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Karsten Wagner - Cap K

(R.I.P.) 12 September 1964 - 16 October 2016

It all started in 1975 for me, Karsten - born in 1964 in Kassel. I heard a song on the radio called "A Glass of Champagne". It sounded like no other song I've heard before. I liked it very much from the first moment. Luckily the speaker told the name of Karsten 1994the band: SAILOR! Hmm, must be a new band. The next time I taped the song from the radio, and heard it over and over again. Weeks later I saw the band in television for the first time; What a funny outfit they had, and this instrument, looking like a "cupboard" or something, Totally unique!
Then the next single "Girls, Girls, Girls" came out; Now I was completely hooked on this music. I remember, when I was a little boy, I began to imitate the band like this: I bought a red bulb, used my mothers hairdryer stand as a microphone, "plugged in" a skipping rope as a mike, and took my
Karsten and Georg Kajanus 1994grandma's scarf. Now I sang playback, with a little guitar, the hits of my favourite band.

I got the LP's "Trouble" and "The Third Step" as presents from my parents. All these different sounds and songs, it was beautiful to listen to. Even my father liked SAILOR from the very beginning. I remember that, after "The Third Step" was released , radio-DJ, Werner Reincke from HR3 played the first 3 songs from that LP in a row, because he liked them so much. Now I started to search for the first SAILOR LP. It was not easy to find here, because SAILOR's success in Germany started with the second LP. But I found a copy at last, a bad pressing, but better than nothing.

In 1977 I was shocked to hear that Phil Pickett had left the band, but anyway I ran to the record store and bought the new "Checkpoint" album. To my surprise, it sounded very good, and I liked the whole stuff. SAILOR had their first "Disco hit" with "Down by the Docks". The Maxi-single with that song has the CBS number 1, it must be the very first CBS maxi-single ever!Karsten 1995
...1978-Hooray all the 4 SAILOR guys were back with a great new album: "Hideaway". But I saw in TV that there was no real SAILOR-image. Without their unique Nickelodeon, I was afraid of how people would react to this. I saw the 4 SAILOR guys in leather jackets performing "Give me Shakespeare". A great song, but there were so many other "normal" rock/pop bands out there. Then it was out, seemed like forever, I was very sad.
Months later, we saw Georg again in German TV, performing the song "Fallout" with his new band: "DATA" (with Henry on keyboards). But as I heard it, I have to admit that this had nothing more to do with the old SAILOR sound. I didn't buy this LP at that time.

In 1980 - A new SAILOR record showed up in the record stores. Henry and Phil with new members. There were good songs on it: "Danger on the Titanic" and "Hat Check Girl" were very good alternative SAILOR songs. Not far from that release, I had another surprise: I got a little sister, after all these "solo" years.

Years later, in 1990 came a very special day. I remember that my girlfriend woke me up with the words: "Hey, there's this band in the radio, you have told me so much about, with a new song"! I remember: I got up as fast as I could, ran to the radio - and...yes...the...voices...the sound...this must be SAILOR! They sang about a secretary. The same day during lunch hour, I went to a CD-shop in the City, and... there it was: the Maxi-CD. What a great restart! After that I bought the album and the other Maxi's. It got on my sisters nerves every time I talked about SAILOR. She liked Mr. Big at that time!

In 1992 another great new album came out: "Street Lamp". This contains my favourite song until now: "Street Lamp". Sister Katrin once came back from vacation, and she had new favourite songs from a band called... SAILOR! I couldn't believe it. One of her Karsten 2001favourite tracks was "Knock Knock". Now it is "Precious Form". We wrote to the club in England... nothing happened. We wrote again, and surprise-surprise, Mr. Henry Marsh himself wrote back to us, asking us to meet him at the next gig! We heard of an "Oldie night" in Dortmund at the end of December 1993, featuring SAILOR, Smokie, Shakin' Stevens (who had a backup singer at that occasion called Peter Lincoln) and many others. Katrin made a poster saying: "Here we are Katrin and Karsten Wagner in order to meet SAILOR". I said: "This will never work"; How wrong could I get. After the first song, Henry gave his greetings to us over the mike, and after the gig, he brought us backstage to the others. This was a very special evening for us! On the following gigs, we met SAILOR again. We showed them record covers they had never seen before, and we talked about many other things. Later I often videotaped the band.
Nearly all the gigs in 1994-95 were Oldie nights. We saw the last gig with Georg on 25 November 1995 in Bielefeld. We did not know it in advance, but all the fans had a strange feeling that night. Katrin, Cilia, Michaela and I were very lucky, because we came on stage during "La Cumbia" (Thanks to Ursula for filming us)!

Then luckily Pete arrived, we heard that he learned from our concert videos with Georg, how to perform with SAILOR. A spirit told us to drive to Esbjerg in Denmark on June 1st 1996, which was the first gig with Pete. I remember that Phil asked Katrin for make-up for Pete.
We met SAILOR several times, even at "Gottschalk's House Party" in Munich (see The SAILOR Story). But from now on they had more to do in Denmark, because their new record company, CMC, was located there. I had weeks of SAILOR spare time during this time, so I made my very first "SAILOR photo session" with our cousin Silvia. For many years she had nicknamed me 'Kaki', and I have called her 'Viva'. SAILOR signed one of the pictures at a gig for Viva. Henry wrote: "To Viva you are a bloody sight better looking than Karsten, love Henry", Thanks again, Hen! This happened on October 4 1997.

Then, I had another SAILOR-photo-session with Monika, and shortly after that, my sister Katrin gave me a unique Birthday-present: The Sailormodels-Website. Just for fun at the beginning - but since that time, more + more Models came up on this site, see: (Website offline since Karsten's death).
I remember one nice comment on one of these photos, it was from Pete to Monika: "What a marvellous blue guitar you have! All the best P.L,"

Sadly there are no new SAILOR album out in the shops, so they still play on Oldie nights. - More Oldie nights, more sessions in Kassel, one with a girl from Mülheim an der Ruhr called Inka. A very close friend to us. She was a Smokie-fan at first, then also a Troggs and SAILOR fan. She came to Kassel for a photo session with "The Kassel crew". This photo session happened in 1998. Then we all saw SAILOR on their little tour with the other "Oldie bands" at some gig's, playing SAILOR stuff, "Pop Muzik", "Cotton eye Joe" and a new encore.

In 1999, Henry left the band under strange circumstances (sadly). For a while, Anthony England came in, wearing a suit like Henry. And he did it well! In 2001, Anthony had no more the time to perform with SAILOR, then - not Hen - but a very talented young musician joined the band-line-up: Rob Alderton (for the first time, a band member of SAILOR was younger than me! Oops!) :-o ~ And in 2001, I started my very own radio-show, at the 'Free-Radio-Kassel", named HANDMADE. See: (Website offline since Karszen's death) ~ Today, I have several shows *g* ;-)
No brand-new SAILOR-album out since "Street Lamp" with Georg, but at least in 2003 they made a Live DVD, which is a nice thing! Recorded in November 2002, near London (High Wycombe). Even Katrin and me were there, plus Uli and Manu, our SAILOR-friends from Gifhorn. In 2003 we were very close to make a SAILOR-Solo-Gig happen in our hometown Kassel, but sadly the concert-promoter beamed up in space or something like that a short time before the gig, so we couldn't have SAILOR live in Kassel again yet (but we will!).

So, hopefully, SAILOR will have another hit and album (somebody has to write songs (GK, where are you?) and they need a music video these days :-o)
I hope, we all can hear and see the best band in the world for years...still.... (I would like to hear good news from Georg and Henry too)! What about the SAILOR-musical? ~ ;-)
In the meantime, (still) I made much promotion for the greatest band in the world (Georg's crew), so I hope we all have the unique SAILOR-sound for the years to come...

I want to thank:
Henry, Grant, Georg, Phil, Peter, Anthony, Rob, Michelle, Sista K., Inka, 'Naylorman', Norbert, Glenn, Viva, Helen, Katja L., Sabine R., Christel, Sabine K., Cilia, Tim, Tom, Andrea, Ollie, Heinz Günter Heygen, Werner Reincke, Marina, Melanie, Carlo von Tiedemann, Mike Leckebusch, Uwe Bahn, Thomas Gottschalk, Manuela B., Horst, Claudia, Andreas B., Irina, Ursula, Ute B., Christina Lux, KUASTA, Frank Weißenborn, Andreas W. Gerner, Dieter Kindl, Ann-Marie, Antje L., Yumi, Jenny Drubig, Suntje, Katja W. from HH, 'Chily', Helen (for the first Hotel-modelsession) *g*, Kathleen, Svetlana (1000 Kisses!), (lovely) Anne, Mark Bayliss, Tina, Katha, Nadja, Marcia, Anna+Birgit und auch allen anderen von 'Schandmaul', Nat, Ute L., Ingrid, all the Sailormodels, the whole F-R-K-Crew, all the lovely SAILOR-fans and -friends, Wilma and all the other great guys on board! It's great to have contact to all of you, hopefully we can enjoy the unique SAILOR-sound together for years!

Greetings from Karsten Wagner / Cap K


...Cap K together with the SAILOR members 1974 - 2006...
Cap K together with the SAILOR members 1973 - 2003


The following article about Karsten and his own SAILOR story has been published in a local magazine in his hometown Kassel in December 1997:

Courtesy of Xcentric (Ralph Otto)!

A complete possessed fan of a half forgotten band

Karsten Wagner works in the registrar´s office of the "Landeswohlfahrtsverband Hessen". Documents! Documents! Documents! And always think of the copy machine. - But in his real life he is a music fan - even a very special one who's liking is not shared by millions of people.
No Elvis, no Jimi, no Stones - he fell for SAILOR.
--- The freshwater Sailor ---

And that - meanwhile - with not so much hair on the upperdeck. His maritime treasury shines with five organizers, half-hundred SAILOR-vinyl + silvers (CDs) - including with bootlegs and rarities plus three dozen videos. The wardrobe is full of the right outfits, and naturally Karsten, like Georg Kajanus, sometimes has an anchor on his cheek. However, the 33 year old man has never really had spray of waters on his moustache and he has never seen a real harbour-tavern from the inside. The experiences of that man from Kassel are limited to the "Zissel", a water party in Kassel. But he remembers that in 1976, HR-3 moderator Werner Reincke played 3 songs in a row from the SAILOR-album "The Third Step". "Unforgettable!"
Nowadays unbelievable.
Our freshwater SAILOR got much more seasick when SAILOR - at the beginning of the 90s - after several shipwrecks and mutinies, came on board again in the original line-up. Very soon our superfan likes to hire, he'll have his equatorbabtise-ceremony, and for sure he can join the captains cabin and bridge. He can lay hand on the famous Nickelodeon. One fine day, Karsten and his sister Katrin have been invited to a special meeting by SAILOR- member Henry Marsh. This has happened on 30 December 1993 at one of these nostalgic-grotesque Oldie Nights in the backstage area of the "Westfalenhalle" in Dortmund, Germany.
The beginning of an accumulating friendship. Sometimes they would meet after the gigs in order to talk about new information or to help Grant Serpell's son to find his father. A symbiotic relationship. Matelot Wagner was once asked to do the official SAILOR fanclub. "But I had neither the time nor a computer. That is why a Kajanus-friend from Berlin finally did the job. Nothing works since he left the band. Now they all write letters to me." All? - Even more seasick people? Fact is that a list from 29 February 1996 includes not only fans in Alfeld, Duderstadt, Groningen, Malmö and Aberdeen but also a fellow from Redwood City, L.A..
Sailing is obviously a must. Karsten Wagner works very hard on a SAILOR comeback. "One hour a day is okay." Some successes have already come along.
He wrote to "Gottschalks Haus-Party" in order to persuade him to invite them to their show, the "Musikexpress" published his letter about SAILOR. He is also investigating in order to discover new unauthorised CDs. "I have discovered one of these here in Kassel."
And on more and more occasions Karsten Wagner is greeted with "Ahoy!" during his CD shop-visits during the lunch hour.

SAILOR
The British band around Georg Kajanus, son of a Russian prince, was formed out of a house combo of a nightclub in Paris. Their sound was created by the self-invented Nickelodeon, a monster that is played by two persons - a mixture of fairground-organ, a pub-piano and a synthesizer. Optically and musically they widened the image of the lonely sailor in the redlight quater of the harbour pubs. Their climax had been reached in the middle of the 70s with the hits "A Glass Of Champagne" and "Girls Girls Girls". After the break of the band, Kajanus manufactured three Technoid albums under the name "DATA" in the 80s. Meanwhile Phil Pickett became a co-writer of "Karma Chameleon" in Culture Club. The surprising comeback of the original line-up happened in 1989 with "The Secretary" and "La Cumbia", and soon they were back in the single charts. In 1995, Kajanus left the ship once again and Peter Lincoln came. A new CD was released only in Denmark until now.

The text next to the photo of Karsten and SAILOR says:
19 November 1994, Hotel Mövenpick, Kassel: What a shame. You appear in your special SAILOR dress and the band comes in private outfits.


The "Free Radio Kassel" is available in and around Kassel (in the middle of Germany).
In July 2000 I decided to ask the Free Radio Kassel for the possibility to do a SAILOR special. Meanwhile there were two 1 hour SAILOR specials with Katrin me, and I have got a regular radio show "Handmade" there.
The SAILOR radio specials included telephone interviews with Phil Pickett and Grant Serpell and also an eMail-interview with Georg Kajanus.

In May and June 2001 we also did two SAILOR specials with our self-filmed concert videos for the TV channel "Offener Kanal Kassel" which you can see in and around our hometown Kassel.


Karsten at the Free Radio Kassel


Here are some examples of Cap K's photo session pictures with "Girls Girls Girls":


Cap K's models - including: Monika. Stephanie, Helen, Petra, Antje, Irina, Simone, Suntje, Ann-Marie, Pirate Jenny, Madeleine, Sabine


Last updated: 29 February 2004


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