Dear people,
We feel very sorry for the fact we COULD NOT play the Colorado show at Fort Collins. We know a lot of people drove a lot of miles [we did too!!!] just to see us. We never blow off gigs without a reason. We have played about 400/500 gigs already with Anneke, and only due to illness and a bus that broke down, we had to cancel gigs in the past. I guess 6 gigs in total over the years. [and the band exists for TEN years now] We love to play live. We enjoy it soo much...
I just arrived from the USA tour, and I am shocked. Shocked by some people who call themselves 'fan', and spread lies and rumours around, without knowing the facts.
First of all we, the band, and our tourmanager didn't have a telephone nor internet, so we couldn't reply that fast. This USA tour was booked very poorly. I am not going to give you any names. But we were treated like animals. Really. They booked the Colorado-show without permission of the band or the band's management. When we arrived at Century Media Los Angeles we saw it was scheduled, and we tried to cancel it. It's very simple, we are just people like you, people who need a bed and some food, and I can tell you that sometimes we didn't even get something to drink!!!!!! Not even water!!!!
We couldn't make the distance to Ft. Collins. We called the bookingsoffice, but they didn't want to cancel it. So we tried to do something IMPOSSIBLE. To drive all the way from San Fransisco to Colorado. Just to please the fans...
That's a mere 800 miles/1250 km in 24 hours!!
We managed to arrive at 22:30 local time. And I can tell you that we were sick. Very sick and incredible tired. Sick of the booking-guy, sick of the organisation, but above all, the inhuman trip to Colorado. We already had to fight a lot of miles and a big 'jet-lag'.
OK. We arrived. Didn't have anything to eat the whole day. Just driving. Raymond, our tourmanager and Theo, our technician walked into the venue. They were treated like shit! Nobody had the decency to talk with our crew, nobody was in charge, [!] we could come back at 00:00, that's what the bar-lady said.
It had NOTHING to do with the marquee which said 'Gatherin'. If you're into us you know we like these 'mistakes'.
It had nothing to do with the venue itself either. We were treated like shit. No hospitality, sick people in the van. To do the gig was impossible. We decided to look for a place to find some rest. Otherwise it would be a big problem for us to finish this tour. Yes, we were so tired, we could not think normally, which is normal and human. And yes, we could let people from the venue know that we wanted to cancel the gig. But no one was in charge there!!
We concidered to walk into the venue for some apologies towards the fans. But what would have happened then? Of course they think you are able enough to play! Our minds were not clear anymore. If you puke 5 times in a bag in one hour you cannot expect a proper mind. [ and a proper gig ] You only think about getting some rest.
There was only one thing we could do. Find a hotel. That's what we did. And we still feel very, very bad about this. We know there were a lot of fans there. We don't want to disappoint fans. If we would have played, we wouldn't have been able to finish the rest of the US tour, and we would disappoint even more fans! What can I say more?
I've said it before; THIS GIG WAS BOOKED WITHOUT [YES WITHOUT!!!] OUR PERMISSION!!
And again; sorry.
The fan always loses in these situations. This time the one to blame is the booking office. This tour was a costly adventure for us, but investments are always nescessary to obtain result. We had a lot of requests to play in the USA. So we did.
And then you come home, broke and broken, [we had to do 2 more gigs in Europe and our tourbus broke down!!!] and you find some so-called 'fans', who pretend to know what happened and complain in a very rude way about us at our messageboard.
Of course you are dissapointed!
WE ARE TOO! But saying you are not going to listen to a record anymore makes no sense at all.
I sincerelly hope people will react on this statement.
If there are any questions, I will answer them personally.
Again, sorry.
But I hope I have cleared up some 'clouds'.
[Hans Rutten, august 8th 1999]
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