Day 7 – Re-Enter Netherlands (06.11.15)Up early and out in the rain, the bass was still booming and the strippers still dancing as the morning light shone dimly through the roaming clouds. We bid a fond farewell to the Reeperbahn, Hamburg and Germany and made a break for the Dutch boarder. A long drive passed quickly as the drizzle hit the windows and we buried ourselves in books, music and constructing two forty-five minute sets, the order for the evening.
We arrived in a place called Enter (like on the keyboard) and rolled up to a sweet holiday park, a few notches up from the one in Arnhem we’d made our base last time in NL. The vacation houses looked like something from the Prisoner with rooves that sloped almost all the way to the floor, tempting the 'Assassins Creed' within us to jump up and find a panoramic vantage point. Inside they were quite easily the finest tour accommodation we’d ever been treated to - Quality. After a quick breather in our new digs we hit the road again for a three-hour journey to the Dutch sea-town of Den Helder. The weather got progressively worse and with the rain reaching torrential, we got the feeling we might be in for a quiet night.
Arriving in Den Helder we found our venue, Rock Café De Engel – a nice long bar decked out for rock & roll and a fitting home for our hard
rocking style. I went for a piss and nearly had a heart attack as a giant spider floated up inside the urinal, thankfully it was dead but the image will haunt me for some time. After sorting our sound we had our first rehearsal since August, unplugged on the stage going over many songs we’d not played in a long time. One thing that surprised me was how good the backing vocals were from all three of my band-mates, all keying in perfectly and, shock me more, knowing the lyrics too. Well impressed.
Not due to kick off until midnight we went for a walk in the rain, finding our way to the docks where a large Dutch trading vessel, maybe one hundred plus years old, was in restoration. The scene across the water was like the beginning of the apocalypse, fires burning in the background. A lap of the town complete, Gibbons doubting my orienteering skills, I lead us back to De Engel. They laid us on a lovely traditional Dutch meal, a ball of mystery meat (as Jordy described it), potatoes and green beans – with a spicy beef soup for starter, just what we needed. Finally back on the beers (they were free, impossible to restrain ourselves two nights in a row) we were informed we only needed to perform an hour set as the weather had essentially ruined the night. Fortunately there was a nice congregation of rockers in, drinking with anticipation.We proceeded to knock out one of our finest sets this year and, yes, you better believe it, the longest ever to my knowledge, clocking one
hour and five minutes (I can almost picture Jordy shaking his head at this). It near killed us. We have good stamina in general (ask the missus) but we try and play every song like it’s our last on earth and that really isn’t the way when playing beyond an hour. Our pure energy captured the hearts of those in attendance and we received great applause, feedback and merch sales from the hardcore contingent who braved the rain.Loading out into the early hours of the morning we scored some extremely tasty kebabs and had some fun bantering with the locals, we stuck out like a handful of soar thumbs. Into the van, we stopped briefly to allow Kal to throw-up on the side of the road, still trying to get a handle on his limits – rich coming from the King (Victim rather) of the Free Bar. Rolling in at 5am this was maybe the longest day of travel we’d done this year and that’s saying something. Finally, some rest for the rockin’.
Our Longest Set (to my knowledge):
TORNADO
NINE OF HEARTS
BLACK CHARIOT
LIGHTS OVER PHOENIX
RUNNING DOWN A DREAM (TOM PETTY)
SO CAVALIER
DOWN IN THE HOLE (TOM WAITS)
MEDUSA
DARKEST HORSE
NO REST FOR THE ROCKIN’
SURF 6-66
MAINSTREAM
NOTHING QUITE LIKE THIS
JACKALS
BORN WITH A TAIL (SUPERSUCKERS)