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Monday/Tuesday - April 28th/29th
2003
Just when you thought it was all over!!
This was my sixth trip to Russia and it has taken all that time
to find a team of people I can work with and trust. I am relieved
and happy that I will be working with Michael, Richie, Tim, Maxim,
Kim and the whole crew again even though it has taken the pain of
working with (and being ripped off by) other, less honourable people
along the way!
Russia is, in many ways, a brand new market and so everyone is learning.
The audiences are learning how to decide who to go and see and how
to spend the very small amount of money they have available, the
agents and promoters are learning how to read riders (and they are
going to need more English speaking people if they want to attract
more western acts) and the Russian musicians (and there are many
really good ones by the way!) are going to have some decisions to
make if they want to expand their markets outside of Russia.
I would say to anyone wanting to play there to be very careful who
you work with! It's easy to insist on things like getting all of
your money up front and so on but you should watch for things like
promoters who will pay for your breakfast in a hotel but only if
you eat it in the restaurant, regardless of if you have crawled
into bed at 4:30am after doing a TV show to promote their show and
make them more money. And then there's the "we only pay for
international flights" thing!! Alicante to Moscow IS an international
flight, no matter how many times I have to change planes along the
way and you will pay for my excess baggage all the way there and
back!! When you stop and think about it, the relatively small amounts
of money involved in scams like this are really not worth losing
an artist over and certainly not in a small circle of people such
as we are in. Word gets around and in the end what you saved will
cost you a whole lot more!!
Our flight from Moscow to Madrid was delayed so we missed our connection
but in the end it worked out well because we stayed overnight in
Madrid and drove back the following morning. It took a little longer
but it avoided a lot of hassle.
I would say that this tour was the most successful so far and now
that we have sifted out the good guys from the ......... not-so-good
guys ..... we have a lot to look forward to.
To all of you who supported us I say thanks and I'll see you again
very soon!
..... Veni, Vidi, Vinci!!!
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