It's all fun until someone gets hurt.
The title of this post is a quote that I have been saying all summer while on tour. Why? I have no idea, I just tend to say shit like that.
The tour ended last night without much fan fare. There were a few crew group photos taken and some champagne drunk. We loaded out and headed to a hotel by the Detroit airport at 2:30am. This morning people went their separate ways. I finally had a short flight home in a long time, just over an hour.
The unfortunate thing is I have been fighting a little cold since Minneapolis. I ended sleeping most of this afternoon after picking up a few groceries.
My body is home but my head is still on tour. I have just about a week at home before I head back out on the 5th of September.
I have come up with a small moving light package for the tour but am still waiting on word from management if they want to spend the money. Hopefully a decision will be made tomorrow. I have to have the lighting vendor get our gear to us for the first show and time is pressing.
Labels: Concert, Lighting, Touring
And then there was one
Tomorrow will bring an end to the Rock The Bells tour. My feelings on this tour are mixed. I got to work with some old friends again and also made some new friends.
The schedule was pretty painless since we spent more days off than we did doing shows. Of course we logged a lot of miles.
There were a lot of problems at the beginning which were basically resolved. Many of them I will probably look back at a laugh about.
The last show is tomorrow here in Detroit, actually Clarkston Michigan at the DTE Energy Center. I have done this venue at least ten times over the years.
On Thursday it's back home for a week before the Finger Eleven tour starts for me. I am still trying to sort out the lighting gear that I want to bring out with us for the run.
My job never ends.
Labels: Concert, Finger Eleven, Lighting
Waiting for the end
Just three more shows and this tour will finally come to an end. The next show in Minneapolis has been moved to a smaller venue. It seems that they have in house lighting and sound. We could fit the lighting system we are touring with in there, but the venue will charge the promoter a huge fee to take it out. So I am stuck using a bunch of par cans. Whatever, it's stupid all the way around.
The people putting on this tour have wasted so much money do to mistakes they have made.
There is also some petty jealousy and talking behind people's back. It's pathetic, like a bunch of teenagers and their little clicks.
So next week I go home for about a week and get to recharge my batteries before I head back out. I will be spending the month of September lighting the guys from Finger Eleven. It's a club tour, but at least it is a real band. They will also be doing a tour in Canada in October which I may not be doing because of work visa issues, mainly the cost. This hopefully will change.
They are suppose to come back into the states in November for more shows. So the rest of the year should be busy for me.
Labels: Concert, Lighting, Rock The Bells, Touring
The saga continues
It's mid afternoon here in San Francisco. The weather is wonderful, we couldn't have asked for a nicer day. The show is in full swing and I have nothing to do. It's a fairly early show today with most of the acts playing before it gets dark.
I am waiting till sometime around Cypress Hill's show to venture out and run lights.
We are down near AT&T park, which of course is home to the Giants baseball team. McCovey cove is right by the venue. I took a picture of the stadium very early this morning along with the stage.
The wind is blowing quite a bit right now and the rig is swinging about more than we would like. There are no backdrops up at this point.
Still a bit tired from yesterdays cross country flight.
I had a bit of an incident with my bag. It seems I was 2 pounds over and they wanted to charge me $50. Now I understand the reason for the weight. It becomes a fuel cost thing. My argument is if I am only checking one bag and you are allowed two, then I am no where near the weight limit.
I asked to speak to a supervisor and she agreed with me and since I fly that airline so much she didn't charge me.
I mentioned this the other day that the show in Sacramento for tomorrow is cancelled so we are off to Reno late tonight. I need to keep my gambling to a minimum.
Labels: Rock The Bells, Touring
Well that was quick
The break is over. Three days goes by really fast. Just like Monday I will spend most of tomorrow on planes flying coast to coast. It's back to Los Angeles and we all get back on the buses to continue the tour. Our next show is in San Francisco and the last date with Rage. Hopefully the crowd will be a little better behaved than they were last weekend in San Bernardino.
The Sacramento show on Sunday has been cancelled due to poor ticket sales. This gives us another day off which we will spend in Reno. There goes my per diem for this week.
It also looks like they are changing the venue in Minneapolis on the 25th. It was suppose to be at the Metrodome in the parking lot. I guess it will now be at the Myth. This is a smaller venue but we should be able to get most of the lighting system in there. This is probably a good thing since I suspect tickets numbers were not high enough to hold it outside at a large venue.
Just a couple weeks on this tour and it's on to another in September. I won't mention the band quite yet since I am still finalizing things with them. Let's just say I have been on tour with them in the past.
Also one thing I want to mention. The mining accident in Utah has caught my attention. I seems that nine more were hurt trying to rescue the six that have been trapped. That industry needs to start looking closer into the work conditions that these folks must deal with. This particular mine has had so many violations in the past yet they were allowed to remain open. Things to need to change.
Labels: Lighting, Rock The Bells, Touring, Travel
ZZZZZZ.....what.....zzzz.....where am I
Spent yesterday flying from LA to the east coast for a short break. All of this on 6 hours sleep over the last couple of days. I departed at 6 am west coast time. The first flight was fine since I was in first class, I sleep most of it. Now what was bad was the 4 hour lay over in Washington DC. I was so exhausted that I nearly passed out waiting to get some food. I finally got home around 7:30 last night. I had nothing to eat in the house so after a quick trip to the store and some food I finally got a good nights sleep.
The tour continues to be an adventure. San Bernardino was a mass of people. Rumor is it was over 40,000. The thing I know was it was chaos. During Cypress Hill the idiots on the lawn decided to set fires, which included burning plastic bottles. I don't think these people realize they are toxic. Well after I finished the Wu-Tang set I turned it over to the Rage Against The Machine LD and got the hell out of there. Headed backstage to find the catering was closing down. Great no dinner for me. So it was off to the bus to see what was there. Thank god for peanut butter.
Now I just wanted a shower and sleep. Which after waiting an hour and a half I got.
The next day we had a regular day with our production in San Diego. My day went well but the audio guys had all kinds of problems. We had a smooth load out and it took only an hour and half. After showers, at 2 am we headed to LA to catch flights. This is why I had so little sleep, two hours I think.
So here I am at home for a couple days off. Had a chance to catch up on mail and pay the bills. I went out looking at televisions too. I had planned to buy a new LCD flat screen HD later this year, but found a nice one for a good deal, so now it sits in my living room.
I also needed to get new piece of luggage since my current bag has a zipper going on it. I hit the outlet mall and the Samsonite store and picked up one of the $400 ones for half price. Hopefully this one will last longer than six years.
Anyway I head back out on Friday to LA to rejoin everyone. We will drive up to San Francisco for the last of the shows with Rage. There is talk the Sacramento show the next will be cancelled because of poor tickets sales. Oh well that means another day off, I get paid either way.
Labels: Airlines, Rock The Bells, Touring
Submarine races
This tour has had so many ups and downs. We have replaced some people that just were not cutting it. We have traveled so many miles in such a short time. As long as we have been out we are averaging less than three shows per week. This is strange for me, I am used to working no less than 4 or 5 shows a week.
I’m not really complaining, I still get paid either way, which is nice. The boredom factor is what sets in though, especially when you ride 1200-1400 miles non-stop.
Yes you read that right. We have done three runs on day’s off that have totaled that many miles per trip. The latest one was after the show in Dallas on Tuesday night. We left around 2:30 am and arrived in San Bernardino, California around 8:30pm last night. We only stopped twice to fuel and take care of personal duties.
The two bus drivers we have on this tour are great and just get behind the wheel and do it. Usually they stop after 10-12 hours and sleep. Not them they want to get there as soon as possible.
So we are here until Saturday, which is a show day. It will be another one of those with Rage Against the Machine headlining. The nice thing is we leave my lighting rig in the truck and use theirs.
Sunday will be back to using mine in San Diego. Which we found out will actually be held inside the Coors Amphitheater and not out in their parking lot.
On Monday we all head home for a few days off. The bad part for me is another set of flights from LAX to Rochester, which means about 12 hours of travel by air. I hate the airports these days especially LA. All the travel headache for three days at home, at least I will be able to take care of some personal stuff when I am there.
Off to explore the neighborhood.
Changes have happened
Things have changed and hopefully for the better. We fired the lighting company that I was stuck with for the first week and half of the tour. The guy who was playing production manager was also sent home today.
We will now have a real lighting company working for us and our stage manager has been promoted to production manager.
The Houston show was cancelled to poor ticket sales. Oh well an extra day off.
I went by the lighting company today which happens to be in Dallas where our next show is. I was very impressed with their facility. I have worked for several lighting companies and been to many shops over the years and these guys do things right. I am actually looking forward to the rest of the tour now.
Labels: Lighting, Touring
