The Tour of a Lifetime

When the Grimethorpe Colliery RJB Band left a very cold and dreary Manchester airport on Thursday February 11th bound for Heathrow, then Tokyo, little did we know what lay ahead. The tour, organised by International Concert Attractions was scheduled to last 26 days - and what a schedule.

We left Manchester at 9.30 A.M. (which meant leaving the bandroom at 6.00!) and arrived in Tokyo at 8.40 A.M. the next morning (local time) - a total journey of fifteen hours! We transferred to our hotel - and what a hotel, The Keio Plaza Inter-Continental. 5-star luxury, this was going to be tough! We had the rest of the day to sleep and get over our jet lag!

The next day, Saturday February 13th was a free day for sight-seeing etc. We did, however have an official welcome party provided by various local bands that evening.

We knew it could not last, and on Sunday 14th (Valentines Day) it was down to work. We had a press call in the morning - one and a half hours of playing and photos, followed by two sell-out concerts in the fantastic Bunkamura Orchard hall (cap. 2500). So that just about got our lips in!

We followed this up with another concert in Tokyo on the Monday, this time in the Kosei Nenkin Kaikan Hall - again sold out. In the audience that night was a good friend of the band, Haydn, the barman at an Irish bar we had found near our hotel - Yes, Guinness in Tokyo!

The Tuesday found us needing to travel to Nagoya for a concert that night. When in Japan, what better way to travel than by Bullet Train.

After our concert in Nagoya we travelled to Osaka and Fukuoka for two more concerts on consecutive days before a last night 'party' in a traditional Japanese restaurant - including raw fish (and copious amounts of Saki!)

It was here that we said goodbye to our Japanese tour staff and prepared for Australia.

We took an overnight flight from Tokyo to Brisbane, landing at 7.25 A.M. We were tired, but, having left Tokyo in a snowstorm it was nice to arrive in Brisbane in one of their hottest summers for years! However nice Brisbane was, it was only a stopover, and we left the hotel at 5.00 the next morning for a flight right across Australia to Perth (six and a half hours!) We were treated to a welcome party from the City of Perth Band, and then performed two concerts as part of the Perth Festival. Yes, that's right, a six and a half hour flight, a reception and two sell-out concerts in one day. Who said life on the road is glamorous?

After an all too short night's sleep we left the hotel and flew to Adelaide, where we had a reception at the Adelaide Parliament building before possibly the hottest concert any of us had ever done. The temperature in Adelaide that day was 36 degrees and the sold-out theatre where we played has no air conditioning! High summer temperatures, 2500 people, a huge lighting rig and 28 players, a recipe for heatstroke!

From Adelaide we flew to Sydney, then drove by coach to Newcastle, a mining town about two hours away - another concert, then drove back to Sydney.

We were to spend the next day in Sydney. we had another press call - this time for Channel 7 TV, followed by an 'in store' appearance in a department store, to publicise our specially released tour CD. Andrew Kay, of International Concert Attractions, took us to lunch where we were presented with a Gold Disc by B.M.G. Australia for sales of over 30,000 Brassed Off! CDs.

We were then taken by water taxi to prepare for a concert in Sydney Town Hall, You guessed it, sold out!

The following day we flew the short distance to the Gold Coast, where we were to stay at the fabulous SeaWorld resort. We had a concert in Brisbane City Hall that night, but the next day was free at SeaWorld.

During our time at SeaWorld some of us learned to Jet Ski, some of us visited the SeaWorld theme park, some went to Surfer's Paradise and some even swam with dolphins! This was our first day off since day 1 in Tokyo, 12 days ago.

Unfortunately we had to leave the hotel at 5.30 the next morning to fly to Melbourne for two more concerts, one in the afternoon and one in the evening, both in different halls on opposite sides of town!

We did manage to get in a small bit of sight seeing the next day (Sun 28th) with a short trip to the M.C.G. (Melbourne Cricket Ground) and then it was back on the bus for a drive around the bay to a vineyard outside Geelong. I know what you're thinking, but we were there to play! We played as part of the Spray Farm Summer Festival to a record-breaking audience of 5,500 in the open air. We were lucky enough to have a barbecue after the concert (with a sample or two of the local produce!) and watched the sun set over the Pacific coast on the same day as the Yorkshire Area contest in Bradford!

We left Melbourne the next morning a travelled to Canberra, where we played at the Australian School of Music. Sold out again!

The next day we returned to Sydney for two nights at the fabulous Star City complex. This is a Casino based resort, but with a 5-star hotel, health club and 2,200 seat theatre (our venue) all under one roof. We played two concerts at Star City, following Engelbert Humperdinck and Julio Iglesias, who had played there in the previous fortnight.

After our two days in Sydney it was back to Perth again, this time for our final concert at Perth Entertainment Centre. The entertainment centre is a vast building that holds a great deal of people. over 4,000 came to our concert! After a last night meal/party we made our way back to our hotel to pack for the journey home.

We flew back via Singapore the next day and arrived back in Manchester in the middle of a snowstorm! From leaving the hotel in Perth to arriving back home took a little over thirty hours!

It was the most tiring tour the band has ever done, travelling over 50,000 miles, but we played a total of 19 concerts to over 50,000 people in three and a half weeks - the tour of a lifetime!

Written by Andrew Snell