"Four countries, eight concerts and almost 50
tea bags!"
"My
trip to The Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Bulgaria, August 2009"
Day 2
Show day
and the problems started early when no-one was at the airport to pick up Magne.
No-one at the hotel had a clue what to do (a sign of things to come) so he took
a taxi.
Eventually everyone arrived in time for sound check but the niggly
organisational cock-ups continued. It was all really stupid and unprofessional
but it would take up too much space to describe here so I wonīt. We knew what we
had to do and we were determined to do it, in spite of the opposition!
And so we did! We were given 75 minutes so we used the same set list as the last
festival which was timed at 82 minutes, including encore. They changed our start
time from 9pm to 8:30 and then to 8:45. Later it was obvious why.
Live Fire is such a good band and festivals seem to be one of our specialties.
The intensity just built and built and we finished with Lady In Black to one of
the loudest singing audiences I can remember! Someone else must have noticed
this because we were forbidden from doing an encore!!
As a headliner, it can be very scary to have the support band kick your butt,
but itīs a little paranoid to react the way these people did. The crowd wanted
another song and we had one ready to deliver but
.. oh well.
A couple of beers at the hotel to celebrate another great gig and off to bed. I
found myself thinking about the time, way back then, when Foreigner opened for
Heep on the same day that Feels Like The First Time went to #1 in America.
They got a killer reaction and our response was to play one of the best shows we
ever played. Thatīs the way to do it
. If you can of course!
