I had the extreme pleasure of touring with Will Wilde and his incredible band. Unfortunately the circumstances were not great, as I was called to replace my friend Alan, who is a great drummer in his own respect, on the tour due to medical reasons.
I filmed and took as many pictures as I could but UNFORTUNATELY my SD card was corrupted when I returned home so I lost everything. I gathered as many pictures and videos from Youtube, but I will continue to try to recover my data. If I do I'll make a follow up post with all my vids and pics!
Here is my story!
In the middle of a drum lesson, Alan called me. I knew it was for a gig, and a last minute gig, because he would never call me otherwise. Turns out he had a problem with his spine and had to fly back to England for surgery. I was devastated. He asked me to join the band the next day. I of course called my wife (like a good husband) to see if this was possible. It ALSO turns out, my wife was planning a surprise birthday party for me that weekend. It was in the early stages of planning so she told me to go and have fun, she would take care of everything. What a woman. She drove me to the train station, and I hopped on a train off to Hamburg, then Gifhorn
I had one day, kind of all I can say. I played through everything quickly once and took as many small notes to help me remember the songs. On the train I listened and edited my notes to make everything easier and was ready to go when I arrived at the gig.
The first venue was at the train station, so I jumped off the train, on stage and we started going through the material. Some of the songs were quite difficult and the soundcheck was a little rough. We had a few hours after soundcheck so I went backstage and ran through all the material on my headphones. Then we hit the stage, around 24 hours after getting the call.
We kicked off the set with attitude and despite a few sound issues the set went ok. As to be expected we were all a bit on edge trying to feel each other out and find a solid groove between the four of us. The first set done, we had a short break before the second set to sell some merch. I ran over a few of he more difficult songs that were in the second set and we hit the stage once more.
Second set was like a bomb going off. Once I got through the first number, "Lazy," I was confident and I gave my all to the rest of the set. We ran through our numbers, the band more confident in me, with a solid groove and a determination to make this impossible feat possible. Finally we hit our last number, and launched into a bass solo. Will nodded at me saying, "Hey, drum solo time." I was ready and I hit. The solo was as good as any that I have ever done, the crowd cheered and we ended our set proud, accomplished and determined to get better.
Without much time to stop and think, we drove off to our second gig in Joldelund. I had played this great venue almost a year and a half ago so I knew it would be great. However our 3 and a half our drive became a 9 hour due to insane traffic jams and Germany police. We were pulled over, searched, questioned and then asked to take all our gear out of the van while the sniffer dogs checked the whole van, our luggage and our gear for drugs. It took at least 45 mins which was frustrating after 8 hours on the road being so close to the venue. Nice policemen but I can't help but wonder, especially living in Holland, what a waste of time and money searching for drugs is.
Great Venue, great people and a great sound. I hopped on the house kit, and was up on a drum riser. The gig just sounded great, and always does at that venue. I was confident as I had reviewed all my question marks on the songs and was ready to play hard. The crowd cheered us on frantically and we played well to that energy. Merch sales were good and the crowd was ecstatic. A friend from the past, Chris Bergson was there and played amazingly. He remembered me from a festival we played together three years ago and was super nice and genuine. I lent the last drummer my drum stool so we had to stay until the end. We got back to the hotel around 3am, had a quick sleep then off to our next venue.
Not too much traffic as we hit the road to Wredenhagen. No one seemed to know where this place was so we didn't know what to expect. What we got was an unbelievable venue
We had a lot of time to soundcheck and get everything right. Our sound guy, Alex, was very particular about the stage sound and about our sound. Trusting he knew the room, I went with his suggestions. Soundcheck went well and we had a beautiful fish dinner from the venue. Sitting backstage we acoustically ran a few tunes to warm and then we were ready to hit the stage.
The place was packed and ready to dance. As soon as we began the dance floor was full and never emptied until we did our second encore. I was confident by this stage and ready to play more relaxed and express the songs in more easy manner. I feel like I still wasn't playing the best drum solo compared to my first one, but that's the LEAST important thing when you're playing with a band really. The crowd roared and demanded 2 encores and we obliged. smiles all round from the band, we played On the Road again for our final song. LUCKILY I had asked Will if there were any other songs we might do, and listened to this song in the hotel quickly before we went to the gig. I was ready, it grooved and we ended strong. Great gig, great venue and a big smile from me.
We had a nice relaxed morning before heading off to Berlin for our last gig. I walked around the town and chilled out quite a bit before we left. Then we got a phone call saying we were supposed to be on at 2pm. It was 1pm and the drive was 2 hours. Whoops! We all jumped in the van and sped off to Berlin.
Our last show was a beautiful outdoor gig with a great venue owner and a beautiful scenic panorama for us to take in while we played, Outdoor gigs are tricky to get the sound right, and something felt off. We would find out later the PA was plugged in wrong in the set break and got the sound better for the second set.
We set up our gear quickly when we arrived and started soon after. When the gigs are outdoors you can really smash your drums because the sound disappears so quickly, so that's what I did. I played that kit with fire and passion man. It wasn't my kit, I was using all of Alan's gear, another weird thing for this tour, but I never break anything anyway. The audience seemed to really dig what we were doing, cheering loud despite the relaxed environment we were placed in.
We played our second set with a properly plugged in PA, which felt great, and finished strong. I felt I had a good drum solo, and we played our encore with everything we had. This encore was our last gig together, and quite possibly, the last time the four of us would play together ever. A strange thought. All 3 of the band were session players, the regular Will WIlde band was unavailable, save for Alan, who left and was replaced by me.
As we finished we were greeted by a feast of food that was locally grown, prepared and cooked with extreme care and love. The owner even told me "I know the name of all the animals we are eating tonight." The venue treated us great, the modern day music scene is built on owners giving a damn and taking care of bands. Owners and venues like this are truly an Oasis in a desert of struggle and stress.
The hotel was a 2 minute drive (it could be seen from the venue) and we all had our own rooms to finish out the last gig. Yep, with a lot of venues sometimes the whole band is in one room for the whole tour. I've been on many tours in fact where you have no hotel rooms and you make do. The hotel was great, but we were up early for a big breakfast then a big drive back. The band was off to Dunkirk, then a Ferry back to England, then home. They dropped me off in Enschede and I gave a quick farewell.
All in all I was very happy with this tour. I feel like I did a near impossible task. Learning such complex material, in such a short time. The band really helped guide me along, with Russel on bass being not only an all-star bass player, but sending me Ques for changing sections, endings and stops. Russel and I formed a deep groove not only on but off stage as well. Playing with Russel was a treat. The guitarist, Steve, was an amazing player with an incredible knowledge and ear for music. We rocked out on stage together and laughed a lot together. Will was a really nice guy who works his ass off without saying much. He did all the driving, and handled all the merch sales himself as well as managed the tour. Will writes amazing songs, used to be a drummer so has great rhythmic ideas, and can play harp like a madman. Did I mention he can sing great too? Sometimes life isn't fair.
I hope to work more with these incredible musicians. This gig was a blast from start to finish. Not great circumstances to get a gig for, I was worried about Alan, but it turned out to be an extremely pleasant experience.
Edit: I should note, Alan had surgery and is doing great! He is already set to tour with another Band in Holland this weekend. Can't keep a guy like that down.
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed this journey with me.
-Joel
