Amsterdam (band)

Amsterdam are an English pop/rock group based in Liverpool. Formed in 1999, they had their first UK Top 40 single with "The Journey" in February 2005. The current band members are Ian Prowse (vocals/guitar), Johnny Barlow (lead guitar), Tony Kiley (drums), Kevin Spurgeon (keyboards), Eimear McGeowan (flute), Anastasia Risnes (violin) and Dave Mastrocola (bass guitar).

Biography

Amsterdam were formed on Merseyside in 1999, and the following year won an NME competition to find the best unsigned band of 2000. They were also among the winners at the prestigious music business event In the City. Amsterdam appeared on an EMI compilation album, Mersey Boys and Liverpool Girls, alongside Paul McCartney and other Liverpool musicians. They performed sell out shows in Liverpool and London to critical acclaim, and played three tracks on Janice Long's BBC Radio 2 show.

Elvis Costello invited the band to play with him live on BBC TV's Jonathan Ross Show to promote his new single. This was followed by opening for Costello in Amsterdam and at the Kings Arena in Liverpool, on his world tour. Amsterdam also made the last-ever John Peel Festive Fifty with "Does This Train Stop on Merseyside?".

Amsterdam (novel)

Amsterdam is a 1998 novel by British writer Ian McEwan, for which he was awarded the 1998 Booker Prize.

Summary

Amsterdam is the story of a euthanasia pact between two friends, a composer and a newspaper editor, whose relationship spins into disaster.

Plot

The book begins with the funeral of artist Molly Lane. Guests at the funeral include British Foreign Secretary Julian Garmony, newspaper editor Vernon Halliday, and composer Clive Linley. The three share certain attributes: each has a very high opinion of himself, each was at some time Molly's lover, and each regards the dead woman's husband, George, with a mixture of amusement and contempt.

Clive and Vernon muse upon Molly's death. It seems she had some kind of rapid-onset brain disease (not specified) that left her helpless and mad. Neither man can understand her attraction to Julian Garmony, the right-wing Foreign Secretary who is about to challenge his party's leadership.

Clive returns home to continue work on a symphony he has been commissioned to write for the forthcoming millennium. Much of the work is complete, save the crucial signature melody. He resolves to go walking in the Lake District, as this tends to inspire him.

Amsterdam (Jacques Brel song)

"Amsterdam" is a song by Jacques Brel. It combines a powerful melancholic crescendo with a rich poetic account of the exploits of sailors on shore leave in Amsterdam.

Brel never recorded this for a studio album, and his only version was released on the live album Enregistrement Public à l'Olympia 1964. Despite this, it has been one of his most enduringly popular works. It was one of the songs Mort Shuman translated into English for the Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris musical.

Brel worked on the song at his house overlooking the Mediterranean at Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, the house he shared with Sylvie Rivet, a publicist for Philips; a place she had introduced him to in 1960. "It was the ideal place for him to create, and to indulge his passion for boats and planes. One morning at six o'clock he read the words of Amsterdam to Fernand, a restaurateur who was about to set off fishing for scorpion fish and conger eels for the bouillabaisse. Overcome, Fernand broke out in sobs and cut open some sea urchins to help control his emotion."

Amsterdam (disambiguation)

Amsterdam is the capital and largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Amsterdam may also refer to:

Places

United States

Other places