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Thursday - April 17th 2003
Another great show, dinner and finally… a bed!
Not for long though as we had to get up early to drive to UFA for
the next show.
Magnitogorsk is a steel city on the banks of the Ural river
and in the foothills of the Ural mountains. The people in these
parts don't get to see much "Western" music, let alone
rock & roll so their energy and enthusiasm is enormous and quite
infectious. All in all it's quite inspiring and, though the travelling
is rigorous and there are many challenges not normally found elsewhere
(like… try finding a roll of ductgaffer tape out here!), the
reactions of the people more than make up for it all.
Today we are driving through the mountains, passing sleepy, almost
dormant ski resorts and tiny villages and I wonder what "life"
must be like here. The mountain region is striking but we could
just as easily be in Colorado or Southern Europe really!
There is virtually no traffic so the journey went smoothly and after
pounding through the seemingly endless wilderness, the mountains
vanished behind us and there on the horizon was UFA!! On first sight
it is a town like many other distant Russian towns… run-down
buildings scattered amongst signs of development and construction
which, though quite chaotic is a definite sign of progress.
Unfortunately, tonight's show had to be cancelled because, among
other things, the local promoter provided a club PA system for a
show in a 1500 seat theatre and there wasn't time for him to do
anything about it!! That's why we provide "riders" and
in this case they were provided in both English and Russian so he
has no excuse at all! I am sorry for the people that bought tickets
(it's sad that they are always the ones to suffer from this kind
of thing) but there was no way we could do the show under these
circumstances. Perhaps lessons will be learned all around but for
me it's very disappointing because the show is why I came here.
So here I am sitting in my room waiting for the overnight train
to Chelyabinsk and taking the opportunity to catch up on
the diary, my e-mail etc…Tomorrow is another day!
Next
day...
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