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Hey there--this here is a special edition of notes from the road --
co-written by Michael and Peter Stuart.
We're out on the road together once again and we've had a swell night.
Let us take you to a club in Ottowa, Ontario--a lovely town. The setting is a club called "zaphod beeblebrox" (we should have guessed it would be trouble right there), and the time is the recent past.
In fact it was just an hour ago.
We'll start with the show. Mike played a great set of songs (as usual) to a completely indifferent audient. Well, there were three people there, but they were busy ignoring Mike. I enjoyed his show, but knew he'd be on the depressed side of things when he was done.
We removed all sharp objects from the bus and got ready for our show. Our show (dog's eye view) was okay--a bit on the epic side as I decided to play lots of new songs- -some that aren't really written yet.
> Anyway, all that silly music stuff was just the preview to the real action of the evening. I'll leave Mike to tell you the good stuff. Suffice to say it starts with an evil woman named Andrea and ends with the Police...
As I rolled out of my bunk where I had hidden after my show, I was greeted by the sound of the boys and Peter talking about how their gig went. I grumbled out a hello and they were all very kind and sensitive to the fact that I was in a sour mood.
Then we noticed that Bill, the tour manager, had walked out of the club and was looking a little exasperated. Concerned, we all went out to see what was troubling the good man.
"What's wrong, Bill? Trouble?" asked Peter.
It was then that he informed us that the manager of the club, a woman named Andrea, was refusing to let us load the gear out of the club until the disco that the club became after the live music closed down. Sometime around 3:00. A.M. In the morning. Late, late, late.
This set-up was no good for us since we had to drive to London, Ontario overnight. That little journey takes 8 hours.
So then we came up with an alternate plan: Bill would go in and get the money and then once we had that, we'd just walk out with the gear and -- WHAT COULD THEY DO? Brilliant! Except... that she refused to pay Bill until after the club shut down. Around 3:00.
Then we started to get angry since they were essentially holding thousands of dollars of equipment hostage. To make matters worse, Andrea, whose name was now being attached to a longer and longer series of uncomplimentary adjectives, seemed only to recall that there was a contract when it suited her.
For instance, we'd say that the contract said that we'd get a set amount of money at the end of the show and she'd say that she didn't see a contract. However, when we wanted to move the gear, she instisted that the contract CLEARLY stated that we had to wait to load out until the club shut down, and didn't we read the contract? It's hard to be reasonable in the face of that kind of stupidity.
Peter decided to try and just get the stuff out anyway and marched into the club. He came out a few moments later fuming that the bouncers had pushed him away from the stage.
Then Dermot decided to take matters into his own hands and manged to remove two small drums from the club. As he walked back in, I decided to accompany him. I should point out that I was really spoiling for a fight, being in a cruddy mood as I was. I was secretly praying that something would happen.
Peter, admirably, was remaining very calm, which was odd because it was all his stuff in the club, and my guitars were already in the bus.
As Dermot got on stage, he was immediately surrounded by four hulking bouncers who told him he couldn't take the gear out. Dermot insisted that it was his gear and he would take it where he pleased, or words to that effect.
The head bouncer, distinguished by his tiny brain, refused to let him off the stage. And in fact, as he kept pressing his "point", he kept backing Dermot up. Then he did the unforgivable, he pushed Dermot backwards violently.
At that moment something snapped in me, I levitated onto the stage and managed to get my arms around bouncer's arms, which were the size of my torso.
I said, "Don't you EVER touch him, again!" At which point the large muscle in my right butt cheek started twitching uncontrollably as I stood there realizing that if this became a fight, I would be pounded into pulp in the very near future and that was OKAY WITH ME.
Andrea, whose name was now unwieldy with epithets, approached me and tried to get me to be resonable. I said something undiplomatic which eliminated any possiblity of me ever playing this club again, not that I want to, and continued to twitch angrily. Then Dermot and I stalked out of the club.
Dermot called the police and told them that he had been assaulted and that our gear had been illegally confiscated. They said they'd be right there. Then they called back up and asked for directions. Amusingly, the landmark that located it for them was the strip club next door.
The police arrived in two cars and out stepped two of Ottowa's finest who stepped right into the middle of this ugly situation and immediately saw that we were in the right and forced Andrea and her henchmen to pay up and let us get our stuff. HA HA HA HA!
Of course by now it was 2:00, so we didn't save all that much time but it sure was fun. As an interesting epilogue, while in the club, the police officers turned off their radios. Headquarters interpreted that as a sign of trouble and within moments the SWAT team in their grey van pulled up and surrounded the club.
I don't think that we'll have that problem again. Not with the SWAT team on our side.
Peter
