Favourite Stranger.

I don’t chase stars, I’m not interested in meeting the stars, I have met a few most have been nice one or two have been down right weird, there’s only been one knob, lets see where this goes!

Ian Gillan has been a dick every time  I have been in the same vicinity of his orbit, I have never liked him as a person, he has always been a complete dick, I could probably do an entire blog on him, I won’t but I will recount the time Leonard Haze was drumming for him on the Tool box tour and he apologised to a couple of girls who Mr Gillan had thrown a drink over for no reason and walked away laughing, Mr Haze was the perfect gentleman, he was when he was in Y&T and he was when he was a hired gun.

Some people can be a little stand offish, some people can be a little rude, but you don’t know how many idiots they have had to deal over the course of the day (one of the main reason I don’t like to bother them) I have met many of the same people over the years and if they were off one tour they would be lovely the next time so I suppose its swings and roundabouts.

Jon Anderson has been weird every time, not horrible just kind of an old hippy, Brian Robertson has always been out there in the outer regions of the galaxy, it seems like he hates the world, not the fans but he does come across as a bit of a git, Stuart Adamson when he was with the Skids was pissed all the time but with Big Country was the perfect gent, Annie Lennox was pretentious Dave Stewart was as mad as a box of frogs but lovely even though he is a mackum.

Ritchie Blackmore always lovely no matter what his reputation precedes him, all of the Stranglers were lovely even Hugh Cornwell, who came across as a grumpy head teacher, but he was actually lovely. Fish has been the Haddington Bear a couple of times but with good cause, we have met him a couple of times and he has always been wonderful including a convention we attended 4 days after the wife had had major back surgery and when he found out, he had a seat put at the side of the stage for her so that she could see the show in comfort and Yatta his stage manager kept popping back to see that she was ok. That was the night I met Steven Wilson, yes that Steven Wilson he was more nervous about meeting people who knew his music even though Porcupine Tree only had a few albums out at the time. Fish’s guitar player John Wesley was lovely as well and again he performed a short acoustic set on the afternoon in the sunshine I bought all of his albums at the merch stall, and had a bloody good drink after the gig.

Brian Tichy was so cool he put us on the guest list for his show at Vamp’d in Vegas (what a holiday with a great people) we were met at the door by the bar owner who was lovely and it turns out it was Danny Cokers wife the owner of Counts Customs, we even got introduced as good friends to Sass Jordan and some tramp who turned out to be Jake E Lee (who was lovely as it happens) who wanted to buy my Buckets T shirt off me  but when we got to explaining who the buckets were he knew who the hell the boys from shields were!

FM are all lovely but Steve Overland is outstanding as being such a gentleman, who was genuinely surprised when I quizzed him about certain albums he had played on that he didn’t think anybody had heard never mind actually have copies of, and he was shocked that I actually had his Broadway debut, but still level headed and a lovely chap.

Yes I have met tons more, way too many to list, but the moral of the story I don’t go out of my way to do so, I can be a tad shy even  back in the day, I will list a couple that I haven’t mentioned, but the only one who was a dick was Ian Gillan I may have made that claim before.

The Rods, Various members  of UFO, Thunder, Eric Martin, Rick Wakeman, Simon Kirke, Dweezil Zappa, Extreme, Saigon Kick, Graham Bonnet, Adam Ant (before he went bat shit crazy) all of the members of Queen, Ronnie James Dio, Y&T, Triumph, most of the Japan guys, actually the were more shy than the fans , all of the Maiden were fab and the list could go on forever, I know some of my friends have met tons more than me, some have worked in the trade, some actively chase the “stars” of the day, if you meet them and they are dicks its probably because someone was a dick to them first they are only people after all.

I have a couple of blogs brewing and I’m enjoying the pacing off them, the numbers are good, the name game is as always in play, stay indoors, stay safe and watch the skies for incoming, until the next time.............Toodles!