Rescued From The Fire: Lars Dorsch
An ongoing series in which we ask artists the record they’d risk life and limb to save from a burning inferno
Play with fire, you'll get burned... Welcome dear friends to the 22nd edition of Rescued From The Fire, the series in which we ask music lovers to talk about an audio possession so near and dear to their heart that they would risk life and limb to save if from the aftermath of an overloaded circuit. Though the series is usually an exercise in fun and nerd-ery, there is a darker side to this edition. Yes, the situation described above really happened. Academy teammate, DJ, and record aficionado Lars Vegas tells the tragic tale...
Walt Disney's Dschungel Buch (1967, Disneyland)
On July 29th I was out of town, and I get this phone call from my girlfriend Sabine...
“Hey, our flat is burning."
“Ha, ha, good joke. What’s up?"
“No, this shit is serious. I’m with Jona (our three year old son) in an ambulance..."
I rushed back home, only to find Sabine and a couple of friends wiping the floor, trying to get rid of the water and foam all over the flat. What followed was an exhausting seven week odyssey, leading to a somewhat nomadic life on friends’ couches, hotels and whatnot, waiting until the decontamination of our apartment was finally finished. Overall, a treat that I wouldn’t recommend to even my worst enemy - especially when you have kids.
Music, although it’s a big part of my life, was the last thing I was thinking about at the time, and the idea of carrying a vinyl record that I rescued from the fire didn’t cross my mind at all. In the end, where and how would you listen to it while homeless anyways? The more pressing concerns were like, “I want to sleep in my own bed again” or “I wish I could invite some friends over and have dinner with a couple of drinks at our house“ – something in that fashion.
Overall, our fire wasn’t really that bad. One of those multi-plug joints overloaded and decided to catch fire with our TV set joining the party. Hence, all the plastic contamination in our flat. However, foam floated in every single corner and gap, which required a complete renovation of our flat. After all this mess, my whole record collection was saved with only a handful of covers that had some water damage – I was frigging lucky! But I don’t want to even think about what happens if your whole flat is on fire...
It’s been ten days now since we moved back in, and just like when you’re moving house, not everything is finished and there are still some items which need to be replaced. In any case, we are all super happy and relieved that the seven-week ordeal is finally over and things can start to normalize again. Trust me, my girlfriend and I were on the edge of having a nervous breakdown on more than one occasion. As our regular life is slowly creeping back, I finally made up my mind on what record to choose. Because, after all, it is the need of wanting something (an object, a feeling, a smell...) that connects you to your home and past life (yes, you do divide life between “before and after“ after that type of experience).
I wanted something that potentially could provide some type of normality and coziness. My choice is the very first record that I got, which was handed down to me by my older brothers when I was three-years old and that my kids in the meantime enjoy just as much as I do. It is definitely not about the music, but about the emotional value that this record, now rescued, provides. It's the 1967 German issue of Walt Disney’s Dschungelbuch (The Jungle Book); an audio drama for kids, which still manages to impress me. It’s just a lovely little story with a couple of cool semi-jazzy sing-along tunes thrown in for good measure, they just don’t make 'em like this anymore. “Look for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities, forget about your worries and your strife..." Lyrics I can more than relate to in the meantime.
PS: Don’t buy cheap multi-plugs. They eventually destroy your house.
