. And my friend who says, I remember him saying, international friendships prevent war.

Dale (46:06.178)
Yeah. and then going back to some of the, like we, there were a few places that we played on our first, very first tour back in 2011, like by Respawn. Chocofet. Love it there. It's, so that feels like home.

And, and, Uva's house concert. did that the very first time we went there to acoustic guitars. and we've seen his family grow up and they were all there at this. I don't know how often that happens that they're all in the same place, but they were all at the, at our show and.

Christina (46:38.648)
Yes, we watched the kids grow up and...

Christina (46:49.602)
Yeah, seeing Uwe and Anya having dinner with them and just catching up, it's so, it was really nice.

Dale (46:57.45)
Yeah. I think those are the two or three, sorry, places that really... and then, mean, obviously there's, we've been to all the places on this tour. don't think we went to a new place on this tour, did we?

Christina (47:13.4)
We played a new venue in Bad Essen, but we've played in Bad Essen. So we kind of grew out of the first venue, I guess. And they packed, it was sold out, this beautiful museum. And yeah, that was great. You know, another really cool show. I say the first and the last were the best, but like one of my favorites too on this one, like they were all special in their own way for sure. But the Vitos...

psychiatric clinic, where Thomas gave us a tour of...

the floors and we got to meet some of the people getting treatment at the, at the clinicum in Heppenheim. And then the show was so well attended. Like it was jammed, it was probably like 120 people. People like who live at the facility are just there. Temporary staff, the public came. So this was a free show that the clinic, you know, they hired us, paid out of pocket to have us come and perform just one set. And.

And, you know, we stayed in, they treat us like gold. It's great to see Sabine and Thomas and Ketchup. They both work at the Heppenheim Vitos Clinic. And that was really special too. I really, that one sounded good, felt great. It's so unique playing at a psychiatric clinic, but they have like a stage there and everything and it just felt...

Dale (48:37.984)
It felt like a normal, like just a show, you know, like, I mean, it was, but yeah, there weren't any duds on this tour. Like I felt beyond like how I played or how much energy we had, all the shows felt really good.

Christina (48:57.262)
Was there an audience that surprised you the most?

Dale (49:03.758)
In that, like them being there or just something that they

Christina (49:12.642)
You know what surprised me? That we had to cancel the Blaubloid end show.

Dale (49:17.494)
Yeah, was a, that was a, when we've played there, what, six, five or six times, I think, and had some really special times. had our friend Ryan and Stefan come and stay with us one time at one of the shows.

Christina (49:35.37)
a really awesome night with bedbugs to remember. The show was great.

Dale (49:38.772)
Yeah, was the that it didn't end. The show was great, though. But yeah, they always felt kind of special, some of those shows. but then, you know, we've been there six times and and yeah, who knows why. But.

Christina (49:56.11)
What has Germany taught you, Like what do Germans, is there something that Germans do better than Canadians?

Dale (50:05.27)
You asked me on stage one night about this and I drew a blank completely, mostly because that's the way my brain works. If I'm put on the spot, it just, it blanks. I couldn't think of it. Nothing good to say. But I mean, like you're generalizing a people. couldn't think, well, every German is like this or every.

Christina (50:17.771)
You had nothing good to say.

Christina (50:27.426)
Well, like the Germans in general, like I don't, I didn't mean like a German in terms of like, well, like maybe a German. You know, okay. I'm just going to give like my strongest, I, what I love about Germany, and I'm not saying it's only Germans or Germany, but you are in a country the size of the province I grew up in, New Brunswick. Okay. They have 86 million people, maybe more, maybe less around that.

Dale (50:33.474)
German quality or

Christina (50:57.102)
And yet you, the beauty, the cleanliness, the organization, the nature, you are never far from nature. Even when you're in most of the cities, like there's usually some beautiful parks very close by, like walking paths that just go on and on and on.

Dale (51:18.354)
That was a big thing that struck me was like, you know, in Nova Scotia, we have a lot of nature and stuff, but I think also we don't value it as much as, for instance, like, you know, an industrial park around Halifax area or Dartmouth or whatever. They just cut down everything and it's an industrial, like people, guess people go, this is an industrial park. We don't need trees. You see an industrial park in

in Germany and there's a big like beautiful. Well, there's a real park there and there's trees and then you kind of they kind of disparate like they don't just knock everything down and then put up manmade structures. They kind of work around. And maybe that is because they don't have as much space, but you just don't notice there's no these these large barren

places there. Everything is kind of wild. And you even look at the trees and they're like old growth trees in this place that

Christina (52:28.48)
It's an array of species of trees instead of like, you know, driving from here to Halifax, see where the clear cutting is and you see like one or two species. And then a lot of times they're not doing too well, like no wonder. So you see, I don't know who's in charge of forestry in these. I know it's, know, Germany has their own like, kind of sort of like provinces, area, regions and whatnot. But it seems like pretty consistently they value.

Dale (52:35.5)
You see one pine tree.

Christina (52:55.732)
nature and the rejuvenation of is taken quite seriously and they're doing it right, whatever they're doing.

Dale (53:04.066)
They work around nature, the industrialization is, kind of works within what's already there nature-wise.

Christina (53:16.866)
What bathroom was the worst on this tour?

Dale (53:21.632)
I've seen a lot of bad bathrooms over the years on tour. But again, Germany is not, I mean, they're, pretty good about, about keeping.

Christina (53:33.752)
There was one you told me not to bother going.

Dale (53:37.638)
it was just a gas station. And that even like in Canadian standards was probably one of the cleaner ones. It just didn't have a lock on the door that I could figure out. And, you know, maybe it'd been a day since it's been cleaned. But

Christina (53:46.092)
Okay.

Christina (53:56.238)
Usually you pay, what I love about the German bathrooms on the highway anyway, is that, you you pay a euro, you get a little ticket that you can use to buy coffee or, you know, food at the gas station, but inside like the bathrooms are just, self-cleaning and then there's...

Dale (54:15.202)
Yeah, the toilet seat kind of goes around and gets cleaned off. And then there's nice music playing and it's totally worth the euro.

Christina (54:23.81)
Kind of a nice retreat. Yeah.

A few more fun questions. So this last tour we just got back from, what's different about this last tour do you think compared to our very first tour in 2011 in Germany?

Dale (54:51.03)
You know what? think, I think that some of the, like Germany seems, feels like home now. Like I know, and I know the most of the ins and outs and I can understand a bit of German now. I know how to, you know, drive on the Autobahn and I know the small towns how to drive. Like we know, we figured out a lot of stuff about touring in Europe in general. So some of that like,

like feeling like a stranger in a strange land on the first tour, you know, where we were like, I had, I'd never been to Germany before you had, but, I hadn't, and I certainly hadn't toured anywhere like that. that's not true. I had been to Switzerland once to do one, one, one show, but, yeah, it's just, and so everything felt new. some of the novelty, I guess that

was there in those first few years of touring there wasn't there on on this tour.

Christina (55:57.165)
We had no Christmas markets on this.

Dale (55:58.734)
Yeah, well, yeah. so I think part of that, not knowing what we're doing type of thing that keeps you actually keeps you going because you're like, wow, this is new. This is new. That wasn't there on this one. But there's something nice about that, too, like some of the anxiety of like, like, I don't know how I'm going to drive in Berlin. know,

Christina (56:27.246)
Even things like, I worry about where we're going to park. So knowing, going back to venues and communities that we've been to before, knowing that we don't have to worry about that.

Dale (56:38.658)
Yeah, I mean when we first started touring in Germany, we ended up having to kill a lot of time during the day, like going to Ikea's.

Christina (56:49.134)
We lived at Ikea. We planned our whole like home decor by spending hours and hours at Ikea. We ate our meals at Ikea.

Dale (56:57.912)
But that's because we needed this, we needed a place to park and we didn't, figure that out yet. And,

Christina (57:04.716)
The GPS's were not as evolved, like Google Maps was not as evolved back then.

Dale (57:10.646)
Yeah, you couldn't find those cool places to eat and stuff. Usually they would, it would drive you into a residential area and you're supposed to be finding a Greek restaurant or something and no, there's nothing there. But now it's just, it's super easy to do that. But, what was I saying? I don't remember now.

Christina (57:30.358)
I don't know, but the hotels are definitely every year got better and better, like across.

Dale (57:35.384)
Yeah, because like places like websites like Airbnb, we didn't use Airbnb this time, but you have in the past.

Christina (57:39.406)
Booking.com is what I predominantly use.

Christina (57:44.706)
I I try and I prefer booking.com just because it's, I'm into eat, what's easier and Airbnb and free cancellation. I'm into what's easy. Like I don't, prefer free cancellation. Airbnb doesn't always offer that. I don't want to show up and most Airbnb do have like a lock box now or whatever, but I don't really want to chat with, you know, someone, the owner of the house.

You're so tired on tour and like, sometimes you gotta get there. Anyway.

Dale (58:17.975)
No, but we've, I think we really figured out how to do it right in Germany and now we'll never, we won't go back again.

Christina (58:26.67)
We'll never go, we'll it we're done. Nah, who knows, maybe we will, but even if we don't, I feel extremely satisfied and grateful for our experiences that we've had there and the friends we've made, know, are friends, some of them are friends for life. Others we'll never see again. no, it happens. mean, it happens. It doesn't mean they're not your friends anymore. Just like,

Dale (58:47.15)
Well,

Dale (58:54.702)
But I mean, that's the thing, going through the pandemic, we were like, well, will we be able to go back to these places again? And then now on this tour, we had all these people going, we're running out of fuel by the middle of the month. You're not going to be able to get home. I hope you can get home. And I was like, what the fuck? And like that. now I don't know if another pandemic, God knows, but...

Christina (59:20.206)
I don't know, but I mean, I've really grown fond of like less is more and we can make music from home. We can make music remotely with our friends too, if they can't get to our house. I don't love touring, but sometimes it makes sense. Like think one of my favorite experiences performing was when we rented the venue at Altony Landing for like a week.

And we'd been rehearsing leading up to that and we kind of lived in that venue for a week and it felt like home by the end of it. And you there's a route, you're able to establish a routine and show up to work every day on touring. You know, and touring with a crew of people can be fun. And when you have help, it's nice. But anyway, the point I'm saying is we can still make music and put music out to people.

We don't have to spend thousands of dollars on marketing. It's that money that we don't have.

Dale (01:00:21.614)
Yeah, mean doing something that, trying to do something the same as you did it 15 years ago.

doesn't make sense. Not many businesses run the same way that they did 15 years earlier, especially now. mean, maybe, maybe back in the, you know, from the fifties to the sixties, what wasn't the big difference or whatever. but now things move so quickly in new technologies and the way people listen to music or the way they make it, or do they want to come out to like all these things change so quickly. 15 years since, you know, since we've been going

Germany things have changed so we kind of have to change as well. We've changed.

Christina (01:01:06.51)
We have changed. I've changed. mean, in what I want and how I see success, I don't think success for me is being super busy. I don't want that pressure. And I think a lot of me wanting to keep busy, a lot of it was fear-based.

I don't want to make decisions based on fear anymore. I want to pay the bills and whatnot. But I want to just, I want to be fulfilled by my work. I want to be surrounded by good people. And I am. And busy enough.

Dale (01:01:41.004)
And, you know, being on the road always refuels my love for the studio. Before we left...

You know, my ears are ringing because I've been mixing so much and do I want to set up another mic on an amplifier? Do I want to mic up a drum set anymore? Do I want to have to come up with ideas? I mean, I always love it and it's always fun, but it's like when I'm on the road, I'm thinking about, I got this idea for the arrangement for this thing that we were working on a couple of months ago that if I hadn't left, I would never have thought about. then coming back into the studio and

and being excited again about working on that kind of thing. That always refuels me.

Christina (01:02:26.796)
Don't you think we could just go on vacation and that would happen as well? And then we'd be actually rested?

Dale (01:02:34.626)
Yeah, I'm trying to think of the last time we went was away on a vacation was those down to Austin last year. And I'm trying to remember if, I, we wrote all the songs. Yeah. And then we recorded. Yeah, you're right.

Christina (01:02:44.46)
He wrote all those songs.

I mean, and it was awesome. had time with friends. had time by the pool. to me, that's kind of, and that was the three weeks. And I didn't feel like I wasn't like dying to come home because I was enjoying, you know, the experience there. But I was dying to come home on this tour and I missed Olivia.

Dale (01:03:09.41)
Yeah. That's another thing, Olivia. And we'd start, we'd get into this thing of like late at night getting into bed and then, and then you bringing up cat videos and just being like, no, we can't, we can't go down this road because it's makes it too hard to. And then you're showing, you showed at every show, showed people. Every show. Talked about Olivia, showed photos.

Christina (01:03:28.108)
Livia was here.

Christina (01:03:32.846)
I talked about Olivia.

People wanted to donate to Olivia's Lively.

Dale (01:03:40.33)
And people, think, not everybody you can tell when somebody's not interested in a cat photos. You can tell when they are interested in some people are. Yeah. And their dogs and their kids. Horses. met when we met horses.

Christina (01:03:48.718)
People show me lots of their cats. Yeah. Horses.

We've met horses. Yes. Our friend JP Fair, brought us to, it was actually one of the last days off on the tour and we had a nice little visit with JP and, he brought us over to the stables where he works and hangs out and these horses were stunning. Yeah. Anyway.

Dale (01:04:16.566)
And we got to, drove trebons in Berlin.

Christina (01:04:20.792)
Let's talk about the fun bits. That was really fun. Okay. So if you don't know what a Trabant is, it's the official car that they had in DDR. So during the Cold War in Eastern Europe. And it's so wild folks, like these cars were in such high demand. had to like, basically, there was a wait list, like you would order your car, your Trabant, and you could wait up to 13 years or more.

Dale (01:04:46.786)
You would, if you had a child, they were born, you would order the car for them when they were born. So they would have it when it was time for them to drive. And I learned also that the used ones were more expensive than the new ones because you could get them right away.

Christina (01:05:08.846)
And the new ones cost about 10,000 Deutschmarks, which was expensive back then.

Dale (01:05:14.306)
And they're so basic. And so, the funny thing was that they gave you this, like a wall of like a steering wheel and a gear shift, a Travi world to practice on. And I found that kind of useless because it didn't have the same action that, that once you got in the car, it didn't really do what it said it was going to do.

Christina (01:05:22.926)
world.

Christina (01:05:36.264)
I found it helpful because I'm a visual learner and it did have, in the car you couldn't see what gear you were in, you had to feel it. But on the simulator, it at least had a map of where the gears were and so you practice going from one to the other and you could see. And then I had this mind map. So in the car, you know, I was, but it was hard to shift.

Dale (01:05:59.116)
was a spring loaded thing about the actual gear shift where it would spring back to a certain spot in neutral and which, know, it didn't do that on the simulator. Like you had to actually push it and, and this would just spring back to which I didn't realize I was driving it. Like I would have driven the simulator and I got stuck at a, at a, light one day and nobody, nobody honked at us because I they were like, they're driving a Trabant. Don't worry about it.

Christina (01:06:29.294)
I was shocked that they would let tourists drive it.

Dale (01:06:32.653)
they put you in the car and then they just send you right out into Berlin traffic.

Christina (01:06:36.526)
If you didn't have experience, like we have, we drive stick shift here at home, but most people drive automatic here. So if you didn't have that experience, I don't, I don't think I could have driven it. I don't.

Dale (01:06:47.794)
Yeah, and we've driven in Berlin before just in general, just another in a car. It's like some people are going to be coming off of a plane staying in Berlin and then having never driven in Berlin traffic. Yeah. Like, okay, what does that light mean? What does that sign mean? But yeah, no, it's it was sketchy, but super fun to. Other other moments that.

Christina (01:07:06.775)
Yeah, it was fun.

Christina (01:07:11.61)
I really enjoyed the spa and the sauna at the first and last hotel. They were the same hotel in Delbruck. Like, I think the hotel was called Waldkrug and like Delbruck isn't a place that most anyone would be like know about in Canada. No. You know, and I think there's a ton of those places all over the world that we just don't.

They're not widely broadcast or promoted. And so it was also, I think, very like affordable, four-star hotel, incredible food, really awesome spa and like really just like the pool was so peaceful. There was no, no kids, no. And also they let us wear our bathing suits, in the sauna, which was very nice. Cause that's just in Germany.

I don't know if you've been watching my socials or if you're a member of my Patreon, it's something I kept bringing up and I was obsessed with. But in Germany, like the saunas are pretty much not clothing optional. Like you don't wear clothes and I can't do that. I'm I'm definitely cool with being a Nevernude and in public. And we're just not used to that here. We all always wear a bathing suit in the saunas.

And so anyway, why I had asked at the desk, cause I didn't want us to get in trouble. And she just said, yeah, it's, you're not supposed to wear your bathing suit, but you can, no one's going to tell you not to.

Dale (01:08:38.186)
I think we didn't run into this, but I think if there were people in the sauna already naked that I wouldn't, I wouldn't go in there with my beard. I would just avoid it.

Christina (01:08:47.533)
We kind of waited, it was very quiet when we were there and we kind of waited for people to be sort of out of the sauna, but it was a gorgeous sauna. had a steam room, two different saunas, a cold dip, they all these amazing salts you could choose to like rub down your body and then to all these incredible showers and you know, heated seats you could just lay on all day. And the pool was like, I don't know, 80 degrees or something like super warm and

Dale (01:09:14.966)
We needed it. We needed it because like going into the tour and then coming out of the tour, it was a good recharge.

Christina (01:09:23.533)
And spending time with catching up with friends. We had a really nice, like Michael Langevender is one of our longtime friends in Europe. He's been a big part of our tours and helping us with our records and manufacturing them.

Dale (01:09:39.83)
Keeping our gear there for 13 years. we got to bring home actually. My Fullerton Duesenberg has sat, well for the past three years since I played it last, but even before that, five, 10 years in Germany. So it's home, it's next to my desk and it's my favorite guitar that I own.

Christina (01:09:42.409)
Forever the Duesenberg guitars and

Christina (01:10:05.622)
Yeah. I brought home my limited edition, the prototype for the Stardust series, which is a caribou model.

Dale (01:10:16.28)
Yeah, and both of these guitars are rare now. Yeah, the Fullerton they stopped making, which I don't understand because it's such a great guitar, and then this one was the prototype.

Christina (01:10:19.8)
They're discontinued.

Christina (01:10:27.246)
Yeah, a lot of people have been asking me, cause I am selling one of my Duesenbergs cause I have, I have two, I have three, I have four actually. So I'm selling a guitar mando cause we don't use it and you have the Rickenbacker, the guitar mando is 12 string. I'm selling my Star Player, which they're not discontinued. if I won the lottery and wanted to get another one, would, I would get it in pink this time, rose pink to be specific.

And anyway, but I'm selling that one and then I'm selling, are my amps because I'm actually trying to move to a system where most of all, first of all, most of all, when you play at a festival, they usually have backline and they almost always carry a Princeton reverb or, you know, something similar, Fender amps, you know, very similar. So.

I don't use it enough. have other Fender amps here at the house. Like I don't really need it and I'd like to put it on my desk. So, but anyway, people have that I've been selling these amps. have an amp, Princeton Reverb in Germany I'm selling to my friend Chris. Thanks Chris. Distin is selling that for me on eBay in Germany. And people have thought like, are you quitting music? And I'm like, no.

Are you not coming back to Germany? Are you just done? No, that is not it. But I can see why you would think that I'm selling off some gear. It's just all about prioritizing and I still have plenty of guitars and I don't need the amps. I'd like to pay down my debt and I'm doing a good job paying down the debt. I'm really excited about that.

Because the reality folks for us is we don't have a pension. don't have, we cannot have any more debt. We own our home, we own our car. We want to be financially responsible and we want to start saving for the future because we're getting older. And this is, these are the thoughts you have when you get old. And I don't want to be stuck in a position where like I, I did watch my,

Christina (01:12:41.42)
You know, my father struggle in the end of his life. he didn't have a pension. It was freaky. He couldn't work when he got sick. it was scary and I, I like, I value security so much, sense of security that, a lot of the decisions I make now regarding like work and, everything really, revolve around is this safe? Like, is this a safe?

Do I feel safe in making this decision? I don't want to be making a decision based on fear or anything, like, is it, does this support our, you know, our present and future? Does it feel good? I'm very glad that we went on this Germany tour. I want to thank the province of Nova Scotia for supporting this tour, the creative industries fund.

Because we would not have been profitable without it. And that is the reality for a lot of tours like ours, think these days and Canadian tours. I can't, you know, I can't speak for other countries are just touring out of the United States. They don't necessarily have that access to that kind of funding. We don't always have access to that kind of funding. This is why we are not touring as much anymore as well. It's just not feasible, but this one was feasible.

And mission accomplished. got rid of all these CDs. got them in the hands of people and complete strangers. did some great shows. There was financial growth per show. We saw our friends. We did our job. And now we have more work to do. What's next for you, Dale?

Dale (01:14:21.72)
Yep, we did.

Dale (01:14:30.126)
I have to go get my Mother's Day gift right now.

Christina (01:14:34.998)
you gotta go get the lobster is it five o'clock? Yes. Okay happy Mother's Day happy belated Mother's Day to all the mothers out there and to our mothers especially.

Christina (01:14:50.798)
Say goodbye to you

Christina (01:14:59.176)
I don't wanna say goodbye to you

Christina (01:15:07.31)
Welcome to the Heartbeat Hotline, 1902-669-4769. I'm the host of a Chat with Heart podcast, Christina Martin, and I'm so excited you called. Leave me your question, a suggestion for the podcast, or a comment about this episode. Please be aware your message may be used on the podcast and social media. Tell me your name, where you're calling from, and it's also fine if you want to remain anonymous. Thanks for listening.

Have a great fucking day. Hey, thanks for listening to a chat with heart produced by me Christina Martin Co-produced and engineered by my partner in life and sound Dale Murray. Dale's not just a wizard with knobs He's also a killer singer songwriter session musician and music producer go snoop around his world at Dale Murray dot CA the podcast theme song talk about it And I don't want to say goodbye to you were written by me and recorded by Dale want to support what we do

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