from Marc K.
Because of trouble with a traffic accident of one of the trucks The Cure had to cancel the show on the 29th.
That show was postponed to the afternoon on the 31st.
So The Cure played twice that day. (4.30 pm)
The 20.15 show started later, I believe around 21.30, but I don't really remember.
The trucks transporting the equipment set off at 2 p.m. towards Holland, where the last three shows of the tour are supposed to be done. Late in the afternoon a call from a GDR-police station: The back-line-truck started skidding because of aquaplaning and got off the road. The "Vopos" (= members of the "People's Police" in the German Democratic Republic) preventively grabbed the two terrified Englishmen and demanded a fine. Of course the drivers don’t have a penny, but after three hours of "interrogation" they are released.
The trucks with the shattered drivers don't arrive at the German-Dutch border until 5 a.m. I talk to them on the phone - and I suggest them getting a shuteye but driving on not later than 10, otherwise they wouldn't reach Utrecht in time. And before they'd set off I told them to definitely give me a call. Which wouldn't happen. To top it all we miss our direct flight to Amsterdam since we've been told the wrong departure time, so we have to change our booking via Frankfurt.
When we finally arrive at Utrecht, there's no trace of the back-line-truck We wait till half past 7 - then the show is cancelled. Five minutes later the truck arrives. And I had been so proud of accompanying a Cure-tour where (almost) nothing went wrong, no extreme excesses, no fights, no cancellations - and then that! Fortunately a second gig in Utrecht is scheduled anyhow - and since this concert falls on a holiday, it's no problem to push in a replacement-concert in the afternoon. But still, due to such things automatically the crew's mood hits rock bottom. All the effort, all the strains - all for nothing! At night in a disco in Amsterdam we dance the frustration out of ourselves. It gets even really funny when early in the morning Robert, in his phlegmatic manner, tries to shake a leg to crispy funk-rhythms.
Then the last two gigs of this tour in Utrecht, where nearly 100 fans from Berlin, Munich, Duesseldorf, Paris, Italy and England assembled to see the band one more time before the end of the tour. The concert turns out to be a worthy ending of the six weeks that cost a lot of substance of man and material. Specially during the last days a tour inevitably gets out of control. When on top of it all these concerts take place in a country where a few things are easier to get than a bottle of beer, you can picture the rest to yourself....
thanks to Marc K.
thanks to Robert R.
