Jim Dickinson, R.I.P.

The bad news that started my day was finding out that Jim Dickinson died yesterday. You may or may not have heard OF the man, but you have certainly heard the man. That was Jim playing piano on the Rolling Stones' song "Wild Horses." Also played on the Flamin' Groovies classic "Teenage Head." And he produced the best record The Replacements ever did, called "Pleased To Meet Me." If you don't own that record, you should. Jim was a Memphis legend his whole life alright.

You can read a little more about him HERE.

Finally checked out of the non air-conditioned Scandic this morning. I got off fairly light on my incidentals, too. Freakin' draft beers were over 12 bucks a pop in the bar, but I got out for only $203 USD. Not much considering a bought rounds a couple of times. I limited myself to only 2 beers a night because they're so expensive. And I'm so cheap…sometimes.

Walked around the venue before doors, taking a few photos of this and that…

Beer vendors prepping for the crowd:
The crowd will buy them there, and return them here:


I love these European 4-man urinals. Sometimes, in certain cities, you'll see them sitting in a town square. Just walk right up, hang a turkey neck, and go...

Our GINORMOUS 140-foot wide stage:



Black-lit confetti storm during the first encore:

First show went well tonight. It felt strange not doing my own show settlement for the first time in oh, twenty years. Uwe handled all of that, while I was quite content to carry on with lots of other bits of the tour accounting kingdom.

Hung out in the office, goofing off online while waiting for the stagehands to come get my case. I don't like to leave my office until I know my stuff is safely on it's way – in most venues, I'd just wheel it to the loading dock myself, but we're in a trailer in a field for a lot of the current shows. Hands, it is.

Finally headed out to the bus around 3am. Gonna be a tough drive to Norway. We've got so many trucks that there isn't any ferry space for the buses, so we're having to drive around the long way. Long, as in 20 hours long. That's a Hell Ride trapped on the 45-foot submarine. We likely won't get to the hotel until well after midnight tonight. And to top it off, those last 5-6 hours of roads getting into Bergen are mounainous enough to make for a shitty ride. Off we go…