Well, here it is. The first year of Onder Invloed is almost done. At the end of the year you’re somehow supposed to be looking back on the highlights, so that’s what I’ll be doing during the coming days. A collection of the best videos published this year and maybe some inside stories or unpublished photographs. Here’s part 1: Januari & February 2008.

It all started with mister Lukas Batteau. A bearded young man from Utrecht, living only a five minutes bicycle ride away. I met Lukas at the Utracks radio show, where I filmed him playing his song ‘By Starlight’ live on air. Some days later I ran into Lukas and his girlfriend/booker/manager/label-owner Ravinia Thwaites at the Oudegracht in the center Utrecht and decided to record a session a month later. There he played – amongst others – ‘Love Is Blindness’ by U2 in a beautiful way.

Second up was the Joy Division tribute band Closer To Curtis, with singer Ernst Grevink from Erny Green. We recorded the session at The Green Motel studios of Maarten Besseling, who set the session up in the first place. A great opportunity to record a session in a real studio, with perfect sound. The first session with separate audio recordings and two cameras.

There are a lot of great stories Ernst could tell you if you ask him about his passion for Ian Curtis and Joy Division. You can tell he really knows the songs he’s playing with Closer To Curtis and the feelings behind the lyrics. It also gave us a fantastic show in EKKO, which I filmed together with – Maarten’s wife – Anne Broekman. All of this in black and white of course. Some of the live footage has been published on this website as well.