October 31, 2021
The Mendel Center
Benton Harbor, Michigan
www.themendelcenter.com

Check out the TOUR page for all venue and ticket information for upcoming dates. 

Halloween is my favorite day of the year. It always has been. So I have to admit that I feel a little out of place this year being out on the road. Although a good case can be made that I have a seriously cool costume and a place to strut around on Halloween, I still feel I should be home celebrating my favorite day of the year in my own particular way. This typically does not happen, meaning that there is usually not a tour planned during the fall. The only reason we did one this year is due to the demand after 2020 for ABBA MANIA. But even if I was able to be home on Halloween, it still feels odd. But hey, at least I do have a built-in costume. :-) 

This year, our venue for Halloween was the beautiful Grand Upton Hall at The Mendel Center in Benton Harbour, Michigan. We had performed here a couple of times before, so we knew the lay of the land going in. However, just like our gig in Wausau, Wisconsin, last night, the weather was much prettier today than in the middle of January when we usually are there. The weather was perfect too for Halloween. It was cloudy, windy, and cold. Actually, it was too cold. I walked around outside as much as I could to try and absorb some Halloween spirit. Still, it proved to be way too chilly for me to get a lot of steps in, which was just as well, I suppose. Again we had an early sound-check, along with an early dinner and a 7:00 show.

Unfortunately, the progress we made the night before seemed to backslide a little tonight. We had more problems with our monitors. But be that as it may, as most of our performances, the reviews were highly positive, and the audience was very enthusiastic and enjoyed our show  immensely. Still, being the perfectionists we all are we came off stage feeling like the Halloween Gremlins were back and had taken a small bite out of our candy apple. But none of that stopped the after-show party on the bus that went well into the night. Yet like a good boy, I performed my nightly after-show ritual - clean up, don my sweat pants and Meat Loaf shirt, crawl inside my bunk and try to sleep. In the true spirit of the season, my sleep was haunted with all sorts of nightmares, and the night was restless and disturbing, so you could say I did get to celebrate Halloween, even if it was in my dreams. :-) 

October 30, 2021
The Grand Theater
Wausau, Wisconsin
www.grandtheater.org

Check out the TOUR page for all venue and ticket information for upcoming dates. 
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So with our first night under our belt, we pulled into the beautiful Grand Theater in the quaint and lovely town of Wassau, Wisconsin. Most of us were more rested and quite ready for a better experience. Like the venue the night before, we have played here previously, but the weather was much different from what we pulled into this time. Our previous visit to Wassau was in the dead of winter, and there were several inches of snow and ice on the ground. There wasn't a cloud in the sky this time, and it was a beautiful, crisp fall day. So already, things were looking up.

The Grand Theater is gorgeous and a joy to play, and it is always lovely to return to a venue you have performed at before. Providing your last time, there was a pleasant experience, of course.  After settling into our comfortable dressing rooms and having a nice healthy lunch, we started an early soundcheck. We made sure to give ourselves ample time to troubleshoot any problems that needed to be fixed and any other problems that may arise. While there was a lot to give detailed attention to, Sean had done his homework, and progress was quicker than the day before. The majority of the problems lie with the in-ear monitor mixes of each individual onstage. We have a new app that allows us to control our separate monitor mix from our personal cell phone or iPad. This is a fantastic tool, but it did not come without bugs and gremlins, as you can probably tell by now. 

Dinner like always was wonderful, and the show was much better than opening night. Yes, there were still some hiccups and technical issues that still needed to be worked on, but all in all, it was a better performance all around, and the sold-out crowd was highly energetic and positive. 

I have to tell you that these first days wore on me pretty bad, and I was utterly exhausted by the end of this show. (Of course, boarding my flight from Atlanta drained and tired probably did not help matters either.) After the show, I cleaned up, got dressed in my tour sleep clothes (Meat Loaf baseball jersey and sweat pants), and walked through the cold weather to the bus. I then proceeded to go directly to my bunk for the evening. Quickly bypassing the cookies, sandwiches, and after-show pizza. This time feeling a little better than the night before and, as always, hoping that sleep would find me. Next day....HALLOWEEN.

October 29, 2021
The Raue Center
Crystal Lake, Illinois
www.rauecenter.org

Check out the TOUR page for all venue and ticket information for upcoming dates. ​
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With the previous day and evening's events still fresh in my mind, I woke up the following day and told myself I would put them behind me and that today would be a great day. The first gig of the tour was going to be fantastic. Thus, setting the bar for the rest of the shows yet to come. With my brain still scattered (like when is it not), I spent all morning rearranging my luggage, backpack, necessities, and cosmetics that I would need to take into the venue with me each day. My goal was to get everything I would need into my backpack, so I could simply walk out of the bus into the venue and into my dressing room, shut the door, and be done with it. It took all morning long, but I finally got to the ‘this is as good as it will get’ point. My final realization arrived just in time to catch our Uber to the venue, where we hoped the bus would be waiting for us so we could get set up and get down to business. ​

Once we arrived, things did get off on a positive note once we heard the show was completely sold out and our wardrobe had arrived. Not only wardrobe mind you, but BRAND-NEW wardrobe. We were all very excited! There is nothing quite like the feel of brand-new satin and white leather mixed with thunderous applause and a white-hot spotlight. Unfortunately, the happy feelings for all were a little short-lived. 

You must keep in mind that with a production show of this size, there are a large amount of technical and performance pieces that need to fall into place for the show to even run, much less run smoothly and successfully. Sean, our sound guy (who is excellent, by the way), had to painstakingly run down dozens of gremlins that got into the entire system and the monitors for each specific performer. Personally, my take is this. I am chalking it up to the season. It is the Halloween season, and gremlins are running around that normally hibernate the rest of the year, and they need something to do. So, there you go. 

To make a long story short, we got everything fixed in time to start soundcheck just 45 minutes before doors opened. “The show must go on” kept ringing in our heads, and we all knew there was no turning back. So, when the lights went down, we jumped out of the plane with no parachutes and hoped for the best. 

Thanks to Andrew McClean, our illustrious and insanely talented tour and lighting director, the lights and stage looked phenomenal. As for the show, we all had some cuts and bruises when we finally walked off stage, but we made it through and did a remarkably good job. Thankfully, the sold-out house were rabid to see us and gave us fantastic praise and applause.  When the show was over, I hobbled back to my dressing room, got changed into my sweat pants and my sleep shirt for the tour (this tours sleep shirt is my Meat Loaf 2003 baseball tour jersey), went directly to the bus, crawled into my bottom bunk, put my earplugs in and fell into a restless, haunted sleep. 

​Check out the TOUR page for all venue and ticket information for upcoming dates. ​

I have heard it said that when something has a rocky start, be it a relationship, tour, etc., what have you, it can be taken as a sign that better days and success lie ahead. Well, if that is the case, then by the end of this tour, we should all be millionaires and have mansions in Bel Air.
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Being on the road is never easy, even at its best, and there will always be unexpected hiccups that are out of your control. To quote R.E.O. Speedwagon, you need to be able to 'roll with the changes.'

​We have all been looking forward to getting back on the road, so Chris, Wayne, and I were excited as we boarded our plane in Atlanta and headed for our rendezvous point with the rest of ABBA MANIA and the tour bus waiting for us in Chicago. Well, our excitement did not get off to a good start due to 'adults' with zero parenting skills letting their crying and screaming kids do whatever they wanted on the plane. Naturally, not wanting to offend anyone, the flight attendants did nothing. So by the time we landed, we were more than ready to get on the warm bus, greet our friends and head off to the hotel.

If you ever saw the movie 'Spinal Tap,' then imagine the scene where the band is trying to hopelessly find the stage and replace it with them trying to locate a shuttle to take them to the correct bus line, which will, in turn, take them somewhere else so they can hook up with their tour bus. (In case you are wondering, we flew into Ohare Airport in Chicago.) What should have been a few minutes seemed like it took forever to find the right bus line and even longer to reach our tour bus.

After a short welcome home meet-up with the band, we are informed by our driver, Dave, that the very nice bus is broken and will not be going anywhere - seriously.

So, if that were not enough, we are also told that our boots and wigs were held up at customs and would not make it over from London in time, so Alison and Hana took off shopping in Chicago late at night to see if they could salvage the operation. Super Troopers they are! As it turns out, they did a damn fine job and were very successful with their shopping spree.

Anyway, back to the bus, thinking this could not really be happening, we wait for a few hours until we finally are told by Andrew, our tour manager, to get an Uber to take us to the hotel, which is about 45 minutes away. Due to the size of the Uber cars available, we had to take more than one car. Oh well, at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Climbing into our Uber out of the cold rain, we were looking forward to a nice, quiet ride to the hotel. Beep! Thank you for playing - not to be. Our driver played loud, extraordinarily vulgar dance club music while singing from the airport to our hotel at an uncomfortable volume. So how do I unwind when I get into my hotel room? A bag full of trail mix, a bottle of water, and American Horror Story on Netflix, which I feel l had just lived through. Eventually, I turn out the lights, just knowing that tomorrow will be better. I should have known better. :-)

Jeff
​10-28-21

​Welcome to my first tour blog. (Yea, I know. What took me so long, right?)  I am going to try keeping a tour blog over the next month of our fall Abba Mania Tour which runs from October 28 - November 23, posting pictures, maybe some video, comments, and thoughts about each day of the tour. I hope you will join me for this should be a fun adventure for both of us! Please don't forget to subscribe to my email list for more up-to-the-minute information. See you on the road! 

Let the disco ball spin..
​          Jeff