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Abbz' tour blog - UK Tour with Europe Feb 2010 Pulling up outside in our trusty bus well lollypop/big k or zoom, we were greeted by one of DH's closest friends…Lloyd and his fiancé Katy. I first met Lloyd at my second ever DH gig at Milton Keynes, and hand on heart he is such a genuine and likeable guy, I have struck up a strong friendship with him. It was Lloyd who sang my praises on the forum when I first joined DH and it's something I will always be grateful to him for, I have long held a promise to show him some nifty licks on the guitar which I promise I will honour one day. 
The one thing about the Empire is both times we've played there, our dressing room has been on the third floor just below the safe cruising altitude of London air traffic (well its very high lets put it like that) by the time you've done the stairs it feels like a work out in its own right! Lloyd and Katy joined us in our penthouse dressing room just as I was making the tea, yeah I'm the official DH tea boy, last man in makes the beverages is what I was told when I joined…..'there's no spoons to fish out the tea bags?' quick as a flash Brian the ever resourceful one, came to the rescue, the handle of his toothbrush, mmmm cool fresh minty flavour, now that's rock and roll !Lloyd and Katy also handed out wedding invitations to all for later in the year, so it looks like I'll have to buy a new hat.It was around this time on the tour when everybody involved in the tour started to lighten up, from this gig on it seemed everybody was pleased to spend a while chatting mainly about guitars and amps (in Brian and my case) to asking about the weather back home(yes that old chestnut)where it seems Sweden was also having more snow than usual, 3ft…! Both of us had a quick chat with John Norum, who was such a quiet, softly spoken guy, he congratulated us (well Brian, I was just standing there like a lemon) on the previous shows and was very complimentary about Nick. Later I got to rap with John's gtr tech, again just talking shop! When guitar players get together they inevitably serve up their latest unsung hero, I'm no exception to this rule and dutifully spilled the beans on my 2 current fave guitar players, Steffen Shackinger and Guthrie Govan, he had not heard of either of these giants of guitar wizardry, I promised to lend them my copies of said players cd's later in the tour. The show was packed, both balconies full and totally in tune with what we do, all I can say is we had a ball; I felt we played really well, I even got alimony right! Armed with my long lead I was able to enjoy a little bit more of the stage than I did on our previous visit and with the massed media there I feel we could do little more to show how the band has evolved and moved on from past glories and has a definite sparkle. We live in hope! At a lot of the shows we tend to eerrrm loiter (in a nice way) by the merch, this serves to meet the fans who want a chat and a photo/autograph and to show that we value any comments or criticisms. Basically Brian and Nick have the lions share of the workload as they are the focal points, but on the odd occasion it has been known for me to sign bits of paper etc….fame at last lol. With Sunday looming and a day off, we headed back through the hectic streets of the capital for home, totally drained but with a feeling of a job well done. I find it strange that, in the wee small hours, London is still at full throttle with shops/ bars/cafes etc still busy, I guess it's the small town in me! Sunday being our day off, I changed my guitar strings although they still had plenty of life, I like to change them as often as I can, I have heard of 'big bands' changing their strings after soundchecks!!! I guess they don't have to pay for them? 
The next 3 shows would kick off in Oxford then Bournmouth followed by Bristol.A couple of exceedingly old Mr Kiplings had promised to come to the Oxford show, I used to work with them in a previous life, indeed I was Mr Kipling for a long time!!!! As promised they were true to their word and I bumped into them outside the venue as I came back from Tesco's clutching my daily allowance of crisps and sweets (again this all adds to your 5 a day, as I had some fruit bon bons). The venue was, lets say compact!! With loading and parking right outside the front door, 'you certainly travel in style ' commented the brace of cake men, pointing at Europe's tour bus thinking it was ours !! Their disappointment was all too obvious once I showed them choc ice/screwball (with juice on). The venue was packed and although somewhat cramped on Ed and my side of the stage, we went down a storm, this was turning into a fantastic tour, we were indeed 'making memories' as well as new friends along the way. Rich Ward our ever faithful web site dude and photographer to the stars arrived and snapped away to his hearts content, he is another unsung hero in the DH list of unsung heroes and we are always glad to see him at the shows. With everything packed and stowed away for the following night's performance, food was next on the agenda. On the recommendation of Europe's crew we headed for a Japanese eatery across the road from the venue, with Rich also in tow and a guy who wanted Brian's autograph, we sat down and ordered(although the autograph hunter slipped away after a quick chat, I guess feeling well pleased although maybe a little peckish). I have to admit chop sticks and me just don't get on, I was determined to put into practice what I had learnt on our trip to Japan, sure enough….. I was useless, lol. With our oriental meal well underway, we were surprised by Staffan, Europe's tour manager who asked if they could use Ed's bass amp as theirs was acting up a bit, not a problem and while we carried on eating Ed sorted out the request for help. The friendship that both bands had was now cemented, although my prowess with chop sticks remains poor! The Only down side was Shirt was feeling a little under the weather and felt an early night may be the right course of treatment………… Tuesday morning and our worst fears had been realised, Shirt was really ill, and unfortunately wouldn't be able to make that night's show in sunny Bournemouth. This was indeed a blow, with our secret weapon out of action we would be using the in house engineer, some are eeerrrm better than others. We needn't have panicked both Bourmouth's engineer and Bristols were sound guy's in both sense of the word. Andy, our ever trusting and much appreciated 'crew' would meet us at the venue as he had travelled down under his own steam… not that that means he drives a traction steam engine you understand. The venue was very much in keeping with the ambiance of Bournmouth, quite old but with a lot a character with balconies all lit up in pale blue , the stage was a good size to boot which always helps when Ed starts stomping round on stage with his size 9's. My brand new re-furbished cab I'm afraid must have caught whatever bug shirt had succumbed to and one of the casters fell off, which meant propping it up with a roll of gaffer tape to stop it falling over (gaffer tape can fix anything) on stage, although not brilliant news it was still very much useable. Again we played great, very tight and 'in the zone', but more than this I felt that the friendship between all of us was electric, because we were having a great time on stage and were getting great feedback from both the audiences and the press, off stage it was great, with plenty of banter and lots of smiles. After loading our (t)rusty steed, food was our priority, again my 5 a day allowance was adhered to with an iron will, salad with eeerrr fried chicken on the side…….. Our hotel for the night was only a short drive away and with the beer vending machine out of order the hotel manager pointed us in the direction of an all night watering hole, he assured us it would be open, he was of course wrong and with a heavy heart we retired to our hotel rooms to share Andy's Jim Bean !................................tbc |