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The Lady
Godiva story. Lady Godiva has been in existence since 1994. During this time many things have happened in the beautiful Sauerland. With over 100 concerts behind us, small and big festivals have led us all over Germany and into the neighbouring countries. We've given dozens of interviews, in Helsinki too, and have successfully released two longplays. But how did it all start? For those of you who haven't been with us from the beginning, here's our story. Already in the 80's Thomas was to be found annoying people at diverse cellar party's. He constantly wanted to listen to ‚The Pogues', naturally our heroes. However, as a result of the music at that time - U2, Depeche Mode and Simple Minds - Thomas was ignored, and so his biggest desire of forming his own Irish folk band couldn't be realised. But those of you who know Runker, will know that he doesn't give up easily, and so the day finally arrived when we gave in to him and decided to form a band. This famous day was in March 1994. Lady Godiva was formed at Andreas' birthday party. None of us could play an instrument, nor sing. Lady Godiva was and still is a crackpot idea. However, we had to decide how this project was going to work and how it should 
take form. We decided on the following: First a good name was needed for the band.
We opened Andreas' brother's record cupboard and found a good, old vinyl from the
Velvet Underground, on which was the song "Lady Godiva Operation". We left out the
"Operation" and the band had its name. Now to the difficult part - Andreas was to
be the singer ( he had experience as an amateur actor), Thomas, naturally as a
Pogues fan, could play the tin whistle, but that was it. Well, there was Christian
who could play keyboard. But as there was no keyboard in Irish folklore he became
an accordian player. Ingo - at that time still in Brasil - had already played guitar
in a local band, and so, without him knowing, was declared our guitarist. Carol also
wanted to be in the band, but couldn't play an instrument, except for the tenor horn.
As we didn't have a bass player, Carol learned to play the bass. We were still missing
a drummer. A colleague of Andreas knew somebody who had a set of drums, and so he was
invited to practice with us. Lars was accidentally there for the practice and so was
given a guitar. This practice took place sometime at the beginning of May 1994 in
Christian's cellar, it was terrible. A tape of it still actually exists. We murdered
"Whisky in the Jar" and "Dirty Old Town" and found out that we were to play at a local
town festival in four weeks time. We met two to three times a week, and put a set of
6 songs together. The town festival was a great success and from then on we never
looked back.
In 1994 we played a handful of successful gigs in our area, thanks to our first manager
- Toni Strapazoni - before we dragged in Yvonne to play violin. Still without Yvonne,
we put our first three original songs on to the sampler "Without Help". We recorded it
at Rudi's potato cellar studio?? and mixed it on a Super 8 sound mixer (or was it more?).
Those were the days. Have a listen to it.
1997 brought a lot of gigs and a lot of laughs. We played many concerts and a
load of great festivals. 1997 ended with the recording of the new CD "Tales of
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musical experiences. The sound was punkier, we composed our own songs, Stormy joined us as
mixer and as a technician ( an absolute stroke of luck for the band), we played a load of
concerts and festivals and finally in May 1996 the first CD "Whisky you're the Devil" was
recorded. The recording was a real experience and everything but professional. Despite
this, we were all very proud and pleased to hold our own CD in our hands. The CD presentation
party in Zero was a great success, and despite the "scandal cover" we sold the first copies
within a few weeks. We were very proud to be able to have the cult band of the Sauerland
"Collaps goes Western", despite their long stint away from the stage, as a support act.
After our guest appearance at the "Schall und Rausch-Festival" we got lucky again - the
music guru of the Sauerland, Kentop Deimel, became our manager and has been since 1996.
The Franz Beckenbauer of the Sauerland music scene brought new "professional" wind to the
band, which was to be seen on the calender.
kings and boozers". Once again with Michael Schwarzer at the reins the whole
thing became more professional. However, the CD still wasn't that what Lady
Godiva are when they play live. But we were, in end-effect, still pleased with
the experience. The CD received a positive review from critics and the band
suddenly got offers from all over the world. (Internet makes it possible) The
CD release party was one of the highlights and we remember fondly the fantastic
support from the "Real Leningrad Cowboys".
It is great to be treated like a V.I.P., even though you "come from a village".
But even Scooter eat Cornflakes for breakfast.