3 new ones from John

[amber]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I know, Jason, it's just a terrible strain. And Stevie definitely works a lot harder than the members of the band who are lugging around and playing instruments. I mean, Lindsey hardly even breaks a sweat up there! And Mick?! Pshh, anybody could bang away on that drum kit for two hours, what kind of physical exertion does that require? I mean, he never even has to change his outfit!

I know you'll "defend" her to the death, dude, but this is not an issue on which Stevie needs defending (and the idea that she works harder than the rest is beyond ludicrous). She's never claimed that touring is horribly stressful, backbreaking work. In fact, she seems to enjoy it a great deal and will take any excuse to do it.

Um....I think he meant Stevie tours a lot more than the others, and has for many years. And, I think she enjoys it as well, but that doesn't mean it isn't tiring and taxing.

[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by amber

Um....I think he meant Stevie tours a lot more than the others, and has for many years. And, I think she enjoys it as well, but that doesn't mean it isn't tiring and taxing.

I think it was on Leno in 1994 that she discussed the details of her tiring and taxing touring schedule: out of bed at 1 PM, fix up the hair, really start to "get going" about an hour before showtime, hit the stage at 9, off by 11, and it's off to the bars! Whew! I need a nap just typing it.

[Johnny Stew]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I think it was on Leno in 1994 that she discussed the details of her tiring and taxing touring schedule: out of bed at 1 PM, fix up the hair, really start to "get going" about an hour before showtime, hit the stage at 9, off by 11, and it's off to the bars! Whew! I need a nap just typing it.

A close friend of mine travels a lot for his job... flies first-class, stays in the nicest of hotels, and so forth... but he still says that, no matter how pampered you are while you're travelling, you're absolutely worn out by the end of it, because you're staying in strange places and trying to sleep in beds that are not your own.

I don't think Stevie or any of the rest of Fleetwood Mac could last a day working my father's job (he's a machinist), but I can definitely understand why they'd be ready to head home and settle-in at the end of a tour.
As Amber said, it's the reason Christine ultimately retired from Fleetwood Mac.

[amber]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I think it was on Leno in 1994 that she discussed the details of her tiring and taxing touring schedule: out of bed at 1 PM, fix up the hair, really start to "get going" about an hour before showtime, hit the stage at 9, off by 11, and it's off to the bars! Whew! I need a nap just typing it.

Travel time. That's the more taxing part. Oh, and don't forget about early soundchecks!
I think we can agree right now that you will think her touring is easy, and I will think it is a little bit harder, though hardly the gulag. I dunno, I think I would be tired if I had to go to a new city every night. But - like you said she hasn't complained much, so it couldn't be enormously tiring. But remember how she was diagnosed with epstein barr, and in the mid years of touring she was always tired? I think she likes it so much she just keeps doing it even if she's tired. Even if she has to take mountains of coke to do so.

[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by amber

Travel time. That's the more taxing part. Oh, and don't forget about early soundchecks!
I think we can agree right now that you will think her touring is easy, and I will think it is a little bit harder, though hardly the gulag. I dunno, I think I would be tired if I had to go to a new city every night. But - like you said she hasn't complained much, so it couldn't be enormously tiring. But remember how she was diagnosed with epstein barr, and in the mid years of touring she was always tired? I think she likes it so much she just keeps doing it even if she's tired. Even if she has to take mountains of coke to do so.

She hasn't complained at all! I don't think that touring is the absolute easiest, cushiest job in the world, of course there's work involved, and of course it gets tiring travelling around all the time. It's merely the chorus of, "Stevie had an off night? She sang out of tune? Oh, she'd better go home and rest up for several months and conserve her strength, the poor darling lamb!" that I find ridiculous. You never hear any of these people offering such sentiments to the roadies carrying around all her **** every day.

[amber]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

She hasn't complained at all! I don't think that touring is the absolute easiest, cushiest job in the world, of course there's work involved, and of course it gets tiring travelling around all the time. It's merely the chorus of, "Stevie had an off night? She sang out of tune? Oh, she'd better go home and rest up for several months and conserve her strength, the poor darling lamb!" that I find ridiculous. You never hear any of these people offering such sentiments to the roadies carrying around all her **** every day.

Well, they don't sing so we don't care about them. Besides, they chose "carrying things" as their career.
I thought I heard her say during SN: BTM that she was "dead tired". That was about the RAL time.
Wait, wait, wait. Do poeple really say that? "Stevie had an off night? She sang out of tune? Oh, she'd better go home and rest up for several months and conserve her strength, the poor darling lamb!"

I dunno, she's 57, we don't want her to have a heart attack, or break her hip. We want her to rest....

[JazmenFlowers]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I know, Jason, it's just a terrible strain. And Stevie definitely works a lot harder than the members of the band who are lugging around and playing instruments. I mean, Lindsey hardly even breaks a sweat up there! And Mick?! Pshh, anybody could bang away on that drum kit for two hours, what kind of physical exertion does that require? I mean, he never even has to change his outfit!

I know you'll "defend" her to the death, dude, but this is not an issue on which Stevie needs defending (and the idea that she works harder than the rest is beyond ludicrous). She's never claimed that touring is horribly stressful, backbreaking work. In fact, she seems to enjoy it a great deal and will take any excuse to do it.

maybe you need to re-read what I said.

[danax6]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

"The travelling bit is just fine with me. Being on the road is as hard as you want to make it. We're so damned pampered. ( And have the bills to show for it)!"

I hope some of the chiffon brigade on the Stevie forum is keeping up with John's Q&A. I always have to shake my head in bewilderment when they break out in their chorus of, "Oh, I hope Stevie is taking several months off to rest, touring is so back-breakingly difficult!"

Oh, put a sock in it. Don't knock it until you have tried it.

[David]

Originally Posted by amber

Travel time. That's the more taxing part. I think I would be tired if I had to go to a new city every night.

If I had to tour with a big-time r&r outfit like Fleetwood, I'd get tired of traveling but I'd also get tired of playing the same show every night. That's a different kind of tired: more like a mental exhaustion that sort of becomes a physical exhaustion. Actors on stage have the same problem: staying fresh. Also Dame Edna has the same problem, although in her case, since she feeds off the audience so much, the particulars of the show are at least potentially variable.

But - like you said she hasn't complained much, so it couldn't be enormously tiring.

I think she used to complain more about the old Fleetwood tours: white album, rumours, tusk. She complained in interviews about the length of each of those tours. And later, during her BD & WH days, she complained again about the old FM tours & about how she was no longer going to do that & her tours were structured & scheduled differently to prevent exhaustion: something like three days on, two off, & so forth. Also, she took more frequent breaks in her own tour schedules: instead of playing three months & then a month off like fm, sn solo became 6 weeks on & then 3 weeks off, & so forth.

She also made that famous remark back in '81 or so about wanting to be at home where she could pop a burrito in the microwave. She said that Lindsey & Mick & John loved to be on the road because they liked room service.

[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by danax6

Oh, put a sock in it. Don't knock it until you have tried it.

No.

///////

[amber]

Originally Posted by David

If I had to tour with a big-time r&r outfit like Fleetwood, I'd get tired of traveling but I'd also get tired of playing the same show every night. That's a different kind of tired: more like a mental exhaustion that sort of becomes a physical exhaustion. Actors on stage have the same problem: staying fresh. Also Dame Edna has the same problem, although in her case, since she feeds off the audience so much, the particulars of the show are at least potentially variable.
I think she used to complain more about the old Fleetwood tours: white album, rumours, tusk. She complained in interviews about the length of each of those tours. And later, during her BD & WH days, she complained again about the old FM tours & about how she was no longer going to do that & her tours were structured & scheduled differently to prevent exhaustion: something like three days on, two off, & so forth. Also, she took more frequent breaks in her own tour schedules: instead of playing three months & then a month off like fm, sn solo became 6 weeks on & then 3 weeks off, & so forth.

She also made that famous remark back in '81 or so about wanting to be at home where she could pop a burrito in the microwave. She said that Lindsey & Mick & John loved to be on the road because they liked room service.

I like how your details fleshed out my vague recollections. And there was the Epstein Barr thing....
Yeah, I think I would bug out to play so many shows the exact same darn way, too, same songs, every time. Bored to lethargy, like you say. I might turn to drink and karaoke. I'd go out after the show, have a few too many, and start singing my own fabulous songs that we didn't play...

[chiliD]

Originally Posted by David

her tours were structured & scheduled differently to prevent exhaustion: something like three days on, two off, & so forth. Also, she took more frequent breaks in her own tour schedules: instead of playing three months & then a month off like fm, sn solo became 6 weeks on & then 3 weeks off, & so forth.

I think instead of being "exhaustion prevention", the schedule was designed more for "vocal cord preservation".

[SteveMacD]

Having had a job that was 50 miles from home for six months, I can honestly say that the feeling of always being in motion gets really old really quickly. I literally got sick of the notion of having to go anywhere over thirty miles away. It took a long time before I was able to make such trips. This past weekend, I got a lot of that same feeling after having gone to Columbus (75 miles from home) twice in two days. So, while they might travel in style, I could easily see where the travel involved in touring could get old pretty quickly.

[chiliD]

The only thing taxing to me about touring on the level that *I'M* at is that I have to schlep my own gear, plus the PA, set it all up, THEN play the gig...a 5-set per night gig...then tear it all down, load it back into the two 1965 Ford Econoline vans, then hit the bumpy, dusty & gritty gravel roads of "off the beaten path" America (and occasionally, Canada)...staying in cockroach infested motels that make the Bates Motel seem like the Ritz-Carlton. That kind of saps most of the energy one has.

All-in-all, as Jackson Browne says in his song "The Load Out", the only time that is much too short is the time we get to play.

If we had people to load in the gear, set up the gear, tear down the gear, load out the gear, drive the vans from town to town while I ride in a private jet & then limousine to 5-star hotels, I'd have more energy to put on a better show for the 118 minutes I'd be on stage (rather than the 300+ minutes I currently play).

[HomerMcvie]

Originally Posted by chiliD

The only thing taxing to me about touring on the level that *I'M* at is that I have to schlep my own gear, plus the PA, set it all up, THEN play the gig...a 5-set per night gig...then tear it all down, load it back into the two 1965 Ford Econoline vans, then hit the bumpy, dusty & gritty gravel roads of "off the beaten path" America (and occasionally, Canada)...staying in cockroach infested motels that make the Bates Motel seem like the Ritz-Carlton. That kind of saps most of the energy one has.

All-in-all, as Jackson Browne says in his song "The Load Out", the only time that is much too short is the time we get to play.

If we had people to load in the gear, set up the gear, tear down the gear, load out the gear, drive the vans from town to town while I ride in a private jet & then limousine to 5-star hotels, I'd have more energy to put on a better show for the 118 minutes I'd be on stage (rather than the 300+ minutes I currently play).

Ah, you schmuck! Welcome to my world! I've not done a 5 set gig for some time.....4 seems to be the limit around here anymore. But we play EVERY weekend! And the PA's all mine, and I load it all(yes, that's my fault, but I make a double cut for doing so). On the ****ty load in/outs, by the time I drive home, I'm completely EXHAUSTED. And not from standing there like a brick, doing the Say You Will lasso! From actual work!