May 16th, 2014
And so, after a reasonably early night, 80s Dave and I rendezvous in the hotel lobby at 10.45am to catch the first tour boat leaving the jetty opposite the hotel.
The idea was to take in some of the sights and sounds of old Amsterdam without actually expending too much energy.
I’m a big fan of Amsterdam and I never tire of taking in the unique laid back, almost hippy vibe of the place. However, after an hour or so I was desperate for a coffee – not having got up in time for breakfast before we left – and so I convinced 80s Dave that we should walk the last few miles back to the hotel (and stop off for a caffeine jolt on the way)
80s Dave takes in the sights of Amsterdam
By the time we arrived back at the hotel everyone had checked out and were all at the venue, which was only a few minutes walk away.
Melkweg is a renowned Amsterdam venue and quite rightly so. It’s a great club vibe and, as a standing only gig, one to look forward to for sure. Plenty of room on stage and great acoustics promised a great show – and, as it turns out, we were not to be disappointed!
Melkweg from the outside
Melkweg from the inside
After lunch and before sound check a couple of us popped next door to look at an brilliant photographic exhibition featuring the work of some amazing tattooists. The travesty of many of these types of exhibition is that they are all too often under-advertised and therefore under-visited and it was a real shame to find ourselves the only people there.
Or maybe it was closed?
Lydia, the tattooed lady……..
Anyway, it was soon time to head back and get to work.
Sound check was pretty smooth and drama free and after dinner we all scattered to do our pre-show thing.
Snowboy has seen one of those things before…… but can’t quite remember what it is.
As I may have said before, my preference is to crawl into my bunk and have an hour’s kip before the show but, as I had yet to write the day’s blog (which came out yesterday – always a day in abeyance) my pre-show time was spent trying to think up some of the usual cobblers with which to assail the handful of folks who still give a monkeys.
To be honest, it’s always a bit of a challenge to think up interesting stuff to write about as, quite often……
….nothing much happens.
Maybe that’s the point though? If it’s purpose is to give the reader an insight into life on the road, then boredom is certainly an integral part of the story. It’s often a case of “Hurry up and wait” and a sizeable chunk of the time is spent either staring into space, getting irritated, mucking around or looking at your watch.
Then, all of a sudden, out of nowhere something happens and its go, go, go.
Then…… back to nothing.
Anyway, having committed to doing it, I shall continue with the daily dredge of my failing short term memory in an effort to recall the previous day’s events.
Having said that, the gig was a spanker!! Poor old Lisa had a bit of a throat infection but, being from good northern stock, she shook it off and gave it her all. An epic performance under the circumstances and, other than the fact the we only did one encore tune, I don’t think the crowd would have known.
It was one of those nights where everything gelled and the whole band was giving it what for! A cracker and we all came off buzzing.
After the show it was off to Paris, However, as our hotel rooms would not be ready until 1.00pm and the trip was only 6 hours we could either leave straight away, get to Paris early and spend the morning there before checking in OR stay in Amsterdam and leave at 4.00am so as to time our arrival.
Unanimously the latter was chosen and the intervening 5 hours involved:
An Irish bar
Lots of Guinness
Karaoke
Sweet Caroline (at full volume!)
Mickey doing the conga with the locals
A 24 hr Maccy Ds
Andrea pole dancing (although this is, as yet unverified)
Kebabs
Pretty soon it was 4.00am and time to leave for gay Paris!
Festivities broke up fairly quickly and next thing I knew it was 11.30am and I looked out of the bus window at a bustling Place de la Republique.
Thursday. This must be Paris.