"Rock at Sea" is a cool idea, the brain-child of Torsten Niklassen whose company
is called July Morning Productions…. how nice! Basically, they pack 2500
rock fans, mainly from Sweden and Finland, onto the boat and they get to enjoy a
lot of performances from a lot of bands and artists, mostly from Scandinavia but
with some special guests like us and Gotthard…. Oh… and they drink a lot
too! Suicidally in fact!! I had done this cruise once before, it was
a lot of fun and I was happy to accept the offer to do it again with "Live Fire".
The boat
sails from Stockholm at 18:00 on Friday, up the Swedish coastline and in the
general direction of the island of Arlund or Aalund, anyway it’s an island.
When I arrived at the terminal I met Magne and Petter, said a quick "hello" to
Wolfgang Rott who I will see tomorrow and made my way to the boat where we found
the band’s dressing room and waited until the cabins were ready. It was
really good to see the guys again and I am really looking forward to touring
with them in December and through 2008. After we moved into our cabins we
got together for dinner and spent some time catching up, then it was time ro
relax a bit before our midnight stage call.
We were
scheduled to play 90 minutes and we hadn’t played together for a few weeks so I
stuck to a "safe" set list for this gig.
INTRO
OUT OF MY CONTROL
BROWN EYED BOY
CIRCLE OF HANDS
JULY MORNING
JUST THE BEGINNING
BLOOD ON THE HIGHWAY
WE’RE ON OUR WAY
THE WIZARD
STEALIN’
EASY LIVING
THE LAST DANCE
LADY IN BLACK
Encore:
GYPSY
The set
went well, the crowd was noisy and we all had a great time. I am so
looking forward to having this band on the road so we can benefit from playing
consecutive gigs and really fine-tuning our show!
The
movement of the boat was quite strong…. it was actually rocking…. but I didn’t
really feel it until I got up to sing The Wizard. I found that I actually
had to be conscious of the boat’s movement so as not to lose my balance.
If you’ever been on a boat perhaps you can imagine this feeling….. Anyway…
it was cool, we had fun and so did everyone else. Back in the dressing
room we celebrated a little and made plans for tomorrow morning.
I have to
say that it was a bit sad seeing so many very young people drinking themselves
silly and staggering around…. but maybe some of that was the movement of the
boat……… right!!
