After a short concert-break, it’s time to start planning for “round two” of my Rock’n’Roll Travels again.
Next up is OZZY in Poland. It was kind of a bummer to miss him at Graspop (he cancelled that show due to illness) but I’m sure the show in Poland will be worth the trip.

This travel-thing is like a drug, I can’t get enough of it, and I wish I could do this full time all year round. In a way, maybe I’m even better off than the bands I’m seeing (depending on the popularity of the band of course).
While they’re travelling around in tour buses with everything that comes with it (I’ve done it, I know the little “details” that are far from nice or comfortable) – I’m flying everywhere and staying in decent hotels.
It’s not that I’m a rich bitch, Far from it. I’ve just done this for so long that I know all the tricks to get the best, cheapest deals for flights and hotels. Might share my tips someday. Or open my own rock’n’roll travel agency.

Like my Firewind-trip to the UK in September (which is the 1st round. After that, shows in NL, BE & DE + 3 shows overseas).
I’ll be going to 3 shows during a weekend+a Monday that I just kind of threw in there because I think that Reading-show could be interesting. ;-) 

All the flights, trains, hotels and transfers have cost me $ 282 (=£172 or 198 Euro). That’s for EVERYTHING.
It includes flight Copenhagen-Manchester, hotel in Manchester 2 nights, train Manchester-Glasgow, hotel in Glasgow, flight Glasgow-London, airport-transfer and train London to Reading, train from reading to London and flight home to Copenhagen. Beat that price if you can.

I travel to see bands that I like, but sometimes, depending on the band, it’s more an excuse to travel than the reason. I’ve never been to Poland for instance. I most likely would never have gone there if I hadn’t found an excuse to go. Ozzy is one of the best “excuses” I could think of. :-)

Found a hotel that’s 3 minutes from the arena that I booked months ago. I’m glad I did because NOW, everything in Gdansk and Sopot (where the arena is) is sold out! And the rooms that are still available are crazy expensive. So, it pays of being early.
It’s a cool designer hotel where each room is unique. No two rooms look alike. I hope I get that “John Lennon” Imagine-inspired room (the white one). Would be nice. :)

Anyway, I’m just glad and very much looking forward to the show – which by the way will be repeated two days later when I see Ozzy at Smukfest-festival in Skanderborg, Denmark. It’s actually a very strange place for him to play because it’s not really a rock concert. It’s all kinds of pop- and alternative music, Danish stars that I haven’t heard of, so I’m wondering about what kind of crowd he will have.
I saw some advertising at Copenhagen central station and they listed all kinds of artists, EXCEPT Ozzy. That’s weird. You get a legendary artist to the festival, and then you barely even mention it? If I hadn’t seen it on the Ozzy Android-app, I wouldn’t even have known about it.

Today is cleaning day. Getting a visitor from Russia on Friday. Probably one of the most “exotic” visitors, since I don’t know anyone from there, other than short chats I’ve had on Youtube with a girl who filmed Jon Oliva’s Pain at Bang Your Head last year.

Now I’ll be hosting Vera, a fellow colleague from the Russian edition of Classic Rock Magazine, that I met in the press-tent at Sweden Rock Festival.
She walked up to me when I was sitting there a few hours before the Judas Priest press-conference (before people started dropping in, because after that, you can forget about getting a good seat in there) and said she remembered me from a few years back – ALSO at the Judas Priest press conference. I had told her that I was a huge Priest-fan apparently.

I’m always amazed with people who actually REMEMBER things. I never remember anything. Too much going on in life sometimes, my “blondie-brain” tends to focus on the future and forget a lot of stuff from the past, even if that “past” was only yesterday.

Vera turned out to be super-nice and helpful. She offered to film the Priest press-conference so that I could concentrate on just listening or asking questions myself. She did that on yet another press conference, can’t remember which one (yeah, the thing about the short memory!).
And then on Zakk Wylde’s press conference, I came WAY too late, it had already started. She on the other hand, had been there on time, so when I rushed in, she offered me her spot so I could get a better angle if I wanted to film it. Just a very helpful and unselfish person, from what I could tell, not knowing much about her. :)

I’ve always trusted my gut-feeling when it comes to people. Sometimes I’m wrong, but most of the time I’m right. :) Spoke to to her briefly the other day and she started telling me about all the gigs she was going to during her visit in Sweden. I couldn’t help laughing because she sounded just like me! Then she comments on that going: “If there’s chance to see a gig, I always do!” Hell YES, sister!
That’s what it’s all about.

I don’t know too many people, especially not girls, who are like that. So it’s great to get to know a fellow rock chick that shares the same passion for music and live-music.

Check out her interview with Doro:

Well, time to start vacuuming, doing dishes and all that stuff, and transform this from a “before-and-after travel”-home with passport, adapters, carry-ons and tickets that are laying around the house, to a more guest-friendly area. :-)