Say You Will Tour Report

l North American Leg l European Leg l Australian Leg l 2004 North America l Cory Q & A l

These reports have been taken from the official fan club exclusive e-mails
 

May 7--Fleetwood Mac has just finished the Sound Check in Columbus, Ohio prior to the first performance of the tour. Spirits are high and the band looks and sounds FANTASTIC! There’s electricity in the air as the crew and management provide a standing ovation for the band. The sound check included “Dreams”, “Say You Will”, “The Chain” and “Big Love”. “This band is geared and ready to kick off the tour”, said Mick.

May 30th--A day for checking out the sights, the Band took in the town. Mick's daughter Amy from Los Angeles was visiting, and so Mick, Carl, and Jamie took Amy to Little Five Points. They did some shopping and Mick bought some books. According to the website www.LFP.com, Little Five Points is "a business community, a neighborhood, and inarguably the coolest spot on the map between Greenwich Village and the French Quarter." Mick then took hi daughter to Lennox Square Mall where they walked around and perused the stores. Mick and Amy had a quiet "Father/Daughter" dinner at the Hotel.

May 31st--It was a quiet morning in the hotel, before the band boarded their private 727 headed for Nashville. The band was greeted by many family and friends in Nashville, including former Fleetwood Mac Guitarist, Bob Welch. The band spent some time with Bob, reminiscing about old days, and talked about what is going on in Nashville. The sold out Gaylord Entertainment Center witnessed the liveliest show so far on this tour. The band was on fire! There were lots of music people in attendance, and their enthusiasm, support and the whole vibe inspired the band to dig even deeper artistically. They just dazzled the crowd. Bob Welch and Walter Eagan greeted the band after the show. Radio contest winners also congratulated the band on a fabulous show. The band returned to the airport, and flew back to Atlanta.

June 1st--Another show day. The band enjoyed a quiet morning in the hotel prior to traveling to the airport for their flight to Greenville, SC. The sold out BiLo Center hosted an incredibly rowdy, young crowd. It was a great show. While demonstrating his passion for the guitar, Lindsey stepped down onto the monitors during "Go Your Own Way", and at times the fans were strumming his strings with him. Stevie did her signature twirls, and to the crowd's delight she really let go on "Stand Back". Some of the crew commented that they felt John McVie played the best bass of his life at this show. As the eldest statesman of the band, John has great vigor and energy for the tour. Radio station personalities and contest winners had an opportunity to meet the band after the show. Back to Atlanta on the private 727. (By the way, if you haven't seen the Club photos of the plane's interior, visit the club photo section inside the Fan Club, and click on the upper right pearl!)

June 2nd--A day off. The band took some well needed down time. Lindsey rested and read in his room, Stevie laid low, and Mick cruised the town with his daughter. Mick and Amy visited Virginia Highlands, billed as "Atlanta's most popular neighborhood for shopping dinning and nightlight." Mick was seen purchasing antiques and in a local music store, where he was buying CD's, Mick signed autographs for fans. For more information on the Virginia Highlands, go to www.virginiahighland.com. The day's sunshine still allowed some time by the pool.That evening the Band percussionist, Taku Hirano and his wife, TV host personality Arthel Neville hosted a party at their home. Lindsey, John, Mick, band management and personnel enjoyed an engaging, entertaining evening.

* On the Road with Jamie Talbot (Tour Management)

This tour report has a twist! We asked Jamie Talbot, a manager at Immortal Entertainment, to give the tour report to our members directly. We hope you enjoy this insider view!

June 4---Nothing terribly exciting happened our last day in Atlanta, the band members hung out at the hotel gym, sundeck and pool. We did some shopping and walking around, and took care of laundry. Mick and I dined at the Madison Grill with the owner and former Earthlink CEO Mike McQuery. All around it was a generally low key day.

June 5--Show day Birmingham. After packing up a weeks stay and catching some last minute rays by the pool we boarded our jet for Birmingham, AL. Today was what is known as an in and out. We fly, play a Show and fly again to Miami. Several members of the band have been battling flu symptoms and are feeling a little run down. Special guests at the Birmingham show were none other than Olivia Newton-John and her band. She was performing her new cabaret show not too far away and she decided to pop by for the Fleetwood Mac show. The show went well with a very responsive and energetic Birmingham crowd. After the show we were off to Miami for three days in sunny Florida.

June 6--After a late check-in to the hotel (the amazingly beautiful Mandarin Oriental, in the heart of Miami) we all unpacked a little and hit the sheets. The weather was Florida hot (about 85 degrees) and humid. A couple of band members even went for a late night swim in the pool. The Fleetwood’s and the Buckingham’s were reunited with their families, as the wives and children reconnected after parting in NY. The hotel’s décor is spectacular and the setting stunning, right in the middle of Brickell Key. We all enjoyed the day by the pool, working out in the gym, dining and taking in some of the sights (mainly South Beach). Former Fleetwood Mac Tour Manager John Courage joined us at the hotel for the weekend; he visited with the band and reminisced about the old times. Several band members and band personnel made the trip to South Beach where they were guests of Gloria Estefan at her restaurant LARIOS. Stevie and guests dined on great Cuban food and then strolled the streets of South Beach.

June 7--Show day in Ft. Lauderdale--After a day and a half of fun in the sun with families and friends, the band readied themselves for the 40 minute drive to Ft Lauderdale, where they played a spectacular show to a scantily clad Florida crowd. There was great energy and vibe to the performance and the audience. Lenny Kravitz was a special guest; he came with his band and daughter and stayed for the whole show. Mick gave special thanks to John Courage, for all his time and dedication to the band over the years, "without him none of us would be here now" Mick stated over the PA, a great thanks to John Courage. After the show the band had several guests and family members to greet. On the way home, die-hard fans tried to get a peak into the limos as they exited the Office Depot, on their way back to Miami. Back at the hotel several band members congregated in the lobby bar for a few drinks and a late night dinner. Stray fans perused the lobby and procured a few autographs from Mick. After a late night swim for a few of us, it was up to bed.

June 8--Show Day in Tampa--After quickly packing, it was down to the pool for some last minute Florida rays and a swim, before we were all off to Tampa. This was a long day as after the show we were off to Chicago, which is a long flight. Tampa again proved to be a rock and roll town, and the band played an excellent show for the tropical crowd who were reeling and rocking the whole set. No new twists, just a great show. After the concert, as we prepared to head to the plane we were informed that due to inclement weather in Charlotte, our outgoing plane was going to be quite late. So we ordered pizza's and mingled around the venue until the jet arrived and we could leave. This pushed our arrival time in Chicago a couple of hours later, causing everyone to grow quite tired. We all got up late on the 9th.

June 9, 10, 11---Days Off in Chicago. While the crew and production make the long drive from Tampa to Detroit, the band and management stayed in Chicago and took in the city. We enjoyed shopping on Michigan Ave. and Rush St.; there is a lot to do in this town! We rested and prepared ourselves for the upcoming shows.

June 14th, Show Day in Grand Rapids, MI. A great show at the Van Andel Arena.

June 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th - Days Off in Chicago.
The band enjoyed 4 days off in a row in the windy city. The band members and staff took in baseball games at Wrigley Field, and Comiskey Park and they participated in the excitement and livelihood of Chicago baseball.
Some of us took a Chicago River Boat Tour of the river and lakefront areas and marveled at the architectural splendor. We visited Navy Pier, which has been a Chicago landmark since 1916, and we perused the shops and enjoyed lunch overlooking the lake. Other band members took in art galleries, museums and movies. We have enjoyed the whole city, especially shopping on Michigan Ave.
Ralph Lauren's first restaurant, adjacent to his Michigan Ave. store, hosted a large intimate dinner for the band and band personal. We all enjoyed the fabulous atmosphere, food and conversation.
John McVie's wife and daughter, Lindsey's wife and children, Mick's wife and children, and several of the band member's spouses and children have all joined the tour while we were stationed in Chicago for 3 weeks.

June 19th, 20th - Shows in St. Paul's MN
We flew to St. Paul's for a quick stay and two shows at the Xcel Energy Center. The band was on fire as The Xcel Center witnessed the 2 biggest crowds so far on this tour. Sheryl Crow and her manager came to the first show and Sheryl returned to the hotel for an after show reception with the band. Sheryl was then off to get ready for her own upcoming tour.

June 21st, - Day off in Chicago
Some of the band enjoyed a scenic drive up to Lake Geneva. A leisurely afternoon was well enjoyed in one of the Midwest's top recreation and resort areas in the country.

June 22nd - Show in Moline, IL at The Mark of the Quad Cities Moline is on the border of Iowa and Illinois, and The Mark of the Quad Cities is one of the premier midsize arenas in the country. What a great show and great crowd, watch for concert photos to be posted in the Fan Club shortly.

June 23rd - Day Off Chicago
More sightseeing in Chicago.
 

The following is an FM Tour Update from J. Talbot (Tour Management):

Sorry it's taken so long for another update folks, but as you must know things have really been brewing up in the FM camp of late. We released the new single, "Say You Will," we announced a whole slew of new dates for North America, and we have been putting the finishing touches on our European Tour. The European leg is scheduled for November, which at the moment includes stops in Germany, Ireland and England. The band is really looking forward to continuing to bring the music to as many cites and countries as possible.

Let me take you back several weeks to where I left off... lots of fun stuff has happened in the last month or so. After the Milwaukee Summerfest on Jun 29, which was one of only 3 outdoor venue dates on tour, the band headed straight for Dallas. The Milwaukee show was known as a runner, in which we go straight from the stage to the limos and to the plane in as short a time as possible. We do this to avoid getting stuck in venue exit traffic and to make sure we get to the band jet and take off before the curfew kicks in, which various cities have. The band literally goes sprinting to their vehicles from the stage. The principal members, managers and assistants go to their respective limos, and the rest of the band and personnel ride in vans and SUV's. Thankfully we only have to do a few of these.

Dallas proved to be a great few days as the weather was great and the whole entourage got to relax a little. Lindsey's family joined him to spend a couple of days by the pool, relaxing and enjoying themselves. Mick had a foursome of golf and enjoyed working on his tan and swimming in the pool.

He was also seen doing some purchasing in the world renowned Stanley Korshak Store. Seemed like everybody laid low. The shows had awesome crowds in Oklahoma City and Dallas. Don Henley of the Eagles took in the Dallas show from a private box and came backstage to hang out and talk with Stevie and Mick. After Dallas it was on to Sin City (Las Vegas) where we played the MGM Grand. Family and friends made the short journey from LA to take in a couple of days of Vegas fun. Mick enjoyed a private cabana by the pool with his wife, as did his manager and family who had come to enjoy the weekend. Being the 4th of July, things were absolutely off the hook in Vegas, most of the band and crew spent time gambling and taking in the sun.

From Vegas it was to Northern Cal where we played Sacramento and San Jose.

Crowd response was excellent and being that both Lindsey and Stevie met and started their relationship in the Northern Cal area, it was an extra special homecoming and both Lindsey and Stevie were very acknowledging of that with the fans, extra special warmth at both of these shows.

While staying in San Fran we all took to the streets and shopped, saw the sights and got some great Chinese Food! At the San Jose show local resident Sammy "RED ROCKER" Hagar stopped by with his wife and band members Vic Johnson and Jesse Harms. He spoke to Mick briefly before the show and stayed right through until the end. (Sammy and Mick both have homes in Maui.) After the 2 incredible Northern Cal shows it was on to LA, but we had a delay on the runway when we discovered a nick in one of the front tires. This caused a two-hour delay and forced us to get home very, very early in the AM. Stay tuned for part 2 of this run as I will bring you guys up to speed on the LA shows and where we are now.

FYI---After much delay the tour book seems to be almost ready. We should have it out very soon. As well as a couple of new T-Shirt designs.
 

On the Road with Fleetwood Mac!

The following is an FM Tour Update from J. Talbot (Tour Management):

This brings us to the LA homecoming. From July 9th through July 21st, the Band and Crew returned to LA after more than 2 months of touring. For all the principles and managers Los Angeles is home. Stevie, Lindsey and Mick returned home to their families and houses, while John opted to stay in a hotel. It is sometimes more difficult than it seems to return home in the middle of the tour.

We are all in road mode and it is easy to lose your focus and groove when there is a home coming mid-stride. For that reason Stevie and Mick both kept hotel rooms to use in preparation of all the Southern California shows. This made it easy to get into the pre-show ritual that the band was used too (the rest of the crew and band stayed in a hotel too!)--shuffling between the shows, homes and hotels, those that lived in LA were able to get home and see friends and family. But we were very much still in tour mode and were all very excited to be playing in LA, Anaheim and San Diego.

The LA shows on the 11th and 12th went off amazingly well. LA was a big deal because we had people from our record label Warner Bros., family, guests, close friends, media, celebrities, and VIPs attending the shows.

Some of the guests spotted at the shows were Tom Arnold, Brooke Shields, Cameron Crowe, Lionel Richie, Tommy Lee, and Josh Groban. The band was also presented with a RIAA award for cumulative sales of 50 million units sold in the USA, this is quite an achievement for the band. The fan response was perhaps the best of the tour at both LA shows. Los Angles is known as a difficult town to get a reaction from because of all the industry populace including critics, despite these circumstances Fleetwood Mac was able to invoke a tremendous reaction. The band was on high for all the Southland shows which were all very gratifying. All in all the Southern California shows exceeded the expectations of the band and it has inspired them to continue on a whole new level.

After taking care of business on the home front, the band headed for a show in Phoenix. Before joining up with the band in Phoenix, Mick made a brief stop in Las Vegas where he is involved in a project raising funding for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). The project, called The Final Editions of Salvador Dali, dedicates a portion of proceeds to the NEA. Mick flew to Las Vegas on July 20th for gala showings at two galleries. Fox, CBS and Vegas Radio covered the events. If you'd like info on the project, want to see the art or want to download free activity programs for kids, visit the following link: http://www.mickfleetwood.com/dali/index.html

The Phoenix show had special meaning since it was a benefit for The Arizona Heart Foundation, a charity that Stevie and her family are very involved with. The band donated all the proceeds to this deeply moving cause and they spent time at a special after show meet and greet for fans and supporters. Stevie was most appreciative, Mick gave a very moving speech, and John and Lindsey graciously gave their time. It was a fantastic, touching evening. You can see more information about this at: http://www.azheartfoundation.org/pressview.asp?ID2=122

We then flew to San Francisco, where we played an amazing show in Oakland. A day off allowed everyone time to do some shopping, work out, and take in a ball game! Stevie likes to take it easy on her days off, watch TV, rest her voice and lay low. Mick is a walker and shopper and gets out whenever he can. John also loves to get out and see the sights. Lindsey sort of blends the best of both worlds, perhaps a book store in the morning and writes a song in the afternoon.

From Oakland it was on to the Pacific Northwest. We hubbed in Seattle, while we played shows in Seattle, Portland and Boise. The weather in Seattle was beautiful and most every body got out a lot and did stuff........Mariner games, harbor front walks, shopping, shopping, shopping, waterskiing, wakeboarding, Golfing, working out, Flying to Vancouver, eating at El Gaucho, Bennihana etc. The shows themselves went well, very eager and excited crowds--incredible performances. We are currently in San Francisco again on our way to shows in Reno and New Mexico. Nothing to out of the ordinary going on, just having great time and enjoying all that comes with what is Fleetwood Mac.

* Tour Report
On the Road with Jamie Talbot, Band Management.

Ok fans....we are back in action. After a too brief but much needed break and mini vacation, the Mac is back on Leg 2 of the 2003 tour. For the last couple weeks of August through Labor Day the entire entourage and crew were free from their duties and all used the time to recharge their batteries, spend time at home or vacation. The principals also took a much needed break with Mick going to Hawaii to spend time with his wife and family, Stevie spent time relaxing in Malibu, John at home in Los Angeles. Lindsey spent time at home as well as New York where he appeared on the Charlie Rose Show. We all reconvened in Biloxi for a day of rehearsal and then we kicked off the second leg on the 6th of September.

It was also the first show with new background singer Jana Anderson, who replaces Mindy Stein while she takes her maternity leave. After some fun in Biloxi, gambling in casino Beau Rivage, it was off to Atlanta where we returned for another great show just outside the city in Duluth. We all spent time shopping in Lennox and Phipps Malls as well as some fine dining at Chops and The Palm restaurants. Some members of the camp took in some golf and tennis as well as working out. Show 3 was in Greensboro N.C., where the fans were loud and very appreciative. Everyone is feeling refreshed and ready to keep the Mac machine rolling. Next up is Knoxville TN and then on to Chicago again. Looking ahead to Boston, we will be taping a special for PBS to be aired early next year. The long awaited tour program has finally been put out and is ready for you all!! Everyone is excited to bring the music back to a few of places we have been as well those cities we have not yet visited. Europe is coming up in November and Mick and John are very excited to be going back to England. Stevie and Lindsey are also very keen on revisiting their fans in Germany and Ireland.

European Tour Report 11/8,9,10

If you don’t already know, we (Fleetwood Mac and roughly 80 staff and crew members) have been stuck together in rehearsals and subsequently on tour since February 2003. A few people have since left, a few people have since come, but on the whole, we’ve been together for nearly 9 months (with the exception of a few much needed, albeit short breaks to go home, kiss your loved ones, sleep in your own bed, and remember how to drive an automobile. But then it’s right back to work.) February, March and April were spent rehearsing and planning for the upcoming tour, which started off on May 7th in Columbus, Ohio. At that point in time we were only scheduled to be out for about two months, five months later we were still on our US tour, which finally wrapped up in Las Vegas on October 17th. We said our goodbyes and headed home for two weeks, and that more or less brings you up to date. On November 7th we arrived in Frankfurt, Germany for the first show of the European leg of the Fleetwood Mac Say You Will Tour. That first show in Frankfurt will be our 71st show. Now, although I can’t rightfully speak for everyone, I think it’s safe to say we all have a lot of fun doing what we do, so we thought that we would share it with you. Enter yours truly. What you guys see is the final product, a two and a half hour Fleetwood Mac show, but what you can’t see is that there is a bustling world of people, hard work and good times under the surface of that final product. So, for anyone interested, here’s a glimpse into the daily life of our happy little family?


November 8th, 2003
Arrivals & Rehearsal
Frankfurt, Germany
Festhalle
Today’s Theme: Jetlag

We arrived in Frankfurt yesterday morning. The time change is nothing short of evil. As if 15 hours of flying and travel isn’t enough to cause delirium on it’s own? The addition of a 9 hour time change has caused me to feel like I’m living in a parallel universe. A lot of people slept on the plane, so they’re not suffering as much, I was not one of those lucky people. I was too interested in watching Fight Club and Charlie’s Angels on the plane, big mistake. Anyway, we spent our first day here catching up with each other and then trying to catch up with our sleep schedules.
Everyone seemed to have their own theory on how to beat jetlag, some of us slept all day, and were up all night, some of us deprived ourselves of sleep for 24 hours and spent the day looking like the walking dead. And the end result on the following workday was that no matter what you decided to do, you were tired. You can run from jetlag, but you can’t hide. Anyhow, we showed up to the venue today to load in and rehearse. It was slow going, due to widespread jetlag and the fact that it’s our first run at putting together a US set-up in Europe. It’s also our first show back from vacation, and it always takes us a while to get back into the swing of things. But given the things that could have gone wrong, I think everything went pretty smoothly. Go team! The band arrived around 5:00PM and spent the first hour or so chatting, but finally made it to the stage to run through a few songs. And since we play a show here tomorrow in this building, we don’t have to load out, which also means that we don’t have to load in tomorrow morning at the crack of dawn. We don’t even have to go the venue tomorrow until noon. Hallelujah. It’s back to the hotel for a cocktail and a good (and quite necessary) nights sleep.


November 9th, 2003
Frankfurt, Germany
Festhalle
Today's Theme: Boredom

Hotel rooms in Germany are weird. I’ve never been to Europe before this trip, so I’m still getting used to the differences. I have 18 light switches in my room and only three lights. I’ll just leave it at that. Anyway, there’s a Pub around the corner from our hotel, so we went out and had a few laughs last night, ended up at the hotel bar. I stayed up too late. So when I woke up this morning, I was still tired, only now I felt tired and stupid for staying up so late. Double whammy. We don’t have our buses yet, so vans picked us up at the hotel today and took us to the venue around 12:30PM. It was a pretty peaceful day since most of what we do all day was already done yesterday. So I’ll skip telling you about the middle of the day, unless you want to hear such exciting details like what was for lunch and how many times I went up and down the stairs from the dressing rooms to the stage looking for something to do.

There are about 45 of us that show up to the venues early in the morning to literally take an empty building and turn it in to what you see and hear when you come to a show. Then there are about 25 people that travel with the band, and they usually get to the venue around 4:00, give or take a little. Sound check usually happens around 6:00, show usually starts a little after 8:00 and ends somewhere before 11:00. The band leaves shortly thereafter while we take down everything we put up only hours before. It seems repetitive I’m sure, and sometimes it can be, but That’s what we do. So we didn’t really have sound check today, since rehearsals yesterday served as a sound check. Tonight’s show was great, it had a good feel to it, being the first show back. We all whine about our jobs just as much as the rest of the world does, but tonight reminded me how much fun it is out here. And the crowd seemed to love the show. I wasn’t sure if the reaction would be different here then it is in the States, but the only difference I noticed is that they clapped along to every song, even the slow ones. It was rather strange.

Load out took a little longer than usual, but we expected that. I think we’re expecting everything to take a little longer these first few days, after that it’ll run like clockwork again. (Right now there are 45 crew members laughing out loud at the idea of me saying that anything runs like clockwork.) Oh well. Such is life. The buses arrived tonight. I’ve never been on a European tour bus, but they’re strange. My bus is a double decker. There’s a lounge, the bathroom and the kitchen downstairs and
then two lounges and the bunks upstairs. U.S. buses are one story, so this is going to take some getting used to. And the downstairs lounge kind of has a purple disco vibe to it. It’s funny.

We have a back to back tonight, which just means that we have two shows in a row in two different cities, so after load out tonight the buses arrived to pick us up and take us to Berlin. We’ll sleep on the bus and instead of checking into a hotel when we get in, we’ll get out of bed and roll right off the bus to load in the show. And tomorrow is going to be a rough one, we don’t get to Berlin until 10:00 or 11:00 in the morning. Load in usually starts around 8:00AM. So we lose roughly 2 hours tomorrow. Ouch.


November 10th, 2003
Berlin, Germany
Max Schmelling Halle
Today’s Theme: Frostbite

Well, I spent the morning complaining to anyone who would listen about how cold my bus was last night. Typically tour buses are kept at a temperature somewhere in the mid sixties. When you have 10 people living together in a small space, it’s best to keep the temperature low so that if one person has a cold everyone doesn’t get their germs. I know, t’s a glamorous lifestyle we lead out here. Anyway, my bus had to have been 40 degrees last night. You could see your own breath. It was awful. And the blankets on these buses are apparently made for people who are 3 feet tall. I was freezing. But I talked to our driver and he showed me all the thermostats, so tonight my bus will be a toasty 85 degrees. I’ll risk catching a cold, I’ll take a case of the sniffles over frostbite any day.

Like I said, we lost 2 hours for load in, so the late start this morning kept everyone perpetually busy. And there was only one loading dock, which means they can only unload one truck at a time. But as always, come show time, everything was ready. And tonight’s show was fantastic. Honestly, all the shows are great, but there are some that just stand out, and tonight was one of them. I don’t know if has to do with the crowd or the band, or maybe both, but there was a lot of good energy tonight.

The only downer for today is that I didn’t get to see any of Berlin, we arrived this morning and we’re leaving tonight, so that’s a bummer. We drive to Dusseldorf tonight, and we have two days off there, so that should be fun. Hopefully our hotel rooms will be bigger than a closet and have less than 23 light switches. (I’m still getting accustomed with Europe.)
 

November 13th, 2003
Oberhausen, Germany
K’nig-Pilsener Arena
Today’s Theme: Disgusting drinks and dirty words

The two days off in Dusseldorf were great. It’s a cute town, with an good public transit system, so exploring the city was easy. A few of us went to Krefeld to race go-karts, which is about a 30 minute train ride away. It was so fun, I think 6 of us went, and I was only the girl racing? I got my butt kicked. The race supervisor looked and sounded like the guy from Saturday Night Live who says? Do you want to touch the monkey?? You know, the Sprockets guy? Anyway, he waves a blue flag at you whenever someone’s trying to pass you. I got blue flagged nearly every single lap. It was hysterical. By the time we were done I think I was 8 laps behind. I am also apparently such a bad driver that I caused Tim, one of the lighting guys, to crash in to a wall. (Don’t worry, he’s fine.) Needless to say, I did not receive a trophy. I placed last. But I’m no sore loser, it was a good time had by all. Even the train ride was fun, the train station itself was this beautiful old building with a clock tower, and the train went all through the countryside. I was ecstatic over seeing ducks and horses while on a train, what can I say, I’m from San Francisco, little things like this please me. I’m pretty sure all the locals on the train thought I was nuts when I started screaming “Look, Ducks!!! Ducks!!” And it’s amazing what You’re willing to eat and drink while in foreign countries, on the way back to the hotel we got these dreadful, foul smelling drinks that consisted of hot mulled wine mixed with all kinds of spices and hot rum. Talk about an acquired taste, yet I drank the whole thing. Why, you ask? Because I’m in Germany, and I’m determined to try new things, no matter how vile they may be.

The gig tonight was in Oberhausen, which is about a 45 minute drive from Dusseldorf. This morning was actually our first morning of how tour usually is. We’ve had rehearsals and back to back shows since we arrived, so this morning finally felt like we were on tour again. Getting up early, loading all your luggage up and piling on to the bus to go to the gig. Today is also the first day I feel I’ve completely recovered from jetlag. It took a week. How’s that for adjustment?

The day went by fast, we had to make sure we were on time today, if not early. There’s a midnight flight curfew in Oberhausen, which means if the bands plane was not on the runway and in the process of taking off at the stroke of midnight, they were stuck in Oberhausen till morning. So we had soundcheck at 5:00PM sharp and the show was to start at 8:00PM on the dot. (Which is when the show is actually supposed to start). Fleetwood Mac is usually a tad bit late to take the stage (not late late, just fashionably late, still, 8:00 was kind of a push.) They ended up starting the show about ten minutes after 8:00. Not bad. And can I just say that the crowd in Oberhausen is seriously one of the best I can remember. They were insane. There as a girl in the front row that kept getting up on her boyfriends shoulders to take pictures of Stevie, no matter how many times our security went to tell her to get down, she was right back up there ten minutes later. The whole crowd clapped and screamed from the first minute to the last. It made the show so much fun. I think the standout song tonight was “Never Going Back”, I’ve heard that song live too any times to count, and it’s always a beautiful song, but for whatever reason, tonight it was heart wrenching. Let’s just say I may have even gotten a little teary. Just maybe.

There was also a lot of commotion today due to the fact that we were recording Peacekeeper for a television show (Editor’s note: it was for the AMA awards). I’m not even sure what show it was for, I just know that there was a television camera crew there, and that I heard the word Peacekeeper 4 million times today. It was the talk of the town.

Okay, my final tidbit tonight is actually a polite request to all you showgoers out there. Please, please leave your tambourines at home when you come to a Fleetwood Mac show. There was a girl behind me tonight that played her tambourine the WHOLE SHOW. And if that wasn’t bad enough, she had NO RHYTHM. It drove me up a wall, so much that our security nearly had to hold me back from jumping in to the audience and hunting her down. So please, leave the tambourine playing to Miss Stevie, the world will be a better place for it. Oh yeah, and those little laser pointer things, leave those at home too, nobody likes those, they’re annoying and you know it. I think it’s my bedtime, I’d say goodnight in German, but so far all I’ve learned to say are dirty words. Figures.
 

November 16th, 2003
Kiel, Germany
Ostseehalle
Today’s Theme: Scary Alien-Like Fish

I am in love with Kiel Germany. Kiel is in the Northern most part of Germany, and it’s right on the water. Needless to say, its bone chilling cold here and the wind is not helpful either. But I love this city. It’s beautiful. We were lucky enough to have two days off here. I spent the first day off walking around in what could best be described as the Times Square of Kiel. It’s obviously not as massive as Times Square, but it has the same busy feel and lots of shopping. The streets are cobblestone and mostly closed to cars, it’s just charming. We went to a German restaurant for dinner, I’m pretty much a vegetarian, but when they brought the guys, food to the table, I have never seen so much carnage in my life. It was just a huge tray of meat, sausages and sauerkraut that they all crowded around like cavemen while I ate my dainty cheese plate. We also had a keg at our table. Is that really necessary? We eventually migrated to an Irish Pub where a lot of the crew had set up camp. I planned on getting to bed at a decent hour, but three hours later I was
taking shots called Brain Tumors. I have no idea what was in them, but I’ll just tell you that it tasted twice as gross as it looks.

After sleeping until noon I was prepared for another day of exploring Kiel. We walked a few miles down by the water and came across a small aquarium. It ended up just being a huge room with different kinds of fish in tanks, but it was fun. We took pictures of all the really creepy alien-like fish that don’t exist in America. After the aquarium it started raining so the night’s activities were limited to getting a bite to eat close by, and getting to bed early.

The next morning was show day, we were up and out of the hotel early, but to make a long story short we were arrived an hour early for load in. So there was a lot of sitting and waiting. I personally took it upon myself to find a comfy couch and take a little morning cat nap.

The show itself was good, as usual. It was our last show in Germany, we drive an hour to Hamburg tonight, check in to a hotel for a good 3 hours of sleep and then we fly to Dublin tomorrow morning to play two shows there. I must say, I loved Germany, but we’ve been here 10 days, and I’m ready to roll. We’ve chartered a 737 to take the crew from Germany to Ireland. What a treat, a private plane. Now this is getting good. I’m indescribably excited to see Ireland. Of all our destinations on this tour, I’m most excited for Ireland. I can’t really say why, maybe I’m just a sucker for a good accent. I’m also waiting to see how many pints of Guinness the boys can get down in 2 days. I should keep a running count. We’ll be taking a tour of the Guinness factory on our second day off in Dublin. This has the potential to get real ugly folks, I’ll keep you updated.

20th November 2003
Dublin, Ireland - The Point

Sorry, this is going to be a long one. It’s decided. I’m moving to Dublin. Immediately. I can’t imagine a better place to be. Okay, I’m probably not moving to Dublin, but this city is phenomenal. After load out in Kiel we drove to Hamburg, arrived in the wee hours of the morning and slept such a small amount that it Shouldn’t even be referred to as sleep. Then we all headed to the airport the next morning to catch our plane to Dublin. We were a tired bunch, the plane was near empty, it was a 737 with only about 40 of us on board. It was really nice, everyone had plenty of room to catch a nap on the 2 hour flight. I decided to tick everyone off and walk up and down the aisle taking pictures of people sleeping. (I only did it because I fell asleep for a half hour only to be woken up by multiple people snapping my photo. And let’s just say that nobody looks his or her best while sleeping in an upright position on an airplane. Who knew I had a double chin?? It‚s news to me.)

We arrived to a lovely day in Dublin. We took a charter bus to the hotel, and within 20 minutes of checking in people were already down at the pub across the street having a real Guinness. (Or two, or seven.) Having been sleep deprived and unfed, two pints later I was more than ready for a nap. I woke up just in time to meet the lighting boys for my first night out in Ireland. I’ll just give the Cliff Notes version and say that we had a lot of fun. I would hate to incriminate anyone by saying anything further. Moving on....

The next morning Kramer, our production assistant, and I walked around and did some shopping. We’re in a great area with lots of little stores and restaurants. We ran in to John McVie who was out strolling the town as well. Then about an hour later we ran in to Mick. Word has it there is nothing to do near their hotel so it’s no wonder they had made the trek to our neck of the woods.

I’m sorry to say that I did not make the trip to tour the Guinness factory. I opted for a day of walking and shopping instead. But I’ll try and get a few pictures for you from one of the guys.

The gig in Dublin was an old brick building that looked like a train station. There was a cat that lived in the arena and I spent about an hour through out the day on my hands and knees trying to befriend it. No luck. We played 2 shows in Dublin, the first of which was fantastic. Best crowd yet. Possibly feeding off the crowd’s energy, Lindsey went crazy during “Come” and careened into Stevie’s microphone stand, knocking it over and nearly killing himself. The crowd loved it. During his solo in “Don’t Stop”, often times he crouches down close to the crowd, well tonight he got a little too close and received a big fat kiss from a girl in the front row. And then there was the cutest little girl in the front row that was sitting on her Dad’s shoulders, and I think Stevie had someone give them passes for after the show. So there you go folks, if you have a cute kid, just come parade them at the show and you’ll get a backstage pass! I think Stevie has a soft spot for kids, kids and dogs. Speaking of dogs, Stevie’s dogs usually come on tour with us, and they couldn’t come to Europe because there’s something like a 6 week quarantine period to bring animals overseas. I’m definitely missing the presence of pets out here.

We didn’t have to load out after the first show since we’d be there again the following night, and we didn’t have to go in until 3:00 the next day, so there was a keg of Guinness is catering that night. Yay for beer.

The second show was just as great, Lindsey ran into the microphone stand again (you’d think he would have remembered it was there) after all, it is in the same place every single night. So that’s twice he’s nearly killed himself on a ribbon and rose covered microphone (he’s 2 for 2). Pretty soon we’ll be placing bets on it.

And then there was a little incident with one of the girls on the crew. You all may be familiar with Carlos Rios and Neale Heywood (two of our guitar players). Well let’s just say the spirit of the Irish got into one of our girls and Carlos and Neale got flashed during “Go Your Own Way”. I have a picture of their faces when it happened. Good stuff.

Ireland was nothing short of perfect for me. For more reasons than I can explain. We fly to Newcastle today, and I’ll be sad to leave. I fell asleep last night to the sounds of drunk Irishmen singing drinking songs at the top of their lungs outside my window. What a great city.

22nd November 2003
Newcastle, UK

Newcastle was okay. I've been tired lately and it's cold here so I pretty much stuck to the hotel the whole time, with the exception of a few meals out. We flew in from Dublin yesterday morning and arrived at the hotel mid-day. The hotel was nice, it was right on the water and there were plenty of restaurants and bars nearby.
 
Any who...I stayed up too late in the hotel bar, and the lighting guys made me drink a shot of Sumbuca, which is basically liquid liquorice hell. Went to bed with a headache, woke up with a headache, and it took a good part of the day for me to feel good again. Like I said, liquid liquorice hell. But enough about me...on with the show.
 
I will admit, the Newcastle show has left a bad taste in my mouth. Not because of the show or the audience in particular, that was all fine and good. But because of what happened after the show...
 
At the end of every show, when Mick is saying goodnight, I wait up front with the crowd until the house lights come on, indicating to the audience that the show is over. Then I make my way to the front of the stage, squeezing myself between crazy front row fans, to start taking down equipment. Well, last night while I was on my way to the front of the stage, there was a lot more action up front than usual, when I got there I saw that a handful of fans had somehow grabbed Stevie‚s microphone stand, which is covered in carefully placed ribbons and beads and rosaries. They had her stand on the floor and they were tearing it to shreds. Real nice, huh? They were like rabid animals. I grabbed the stand and was playing tug-o-war for it with two guys. One of which pushed me, and it would be unladylike for me to repeat what I said to him, but it involved a lot of words that my grandmother would smack me for saying. I jumped up on the stage to find one of the sound guys helping me pull the stand back up and away from the ribbon-hungry fans. What monsters! Who pushes a girl? There was, however, a very sweet lady picking up sad little scraps of ribbon/bead shrapnel off the floor for me. When all was said and done, the ribbons and beads were not doing well. They are back in a wardrobe case recovering now, and have been stabilized but remain in critical condition. I just hate that a handful of people can ruin a whole night. Oh well, roll with the punches, tomorrow's a new day.
 
After the show I went up to Stevie's room to tell everyone about the mic stand brawl, she was not happy about it. But it makes for a good story, doesn't‚t it?
 
We went back to the hotel after load out and had a drink before retiring. Tomorrow morning we take a bus to Birmingham for 2 days off and then 2 shows. This leg of the tour is flying by; it feels like I've been out for a couple days, and we‚re already halfway done. For some people who are anxious to get back to their families and such, that would be a good thing, but for me, I'm a youngin, with very little to call my own, so I'm not ready to go home yet...I'm just getting started with Europe.

26th November 2003
Birmingham, UK - NEC

If I have to blow my nose one more time, I’m going to jump off a bridge. I hate to be melodramatic, but I’m deathly ill, and it’s only getting worse. The only time I complain about being out on the road is when I’m sick, because all I want to do is call in sick to work, crawl in to my bed at home and cuddle with my cats while I feel sorry for myself. That is not an option. I can’t call in sick, I’m thousands of miles from home and from my bed, and my cats don’t even remember me at this point. I know, it’s just a cold, but I’m a big baby about being sick.

Tour is like day care, if one kid shows up with a cold, it’s only a matter of days before everyone has it.

So unfortunately, I can’t tell you that much about Birmingham, since I spent one and half out of two days sleeping and coughing and watching television. We arrived mid-day on the 23rd after a 3 or so hour drive from Newcastle. I fell asleep as soon as got to the room and saw a fluffy white down comforter with 4 huge pillows. If there’s anything I’m good at, it’s staying in bed for downright unhealthy amounts of time. The bed doesn’t even need to be comfy, but I’ll take all the help I can get.

The first night we were there a bus was scheduled to pick us all up and take us to a pub that was about 45 minutes away. Our production manager lives near Birmingham and his friend who owns this pub was nice enough to open up just for us and have us all for dinner and drinks. I over slept and nearly missed the bus. Big surprise. In case I haven’t mentioned it before, I have a little reputation for missing the bus. It doesn’t happen often anymore, but there were a few weeks where I missed nearly every other one. Oops.

Dinner was great; the pub was adorable, very cozy and cute. I was still pretty out of it from being ill and sleeping so long, but everyone ate and drank too much and had a good time.

The next day was the day I spent in bed. We’ll skip that day.

Which brings us to the shows. I’m sure most of you know about the meaning behind the penguin, it was sort of a mascot for Fleetwood Mac way back when. We don’t see many penguins at the shows in the states, but here in the UK, penguins are taking over. At the first show in Birmingham, someone put this dancing penguin on top of Stevie’s monitor. It had a sensor on it so it never fell off, it just stayed, going from side to side, dancing and spinning. Stevie was having the hardest time keeping a straight face. The first time she came off the stage that night she proclaimed that she loved the dancing penguin and wanted it. I don’t think she realized that she’s at a Fleetwood Mac show, and that the people with the penguin would probably be more then happy to give it to her. At the end of the show, they offered the penguin up, and Mick took it…Stevie ran over and grabbed it out of Mick’s hands. Backstage later that night I had to help her figure out how to turn the dancing penguin off, because after 20 minutes…you just want the penguin to stop dancing.

Continuing the penguin theme, the second show in Birmingham was John’s birthday. After World Turning, Mick introduces everyone on stage, and when he introduced John and announced that it was his birthday, it was like a penguin downpour. There must have been 30 stuffed penguins thrown on stage. It was hysterical. We bagged them up after the show and we are now travelling with a penguin arsenal. You need a penguin? We’ve got a penguin for every occasion! Penguins dressed like Santa, penguins with scarves, penguins dressed as reindeer, penguins with little Fleetwood Mac shirts on, dancing penguins, singing penguins, penguins with sunglasses on….you name it, we have it.

I also have to mention that a fan, or a group of fans, made Stevie a cake. They managed to give it to the right people and it actually made it back to Stevie’s dressing room. It was incredible. Stevie made sure we took plenty of pictures of it. It had little mini album covers on it, painted perfectly. It must have taken them forever to make, so in case any of the bakers of that cake are reading, we were all very impressed, Stevie included.

We drive 2 hours to London tonight, where we have two days off and then two shows. Hopefully the cold that is kicking my butt right now will be better soon, I don’t want to miss any of London.

On a completely unrelated note…if you’ve never been to the UK, you should come for the candy alone. There’s this candy bar called a Crunchie. I’m considering leaving the United States simply because candy like this doesn’t exist there. I would happily live in an igloo in the Antarctic as long as I had Crunchies. There must be some conspiracy as to why we these aren’t sold in the US. My new mission in life is to find out why. I’ll let you know what I find out. Until next time…
 

1st December 2003
London, UK - Earls Court

Upon arriving in London I was most pleased to see that there are actually bright red phone booths everywhere, and policemen actually do wear tall, funny hats. I did a lot of shopping, a lot of eating, and then some more shopping and more eating. I didn’t do any sightseeing, I didn’t feel the need to see Big Ben or Buckingham Palace or anything like that. I was more interested in just checking the city out. My most impressive achievements for the four days in London? Taking the subway multiple times and not getting lost, but even more impressive...I did not get hit by a car, I came really close a few times, since my brain was not capable of grasping the concept of looking right THEN left when crossing the street. I’ve been honked at a lot the last 4 days. I’ve gotten used to it.

The gig here was a little hard to manage. The stage is on the ground floor, but the production offices, dressing rooms and catering were all up 4 flights of stairs, or you could wait 5 minutes and take a huge freight elevator. Neither option is all that appealing. I opted for stairs, and it was a painful reminder of how out of shape I am. The upside to this problem was that we had golf carts to drive the band around.

I love golf carts.

I would drive one all the time if they were street legal. After hours of begging, our stage manager finally let me drive one. And when I say he let me, I mean that he didn’t come chasing after me or start cursing me over the radio when I got in and drove away with out anyone’s permission. Mission accomplished. But then I ended up having to drive Stevie up to the dressing room when she arrived and then back down for soundcheck. Driving with one of the band members is kind of nerve racking, I felt like I was taking my drivers license exam. If my golf cart had turn signals, I would have used them....in addition to using hand signals. All I could think was “don’t crash, don’t crash, don’t crash”. I didn’t crash. Yay for me.

The dressing rooms at this venue are all trailers, which I like, because they are all arranged in a little corral. So it leaves this open space in the middle where we set up couches and some mood lighting. It gives everyone a place to hang out together & mingle, it’s nice. We call it Camp Fleetwood Mac, now all I need is a firepit and some marshmallows.

The shows were good, there was a strict 10:45 curfew, which basically means if the band is still playing at 10:46, there’s a big, huge, fat fine to pay. So we were planning on going on at 8:00, that didn’t happen, I think we went on at 8:15, and we ended up having to cut the last song. But the second night, our lesson was learned and the band was saying good night at 10:40 after a full set.

The band stayed really late after both shows, London was full of friends, family and guests. We had to have two huge tents in addition to our normal hospitality area just to accommodate everyone.

We’re off to Manchester in the morning. Only 5 more shows to go and then The Mac is going on vacation! As much as I’m loving Europe, I’ll be ready to go home when it comes time....I’m tired and I miss my own bed.
 

5th December 2003
Manchester, UK - MEN Arena

Our four day stay in Manchester was full of happenings. We had two days off after we arrived from Manchester, the first day off was really only a half day since we arrived in the early evening. There wasn’t much to do near the hotel, there were a few restaurants and an outlet mall that I was smart enough not to visit, knowing I would spend far too much money if I did. But the hotel was right on the water, so I was perfectly happy just being outside and going for walks. We went to an enormous mall that was a ten minute cab ride away, it was so big that by the time we had covered the whole mall, I was exhausted. Shopping is tiring. The hotel bar was also perfectly suitable, so it was constantly occupied by at least a few of our hooligans.

But on with the show...Behind the stage there is this lift, in addition to 4 sets of stairs to access the stage, the lift is a quick way to get Stevie on stage. It’s a pretty simple concept, it’s just a platform that is operated by a single button...up or down. Stevie comes off stage a few times during the show, takes the lift down, goes to her tent behind the stage until she needs to come back on, then she takes it back up. Simple. Only it’s not so simple if the lift decides to stop working when she’s standing on it and is already late to be back on stage. Our stage manager took note that the lift was not going to work, and somewhere between Stevie, our stage manager and one of our security guys, the decision was made that there wasn’t enough time to go all the way around the stage and take the stairs, so they decided to pick her up and lift her on to the stage. Halfway there, Stevie started laughing uncontrollably, causing our stage manager to start laughing, and getting her on stage turned into one big laughing party. She made it up there, but I think it took her the whole song to stop smiling and giggling. We’ve now purchased a small ladder in case this kind of thing ever happens again. We laughed about that all night and into the next day.

Then on the second night, near the end of the show, during the intro of Tusk, Lindsey started yelling. At first I thought he was just having a crazy night and really getting in to it, but he was pointing in the audience yelling “stop that!”. Mick knew there was something wrong and stopped playing, the arena was totally silent. I guess Lindsey had spotted a fight out in the crowd, someone who had obviously come to the show for the wrong reasons, and Lindsey wasn’t having it. It was great, he told them to get out, and they did, security escorted them out immediately. But not before Stevie put her 2 cents in as well, “how dare you! Get out of our concert!!” Such a cute, feisty little thing she is. Come on people, this isn’t a Guns N’ Roses concert, this is Fleetwood Mac, we’re all about the love. No fighting allowed. If there’s one thing this band won’t have it’s fighting in the crowd. They’ll stop a show over it. Tonight was proof of that. After the troublemakers were escorted out (embarrassed as all get out, I’m sure) they started Tusk again and finished the show with flying colours.

All in all a great 4 days. Goodnight Manchester....Scotland, here we come.
 

9th December 2003
Glasgow, Scotland & Belfast, Ireland - SECC & Odyssey Arena

We had a day and a half off in Glasgow after the drive from Manchester. I slept the first day and spent the second walking around, followed by a very late night at the hotel bar. A group of people took the train to a castle in Edinburgh on one of the days off, but I have to admit I didn’t see much of Scotland. And talk about accents, I didn’t understand a word anyone said, they might as well have been speaking Swahili. I hadn’t an idea what they were saying, but it was cute anyhow.

The best part about the arena in Glasgow was that the Stage was about a 5 minute walk from the production offices and the dressing rooms, and you know what that means....golf carts!! For about three hours during the day I ran a taxi service to and from the stage. Back and forth, back and forth. And no one even bothered to tip me! Cheapskates. The show was good, went off without a hitch, which is both good and bad, good because nothing went wrong, but also bad because it means I have no funny stories to tell you.

There were a few penguins thrown on to the stage in Glasgow. John saves every penguin anyone has ever given him or the band. And when I say every penguin, I mean every penguin. After taking the penguins in to John so they could introduce themselves, I went to put two penguins in his road case after the show...and there’s no room. There’s not even room for clothes anymore. It’s all penguins, shoved in to every drawer, in to every spare bit of space. It’s a good thing this leg of the tour is almost over, because we might have had to start sacrificing penguins.

We left right after load out to drive to Belfast. We have sleeper buses with us again, so I thought the drive would be ok because you could just crawl in bed and sleep the whole way there. Silly me. We had to take a ferry to Belfast (obviously, since Ireland is an island). I’ve never been on a ferry, well at least the kind that you drive your car onto. It’s very weird, the bottom level of the ship is basically just a big parking lot, and the upper part is restaurants and bars and lounges. So at 5:00AM, after 2 hours of sleep, everyone on my bus woke up to get off the bus and go upstairs to the main part of the ship. I asked why we couldn’t just stay on the bus and sleep, and was bombarded with replies about how I wouldn’t want to be down here on the bus if the ferry happens to sink. Everyone on my bus was going upstairs and I really didn’t feel like being alone on the bus in the dark on the bottom level of a ship, dreaming about the ship sinking, so I got up too.

Walked around delirious in my pj’s for 2 hours and nearly cried for joy when they announced we could go back downstairs. The funniest thing about it is that no one from any other bus woke up and came upstairs, they all slept through the ferry ride except for our bus. I guess they put all the paranoid people on my bus. Fell back asleep the second my head hit the pillow only to wake up an hour later for load-in in Belfast. Grrrrr.

I saw nothing in Belfast other than the arena, which is too bad, I would have liked to see the city a little bit. The funniest thing that happened in Belfast? Well, funny to me anyway. During the show, about four songs into the set, a very bad smell started making it’s way over to the stage area. We all noticed it immediately, you could see everyone looking at each other as if to confirm that they smelled it too. Come to find out there was a sewage leak in the main dressing room hallway during the show and the building maintenance people were not best prepared to handle such a situation. Apparently the best way to fix it was to just throw a large section of carpet over it. Then, they used a wet-vac to try and clean up the water, which only worsened the smell immensely. (I have to tell you that I have a really sick sense of humour, and bathroom jokes make me laugh so hard I could cry, so needless to say, as much as grossed everyone out, I found the whole situation downright hysterical and could hardly form a sentence for about an hour after the show. Even as type this I’m laughing so hard I’m crying.)

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again....it’s a glamorous life we lead out here!

We had yet another ferry to catch that night, but it didn’t leave until 8AM, so we stayed at the gig, on the buses until 4:00AM. A lot of people sat in catering drinking Guinness until the building finally kicked us out. I woke up to go upstairs on the ferry ride again, this time it wasn’t as bad since I’d had 4 hours of sleep, and we had a 12 hour drive ahead of us so I knew I had plenty of time to sleep later. The drive was long and boring, we watched a few movies and slept on and off until we arrived in London at about 7:00PM this evening. Tomorrow is our last show before we pack it up and head home for 6 weeks. I hate goodbyes, so I’m not looking forward to it.
 

12th December 2003
London, UK - Earls Court

If you can remember what the last day of school before summer vacation feels like...that’s what the last day of tour feels like. It’s a good feeling. Especially when you know you don’t have to say goodbye to everyone forever since we’ll be back on the road in 6 weeks time.

I’m sure you’ve all heard rumours of Christine coming to the last show, and you might be surprised to know that even we didn’t know if she was coming. Late in the day we found out she would be attending the show, but not performing. She came early and hung out, watched the show and stayed for a while after the show as well. She and Stevie were like schoolgirls, giggling and chatting. She looks fantastic, might I add.

My personal victory of the day was at soundcheck. One of my favourite songs is Trouble, one of Lindsey’s solo songs. I beg and plead about once a month for him to play it at soundcheck, to no avail. But in London, I used the “as a going away present to the crew” excuse, and he finally agreed. So after the rest of the band left the stage, he stayed, along with the back-up band and I finally got my Trouble. It was so good. In September, Lindsey recorded a show in Chicago for PBS called Soundstage, and about 12 of our crew stayed in Chicago to help out. I was lucky enough to be one of them, because there was very little work required and we basically got to sit around and watch Lindsey and the back-up band rehearse and screw around. Stevie came for a few songs too. He performed Trouble, and a handful of other great songs. I highly suggest you check it out when it airs, if it turned out half as good as it was live, it’ll be worth your time. And that wasn’t a shameless plug, I swear, when he did Trouble at soundcheck it reminded me of the Soundstage show, and how good it was.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand. The show went well, the band gave thanks to Christine during the introductions, before we knew it Mick was on stage screaming “The Mac is Back” and our last European show was over. The band stayed late, being that Christine was there and that it was our last show for a while, but eventually everyone filed out, a few hours later load out was over and we also left. We headed back to the hotel where the hotel bar was packed with our crew. We stayed up until the wee hours of the morning having our own little going away party, and for those of us with early flights (myself included) I think the decision was made at about 4:00AM to forgo sleep and just head straight from the bar to the airport.

Turned out to be a good decision, I slept for nearly 7 hours of an 11 hour flight. I had a 3 hour layover in LA, and at 7:00 yesterday evening, I touched down in lovely San Francisco, and was delighted to get home, get in my own bed and sleep for 24 hours. As I write this I am cuddled up in bed with my cats and a cup of tea. It’s good to be home.

I hope I’ve done my job of at least providing a little entertainment and giving you a window into our world. I can only hope that I’ve conveyed how much fun it is out here, and how thankful I am to have been a part of it. Until next time....
 

Australian Tour Report

Newcastle, Australia 02/17/2004
February 17th, 2004
Newcastle, Australia
Rehearsals & Show
Newcastle Entertainment Centre

Well, we’ve officially invaded Australia. We left California on the 11th and arrived in Sydney on the 13th. An interesting thing I’d like to mention is that the time change makes it so that February 12th does not exist for us. I know it’s a simple concept, but I still find it very odd that there is a day this year that has been erased from my experience.

Anyway, after a FIFTEEN HOUR flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, of which I slept only three hours, we arrived in Sydney, where it was 95 degrees and insanely humid. It’s a slightly shocking, however nice change from a rainy, cold winter in San Francisco. We boarded a bus for a two hour drive to Newcastle. I wasn’t looking forward to a long bus ride after having been couped up on a plane for so long, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the drive from Sydney to Newcastle is breathtaking. It’s reminiscent of Hawaii, which is the only place I’ve been that would even begin to compare to this. I already feel like I’m on vacation. I’m going to have to constantly remind myself that I’m here for work.

The band has been spending time in Hawaii to acclimate themselves, they also arrived in Australia a few days before we did to kick any jetlag and adjust to the time and weather.

We had a day and a half off here in Newcastle before we actually went back to work, and being that our hotel is right on the beach, we spent the time off getting a little sun, snorkeling, swimming and other beach-related activities. We had a 7:00AM lobby call this morning for a day of loading in and rehearsal and it was hysterical to see everyone file in to the lobby with pink cheeks and various degrees of sunburns.

We spent a sweltering day unloading our 11 trucks and setting up. Not to mention a LOT of screwing around, making fun of each other and laughing. I should also mention that the local Newcastle crew was great, everyone is so genuine and friendly. It’s a pleasure to be around.

Everyone is in great spirits, I don’t know if it’s due to the good weather or the fact that everyone is just happy to be back at work, but whatever the reason, it was a really fun day. This month of the tour marks the time that most of us have been together for a whole year now. We’re as good as family around here. It’s a really good time, no explanation I could give you would do it justice.

The band arrived at the gig around 6:00PM, after driving three hours from Sydney. Stevie was all giggles when her car pulled up, apparently she had a lead-footed driver, who for the entire three hour drive punched the gas and slammed on the brakes continuously. She said at first everyone was thoroughly annoyed by this, until about half way through the drive when it just became hysterical. Mick arrived with a nice healthy glow from a little time spent in Hawaii. All in all, it looks like everyone is glad to be back, rested from a few weeks off, and seems ready for our month in Oz.

Rehearsals were quick, Dreams, Chain and Rhiannon, followed by a good hour of socializing on stage. They’re so funny, they’re like school kids catching up with each other after summer vacation has ended and school’s finally back in session. It’s really endearing. Slowly but surely, the band filed out for the evening, only to return in 20 hours for the show.

We returned to the gig around noon on show day. It wasn’t as hot today, thank god. The day flew by. Before I knew it , it was 7:30, doors were open and everyone was quickly gearing up for our first show back. The band was brimming with energy, Stevie danced the whole night away, Lindsey was on fire, swinging guitars all over the place, the whole band seemed happy to be back playing to the crowd. The show was great, sounded great, looked great, felt great.

For those of you who read the Europe tour diaries you might like to know that Stevie’s lift broke again tonight, right after Come when she’s heading back on to the stage, it went up about two inches and then jerked to a stop. Remembering what happened the last time the lift broke, Stevie just looked at our stage manager and started laughing when he emphatically pointed her to the side of the stage to take the stairs.

After the show everyone hung around for a while, wandering in and out of each others dressing rooms. I was in Stevie’s room putting a few things away in one of her road cases, she and I were looking through all of her clothes when she pulled out the top that she wore in the Gypsy video. She made me try it on. It’s absolutely beautiful but the only problem is that she is so tiny that I couldn’t even fit my hands through the sleeves. She was pulling at it to get my hands through and all I could think is that I’m about to rip a piece of history. She finally gave up and just made me try it on with my hands only half way through, and then proceeded to make me model it for everyone in her dressing room. It was a riot.

The band finally headed out to their cars and went back to the hotel. As usual, we headed out a few hours later after load out and tomorrow the crew drives back to Sydney to catch a plane to Brisbane. So far so good.

Until next time...

CB

Brisbane, Australia 02/21/2004
February 21st, 2004
Brisbane, Australia
Brisbane Entertainment Center

Let me start off by saying that Brisbane is wonderful. Absolutely wonderful. Picture being in a tropical paradise only with the added bonus of a really great city with lots to do. Our hotel is right on the water. It’s beautiful here. I’d be perfectly happy to just stay here for the rest of the tour. Now, with that said...

It’s hotter than hot here. Honest to god, it’s insane. They always say it’s the humidity that gets to you, not the heat. Well, here in Brisbane, it’s both. It’s so hot it’s hard to breathe. I like a little warm weather, I’m from California, but my god, this is unbearable. I gave up even trying to wear any make-up or formulate any hairstyle, because the second you leave your perfectly chilled hotel room, everything just melts and you look like you’ve been sitting in a sauna for three days straight. Not exactly the look I was going for. Turns out that while we were in Brisbane, they had record high temperatures, just my luck.

Another thing...For those of you that have never seen a bat the size of a freakin’ eagle, come to Brisbane. Ugh. People keep telling me that they’re completely harmless and that they’re just fruit bats, but let me tell you something, I DON’T CARE! It’s a bat! And it’s wingspan is FOUR FEET. I don’t care if they eat fruit or small children, it’s still a freakishly oversized bat. At night they’re in all the trees, flying around, hanging upside down and making noises that could cause some serious nightmares. That is my only true complaint about Brisbane, and although I’m sure a little problem like bats wouldn’t bother most people, I’m not most people.

Now that I’ve bored you all to death...

The two shows in Brisbane were really good. Mick has taken to wearing a satin red top hat for The Chain and Goodbye Baby, I’m not sure where he got it, but it’s definitely a new addition. Stevie has also been throwing a few new things into the mix, for Gypsy she’s been wearing this beautiful red blouse/caftan thing. I’m not exactly sure what to call it or how to describe it, but it’s lovely. It looks amazing under the lights. Hopefully I’ll be able to muster up a photo of it somewhere. She’s also been wearing her boots for most of the show, which I love, she gets a little extra sass in her step when she’s wearing the boots.

One of the zippers on Lindsey’s boot broke when he was taking them off after the first show, he decided to wait to tell us about it until the band was getting ready to go on stage the second night. Having only about ten minutes to figure out how to ensure that his boot didn’t fly off in the middle of the show, Jill (my fellow wardrobe cohort) and I decided to use three inch black gaffers tape and tape his boot on. His boot stayed on, and although I can’t say it was the most professional solution, I suppose it was better than playing barefoot.

Often times we get gifts for the band or things for the band to sign, sometimes people send artwork, and every now and then there’s something that really stands out. A drawing of the band showed up backstage in Brisbane. It was really well done. I think it was meant to just be signed and sent back to the artist, but Stevie liked it so much that she’s having the artist contacted to see if they’d be willing to draw one for her. Somehow I think the artist of this drawing wouldn’t mind drawing another one for her...Stevie spent a good ten minutes taking pictures of it.

Brisbane treated us well, now we’re off to Melbourne....

CB
 

Melbourne, Australia 02/25/2004
February 25th, 2004
Melbourne, Australia
Rod Laver Arena

When we left Brisbane is was the hottest day they'd had in ten years. Literally. When we landed in Melbourne it was raining. I'd to like request that we find a happy medium as far as the weather goes.

Melbourne is a great city, however it reminded me a lot of San Francisco, so instead of feeling like I was on vacation, I almost felt like I was just staying in a hotel at home. An odd feeling, but a lovely city nonetheless.

The shows in Melbourne went well. After Landslide someone yelled "It's better than the Dixie Chicks!" which threw Lindsey off a little, he just laughed and thanked them. It gave all of us a good laugh as well.

Stevie's been bringing out a lot of new wardrobe pieces, she's not only been wearing the new Gypsy top and boots, but for the second show in Melbourne she wore a new top for Goodbye Baby. It's a gorgeous pink, sparkly corset style top that she wore under her usual pink Goodbye Baby cape. It looked really pretty, especially under all the lights. I realize that Stevie's outfit choices might not be a topic worthy of the evening news, but I, along with the few other gals on tour, I love when she wears something new, so I somehow feel the need to share it with you. Stevie's assistant Karen, who knows how excited I get over these new clothing items, says we're in for a real surprise in Sydney. So we have that to look forward to...I'll keep you updated.

During World Turning a girl managed to climb over the speakers and made it on to the stage, right in front of Stevie. I've never understood the need as a fan to get on to the stage. As much dedication as that may display, it's still kind of weird, if you ask me. One of our security guards stands right behind me during the show, and when I turned around to point the woman out to him, he was already gone. I looked back to the show to see the stage climber being kindly assisted off stage. Our security boys are quick, that's for sure, the woman was on stage for a total of 2.3 seconds...hardly worth the work in my opinion, but now she has a great story to tell, I suppose.

Lindsey knocked over Stevie's mic stand during I'm So Afraid....both nights. The first night he actually swung his guitar into it, the guitar got all caught in up the beads and ribbons and he kind of dragged it around. Now, me being the one who has to "care" for her mic stand, I never like to see this, as I'm the one who ended up coming in early the next day to repair the damage. So when he knocked the newly repaired stand over again the second night I was about ready to go on stage and kick some Lindsey butt. However, Stevie has my back...when she came back on stage for Landslide, one of the sound guys was picking her stand up. She just leaned in to the microphone and said "he's so grounded." My sentiments exactly.

As the band was all heading back to the dressing rooms after the last show, Stevie was singing `Take Me Home Country Roads'. Which isn't weird in itself, she often bursts in to song for seemingly no reason. But it was cute, mid-verse she couldn't remember the words, so Lindsey filled them in for her. She proceeded to stroll along singing while Lindsey hummed in the background.

We're off to Perth, where it will be unbearably hot. And we're playing an outdoor gig. Time to get the sunblock out...

Until next time...

CB


Perth, Australia 02/29/2004
February 29th, 2004
Perth, Australia
WACA

It doesn’t take much for me to like a city. I’m just happy to be out of the house, really. I can find something enjoyable about nearly every place we’ve been over the last year. I didn’t have to look very hard in Perth. I had such a good time here. For starters, there are parrots just flying about everywhere, perched in the palm trees outside my window. Where I’m from, the only place you see parrots is at the zoo.

The city itself is really cute, with lots of nice little shops and restaurants. The gig was amazing, it was an outdoor cricket arena, comparable to an American football field. It was monstrous. It was circled by enormous stadium lights, the grass is so green you’d swear it was fake, there must be 30,000 seats, I mean this place is big. The stage was in the middle of the field, and we sectioned off an area of 10,000 seats for the show. I love playing outdoor shows. They’re my favorite. We loaded in the evening before the show to avoid the heat, so when we arrived at the gig the sun was just setting and I was feeling very happy to be in Perth.

That happy feeling turned in to sheer joy when I was informed that we had not one, not two, but THREE golf carts. Golf carts on a cricket field is something everyone should experience in their lifetime. It was better than Disneyland. No one else really seems to care much about the golf carts, so I basically always end up adopting a cart and I refer to it as “my golf cart” for the rest of the day. It’s great. I did however almost crash a few times, because although they had American drive carts (meaning the steering wheel is on the left side), they drive on the left side in Australia. There were all these narrow roads at the gig and whenever another cart or car was coming at me I would go to the right, but they would go to the left and we’d almost crash into each other. I should have put a sign on my cart that said “I’m an American”. At least then they would be aware that I had a valid reason to be such a bad driver. Near fatal crashes and all, it was still heaps of fun.

Now bear with me, I have to talk about myself for a minute, which I don’t particularly like doing, but the guys told me I just have to tell this story, so here goes...I am fully willing to admit that I have an attitude. When it’s called for, that is. I guess to put it nicely, I don’t take crap from people. To preface the story, it was really windy in Perth and I didn’t think we were going to be able to use Stevie’s usual mic stand. The ribbons and beads would have just been flapping everywhere and hitting her in the face and it would have been a disaster, so we used a plain, undecorated mic stand. I tied roses on for her as usual, but she also asked that I take her rosary from her stand and see if I can put on the new stand just to jazz it up a bit. So I do. But it looks silly. I keep trying to make it look nice, but it just keeps looking silly. So one of the guys comes over and we’re spending far too long trying to drape a strand of beads on a mic stand. We know we’re taking too long, and we’re laughing at ourselves about it. We are by no means taking ourselves seriously. We realize that we’re not solving world hunger here. This woman comes up to the front of the stage, looks up at us and says “excuse me”. We kindly give her our attention when she rudely replies something along the lines of, “are you guys really this silly and dumb or are you just trying to look silly and dumb, how long does it take to hang a strand of f**king beads on a stand?” Now, why this woman felt the need to involve herself in my life, I have no idea, but like I said, I don’t hold my tongue well, so without really thinking it through, I say “who the F**K are you?...Go back to your f**king seat”. I then realize that the first 5 rows of the audience had been watching this and they all applaud me telling this woman off. Right then the spotlight operator was calibrating his spot and just happened to light me up. It was hysterical, with the spotlight on me and the audience cheering, I couldn’t help but to take a bow. Word travels fast on our crew and within 10 minutes pretty much everyone had heard about my little episode and were yelling bead related jokes at me all night. I hope I didn’t offend anyone with that story, I just thought the woman was rude, and that there was no need to speak to us like that. I promise I would never speak to anyone like that, not to mention a ticket buying fan, unless it was called for. Oh, and by the way, we ended up not using the rosary at all. I told you it looked silly.

Keeping with the topic of the mic stand, Stevie is so accustomed to having all the ribbons to play with, she was reaching for them all night. It was so funny to watch her, especially on Second Hand News when she uses the ribbons a lot. She handled the loss of the ribbons like a champ though. And we have new wardrobe to discuss! It was a little chilly at soundcheck and Stevie was worried about being cold during the show, so for the two Perth shows she wore a new skirt, basically the same style, heavier fabric with different patterns, and a bit longer than the usual one. She also wore satin gloves and a black silky scarf. She looked fabulous with a capital F. And to top it all off, she still wore the new-ish Gypsy top, the new Goodbye Baby top and she wore a brand new white layered blouse with beautiful beading and lace work for Don’t Stop. It was the nights of the new wardrobe!

Also, I would just like to mention that Stevie takes such good care of us girls. We were on a break during Christmas, so the second night in Perth she called the three girls on tour up to her dressing room and gave us belated Christmas presents. I won’t go in to details as some of the gifts were personal, but let’s just say she spoiled us, the gifts were very sweet and thoughtful. I just thought all you Stevie lovers would like a confirmation that she’s as caring and generous as I’m sure you imagine and hope her to be. She’s a pleasure to work for. (And she doesn’t read these, so you know I’m not sucking up to the boss!!)

The shows were so much fun. Being outside, in the night, under the stars, breeze blowing, music blaring, it was wonderful. The only problem is that I’m usually 6 feet below the stage, where no one can see me, and that’s how I like it. For a lot of the outdoor shows we’re all right on stage with the band, I was a mere 5 feet from Brett Tuggle, every time the lights shined on him I felt the need to crawl under the table and hide. And we’re doing a whole tour of outdoor gigs this summer, so I guess I’m just going to have to get used to it. The good part about being on the stage is that I can see our guitar players, Carlos and Neale. We make faces at each other all night and they do silly dances and make me laugh, it’s rather entertaining.

I’ve babbled for far too long now, so I’ll be on my way. Next stop: Adelaide.

CB
 

Adelaide, Australia 03/04/2004
March 4th, 2004
Adelaide, Australia
Adelaide Oval

Adelaide was very nice, mainly due to the fact that my hotel room was so wonderful I would have been content to live in it. It was a gorgeous room that had the most heavenly bed imaginable, a bathroom bigger than my bedroom at home and a very nice sized balcony. So, our first night in Adelaide I walked to get dinner, but promptly headed back to my room, lit a candle, turned some music on and sat on the balcony and drank tea. How’s that for being a party animal?? The next night we loaded in. Again, we were playing the outdoor cricket field as we did in Perth, it was great...huge, hot, green grass, breeze, and all the boys had their shirts off, which is always much appreciated if you’re me.

The funny thing about playing the Oval is that there are two lawn bowling greens right next to the production office, so the wall to wall windows in production overlook a bunch of cute old men playing lawn bowling. It was a kick. It’s not often that you can sit and watch little old men in big hats play lawn bowling at a gig. It’s a first for me, that’s for sure.

But on with the show...

For the first time someone came up to me before the show to let me know that they enjoy these little tour diaries, so that was nice. I forget when I’m writing these that people actually read them, the funny thing is I don’t know if it’s ten people reading them or a thousand. I just sit in my hotel room and blab for 20 minutes, so it was a strange feeling to have a real person standing there discussing it with me. Anyhow, I appreciated the compliment.

We had golf carts again today. Only these golf carts must have been the oldest golf carts in the world. They sounded like they had a diesel engine, it would have been more comfortable to drive Stevie to the stage in a riding lawn mower. And to top it off, when you reverse in golf carts they typically make a beeping sound to alert people you’re backing up. Well, these carts sounded like dying cows when you backed up, I can’t even describe it, but combine the diesel engine sound and the dying cow beeps and it sent both Lindsey and Stevie into hysterics. I also found myself in a bit of an Austin Powers situation while trying to turn around in a very tight space. I had Lindsey in the cart with me at the time, and I practically wedged us in between two walls, it took me a good 5 minutes to get us out of it. I would have been able to do it faster but we were laughing so hard that my motor skills were not functioning properly. At least the old, run down golf carts provided some good entertainment.

This was another gig where we were actually on stage with the band, as opposed to being hidden six feet below the the stage, so I did a lot of ducking and hiding when the lights were shining on us. Neale Heywood played barefoot, I’m not entirely sure why, but it was funny none the less. Another thing about being on stage is that Stevie stands behind Brett Tuggle a few times during the show, and usually I’m out of sight, but at these types of gigs I’m only a few feet from her. So she’s taken to calling me over to tell me something or ask me something in the middle of the show. Three times I crawled behind Brett Tuggle to speak to her. I looked up at Brett and he looked at me like “What are you doing here?”

The show went well, I couldn’t see the crowd very well but everyone I talked to said that it was a really good crowd. After the show there were a few people up front asking for things like set lists, towels, beads, roses etc... The weird thing was that a few of them knew my name, which kind of threw me for a loop. I hate to cut it so short today, but to be honest, Adelaide was just a great show, and other than a few golf cart antics and a barefoot guitar player, I don’t have much to tell you. Some days are funnier than others I guess.

Our next stop is Sydney, the final city on our Australian adventure. Three more shows and then we’re homebound.

CB

Sydney, Australia 03/09/2004
March 9th, 2004
Sydney, Australia
Sydney Entertainment Centre

After 22 hours of travelling, I’ve finally made it home, I was expecting to come home to a cold, rainy San Francisco, but thankfully, it’s lovely here. It’s warm and sunny, so I’ve set up camp on my patio with a cup of tea, and I’m going back and forth between my computer and the newspaper. It feels good to be home, that’s for sure.

Sydney was amazing. It’s the most beautiful city. Even the best pictures I’ve seen don’t do it justice. On the whole, Australia is just an awesome place. I realize that no matter where you live in the world, it’s a pretty big trip to take, but I highly recommend it. I can’t say enough about it, but this has been a phenomenal trip.

Our five days in Sydney were fantastic, with the exception of pouring rain the last two days, we had a great time there. A bunch of our crew climbed the Harbour Bridge, others went to the zoo, the aquarium, the horse races, deep sea fishing, botanical gardens, the list goes on. There was a lot to do there, and I pretty much just shopped. What can I say, they have excellent shopping in Sydney. Grade A Prime Shopping. They also have bats. Bats bigger than the ones in Brisbane. But I’ve already given my two cents about the bats, so I’ll save you the trouble of listening to me rant about it.

Personally the second show in Sydney was the most memorable for me, but only because I got in a bit of trouble. The trouble only lasted about the length of one song before it was cleared up...but it was the longest song of my life. To make a long story very short, there was a misunderstanding as to what song was supposed to come after Peacekeeper, and in front of 10,000 people Ms. Stevie Nicks pointed to me and blamed me for a this little screw up, she also called me by my full name, which as we all know from having mothers, that this ALWAYS means you’re in trouble. After Say You Will, when Stevie went stage right to get her Rhiannon top, Karen cleared up the misunderstanding and was sent to give me Stevie’s apology, which was sweet. I met Stevie in the quick change tent after Rhiannon to give her a hard time about it, and as soon as she saw me she just covered her face and smiled, gave me a hug and apologized, it was really funny. After the show the crew definitely gave me a hard time about it. The next show during Second Hand News she came over to my side of the stage, looked down at me, smiled and gave her tambourine a little shake in my direction, she’s very funny.

Brett will kill me for telling you this...but it’s too funny to let go. Brett leaves the stage and goes back to his dressing room after Gypsy, since he doesn’t play on Big Love or Landslide, the two songs that follow Gypsy. The first show in Sydney, he apparently had a momentary lapse of reason and headed back to his dressing room after Rhiannon instead. The problem here is that Come is right after Rhiannnon, and Brett plays on Come...a lot. Halfway to the dressing room Brett heard the beginning of Come and realized that he was supposed to be on stage, and thankfully made it back just in time.

During the last show John asked his bass tech if he had a dollar, as he wanted to give Mick a dollar when he introduced him. In perfect Mick fashion, he accepted the dollar, stuck it to his forehead and left it there for the entire duration of Don’t Stop, before handing it someone in the audience.

Before I sign off I just realized that the “big wardrobe surprise” Karen was telling me about for the last show in Sydney didn’t seem to happen, either that or I was so out of it that I didn’t notice, but I really don’t remember anything new. I’ll have to investigate that further when he head back to work in a few weeks.

I am indescribably happy that we decided to tour Australia, it was most definitely a month of my life that I will never forget. Thanks to everyone for coming out to the shows and making our experience there such a good one. But it’s back to The States for Fleetwood Mac...see you guys there.

CB
 

New York, Madison & Champaign 05/10/2004
May 10, 2004
Rehearsals
New York, Madison & Champaign

Yes, I’m back. You can’t get rid of me, I’m like the relative that came to stay for a week and ended up moving in to the garage. I’m back to fill your heads with useless information about our daily life out here. I fear that with some 36-ish shows I’ll run out of things to talk about. So please, you’ll all have to bear with me if some days are shorter and/or more boring than others. I’ll do my best to keep you somewhat entertained. At the first show in Madison I was told by someone from the fan club that there are actually people out there reading these....and enjoying them? Wow. I’m in shock. So now I kind of feel like I’m talking to someone instead of just blabbing to a blank computer screen in a hotel room. Ok, here we go...I have to remember how I used to do this...

For starters, I have a big, fat, blue sausage finger right now. I smashed it between a door jam and a road case last night during load out, it doesn’t feel good. I can’t say whether it’s broken or not, all I can tell you is that I never knew typing could be so painful. Alright, now that I’ve gotten my daily quota of self-pity taken care of, we can move on!

I’ll get you up to speed on our schedule...we spent two weeks at home after Australia, then we headed to LA on the 24th of March for three weeks of rehearsals. We ended up cutting rehearsals a week short since the first two weeks were pretty productive, but more so because Lindsey and his wife were due to have a baby any minute. (She has since arrived, beautiful, healthy, and happy. Her name is Stella.) Rehearsals we’re great. The process of seeing new songs put together for a live performance is amazing. Even more amazing is seeing songs that are 25 even 30 years old being pulled out from the archives and given a new life.

We started out with rehearsing I Know I’m Not Wrong, from Tusk. It’s one of my favorite FM songs, so I was was thrilled about that. It sounds awesome live, if you’re coming out to any shows on this leg you can definitely look forward to it, it’s soooo good. Then out from the depths of the Buckingham Nicks era (and a brief, albeit glorious appearance on the FM Live album) came Don’t Let Me Down Again. That calls for pee your pants excitement in my opinion! It sounds great, and they played it at the first show in Madison. If you were at the Madison show, consider yourself lucky, because I think it will be leaving the set. Sadly, it seems it can’t find a place to fit in. It will be sorely missed, but at least I got to see it come to life, it was like a little piece of history...farewell Don’t Let Me Down Again, it was nice knowing you...sigh. But we’ve got Sara (big huge yay!), Destiny Rules (double yay!) and Red Rover (pass out from excitement yay!). Personally, my favorite live FM song is Monday Morning, I begged and pleaded for it this time around, to a point where I think they were actually becoming angry with me. (Okay, so I may have been a little pushy). They finally played it once at rehearsals to test it’s waters, I was like a teenage girl at an NSync show. It was incredible. But it got vetoed. I have wiped away my tears and with the help of good therapy and medication I am almost over it.

After rehearsals we all went home for three weeks (seemed like three days) and then flew out to New York on May 3rd for this MTV Networks thing. I won’t explain, it was really boring. We were there for two days to play three songs. I was bored senseless.

We then flew from NY to Madison for the first show of the tour. The best thing about arriving in Madison was the return of our tour buses. We have been in Europe and Australia since November, it had been months and months since we’ve seen a bus. When we were overseas we only flew, we had no place no call home...but our homes on wheels have returned, same buses, same drivers, it’s like we never left. Actually, I think three of the four buses are the exact same buses as last time, but the bus I’m on was changed out for a new one (I guess the one we had originally broke down) and now we have automatic doors on the bus. Instead of just manually pulling them open or closed, you push a button and they slide open, it’s like Star Trek, it’s hysterical. Most buses have these doors, but I can’t get used to them, I feel the constant pull to make really bad teleporting/Star Fleet/Captain Kirk jokes. As you can probably tell, it isn’t hard to entertain me. Anywho...moving on...

Day one in Madison was a load-in/rehearsal day. It had been weeks since the band had played the new songs, so they did a quick run-through and some final tweaking. That evening, after the band had all gone back to the hotel, Stevie stuck around for a fitting (new clothes!). There were only a few of us left in the building, most of the crew had gone back to the hotel for the night. (To enjoy this anecdote you’ll need to know that we all carry radios at the gigs to communicate.) So I’m standing outside on the loading dock when someone starts singing over the radio. It seems Stevie was bored, so she took Karen’s radio and decided to indulge our Production Assistant by giving an impromptu performance of Illume, our PA’s favorite Stevie song. After her radio debut, I asked if she was taking requests, and she was...so I got a radio performance of Storms, from Tusk. I can’t say how many of the little things I’ll really remember when this tour is over, but that will certainly be one of them, it was very sweet.

Cut to 24 hours later...the show went well, although there was a chunk of technical problems in the middle of the set. Guitar problems to be more specific. Long story short, Stevie and Lindsey had to fill a good 5 minutes of silence, the whole crew was mortified, we were all standing around staring at each other with our jaws on the floor. We couldn’t believe our eyes, it was the longest 5 minutes of our lives. Seconds feel like hours in those situations. The band handled it like champs though, they’re so funny, Lindsey finally just got down and started doing sit-ups and push-ups to kill time, Stevie laughed and said “I didn’t know you could do that!!” It worked out fine, I think it’s nice every once in a while when something goes just a little bit wrong, it’’s entertaining. And this time it was actually really funny.

The Champaign show was free of large technical mishaps, but instead, it was hotter than all get out. The arena in Champaign had no air conditioning. Even in cold weather, arenas really heat up when there’s thousands of people in them, so in hot weather (about 85 degrees), no air conditioning is a death sentence. Poor Mick and Lindsey were about to die from heat exhaustion. We even had portable AC units and tons of fans on the stage, but it just wasn’t helping, it was a sauna up there. Luckily the dressing rooms had good air conditioning. It was so funny, after the show we were all finding reasons to go in to the dressing rooms and stay there as long as possible just so that we could cool down a little. I suppose we might as well get used to it, it’s going to be a very hot and a very outdoor tour. Bring it on...I’m ready for summer.

We’re in Green Bay now, we have two days off before the show here, so I’m going to take my broken finger (self-pity mention #2) and get out of my hotel room.


Until next time...

CB

 

Green Bay, Nashville & Atlanta 05/16/2004
May 16, 2004
Green Bay, Nashville & Atlanta

When I last left off I think we had just arrived in Green Bay...

Green Bay is very, very small. By the end of the first day off, after having taken a shuttle to the nearest mall, visited a few lovely bars and eaten lots of cheese, I felt I had experienced what Green Bay had to offer....that is, unless you are a football fan and then the possibilities for entertainment are limitless. I myself, am not a fan of the football. Sooo...I slept until 4PM the second day. Sleeping is an art in my opinion...and I am an artist. I paid for my art later that night when I was not able to fall asleep until 5AM, and I had a 6:30AM wake up call. I was a little wacky at load in that morning, to say the least.

I am now certain that my finger is broken. It’s been a few days and I can’t bend it. It’s still blue. It’s no longer swelled up like a sausage, but it’s still blue, and it still really hurts. It’s been splinted and taped to my other finger, but now my left hand is pretty useless and it’s hard to work with only one hand. Grrrr. This is no longer considered self-pity, this is just blatant whining. And if it doesn’t get better soon our Production Manager will most certainly force me to see a doctor. Double Grrrr.

Let’s see...what to tell you about the Green Bay show...

It poured rain in Green Bay. Poured. This does not feel like a summer tour. The enormous suitcase I have that is filled with tank tops and flip flops has not served me well. (In a few days I’ll be complaining about the heat....I’m reeeallly good at complaining, ask anyone that knows me.)

Landslide was dedicated to the Packers. A very delicate song to be dedicated to a bunch of guys that tackle each other and bang helmets together...but hey...football players have feelings too. There was a flight curfew in Green Bay so the second the show was over we were dragging band members out to their cars...there’s nothing like kicking people out of their very own concert.

Ten hour drive to the next city. Slept the whole way and woke up with just enough time to enjoy a morning bowl of Lucky Charms and a Red Bull before disembarking the bus.

Ahhh, Nashville. Last time we were in Nashville we stayed downtown and it was great. Fun city, lots to do. As you might have guessed, it’s all country, all the time, but it was still fun. This time around we stayed about 30 minutes from downtown and there was nothing to do. A bunch of the guys went to a sports bar to watch a big hockey game, but just like the football, I’m also not a fan of the hockey. Or sports in general, really. Water sports are good, with the exception of water ballet or synchronized swimming...let’s be honest, those are just silly. Anyway, we arrived in Nashville around 1:00PM so we really only had half a day off. I sat around writing the previous tour diary, checking e-mail and also dyed one of the lighting guys hair fire engine red...that’s my motto, when boredom strikes, dye your hair!

You know how I said it poured in Green Bay? Nashville made Green Bay look like a sorry drizzle. We had about 400 towels laid out on the floor backstage. The place flooded. I felt so sorry for people who had lawn seats in Nashville, they sat through a two and half hour storm. Talk about dedication. Stevie dedicated Landslide to all the songwriters from Nashville, past, present and future. Stevie’s family has some deep country music roots, so I think Nashville holds a special place for her.

For the 15 minutes or so before the show, after Mick is all dressed and ready to take the stage, he typically paces the hallway, stands around and chats, and uses our security guards (large) arms to warm up his hands. It’s just his way of getting ready for the show. Anyway, he was standing next to my road case, resting his arm on it, and when I went to get something out of it I nearly slammed his hand in the drawer. Can you even imagine if I had? Oh. My. God. “Fleetwood Mac tour canceled because ditzy girl breaks Mick Fleetwood’s hand”. He just looked at me like we had just avoided the biggest catastrophe ever. We were all silent for a minute, and then howled with laughter when I held up my wounded, bandaged, broken hand to Mick and he just said “Now you’re trying to break my hand too?”

Atlanta. Holy mother were you guys a good crowd! When the show started it looked there were a lot of empty seats and it was a little nerve racking. It was still light out and it just felt a little weird. By the third song, daylight had made it’s exit, the seats filled up and the show was awesome. When dedicating Landslide Stevie leaned down and asked a girl in the front row what her name was, “We would like to dedicate this song to Angela, from Atlanta Georgia”, the girl was already crying at this point, but as soon as Stevie said “It’s called Landslide”, the poor girl just started sobbing. It was so sweet. She cried through the whole song.

We also had a little problem with the security guards in Atlanta. Every day, our production manager has a meeting with all the house security. Security is told that people are allowed to stand up front the entire show. The only thing they are supposed to watch for is people climbing on to the stage. Apparently there were a few misinformed guards that kept telling people to sit down. Stevie came over to get her cape before Gold Dust Woman and she was piiiised. She turned around and barked at our security guard, “You go tell them to stop making people sit down...they’re ruining the show!!!!!” I believe the troublesome guards were switched out for people who had actually paid attention at the security meeting.

Lindsey’s wife came out for the Atlanta show, she was carrying a handful of pictures of little Stella for all of us women to fawn over. (Stella and the kids are at home with Grandma for the weekend...) But we all cooed over the pictures, snatching them out of each others hands. After the show someone handed me a few signs to give to the band, one of which said “Welcome to the room Stella” which I thought was very cute.

Okay, set list discussion. Don’t Let Me Down Again has in fact taken a permanent vacation, (insert expletive here), Goodbye Baby has been rehired, although I love the song, I kind of liked ending the show on a high note. Goodbye Baby is so sad! But I suppose it’s the logical follow-up to Songbird...I guess tradition is tradition. Destiny Rules got the boot, which I’m livid about. There are a few of us who have told Stevie we will not speak to her until they put it back in the set. (I think she knows that we work for her and that we have to speak to her, so she kind of called our bluff.) Say You Will is standing by for a permanent position, and all the other new ones look like they are here to stay, thank heavens. I’m loving Sara, and I’m loving I Know I’m Not Wrong. I adore Red Rover so much I just might marry it.

As part of my desperation to entertain you, and by request of a few fan club members I’ve put together a set list of my own. Not that my opinion matters to any of you, but this is what results from boredom. We play 24 songs now, and I couldn’t narrow it down that much, so I settled for 32. In no particular order:

Monday Morning (Okay, that one has to be the opener though.)
Blue Letter
Crystal
Landslide
Oh Well
Sara
Not That Funny
Never Going Back
Fireflies
Farmers Daughter
Can’t Go Back
That’s Alright
Empire State
Hold Me
Oh Diane
Eyes Of The World
Second Hand News
I Don’t Want To Know
Thrown Down
Red Rover
Steal Your Heart Away
Seven Wonders
Welcome To The Room Sara
Tusk
Over & Over
The Ledge
Think About Me
What Makes You Think You’re The One
Storms
When You Were Good
That’s Enough For Me
I Know I’m Not Wrong

Last but not least, I want to thank any and all of you who take the time to say hi or give me feedback on the tour reports. I really, really appreciate it, and if I’m ever short with any of you before or after the show, just know that it’s only because I’m usually a little busy and a lot sarcastic. (Not to mention a wee bit socially anxious, but that story is best saved for another day.)

Joking aside, thanks guys, I’m genuinely flattered.


Signing off. See ya’ll in West Palm.

CB
 

West Palm, Charlotte, Raleigh & Jacksonville 05/25/2004
May 25, 2004
West Palm, Charlotte, Raleigh & Jacksonville

Sorry for the wait! It was a busy week.

Since I’m packing four shows and four days off in to one little report I’ll try and just give you a good recap, otherwise it will be 25 pages long...

Our two days off in West Palm Beach were great. There was a pool, it was sunny most of the time, although it rained both nights, the days brought good weather for the most part. It was disgustingly humid, but at this point I’ll settle for humid as long as it’s not raining. For a while it seemed like we were destined to have a rain cloud follow us this whole tour...

The really nice part about our stay in Florida is that we were staying literally right next door to the band and staff. It isn’t often that the crew is even in the same state, so it was tons of fun to have everyone in the same place for a few days. It was like a high school mixer. Good times.

The West Palm show went well. However, I got a call early in the day to inform me that Stevie’s vocal chords were swollen and that we may be dropping Silver Springs from the set that night. The range that Silver Springs requires can be hard on her vocal chords and she didn’t want to push it too much, especially since Silver Springs is right before Standback, both of which are songs that she really steps it up for. Originally, she was going to tell us after Rhiannon whether or not she was up for Silver Springs, but then after sound check, she and her vocal coach decided to play it safe. I realize that it must have been a total bummer for you guys in West Palm, but just know that if she doesn't take precautionary measures like that and ends up blowing her voice out, then we’re canceling shows...and nobody wants that. Our production assistant and I suggested that she and I get up there and perform Silver Springs instead, but oddly enough, no one liked that idea. And have no fear, Mama Nicks can still sing her booty off, and she still puts on a show worth watching, she’s just being careful not to stress her pipes too much. Silver Springs will be back as soon as Stevie is 100% again, there is no need to panic.

Lindsey left the stage for Mick’s vest solo, he usually just sits on the side of the stage, but it was really hot, and he decided to go soak up some air conditioning and rehydrate a little. The change in routine threw him off and he ended up hurrying to get his guitar back on, and whacked himself in the head with it. He took a nice chunk out of his eyebrow and from what it looked like, he may have been seeing stars. He seemed a little out of it for the encore songs. He is alive and well, so again, no need to panic. The doctor used a little medical grade super glue to seal it up and he’s as good as new.

We had a nice long drive that night to Charlotte. Long drives are much better than short ones when you live on a bus. You know how babies always fall asleep in cars? It’s the same thing on the bus, as soon as the engine fires up and you climb in your bunk, you’re out like a light. As soon as the bus stops, you wake up, it’s really odd. If the drive to the next city is only two or three hours, you wake up at 4AM and can’t fall back asleep so you end up dragging your bags up to your hotel room in your pj’s at an ungodly hour of the morning. So, the ten or so hour drive to Charlotte left plenty of time to have an pre-bed cocktail and still get a good 8 hours sleep. Then you wake up and you’re at the hotel, ready for your day off. There’s today’s lesson in bus life for you. Class dismissed.

We had half a day off in Charlotte, there was a big mall that everyone went to (at this point I feel like I have been to every friggin’ mall in the country.) I ate way too much Chinese food and tried to get to bed at a reasonable hour since my alarm clock would be waking me at 5AM. The next morning it was apparent that we were in for a hot day, since at 6AM it was already about 85 degrees outside.

Stevie has a big comfy chair that she sits in to have her make-up done. If you guys watched the Destiny Rules documentary, it’s the same one she’s sitting in all through rehearsals. Anyway, it’s totally beat up, it doesn’t have a road case, so it basically just gets thrown on the back of the truck every night, and after 100 something shows, the chair has seen it’s better day. We’ve replaced the fabric about ten times and the paint is all worn away and chipped, so I decided that I would repaint it. I’m pretty sure I got more paint in my hair and on my clothes than I did on the chair. People kept asking me if I painted the chair or if the chair painted me. Only slightly embarrassing.

One of the local crew guys in Charlotte told me he was the “biggest Lindsey fan ever” and could I please get him some guitar picks...does this sound silly to anyone else?? He was visibly embarrassed and shocked when I revealed that Lindsey doesn’t use picks. That happens more often than you would believe.

The show went well, although it was really hot. There was no airflow on the stage and the heat was oppressive. A few of us later complained that we were on the verge of passing out halfway through the show. (I won’t even discuss what the humidity did to my hair, but let me just say that if it was 1983....I would have been soooo cool.)

We headed to Raleigh that night, it was a pretty short drive, and I had to get off the bus at 4AM because my bus was heading right back to Charlotte. Why? Because my bus was serving as the charter service to take about 10 of our guys back to Charlotte so that they could spend their day off at the car races. Apparently, they got to sit in some famous race car driver’s box seat and watch the race. (Sorry about the lack of detail, but you know me and the sports.) So I crawled off the bus at the crack of dawn and cursed my way to my hotel room.

And you know how I said Charlotte was hot? I take it back. Raleigh was HOT. But, the stage in Raleigh was air conditioned, which helped ease the pain a little. Raleigh was one of those gigs where about 10 minutes in to load in everyone had their shirts off. I like to call it half-naked load in.

As I’m sure you all know, there is a tour that comes through the backstage area everyday and a lot of the time people bring gifts for the band. Someone brought some really cool gifts in Raleigh. Lindsey received a framed Pet Sounds Beach Boys poster, which I knew he would love. When he first saw it in the dressing room, he said “is that a gift for the whole band?”, I told him that it was just for him...”oooh! That can go in the studio!” It doesn’t matter who you are...everybody loves good presents. John received a very nice Hawaiian shirt, that to our surprise he liked so much he asked if we could have it pressed so that he could wear it that night. I’m sure he made someone’s day.

As usual the show was great, blah blah blah blah. There was a loud buzzing noise before dreams I think, so Stevie had to ad-lib a little while they tried to fix it...”talk amongst yourselves”, she then proceeded to try and help point out where the buzzing was coming from. The highlight of the Raleigh show for me, I owe to our lighting director. I’ll try and explain it quickly. What you guys see is a bunch of lights, but there are about six guys up in the truss, above the band, and four guys out at front of house, up in the rafters, running the lights. Then our lighting director (also one of the funniest men on the planet) sits out at the lighting board and for two and a half hours calls the lighting cues (all the while pushing a million buttons to run the more automated part of the show). All of them are on headset to each other and only four out of the twelve or so guys running the lights are from our crew, the other ten or so are local at each gig. So, I always hear these outrageously funny stories about what goes on over their headsets. In Raleigh, one of the lighting guys ran me a headset to where I sit during the show so that I could listen in. He even showed me how to talk if I wanted to say something. And it was hysterical. Most of the local guys didn’t even know which one was Lindsey and which one was Stevie (even though that topic was covered very well at the lighting meeting earlier that day). So there was a lot of “spot 6, 7 and 8 stand by to fade in on Stevie Nicks...the female singer. And 2, 3 and 4 stand by to fade in on Lindsey Buckingham...the guitar player.” It was two and half hours of pure funny. So that was my Raleigh highlight, I was an honorary lighting guy for a day.

Wow, this is already getting really long. I’ll try and wrap it up.

We had a back to back, so we left Raleigh and headed straight to Jacksonville, where, you guessed it...it was really hot! But this time we were back in an arena. Air conditioned buildings are my best friend. Stevie has been going crazy with her camera. She has this little digital camera that she takes everywhere. The best part..and I say this with love...is that she doesn’t really know how to use it. Every time she takes a picture, she has to take it three times while saying “this damn camera”. It’s a riot. She takes pictures of EVERYTHING and always says “we WILL remember this tour”.

We also had a golf cart, but it was a gas powered one and it smelled really bad. Didn’t stop me from taking a few joy rides, however. The hallways in this arena were kind of narrow, and the golf cart was a double seater, so it was hard to turn around in the halls. I was parked outside Stevie’s dressing room waiting to take her to the stage for sound check, when Mick came out, so I drove Mick down to the stage and headed back to her room. I told her security guard not to bring her out yet because I still had to turn the cart around. Well, midway into my very Austin Powers like turn around process, out comes Stevie. So now I’m trying to hurry and get the cart turned around. Her security guard is trying to help by telling me how much room I have behind me, but he’s a terrible driver, so I end up backing in to wall with a big “bonk” noise to accompany it. And Stevie is watching the whole thing. I fall over with laughter, as does Stevie, and everyone else who happened to be standing by. And of course... the whole time, Miss Photographer was snapping photos of my golf cart crash...or at least she was trying.

Gotta run...the mall across the street is calling my name.

CB
 

Bristow, Mansfield & Holmdel 05/30/2004
May 30, 2004
Bristow, Mansfield & Holmdel

About ten seconds after completing and submitting my last tour report, I get the dreaded phone call. The Bristow show is cancelled. Ugh. But, then again, this would give Stevie four whole days off to rest her voice, so the hope was that if we just cancel this one show, we’ll be okay. It’s nerve racking though.

And it seems I have told you all a lie...but I swear I didn’t know I was lying! We just found out that Silver Springs isn’t coming back. The band decided to 86 it. Sad, but true. It’s a long, hot summer tour, and the band is just making sure that the whole tour goes well...from start to finish. I hope everyone out there eventually understands that. I’m just as disappointed as the rest of you, I love that song. But it had a good run of 100 something shows, a nice long life...may it rest in peace. And may you all forgive me for unknowingly lying about it.

So anyway, with the news of the cancelled show, our travel plans changed. We were supposed to play the show in Bristow on Wednesday and then drive that night to Mansfield. Instead, we left for Mansfield on Wednesday morning and would spend two days waiting for the call that it too, was cancelled. Thankfully, that call never came and we loaded in the Mansfield show on Friday morning, as planned.

Ok, but back to our arrival in DC...

Holy cow! Cicadas are the most terrible, awful, scary, disgusting things on the planet. And they are EVERYWHERE!! They just fly in to walls (or your head) and buzz around and land everywhere. Gahhhhhhhhhhhh! I spent most of my time outdoors, running around, screeching like a little girl as cicadas blew by my head. The rest of the crew really seemed to enjoy my phobia...they have no idea what it’s like to be me. It’s insect hell in my world.

My bus driver is the best driver ever. For the most part, on days off the buses just stay parked at the hotel, but OUR bus driver takes us out on days off. Usually to Target or WalMart, or anywhere else that we feel like going. So the second day off in DC the guys went out and bought a barbecue, folding beach chairs, and tons of food and beer. We set up outside the bus in the parking lot of the hotel and barbecued all afternoon. It was great. And then the rain came. The DC area (or at least somewhere nearby) was on tornado watch, and when the rain hit, it hit hard. I’m from earthquake country, so to see the sky go green, and the light change, all the thunder and lighting, and the black clouds moving a million miles an hour and twisting together, it was totally surreal and cool. We all stood outside the bus and stared at the sky, waiting for something cool to happen, but eventually the storm passed and we were all left to find something better to do. I went to the movies and saw Shrek 2.

We left for Mansfield at 11AM on Wednesday, and it was a 9 hour drive. We were kind of in the middle of nowhere, our hotel was nestled comfortably in a business district...so we barbecued again. All afternoon, and all night..until the mosquitoes ate us alive. We bought more beach chairs and all kinds of BBQ goodies, and now we’re in the market for an awning and some astroturf. We are now referring to the tour bus as our expensive trailer park.

The Mansfield show was a new wardrobe parade! Stevie wore something new on practically every song. She wore so many new things that I can’t even begin to tell you about it, hopefully you were either at the show or know someone who was. I was in shock. We had blue, red, pink, gold, black, we had lace, velvet, silk, satin, beads, hair clips, jewellery...I mean she brought it all out. Hopefully you can find pictures online somewhere, because it would take pages for me to describe each and every thing. The wardrobe room was a busy place that night.

Since we ended up cancelling the show that would have been Stevie’s birthday, we gave her a little belated birthday celebration in Mansfield. We got a helium tank and pretty much filled her dressing room with about 100 balloons. Her room looked like a florist’s shop with how many flowers were in there. We also got her two cakes...one was a huge carrot cake that was decorated to look like a big present, we brought that one out during sound check and everyone came out on stage and sang happy birthday. The other cake was a bit of a joke...it was a small cake that we just put on the table in her dressing room, it was a dark chocolate cake that had a little figure of the grim reaper on it and he was standing in a graveyard...only the gravestones had the names of the songs that have been taken out of the set since we started this tour a year ago. It was the funniest cake, she loved it.

Load out was slow, as the loading dock only had two spaces for trucks, and we have seven of them. But we got out eventually and headed straight to Homdel, New Jersey for a show the next day. The dressing rooms in Holmdel were under the stage, but there was no elevator, there’s just a big hole in the floor and they lower the wardrobe cases (all 25 of them) one at a time through the hole. It was tedious. The show itself was great, although pretty uneventful, Stevie kept up with Mansfield as far as the plethora of wardrobe additions go.

We had a short drive that night to Scranton, and now we have two days off here. I’m thinking I’ll hit both the mall and the movie theatre, and there’s also rumours of a Harry Houdini museum...the weird ideas people come up with never cease to amaze me, but it might be worth checking out.

Off to explore the many wonders of Scranton, PA...

CB


 

Seven Painful Days Off & Jones Beach 06/07/2004
June 7, 2004
Seven Painful Days Off & Jones Beach

Well, what a week it has been, huh? You guys must have been going crazy. Believe me, if it makes you feel any better, it was just as crazy for us. We arrived in Scranton with the assumption that the show was going on as planned. We all had kind of a sinking feeling though...

And then we get the phone call, the night before the show...Scranton is cancelled.

And Camden.

Oh no... What has become of our little tour? Cancelling shows? Somebody get me a paper bag...

We left Scranton on what was supposed to be the morning of the show and we headed to Philadelphia to await more news. We knew for sure that Camden was off, which meant we had at least 4 days off, so a lot of the crew flew home for the break. I stayed and waited it out. The first day in Philly came and went, with a little retail therapy (Philly has great shopping). The second day in Philly came and went (again, Philly has really great shopping). The third day in Philly came and went (sleeping in and sightseeing). So there we were, 2 days before the Hershey show, and no news yet. This is a good sign. No news is good news? So we sit and we wait for the story to come down the wire....

Hershey is a no go. Now I can’t help but wonder about Jones Beach...so we wait it out for another day...

We’re good!! Jones Beach is on! Touchdown! We did have to reschedule a few shows, and yes, we did have to cancel a few. There’s a million factors that go in to successful rescheduling, so we’ll have to wait and see how it all pans out, but so far, it looks like we’re at least back on track. Excellent. Stick with us guys...we’re doing the best we can with the hand we were dealt...

So, at the stroke of midnight the night before the Jones Beach show we left Philadelphia and headed to Wantagh, NY. I like Jones Beach, other than the offices themselves, everything is outdoors, including catering, so provided the weather is nice, it feels like summer camp....However, we were not so lucky. When I woke up at 7AM in the parking lot and looked outside the window of the bus it was pouring down rain. And when I got off the bus to head in to the gig, I was disappointed to discover that not only was it wet, but it was freezing cold and windy to boot! Mom...I don’t want to go to school today, can we call and tell the principal I’m sick? Didn’t think so.

The rain eventually died down midday, but it was cold all day and all night. I was so cold that I begged our merch guy to score me a snugly Fleetwood Mac sweatshirt, which I wore around all day, hood tightly secured, hands in front pocket, like a little gnome. We had a bunch of space heaters on stage for the band, and we even had a big propane heater on each side of the stage (the kind that you can actually see the blue flames inside, and they sound like an airplane warming up to take off). The one on Lindsey’s side kept shorting out and eventually we just gave up, so poor Lindsey must have been freezing all night. As soon as the band took to the stage, during the intro for The Chain, Stevie looked over at me and mouthed “too cold”. Oh great. I had visions of all of us running around on stage plugging ten more heaters in, blowing circuits, all hell breaking loose...But then after a few minutes she looked over and mouthed “I’m okay now” and nodded. Crisis averted. It rained through out most of the show from what I could tell. The crowd were troopers though, they stuck through it. I was freezing my buns off and I wasn’t even wet, I can’t imagine how cold the crowd was. I am awarding the Jones Beach crowd an honorary cold weather endurance badge. Well done guys. Way to show your FM spirit.

Stevie had the crowd say a little prayer to make the rain stop, it didn’t seem to help, but it certainly gave her a little giggle. Stevie tried her best to stay warm, she was gloved the entire show (and I don’t blame her!), she also brought out even MORE new clothes. The main piece was a plain black, fitted, velvety coat with a peach coloured, almost Japanese like satin material at the bottom. It was stunning. She wore all kinds of layers and she also had little silk, ruffled leg warmers on under her skirt. She brought out red velvet gloves for Sara, to match her red cloak. Can you say...ooh la la...she looked fab tonight.

There was a large lip on the stage, so from the band to the audience it was about 15 feet. The stage at Jones Beach is hardwood, and the carpet that we always put down on the stage didn’t cover that last 15 feet, and it was of course wet, so every time Lindsey went out to play to the audience I was just waiting for him to slip and fall and kill himself, but thankfully, he made it back to the safety of the carpeted area each and every time.

Okay and I have to tell you this because it’s to die for...Stevie’s manager has a little dog, I think he’s a maltese. A little white, soft and cuddly, energetic dog. He’s a total doll, and he’s friends with Stevie’s two yorkies. Anyway, he has a new trick. Stevie’s manager holds a treat up in the air and says “Standback! Standback!” and moves her hand around in a circle, and he stands up on his hind legs and twirls just like Stevie does. It is so damn cute you just want to eat him. Stevie got a huge kick out of that one.

Well, we arrived in Hartford at 4:30 this morning, and now, as day breaks, I’m wrapping up the latest episode of the tour tales and I’m crawling into bed...nighty-night.

CB

p.s. On a side note: Cancelled shows, rescheduled shows...they’re a total bummer, though sometimes unavoidable. Thank you ALL for changing your schedules, rearranging your life, your travel plans, your jobs, your families, your finances. I know that going to a concert isn’t as easy as buying a ticket and parking your car. I know that it means time off work, baby-sitters, saving money, transportation, etc, etc, etc. I know that you guys are the reason we all have these jobs, and the band knows that too. So if no one else gets the chance to thank you for your understanding, at least I have.

Hartford & Scranton...again 06/11/2004
June 11, 2004
Hartford & Scranton...again

I regret to say that I really have no idea what Hartford is like. We arrived at 4:30 in the morning, after a two hour drive and after sitting in my room writing the last tour diary until the sun came up, I went to bed around 10AM and slept until 4 in the afternoon. After a shower, a 4 minute walk downtown, and a quick dinner, I headed back to the hotel room for bed. All in all I think I spent two hours outside of my room.

I may not have seen much of Hartford...but I loved Hartford, because it was warm there, and after the raining, freezing cold Jones Beach experience, I was thrilled to no end to wake up the morning of the show to a weather forecast of 93 degrees. And boy howdy, was is hot. I was disappointed when we arrived at the gig because it appeared to be an indoor venue, and I was all dressed for a day outside. But then the entire back end of the building opened up and we were suddenly outside. Presto-chango. That’s a first for me, it was cool.

Mick’s family was in Hartford, his little girls are so cute that you just want to squeeze them. They watched sound check and afterwards Mick sat at his drum kit with one girl on each knee and they banged around on the drums for a while. Cute, cute, cute and more cute.

I have this curse with Stevie’s dressing room that I’d like to complain about. Everybody enjoys a cool, comfortable room, especially when it’s sweltering outside. My problem is this... If it’s really hot out, the whole building will be perfectly air conditioned...All the dressing rooms will be at ridiculously freezing temperatures...except Stevie’s room. Her room will always be uncomfortably warm, and the most painful part is that the building maintenance people never know why. They always tell me that it should be working just fine...yeah, if 83 degrees is what you consider fine. It never fails. Never. I always end up putting her in a dressing room that just won’t cool down. It drives me bonkers. It has become a running joke on the tour. So at about 3:00, we pulled in one of our portable AC units and I spent my afternoon running AC exhaust pipe out of her room. It was an all out war between me, 2 rolls of gaff tape and 40 feet of tubing...In the end I was victorious. Can I get a round of applause for a gloriously chilled dressing room! Yay for me.

I hardly saw the band at all in Hartford, their plane was late getting in, and they left right after the show, straight from the stage to their cars, and it was a busy day for me, I think I exchanged maybe three words with each of them. So no fun stories to tell there...sorry.

We arrived in Scranton, for the second time, around 4AM the next morning. Our day off was beautiful and sunny, but around 7:00 that night it poured. I don’t think I’ve ever seen rain like this, it was raining so hard that it wasn’t even individual rain drops anymore, it was just a huge sheet of water coming down. The skies opened up and let loose. Purple lightning and booming thunder. We took a taxi ride to a Japanese restaurant to have dinner (a very scary, most likely life threatening cab ride, I might add.) We sat at one of those hibachi tables where the chef cooks all your food in front of you. We got the chef drunk on sake and he started to play this little game where he tosses food at you and you try and catch it in your mouth. Alcohol and hibachi tables are a dangerous combination people...

The rain continued into the next morning, although not nearly as bad as the night before. It sprinkled all day and then the instant we get the call that the bands plane has landed and they are 20 minutes from arrival, it starts to pour again. What great timing. So we all stood around with huge umbrellas waiting to keep our rockstars dry as they made the walk from the cars to the dressing rooms. And of course, out of the four cars, Micks pulls up right next to my post, and instead of sheltering Stevie, for instance, who is quite a bit shorter than me, I get to try and keep Mick dry...holding the umbrella 14 feet above my head. It wasn’t pretty. Then John arrived, and he wouldn’t let me walk him in with the umbrella. He said this is just a normal day in England and he’s fine, it’s just rain. I told him it’s no trouble, really...He ran away from the umbrella. So when they were on their way to soundcheck I chased him with it, trying to walk him to the stage. It gave me a good laugh.

Thankfully the rain died down before show time, so at least people up in the lawn seats didn’t get soaking wet. As soon as the rain stopped I went up to concessions right before the show and purchased three funnel cakes (if you don’t know what they are you need to go find out right now...they are one of life’s little treasures.) I gave one cake to our tour manager, but managed to eat the other two pretty much by myself. I didn’t fell well afterwards, to say the least, but it was well worth the tummy ache.

The show was totally on tonight. The crowd was great, and on a lot of the songs you could actually hear them singing along. It takes a lot of people singing for me to be able to hear it over the PA. They were singing so loud on Landslide that I could hardly hear Stevie. She loved it and towards the end was playing conductor to the audience. She dedicated Landslide to a little girl named Ashley. It’s a long story, but she’s a disabled artist who drew an amazing portrait of Stevie. She got to meet Stevie before the show, and Stevie just loved her. Ashley ended up sitting on the speakers for part of the night and both Lindsey and Stevie played to her all night long. She looked like she had the best time ever, it was so sweet. At the end of the show Stevie went over and wrapped the scarf she was wearing around Ashley’s neck. So sweet.

Lindsey dedicated Peacekeeper to Ray, I’m not entirely sure why though. I didn’t see Lindsey after the show, but I’ll have to look in to it for you next time I see him.

Someone threw a beer bottle up on stage and it went right under Stevie’s feet. Call me overprotective, but when that kind of rude stuff happens, I swear I could just jump in the audience and punch someone. Who does that? Ok, it’s lesson time class...if you decide you want to throw something on stage (whether it be an annoying beer bottle or a lovely gift) plan your item toss correctly. Don’t do it when Stevie is walking, wait until she’s stationary. Then you’re really going to want to aim for just the edge of the stage, if it makes it too far back then it’s in the way, and your lovely gesture has now become an annoyance, and it also means that I have stress out and run out there to get it as soon as the song is over. But it’s okay, put me work, I don’t mind.

Two of the items thrown on stage in Scranton were a zebra print cowboy hat and a rainbow feather boa. I’m going to wear them to greet the band as they come in at the next gig. I like trying to make them laugh. Now all I need are fishbowl platforms and some gold spandex...yeah baby!!

See ya’ll in Hershey...

CB

Hershey & Cleveland 06/15/2004
June 15, 2004
Hershey & Cleveland

As we pulled in to the venue in Hershey early in the morning on show day, I could see roller coasters. How is it that no one mentioned to me that the gig was right next to an amusement park? I ask our promoter about it, he says that if you walk over to the employee entrance of the park and show them your laminate, you can get in for free, as many times as we want...So we all spent the day hurrying to get our work done so that we could go play. Whenever we had twenty minutes of down time we would run over, ride a roller coaster and run back. (Or in my case, run over, buy three funnel cakes and run back.)

Our radios worked over at the park, so we played radio games. Every time we went down a big drop on one of the roller coasters we’d cue our radios so that everyone back at the gig working heard all the screaming people and the loud, familiar noises of the roller coaster. It was fun, I think we should only play venues that have amusement parks next to them from now on. I’m going to start a petition.

Before the show I went out to the sound board and on my way back to the stage, a guy caught up with me and asked me to sign his Rumors album. Me? I told him I can’t do that, I said I’ve never signed an autograph in my life, and I’m not going to start now. He said his wife loved me. Me? Are you sure? It was totally embarrassing, but I just did it and ran away. He didn’t want me to take it back to the band, he didn’t want anything. Except for my signature. The world is a very weird place. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it was just a piece of paper, but it just seems like only the band should sign their own album. I went back to Stevie’s room and told Stevie and Karen about it, which wasn’t a good idea, because after Stevie’s bout of laughter finally subsided, for the rest of the night they both kept asking me for my autograph. Very funny ladies....mock me if you will, but I’ll get you back.

The weather in Hershey was perfect, warm, sunny, not too humid, and it didn’t rain! I should have known that being in Hershey there would be a lot of chocolate references...during the show the stage was bombarded with about 25 little stuffed Hershey’s kisses. It was pretty funny.

During Beautiful Child, Lindsey kept peeking out from behind Stevie making funny faces at me and it was causing me to laugh so hard that I forgot to pay attention to my job, and totally screwed up. Oops. I don’t think anyone noticed though, thank god. At least Stevie didn’t call me out in front of 15,000 people. Been there. Done that. Don’t want to do it again.

During I Know I’m Not Wrong Stevie came over during the guitar solo and smiled and winked at us over on stage right. She was watching our keyboard tech who plays second keyboard on that song, and she waved her hand in his face like she was conducting him, he lost all concentration and came dangerously close to screwing up. He shook his head, trying to tell her that she was making him mess up and she just giggled.

The band was gone before the lights came up, we loaded out and hopped on the bus to head to Cleveland for a show the next day.

The venue in Cleveland is incredible. The stage itself is beautiful, the whole building is reminiscent of a hunting lodge. I know that sounds weird, but everything is stone and wood, it’s really amazing. It was a busy day, as the second show of a back to back usually is. The weather was great, until about 9PM when it absolutely poured. How silly of me to think we could have two days in a row without rain.

The show was good, although the stage was a bit of a war zone for Stevie. First, people kept tossing single roses on stage, with the little water reservoir thing attached to them. There were about ten of them scattered around on the stage, so she had to watch her step, and every time we went out in between songs to clear them away, people just threw ten more...it was frustrating. Then someone threw a top hat that landed right by her feet. And then someone literally launched a bunch of roses at her, but it wasn’t just a toss, it was almost as if they aimed for her head. They missed her by about an inch. Then a teddy bear came up, (which, by the way, really freaked me out because when I picked it up it started singing...stuffed animals should not sing), then some more flowers...it was a battle field up there. John had to kick roses out her way a few times. And I kept running out between songs to clear stuff out of the way. Note to self: When hurrying to get roses off the stage be careful of thorns. Grrrr.

And to top it all off, from the beginning of the show I could see big puffs of smoke coming right up at Stevie, and I just knew it was driving her crazy. It only took about 6 songs before she couldn’t take it anymore, I think it was after Say You Will, she said “I just have to say one thing, who ever is out there just smoking away, you’ve really got to stop blowing it in my face, because it’s really bothering me.” Ooooh! Somebody’s in trouble!! You know whoever that was must have gotten a few dirty looks from the people around them.

And as if the first album cover I was forced in to signing wasn’t embarrassing enough, after the Cleveland show, a lady with a Buckingham Nicks album was holding a Sharpie up. Apparently Lindsey said he would sign it after the show (he obviously didn’t know that he was leaving immediately after the show...) so I told her he was gone, and thought that would be the end of it. No, she wanted me to sign it. This is where my face turns beet red and I feel the need to run and hide in a corner. Can I make a public announcement here? I have now ruined two perfectly good, somewhat historic album covers. It pains me. Oh well, such is life.

We’re in Dallas now, after a 20, I repeat, a TWENTY hour bus ride, and I’m late submitting the tour report because I fell victim to going out until the wee hours of the morning on our first night off, and today, our second day off was spent making nice with the tequila I shouldn’t have partaken in, but did anyway. Ouch. So here I am, the night before the Dallas show, going back and forth between typing and trying to figure out how it’s possible that all of the clothing scattered around my hotel room came out of one suitcase. I think my clothes are secretly breeding and multiplying when I’m sleeping at night. I’m rambling now...

Forgive me, I’m tired...’till next time...

CB

Dallas, Houston & Irvine 06/21/2004
June 21, 2004
Dallas, Houston & Irvine

Okay, I’m going to breeze right through Dallas and Houston and do a ten second recap. It’s nothing personal, I’m just a total scatterbrain right now, and I can hardly remember what happened today, so remembering what happened 4 days ago would make my head explode.

We stayed at the most amazing hotel in Dallas...the rooms were absolutely beautiful and it’s made going back to staying at normal hotels a total drag. It was so hot in Dallas that it makes me wonder why anyone would ever want to live there. It’s sweaty and sticky and damp and clammy, it made my hair look like Farrah Fawcet, with the feathered frizzy bangs, and the makeup I put on in the morning slid off my face after being outside for 1.8 seconds. But after I got over the fact that it’s too hot to breathe or think, we had a really good time in Dallas. Tequila. Enough said.

Show was good. To be honest, it was a busy night, it was a hot (HOT) night, and I remember nearly nothing about it. I know that’s terrible, as my job is to try and tell you all the interesting things that happen during the show, but for some reason my brain has just been on autopilot lately. My deepest apologies.

We headed to Houston after load out and guess what? It was even hotter in Houston! Frick. I’m serious, how do people live like this? I know, enough about the weather. Okay...what do I have for you...There was a cat fight in the front row in Houston. Ah, alcohol and attitude problems...always the makings of a good cat fight. They were removed promptly and the show carried on without anyone even really noticing.

Lindsey’s family was in Houston. Three words...Cutest. Baby. Ever. She’s such a little doll, she’s two months old, and this was my first time meeting her, so I was pretty much glued to her every spare second I had. She’s precious. Stevie bought Lindsey’s 4 year old daughter the cutest little ballerina outfit, and within seconds she had it on and ran out on stage to show everyone at soundcheck. The funniest part is that Lindsey and Micks’s kids have to wear these industrial headphones, the kind that airport employee’s wear....so the ballerina outfit looked a little silly with huge bright blue cans on her head. Brett played sweet little dancing ballerina music on the keyboard, and she pranced around on stage until she got pulled so that the work day could actually continue. It’s good to have kids around sometimes, reminds you not to take everything so seriously. Everybody should dance around in a pink tutu every now and then....

Show was good. See above comment about Dallas show. Again, I apologize, I just don’t have the brain power lately!

We flew to Southern California the morning after the Houston gig, and let me just say...it’s good to be back in Cali. Beautiful, comfortable weather, road signs I recognize, and people I haven’t seen in months. Good times. We had two days off before the gig. We went to the mall, we went bowling at the rock n’ bowl, we went and saw a movie (Dodgeball, I highly recommend it, but only if you have a sarcastic, idiotic sense of humor like myself. Nothing funnier than people getting smacked by big inflatable rubber balls, in my opinion...but I digress).

And after all said activities, it was back to work. The LA shows are always a little stressful for us dressing room girls. There’s usually about eleventeen gazillion people at the LA shows, and it’s a little hard to accommodate eleventeen gazillion people, and it ends up getting really crowded and it keeps us super busy. So my blood pressure is just now coming down, 12 hours later.

The crowd was great in Irvine, the first time Lindsey spoke he thanked the crowd for coming and said it’s good to be home. Amen to that. The only problem with the show was that everyone and their mothers were smoking, which isn’t such a big deal, but whenever someone is smoking in the first ten rows, it just goes straight up to the stage and right into Stevie and Lindsey’s faces. Stevie has already made her problem with cigarette smoke very clear, so I spent the show acting as the smoking police. Every time I saw someone smoking I would flash them with a flashlight and if that didn’t work, I’d lean over and tell one of the floor security guards to go make them put it out. It seemed like every time I got someone to put their cig out, two more people lit up. I was flashing that flashlight like it was a disco. I’m going to get myself a uniform and a badge....maybe even a theme song and a sidekick.

Before Landslide Stevie told everyone that Jess, her Dad, drove out from Phoenix with her brother to spend the last month of the tour with us. She said that he’s the same man who sat in their living room in 1968 listening to Lindsey and Stevie sing, and said that they really had something going. LIndsey was smiling and laughing. She said “So he’ll be with us for the rest of tour, and Dad, I can say one thing to you...Let’s roll.” It was great.

After the show in Irvine it took the band a reeeaaaallly long time to get out of there due to the eleventeen gazillion guests I spoke of earlier. We just waited and waited and waited. It kind of got to the point where I was like “Look, I love you, but get OUT!” After twiddling our thumbs for what seemed like 12 hours, they headed out, one by one, we cleared out the dressing rooms and we were on the bus for a quick drive to San Diego.

I’m counting the days until we make it to the Bay Area so that I can sleep in my own bed, drive my own car, and have my Mom make me some home cooked food. I think my Mom reads these, so Mom...get the bacon salad and the orange chicken wings ready...I’ll on my way home.

And on a personal note, while taking advantage of my little tour diary gig...I’d like to wish my Mom a very happy birthday.

Until next time...

CB


San Diego (Chula Vista) 06/23/2004
June 23, 2004
San Diego (Chula Vista)

Ok, I would normally wait until there were at least two shows to talk about, but my brain seems to be working again, and there was plenty of action and antics in San Diego last night so it get it’s own report.

We stayed at the W Hotel in San Diego. If you’ve never stayed at a W, I highly recommend it. They’re a little too hip for their own good, but the beds are the best beds you’ll ever sleep in. Every time we stay there I find no reason good enough to get out of bed before 2 in the afternoon. So I didn’t. Had dinner and coffee with a friend, and got back in bed at 9. Now that’s what I call I good day off.

About an hour before the show our promoter called me on the radio to tell me that concessions was selling funnel cakes and churros (I know, I need help...I’m an addict.) So I took orders, and headed out to the food stands. I purchased a few churros, handed some out to our lighting guys who were on their way up to the spotlights, and started to eat one myself. They were cold and stale. I was angry, but my spirits were still high, as I knew there were funnel cakes in my future. I bought 4 funnel cakes...for $32!!!!! That’s absurd. But anyway, I stacked up my cakes and proudly toted them backstage. I dropped one off for our tour manager and headed to the dressing rooms to bring Karen one. We dug in, and upon first bite, we were utterly disappointed. They were disgusting. Soggy and oily and undercooked. I could have cried. I tried a few more bites, refusing to believe that my funnel cake experience had been ruined...but alas, it had. Our two security guards and Mick’s assistant told me I had to bring them back, I didn’t want to, I hate returning things. They asked me how much I paid for them, I told them $32. After they were finished making fun of me, and after their laughter subsided, they insisted I return them. So I stacked the cakes up again and headed back out to concessions where I politely requested a refund. They only gave me a refund for three of them, since the fourth was half eaten. Wicked, cruel world this is. So, in the end, I was out 8 bucks for nothing. Bad funnel cake experience. As you can tell, I’m very shaken by it. Thank you for letting me vent, I feel much better now. OK! On with the show!

There was a very small putting green at the gig, which Mick noticed immediately as they arrived, he went in and got his golf club out of his case and hit a few balls before the show.

And check this out...I remember last night so well that I can even tell you about it in chronological order...Woo hoo!

Crickets roll, the band comes out and Chain starts. About ten seconds in to the song, Stevie looks over at me and makes a motion with her hands like she’s taking a picture. I’m usually very good at reading her show speak, which consists of lip reading and charades, but I had no idea what she was talking about. She was smiling so I knew it wasn’t a dire situation, but she kept doing it...our keyboard tech and I start discussing what she could possibly mean. We came up with a million detailed interpretations. I asked her after the show what she was doing, she said the sunset was really pretty and she wanted someone to take a picture. Are you kidding me? I sat there stressed out for 5 songs about what it is you wanted, and all you wanted was a picture of the frickin’ sunset? Yes. Grrrr.

Stevie had all of her hair up for Sara, and it looked so beautiful. It was especially cool because in the Tusk footage that plays on the screen behind her she has her hair all up in a bun, so it was kind of a “then and now” moment. She also had a new top on for Beautiful Child, a sparkly black three quarter length sleeve. It was lovely.

Speaking of Beautiful Child....About halfway through the song, I see a guy start to climb up on stage on Lindsey’s side. It always takes a minute for it to register that someone is actually climbing on to the stage, but as soon as it clicked I start yelling at our security guard and pointing. I’m yelling and pointing and yelling and pointing, but our security has his head turned in order to hear what someone is saying...by this time the guy has made it on stage and is standing between Lindsey and Stevie, with a hand on each of their shoulders and he’s just singing along to Beautiful Child! Linds and Stevie just went about their business, playing and singing, and then, unfortunately for the stage jumper, our security guard tackled him and escorted him off the stage. After the song was over Stevie giggled and said “whoever he was, I just want you all to know he had a very gentle touch...it was like there was a ghost behind me...for a few seconds there he was almost in the band.” The reason why this guy got to stay on stage for so long is that he actually looked a lot like our monitor engineer, so for a second, everyone just thought there must have been something wrong with the monitors. How funny is that? I asked Stevie about it after the show, and she said the same thing, she thought is was our monitor guy, that there was something wrong with the sound and that she was going to just keep singing until he told her what to do. Oh man, good times.

Later that night on the bus, we were watching a recording of the show and we fast forwarded to the stage jumping moment. We played Stevie’s reaction in slow motion when she realized that the guy standing next to her was a total stranger. Hysterical. We kept freeze framing her expression of confusion, and then we would do commentary on what she must have been thinking. “Um, who are you?” But I have to say, the girl didn’t miss a beat!

As the show was ending and Mick was saying his goodnights, I looked over and Lindsey had a green cowboy hat on. He’s such a goof ball. He was running back and forth, trying to leave the stage, but not wanting to leave anyone out of an autograph or a handshake, he finally ran off stage and as Mick was leaving he grabbed a woman’s Buckingham Nicks album to take backstage to be signed. I had to fight the security guards off from kicking her out while she waited for someone to bring it back. When they brought it back out Stevie had signed it, but she seemed really sad that Lindsey hadn’t signed it too. She was very nice and was so appreciative and I knew the band was all still there, so I took it back to LB and gave him a Sharpie. When I brought it out to her, she was so happy, she couldn’t believe I had just gone back there and gotten him to sign it. It was nice to be able to do that for her, she wouldn’t stop thanking me. It was very sweet.

There was a meet and greet after the show and usually management will gather up Mick, John and Lindsey and as soon as all the boys are ready, they’ll go in and get Stevie. (After all, she is the lady of the band, and we all know you never keep a lady waiting.) But last night Lindsey had a few of the members from his Out Of The Cradle band there, and he was busy socializing. When Lindsey is socializing, heaven help the person who has to go pull him away. Well, last night, that person was me. Our tour manager looked at me and said “I’m going to get Stevie, you get LB, we’re ready.” OH NO! How did I get stuck with this? Ugh. I headed in to the dressing room with a firm attitude, I wasn’t going to take no for an answer, I was going in there with a mission, I would go in alone, and I would come out with Lindsey...I would use physical force if I had to. “Excuse me, I’m sorry, Linds, we gotta go. Lindsey, meet and greet, they’re all waiting. Um, Linds, say your goodbyes, we’re late. Lindsey, please.” I tug on his shirt a little, he just smiles and puts his arm around me like I’m there for my health. I call our tour manager on the radio. “I don’t have LB. I repeat, I need at least 2 minutes.” Five times Lindsey says his goodbye to people and looks like he’s leaving, but right as we get him in the doorway he goes back in. He faked me out at least 5 times.

The funniest part? When we finally did get him out in the hallway, John said he needed to grab something out of the dressing room, and as he walked by me, he winked. He didn’t need anything out of the dressing room...just his little joke to point out how long they had waited for Lindsey. God I love this band.

It was a good night. Bad funnel cake and all.

Next stop: Fresno.

CB


Fresno, Marysville, Concord, San Jose, Seattle, Spokane 07/04/2004
July 4, 2004
The Lost Week....

My how time flies....Fresno, Marysville, Concord, San Jose, Seattle, Spokane. I swear I meant to write the tour diaries, but it just never happened. California is my home state, so those shows were a little crazy, lots of friends and family, and even some time off at home. (Thank god!!!) But here I am, sitting in my hotel room in Portland, and I’ve got six shows to tell you about. Shame on me.

I’m going to give you the Cliff Notes version, as it’s late afternoon here, and I’ve got to go get ready for the Fourth of July festivities. I love fireworks and I’m very excited that we have a day off so that I get to see them...I apologize if I rush this, but I looove fireworks.

Fresno was good. Nothing out of the ordinary. I was going crazy because we were getting so close to home for me, it was like hours were passing like weeks. I’m never really homesick out here, but when you get close to home, and you can imagine your own bed, and your cats and your car and your friends...you start to get a little antsy. So I was happy to load out of Fresno and head to Marysville, just one step closer to home.

Marysville was a really great show. I was a little thrown off by the Marysville date, if you’ve never been there, it’s pretty much just out in the middle of nowhere, farms and fields and such, so it was surprising to see this huge amphitheater surrounded by dirt roads and cows. My mom drove out to Marysville, she had been in Sacramento that morning buying a kitten, which she brought to the show. He’s 8 weeks old, and he lived in Wardrobe for the day. He was very popular, everyone spent all their spare time in Wardrobe snuggling our new kitten.

Stevie dedicated Landslide to my mom, it was a very moving little thing she said, and it reminded me how amazing all the history of this band is, but even more amazing how much the history ties in to my life. Every time Stevie introduces Beautiful Child she says it was from an album they did in 1979 called Tusk. I was born right when Tusk was released. My mother was pregnant with me at the Tusk shows. It’s crazy. The landslide dedication was very sweet, it started to get me a little misty eyed...and if that wasn’t enough, Lindsey finished the job...

Lindsey made a dedication for Say Goodbye. He told everyone that the drive to the show reminded him of his father, who grew up on farms in that area. He was saying that even after 30 years, it’s amazing how there are still things to come to terms with, things to accept and let go of. He said he was going to cry. It seemed it was too late for that. He dedicated the song to his Dad. Our keyboard tech went and got me kleenex. The tears were a’ rollin.

Well, after the cry-fest that was Marysville, we packed up and headed to Concord Baby!! Only one hour away from my house. It was a painful day...I’ve never wanted a day to be over more quickly. My mom brought my car, it was parked next to the bus and it was just calling my name, ready to take me home.

All the members from Fritz came out for the Concord show, Stevie dedicated Landslide to them. After the show, I was so ready to get in her dressing room and load out so that I could go home, but instead, I watched what must have been a hundred people pile in to her dressing room (okay, I did a head count and it was more like 38, but still!!) All the guys from Fritz, Lindsey, Mick, Lindsey’s family, EVERYONE was in there, music blaring. Finally when, it looked like they were going to stay in there forever, I got the go ahead to just head in there and turn the music off (always the best way to end a party). We just slinked in and started taking everything down, and Stevie (who is well trained in being kicked out of her own dressing room) came to my rescue and yelled over everyone “okay, everybody’s gotta go, my girls need to come in and take everything down!” Thank you!! Within minutes the room was empty, Stevie got changed and was on her way, and so was I!! I threw my radio at our production manager and put the pedal to the metal...homebound.

On a side note, Lindsey’s Say Goodbye dedication was to his brother, for getting him into music way back when, and Stevie dedicated Beautiful Child to Vanessa Carleton, who was at the show. Stevie is a big fan of hers, and Lindsey just did some work on her album.

My day off at home was glorious. I slept in with my kitten, drank tea on my patio, did some laundry and stayed in my PJ’s most of the day. Drove my car, saw my friends and watched Tivo. Heaven. My mom dropped me off at the San Jose show the next morning, and it was almost like my day off at home never existed...

San Jose was CRAZY. I had 35 guests. Friends and family alike, it was crazy. It was great to see everyone, but it’s a little hard to balance work and 35 guests. I nearly lost my mind. Lindsey’s wife and kids were there and he dedicated Say Goodbye to his wife. I couldn’t wait till we got out of California so we could be done with the teary dedications! I just couldn’t take it anymore.

I said goodbye to my house and my family and we headed to Seattle after the San Jose show. It was a nice long drive and I got tons of sleep. We had a really nice day off, Seattle has great shopping, so I hit the streets with intent to spend. Show day was good, everybody sang happy birthday to Stevie’s dad at sound check, as his birthday was the following day off. It’s amazing how good happy birthday can sound when people who can really sing are singing it. It was lovely.

The show...Stevie swore she smelled chocolate cookies somewhere, lo and behold, someone in the front row appeared a few minutes later with a tub of cookies. Hysterical.

There was a little kid sitting right up front, on the subs with his ear pretty much touching the speaker. This is not okay...just for those of you who don’t know. If you bring a child to a show, they need to be wearing earplugs or headphones...and to sit them directly in front of the speaker is straight child abuse. Sorry, but that’s just not okay with me.

Anywho, a girl made it up on stage, but was removed quickly. Me thinks the poor thing had a few too many cocktails.

Spokane came and went without anything out of the ordinary, although I did really like the city, it was very cute. And now it’s time for me to go watch some fireworks. I love fireworks.

Sorry for being late, and I’m sorry if this bored you all to death. I’d hate to bore you this close to the end! I’ll make the last few good, I promise.

CB


Portland & Calgary 07/08/2004
July 8, 2004
Portland & Calgary

I love the 4th of July. I realize there are a lot of holidays with much better themes....gifts, costumes, food, etc...but there’s something about the 4th that I love. FIreworks only last 15 minutes and more often than not it seems like it’s over before it started, but I just love it. We were in Portland for the festivities. The weather was beautiful and clear, and during the day there was a blues festival and tons of food and drinking going on, and then around 10, we watched 20 minutes of really good fireworks, and then we headed off to bed. I’m sure it sounds like a really uneventful day, but it was actually really nice. Last year we were in Vegas for the 4th of July....so this was a nice change from the debauchery that was last year.

The show itself was actually in Ridgefield washington, not Oregon at all. I was confused by this at first, as nobody could tell me why the itinerary would say Portland, Oregon if we weren’t even in Oregon. It’s the little things that confuse me. Oh well. The show was good.

When the show first started, Mick and John came out, and usually Lindsey and Stevie are quick to follow.....but not tonight. We waited and waited, Mick and John were chatting and the crowd was cheering in anticipation, but still, no Lindsey...no Stevie. I had watched them all walk out from the dressing rooms together. I saw them all ready to go on stage...what’s the problem here? John starts making yawning gestures, and Mick pretends to fall asleep. Finally, they come out and the show starts. It turns out there were concerns about the lighting for the show, since the sun was still very much out at show time. It made me laugh...sorry guys, but we already sent the other half of the band out on stage...we can’t exactly take that back. I mean, it was really bright out when the show started, but who cares, you know? It’s just lights, people didn’t come to see lights.

After Go Your Own Way, a lot of people in the crowd were holding their lighters up in the air, and I look over at John, who is standing on the side of the stage, waiting to go back on for the encore, and he has his lighter up in the air also. He’s a total goofball.

We had a long drive to Calgary that night, which was made even longer when it took us two hours to get through the border. All four buses pulled up in a little cluster in the parking lot of border control. It was early in the morning, we all climbed out of our bunks and lined up show our passports, passing the time yawning, rubbing our tired faces, and trying to figure out who has the best bus hair out of everyone. (There’s something about sleeping in a bunk that makes your hair do the most incredible things. It’s just like normal bed head, only like twenty times worse.) We thought we were good to go, but then it turned out we had to wait outside the buses while they went on the buses and looked through everything, including luggage. It took forever. They went one bus at a time, and of course our bus was last. So two hours later, after sitting on the pavement in the hot morning sun, wishing I could go back to bed... I finally did. All in all it took us about 15 hours to get to Calgary.

We stayed at the same hotel as the band in Calgary, that’s always fun. We headed off to dinner and saw Mick walking around, checking things out. We ate and hit the hotel bar for a few cocktails. We were in Calgary a few days before their big rodeo. I don’t know much about it, I think they call it Stampede, but our hotel was decorated like a really bad western movie set. Every time I waited for the elevator, amongst badly painted cowboys and barnyard type animals...I just had to laugh. We’re staying at like a 5 star hotel and there is hay on the floor. Unreal?

The show was fantastic. The arena was packed. I couldn’t see one empty seat. And the crowd was great. Stevie dedicated Landslide to The Stampede, people seemed to like that. Lindsey talked about the meaning behind Say Goodbye, the whole leaving the band thing, and his relationship with Stevie, forgiveness, etc...Mick’s vest solo was crazy. He kept yelling something like “can you hear me barking?”. As I was falling asleep in my bunk that night I could hear the guys in the back lounge of the bus watching it again...it’s like a car accident, you don’t want to look, but you just have to. Again and again and again. Don’t get me wrong, he’s enormously talented, but the vest solo is enough to boggle even the sanest mind. But anyway...

We drove from Calgary to Bozeman Montana last night, with a brief stop at the border at 4AM where we all had to climb out of our bunks and sit in the front lounge with our bus hair, while a uniformed officer identified all of us and one by one told us we could go back to bed. You don’t have to ask me twice. I slept until we got to Bozeman at 10AM this morning. Upon arrival we saw only a WalMart and a Costco. Looks like it’s a good day to Barbecue.

Only six more shows, eleven more days, 138 more songs...only three more tour diaries.


...Country roads, take me home, to the place I belong...


CB


The Final Episode... 07/21/2004
July 21, 2004
The Final Episode...

I’m late again...sorry about that. The last week of the tour was hectic for me, along with trying to clean out all our cases and get everything ready to spend 2 months in storage, to make a long story short, one of our crew went home a week early, so instead of hiring someone to do her job for just 5 shows...I got to do her job...on top of my own job. My days were busy...to say the least. But I’m back, I didn’t desert you.... I wouldn’t dare.

We’ve had six shows since you last heard from me, I’ll give the best recap I can, and then I’ll say farewell. We have a few shows in September, but you’ll have to forgive me as I don’t know that I’ll be providing a report for those shows. So this might be it for me...

Montana is beautiful. The drive from Calgary to Bozeman was unbelievable and breathtaking. I sat in the back lounge and watched the scenery go by for hours.

Bozeman is apparently a very cute town. I personally am not able to verify this, as I slept the whole afternoon off. I had quit smoking a few days beforehand, and for some reason it left me feeling a bit like a narcoleptic. I just fell asleep all the time, where ever I was, what ever I was doing. It was rather odd. Anyway, so I didn’t see Bozeman, but it was a beautiful night and we had a really great barbecue out by the bus.

Denver was the chosen city for our end of tour party. The band, staff and crew all gathered for dinner and drinks. It was a lot of fun. Mick and Lindsey both gave a quick little speech expressing their gratitude to everyone, at the end of Mick’s speech he yelled “are you with me??” We all laughed. A few others stood to say a word, and when our production manager was finished he screamed “The Maaac is baaack!” That also got a laugh. It was nice to see everyone in such a relaxed environment, just hanging out and enjoying themselves. It was also a riot to see everyone put their “good” clothes on...we tend to look pretty grubby most of the time, jeans and t-shirts...but I must say, we clean up nice!

There was however, one let down that night. Mick had a suit he was planning on wearing to the party, I was one of the lucky few to see it beforehand...it was outrageous. Shiny, gold plaid pants with a matching jacket and a gold vest and tie...and I couldn’t wait to see it on him. I was very disappointed to see that he opted to wear something different, and much more toned down. Sigh...oh well.

The Denver show was good, it was our last outdoor gig, and I was feeling a little down about it. This has been my favourite leg of the tour, all the outdoor shows. I love being outside, watching the sun set as the show starts. Working all day in the sun. I’ll miss it. It’s one of the many things I’ll miss.

There must have been some static going on with the ribbons on Stevie’s mic stand, because three times she nearly pulled it over when the ribbons got caught up in her shawl. The first time it happened she nearly brought her mic stand down and she just leaned in to the mic and said “nice save”. The next few times she just ignored it and then turned to make funny faces at us. After Landslide, when she and Lindsey hold hands, her hand got all tangled in the ribbons and therefore Lindsey’s hand got all tangled and it looked like they were going to knock it over again, but for some reason the mic stand gods smiled upon us and all was well. Apparently the mic stand and Denver did not get along well.

Sioux City came and went, we arrived, played a show and left faster than you can blink an eye. But the show went well and the crowd was loud and excellent.

The gig in Cedar Falls was so weird. It was indoors, but the ceiling was a big skylight. And it was a huuuuge venue, my legs were so tired by the end of the day. Cedar Falls marks the point in time where I started to realize this was all coming to an end. Stevie gave a really lovely speech at soundcheck, she thanked the crew profusely and talked about what a good time this has been and that she would never forget it. (Sniffle sniffle, try to not look like I’m crying...) During the show she dedicated Landslide to the crew, thanked everyone for staying with them all this time, it was very sweet. After load out that night, we said goodbye to a few of our crew that wouldn’t be coming to Santa Ynez with us. It was the beginning of the end. We all stood around the buses while the lighting guys set off fireworks that they had picked up on the Fourth of July. But I’ll get back to that...

We drove to Chicago that night, spent about six hours there and then headed to the airport for our flight to LA, which I spent watching the Live In Boston DVD...Then we hopped on a little prop plane (ugh!) to Santa Barbara, and then a 45 minute drive to Solvang, which is a very weird, albeit cute version of Scandanavia...Who needs funnel cakes when there is a bakery on every corner selling pastries and danishes. Mmmmmm.

The Santa Ynez shows were at an Indian Reservation casino. It’s always really hard to work when there is gambling to be done. Luckily, I was so busy that I only had time to lose 200 bucks. Not bad. It could have been muuuch worse, believe me. I was exhausted after these shows, as the “dressing rooms” were really hotel rooms at the other end of the world. So I spent both days running back and forth, up the elevator, down the elevator, through the casino and back, a million times over. Very tiring. Good shows though, a little weird since it was only 1,000 people and we’re used to more like 10,000 if not 15,000. But it was nice, intimate. Stevie dedicated Landslide (or maybe Beautiful child?) to her Dad, who had been with us for a few weeks on this leg. She said “Daddy, you win”. Oh man, bring on the tears!

We also played a little joke on Stevie in Santa Ynez...More often than not, Stevie shows up to soundcheck with curlers in her hair. Usually it’s just one or two in the front, but sometimes it’s a whole head of them. So at the last show, we all (boys included) put a curler in the front of our hair and we all waited patiently for her to arrive. When her car pulled up, she got out and you could see her surprise when she saw one person wearing one, then two people, then three, then EVERYONE. She died. She was taking a million pictures and was laughing so hard she was crying. We were concerned that she might show up with no curlers in her hair, and then it wouldn’t be as funny, but thank god, she showed up with the full set! She made Karen take her picture with everyone and their curlers, the dogs included. Good times.

John even participated in the hair curler antics...we gave him a hair curler with some double stick tape on it. During Goldust Woman Stevie always turns around and does a little dance for John, before she turned to face him he stuck the hair curler to his hat. When she turned around and saw him I thought she was going to lose it. You couldn’t see her face from the audience, but she waited an extra long time to turn back around because she was laughing so hard. At least the Queen Bee has a good sense of humour!

The last show was heart wrenching. I hate goodbyes. I got teary at least a dozen times during the show, and was literally weeping as I said goodbye to people at the end of the night. We walked out of the casino, and the sliding glass doors closed behind me, and just like that...a year and a half later...it was all over.

Which brings me back to Cedar Falls...And to my closing words...

Bear with me for a little flashback...I’m standing in a parking lot behind the venue in Cedar Falls. It is a perfect night. The four tour buses we have called home are parked all in a row. The 40 people I have called my friends and family for the last year are mingling about, talking, laughing, drinking. I am standing alone, forty feet away, watching them all, listening to their familiar voices. There are fireworks going off over my head, huge bursts of colour and noise. Yellow sparks are falling from the sky. Rainbow flames are spinning around on the ground. Their laughter and their stories blend together with the fireworks like music and then it all goes silent. I am watching in slow motion as this night is burned into my memory. This night is mine. These people are mine. Their laughter is mine. These memories are mine. These fireworks in the sky are mine. This was all mine, from the first day of rehearsals to the final plane flight home, it is all mine, and I will keep it with me, always.

I do love Fleetwood Mac, and I have loved getting to be a part of their show and their tour. I love the music and I love the band. I am, without a doubt, a Fleetwood Mac fan. But I promise you, no matter how big of a Fleetwood Mac you are...if you had the opportunity to be a part of what I was just a part of...at the end, it wouldn’t be the band or the show that had the biggest impact on you. It would be these people. This incredible group of people, and this experience that has forever changed me. It might sound a little extreme, but that’s because for me, it was.

I thank all of you for coming to these shows and giving me a reason to have this job. I will never, ever forget it.


Once and for all...signing off...

CB