My Book of Souls world Tour

From one side of the world to the other!

I really got the bug for travelling abroad to Iron Maiden shows in 2008. Historically before that I would just take one UK show in per tour or maybe a coach trip to Paris. I joined the FC around 2004 and started going on the FC trips around 2005. In 2008 on the somewhere back in time tour, I managed two shows in Paris, and then I went on “Bruce’s birthday bomber”, which was a Bruce air trip to Poland and the Czech republic, where Bruce Dickinson flew us to the shows, cool huh? After that I have seen them in Washington DC, Philadelphia, Las Vegas, San Bernardino, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa bay, Luxembourg, Amsterdam and Italy. In those trips I made some great friends and got some lovely touristy photos and for someone who had never really been anywhere except Fishing in France, the combination of seeing my favourite band playing and being to places I had never been to before was just fantastic! I never dreamed of getting to any Asian shows, but then things took an unexpected turn in my life, when a job offer came in from Gillhams fishing resort in Thailand, working at a lake full of monsters, in Thailand, with the possibility of Maiden turning up, it was too good to be true!

I had a fair idea that Maiden may well visit Asia before I took the job, we all knew there was a new album coming back then. So, if all went well, a world tour had to follow, and that had to include Asia in some way, especially as Japan has been, an often-visited destination by the band, but had been cancelled due to the earthquake in 2011. With the job offer accepted, I happily quit my job (to be fair, which I didn’t like that much anyway) and moved out to work in Thailand and at the top of my “things to do whilst in Asia list”, seeing a show or two was number 1. For twenty years I have wanted to see the neon lights of Tokyo and eat sushi there, so it was fingers crossed that it would all happen.

I started my job in November 2014 and awaited whatever news came along. The first news however wasn’t good, as on February 19th 2015 we heard the news that Bruce had got throat cancer and everything was on hold, until surgery and chemotherapy had taken place. OK we were also told that the doctors and specialists said he should make a full recovery, and I prayed for that.

We had a little update in March that things were looking good and then on the 15th May we got the “all clear” news that we were hoping and praying for. Everything was game on again although a bit delayed as Bruce’s recovery took place over the rest of the year. I could live with that one, no problem. There are plenty of big fish to catch and things to do and see in Thailand, so I could keep myself entertained. Now I just had to wait for the album and tour dates. The waiting was killing me, could I fulfil a 20-year ambition of wanting to go to Japan and see Maiden there??

The next thing that happened was in August when the initial tour plans were released and Japan was mentioned AND the band’s first ever gig in China, I squealed with delight so loudly, that my work colleague who shares the room next to me, poked his head round my door and said “I take it Iron Maiden are coming then?” “oh yes!” I replied, wiping the dribble from my mouth.

September saw The Book of souls released. I went to ITUNES and bought it on the day, and as soon I as pressed play, I knew this was one hell of a masterpiece and it instantly became one of my favourite albums by the band.

It didn’t take long and then the tour dates were released, 2 nights in Tokyo Japan, 1 in Beijing and 1 in Shanghai, China. I played around with the idea of doing both shows in China, but it was a step to far for me, I just couldn’t get it together and sort the visa out in the short amount of time I had in England in JAN/FEB of 2016 and I would have to apply for a short 72-hour visa when I landed in Beijing, but that was fine. For me the real one to go to was the first ever gig in China, that had the real kudos out of the 2 Chinese gigs and quite frankly that was all my money done too!

I have said before that I just love the fanclub trips, as everything is done for you. You don’t have to worry about anything, just sending your money to ICT. This trip however I had to organize everything myself, now for you seasoned travellers that’s no problem, but anyone who knows me, knows that if something is going to go wrong for someone, then it will be me, every time without fail.

I wrote everything down in chronological order on a piece of paper and slowly went through it stage by stage, ticking off flights and hotels as I went, checking and re-checking that I had got everything right, I even got my friends and family to check all my paperwork.

The first leg of the tour started with the band, stage set and crew all aboard on Boeing 747, named Ed Force 1 and I couldn’t keep away from the pictures and stories that were coming from the internet, the show looked incredible and the set list was a fine as a nice oak-aged rioja.

Then disaster! Just 5 weeks before ED Force 1 was due to land in Japan, we heard of the accident that let to it's grounding. I couldn’t believe it! Not that I know anything about repairing planes at all, but 2 engines broken on a 747 in south America, no way was that going to get fixed in time! My heart really sank, I walked around with a face like a pushed-in-sock for 3 days. I genuinely felt my plans were going to fall on their arse! I also felt so sorry for everyone, the band, management and the fans, all the work that goes on behind the scenes possibly scuppered by an accident, it didn’t bear thinking about what might have happened.

Luckily, it only took a day or so and then we heard news that the accident shouldn't affect the tour in anyway! I was buzzing, my dream trip was on again. Somehow it was sorted very quickly and after some amazing behind the scenes stuff, the plane was very quickly repaired and in that time not one show was missed, amazing stuff!

The day finally came and I left the fishing resort where I worked in Thailand and went to Krabi airport, 20 minutes away, to catch an Air Asia flight to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Then I had a 5 hour wait before I would fly from Kuala Lumpur to Tokyo, landing at 10.30pm that night. I like to fly with Air Asia because the planes are nice and new, the food is OK, the air hostesses are beautiful and they normally land without incident. Going via Kuala Lumpur made the journey a bit of a ball ache but at 50% less cost I didn’t mind, I just wanted to see the shows.

I landed at Tokyo and went straight to the toilet to change into some warmer clothes. Whilst in the toilet I noticed there were a load of controls for its use, somewhat bemused, I thought I had better try it out and was amazed to find out that I could control, music, a small water yet that eliminated the need for toilet paper, and that included temperature, pressure and indeed the positioning of said water jet, along with a small air blower for drying purposes. I took it from that that the Japanese treasure their time on the toilet, same as me, although usually I just read a book. After that I found a cab which took me straight to the hotel, which was about 20 minutes from the Ryogoku Kokugikan, a sumo wrestling venue where the two gigs were to be held.

Just down from the hotel was a Family mart, just like we had in Thailand, so to celebrate getting this far without incident, I shot in there and purchased a bottle of wine. That I night I messaged a friend of mine, Kenny from Canada (who is doing the first to barrier wristbands on this tour) and we arranged to meet up the next day and do some sightseeing.

Now, I openly admit to being a bit of a nerd, nerds are cool in my eyes. And one very “nerdy” thing I do, is to google all the tourist attractions of where I am going, then I make a little map, and plan how to spend my days in foreign places, and at the top of my list for Tokyo, was the Robot Restaurant much to everyone’s amusement around me.

The next day I met with Kenny and we went straight there and caught the afternoons first show. It was crazy, you have never seen so many lights and crazy robots flying about in a 2-hour show, we couldn’t stop laughing, it was probably the most ridiculous thing I had ever watched, but I loved every minute of it. After that we went to a meet up not far away at a local metal bar called Dusk till Dawn, where quite a few fanclub members were coming for a meet up and to collect their tickets from Yu Shimada, who had very kindly got them tickets previously. I saw Donz, Dan and Mary, Alex and Jett, Sanja, Jon and a few others I recognised from previous trips.

The next day my ex boss Stuart along his wife Benz, arrived and we met up and had a day up the Skytree tower, which involved a meal on the 32 second floor and a look around an aquarium which was pretty cool and then we headed for the venue for the first of two shows. We got into the venue and had a quick walk about and caught the last half of the Raven Age’s set.

I had been keeping a close eye on the footage coming back from the tour, Maidens Facebook page and the like and everything looked good and Bruce seemed fine, voice spot on, not glowing in the dark because of all his treatment etc. However, nothing prepared me for start of the gig, the opening notes of “If eternity should fail” were just electric! The crowd lapped it up, and then Bruce started singing, which notably lifted the crowd even higher, then the band ran on stage, and they were off with aplomb it has to be said! I loved every second of the show, the new songs are just superb live with “The Red and the Black” being my favourite one, “Tears of a clown”,” Speed of light”, “the Book of Souls” and “Death or glory” were just fantastic too! Obviously, the old classics like “the Trooper”, “Fear of the dark”, “Wasted years” etc. were in there too, but “Powerslave” and “Children of the damned”, were the icing on the cake for me, but the little cherry on the top was seeing Bruce flying about and belting out the tunes as if nothing had ever happened, he looked fit, strong and all of the band looked like they were loving every second of the show, as much as the fans were. The new Eddies were very cool as well, especially the one that comes on during the book of souls. It was enough to put a tear in your eye, it didn’t as it turned out, but it did make the hairs on the back of my hairy neck stand on end (which can’t have been nice for the people behind me but hey-ho!)

The second show was just as amazing as the first although a couple of things made me chuckle. Firstly, I stood in the crowd with Donz about 15 rows back from the front and next to her was a Japanese chap, who was telling us, that this was the first time he had seen Maiden play and he was very excited about it, he had been a fan since he was 15 and now he was 45 years old, so a quick 30 year wait for him then! I said “hello pleased to meet you” he said, “hello my name Suzuki”, it was an opportunity not too be missed, “Hi I am Kawasaki” I replied, to which he burst out laughing so I told him my name was Spug, to which he just raised an inquisitive eyebrow. It was also great that I managed to bump into Jeff Weir, very much a major player behind the scenes!

The next thing that really tickled me is this whole “climb like a monkey” thing, that Bruce has got going on with the crowd. I think it’s great, you have got a load of metal fans, all pretending to climb like monkeys, at Bruce’s command. In fact, as I looked round on the second night I even saw someone with a banana in each hand, doing the monkey dance! I had to laugh, when you think of all those years ago the PMRC and the like, were trying to stop heavy metal music because of Satanic undertones etc, and the spawning of a whole generation of devil worshippers, if only they could see the deranged devil worshipping crowds now, doing a monkey dance with banana’s in their hands, you couldn’t make it up really, absolutely brilliant and I confess on the second night I danced like a monkey too, although danced like a silver back gorilla may been more appropriate!

After the show I met with Kenny and his Japanese friends, Yuko and Hisashi and I ticked the last box on my wish list, which was to eat sushi in Tokyo. We found a restaurant one stop down on the tube and made our way there. I don’t really know what I ate, I think a part of it was called a gizzard chad. But we ordered off the iPad in the restaurant, it came on a conveyor belt to our table and then we ate it, before the waitress scanned the micro-chips in our plates and gave us the bill. All very high tech that’s for sure.

Found this great video on You tube of the show at the Robot Restaraunt!

Tokyo had been great and some, but now was the big stress point for me because I had to get to Beijing and get my 72-hour visa on arrival. Some of you may be thinking, “what’s he going on about? All this stuff is easy!” well not for me, because 1) I am a worrier 2) things go wrong for me, in fact, I am the man that ended up in A+E after being cut out of my car by the fire brigade, after crashing it, because I choked on pear drops! Of course I was stressing!

I had a bit of bad news that night, my good friend and partner for China, Nils, had got stuck in Russia making his way over to China, because of an overbooked flight! I was gutted I hadn’t seen him since the Luxembourg FC trip and we had plans to go and see the great wall etc. I had to continue alone it seemed.

I had bought my plane ticket through a third-party agency and I was stressing about it being a false website or whatever, but when I arrived at the airport early the next morning, I was absolutely delighted when the lady booked me in on Japanese airlines flight JL21! Happy days! I wasn’t so happy when she said that I had also booked a flight back from Beijing to Tokyo a month later! I told her not to worry she could keep that ticket for herself as I would be back in Thailand four days later. This slight balls up didn’t worry me too much, as I was confident that my Air Asia flight would be OK from Beijing to Krabi three days later.

We took off from Tokyo and flew over Mount Fuji, it was an incredible sight, nearly as good as the windows on the plane. They had a little button underneath them, that upon pressing meant you could tint the windows darker or lighter. What an invention, this kept me entertained for about thirty minutes, until the gentleman sitting next to me made some strange sighing noises, which I think was a hint for me to stop acting like a child and leave the button alone, which I did and then the sighing stopped.

We landed at Beijing and I managed to get my 72-hour visa without any drama’s, other than not putting my feet on the yellow foot prints painted on the floor, and standing in the correct place in front of the desk, which led to quite a stern telling off. Unperturbed I went through the airport and found the driver from the hotel, who was waiting for me in arrivals with a banner bearing my name on it. I had pre-booked this with my hotel before leaving Thailand, as I didn’t dare risk me trying to get a cab, by myself in Beijing and finding a hotel near Tiananmen square. As it turned out this was a wise move, as a few of my travelling friends paid way over the odds for their taxis.

I had thoughts of my own mortality as we sped down the hard shoulder with the taxi driver repeatedly sounding his horn, this was like wacky racers, but it seemed like all the other cabs were doing it as well, so I literally shut my eyes and prayed I would get there in one piece. After the craziest and most dangerous journey of my life, I booked into my hotel room, logged onto the Wi-Fi and made contact with Kenny. I was literally 10 minutes walk away from Tiananmen square and that was where we agreed to meet up. So only 10 minutes after checking into the hotel, I was off out to have a look around. I met Kenny and we wandered around the square, taking in all the sights. I found it magnificent, eerie, sad, amazing, almost overpowering with its sense of awe.

As we walked around people stared at us, even asked us if they could take our pictures, it was quite strange really, it didn’t make you feel uncomfortable, but you certainly felt like the odd one out, which fortunately for me, isn’t a new feeling, but pardon the pun, we were definitely strangers in a strange land. We went from the square to the imperial palace and the forbidden city, really good places for tourist photos, Kenny introduced me to the locals as an up and coming film star, I don’t think they really understood what he was saying, but they joined me in my photos anyway, which made me giggle.

At the end of the day we stopped at a small off-licence and watched the sun go down, with a tin of lager, (which we were vastly overcharged for) but we didn’t care, we were in Beijing, on the eve of Maidens first ever gig there, the excitement was rising.

Speaking of excitement, as we sat there watching the sun go down, a young girl whose parents owned the off-licence came out and sat with us, we gave her 10 renminbi’s and she ran off and bought herself an ice cream and some fruit, it really was a quite humbling experience, because she was so happy and to see the smile on her face as she ate her ice cream, is a memory that will be etched on my mind forever. That night we went out for dinner and ate some weird things on kebab sticks, before finding a restaurant and eating some chicken noodles and avoiding the cooked intestines with stir fried tripe that were also on the menu.

The next morning me and Kenny headed for the great wall of China, one of the seven wonders of the world, I was so excited that I barely slept that night. We met at my hotel and had breakfast together. In the hotel restaurant was Martin from Germany, Rasmus, Paal, Yu, and a host of Maiden fans, which was nice to see. After breakfast we got to the wall and after a small cable car journey, there I was standing on the great wall of China, I could not believe it! All the history surrounding this place involving people like Genghis Khan with wars and such like, it was amazing, and I will certainly try and find out more about the history of it when I get chance too.

We didn’t stay to long as we had to get back, but we got all the photos we needed and another box was ticked as they say.

I spoke to Martin from Germany about the Beijing gig and we both agreed, this was THE one to go to, THE gig of the tour. There was massive speculation before the gig, would it even go ahead? What would the crowd be like? Will there be a row of stern faced officials in suits all down the front? Will it get stopped after an hour? What wouldn’t the band be able to do?? The list went on and on and it just raised the “anti” higher and higher.

Me and Kenny left the great wall and headed straight for the venue, collecting one of his Japanese friends on the way. We got to the venue called the Lesports centre and then had a look around. It seemed like there were quite a few metal fans about and not too many suits. I bumped into an old friend of mine James, who I had hung out with on Bruce’s birthday bomber in 2008. Turns out that it’s his computer company doing the much anticipated Legacy of the beast computer game!

Me and Kenny made our way to our seats, there was no Raven Age in Beijing and the barrier was about 8 metres back from the front of the stage. A good look at the crowd and there were flags, banners many Maiden t-shirts everywhere, in fact it didn’t look to dissimilar to the crowd in Tokyo.

The first minute of Maidens first gig in China

Doctor doctor came on and we knew what was next, the lights dimmed and the opening to “If eternity should fail” started, the atmosphere was electric. Bruce started singing the atmosphere rose again and we were off! If the hairs stood up on the back of my neck in Tokyo, they simply melted in Beijing, the crowd were loving it and singing along, jumping up and down and throwing the horns etc, it was amazing, and there was me thinking they would all be sitting down, only to stand up at the end of the song and give a short round of applause and sit down again, how wrong could I have possibly been? I saw Bruce look at Adrian on about the 4th or 5th song in, and if I have got this right the look on his face was, “flippin ‘eck! the crowd’s going off!” and again if I have it right, Adrian’s face along with a large grin replied, “certainly is me ole bean!”

There was no pyro, no flag on the Trooper, and Powerslave wasn’t played (cough) instead Wickerman was, you know the one, “tell me why I have to be a Wickerman, I don’t want to die, I’m a god why can’t I live on”. None of this made any difference what so ever. Maiden had won the day, well not only won, but owned the day. The crowd lapped it up and went home happy, me and Kenny looked at each other and almost hugged at the end.

History had been made, Iron Maiden had played in China to what was (or must have been close to) a sold out crowd and blown the roof off the place!

Fear of the dark Beijing

My final day in Beijing consisted of a KFC dinner, a bit of souvenir shopping and a little bit of sightseeing, before I caught the plane back to Kuala Lumpur at 2am just before my 72-hour visa ran out, and then onto Krabi. It went without incident, and when I came out of the doors into 40 degrees in Thailand, I sat down with a cold Singha beer in my hand and I just smiled, I had done it, basically all by myself, this was THE BIG ONE for me, a trip I will never forget that’s for sure. I thought that would be where my Book of Souls tour ended and I was well happy with that, but then things took another interesting twist.

Originally the whole objective of going to work in Thailand was to see Maiden play in Tokyo, I had no idea that Beijing was also going to happen, what a stroke of luck that was! A month after the wheels touched down from Beijing, I handed my 6 months-notice in and looked forward to coming home again. As those months went by, more dates of the tour were released including, two London shows at the 02, and then a FC trip to New York with a further two shows in Brooklyn! This I didn’t expect either. So, I had to figure a way out of making them happen, what had turned from a quest just too see them in Japan, now turned into a quest to see them “from one side of the world to the other” on the Book of Souls tour, now that would be a challenge as I came back to England penniless!

Luckily, I had decided not to sell my car when I was In Thailand, so after a month chilling out I went looking for work and managed to get a job fairly quickly. Again, things took an unexpected turn when my German friend Nils got called back to work and couldn’t make the FC trip to London either, poor sod! He asked me if I wanted to have his hotel room, oh wow that would help a lot! My mate Tommy was coming over from the USA and we had already decided that I would spend the second night with him, in his hotel right next to the 02.

The 2 shows at the 02 were again really good, but there was something really special about the 2nd night, I can’t tell you why exactly, but the atmosphere was just incredible Maiden were on fire! I managed to take Tommy into hospitality and he met Laz from the FC, and some other good friends of mine and he loved it, especially the bacon sandwhiches after! That night I also bumped into Michael Weir, Jeff's twin brother, who owns Stained class Merchandise, the coolest T-shirts in town ( many of which you can see in the pics on this tale) and he also does a bit of personal security and like Jeff he's a big old unit, but I still thought he needed to know what a proper set of "guns" look like!

So, with Tokyo, Beijing and London all done, it was all systems go to try and make New York happen! I sold a couple of bits and bobs to help raise money for the trip and every week I sent ICT (International concert travel) some money over and with a little help, I managed to get on the guest list and that was everything covered and I couldn’t believe I had managed to pull it off, New York here we come!

New York was really the first ever place I went to, other than fishing in France. We went on the millennium celebrations and went up the old World Trade Centre. I loved the place it was crazy and we had a crazy trip over, which was all about going clubbing to Twilos, at the time it was THE club in the world to go to, big digital sound system and Sasha and Digweed played an 11-hour set that night, which saw us stumbling out at 11am on the 2nd of January after what had been a 56 hour bender! How did we stay awake all that time?? After that of course the terrible events of 9/11 happened and it really affected me, I was devastated that the time, and always wanted to go back and visit there, at least too see Ground Zero.

The trip couldn’t come quick enough for me and the days dragged by. With a couple of weeks to go I was watching a fishing DVD that a mate of mine had released. On that DVD he went fishing to Central Park and caught a small carp out of there, this got me thinking! What a result that would be to catch a carp from the park as well! I had a small travel rod from Thailand, I just needed a landing net and the permits to be allowed to fish. I got hold of Tommy in the US and told him about my idea and he was well up for it and said he would source a landing net and get the permits sorted out, great here we go, it was game on. Tommy was going to be in the same hotel as me, so we set our plans out, the trip was getting better by the second!

The day finally came and we flew with Virgin Atlantic, we eventually (after a 4 and a half hour delay at Heathrow) got to the hotel, myself and Caddsy (Mark Cadier from ICT) booked into our room and went for a beer or three. We ended up in a bar called O’Hara’s, a place which was about to have quite an impact on me a day or so later!

The next morning we headed out sightseeing and the first place we went to was the iconic Brooklyn bridge. It was quite hot but we walked there, got all the touristy type photos and then headed for the new world trade centre and ground zero. After a small que we arrived on the top floor and then we were bundled into a room where we watched a film about the building of the massive structure and then all of a sudden, the screens went up and there was New York through the windows and wow, what a sight! I am not a great lover of heights but we stayed in there quite a while and took some amazing pics of the city before we came back down and went to have a proper look at ground zero.

I hadn’t realised before, but Ground Zero has two memorial pools, one for the North and South towers. God they are big and when you look at all the names that are written on them, of the people who died, it’s really quite sobering and sad.

We ended up going back to O’Hara’s for a beer or two. As we sat in the bar I noticed some pictures up on the wall and then loads and loads of insignias on the wall, of various fire fighters and police units. Blimey, I had no idea! This was the famous pub that survived the World trade centre collapses only a couple of blocks away! You can see how close it was in the pic I took where you can see the front of the bar and the new World trade centre in it. I spoke to some older guy in there and his eyes welled up with tears as he said he was there that day, blimey I felt emotional, very sad indeed. We kept popping back to the bar and restaurant for the rest of the time we were out there, if ever you go to New York, look it up, it’s well worth a visit.

Tommy flew in that afternoon armed with permits to fish and a landing net, so the next thing on the agenda would be trying to catch a carp in New York. We arranged to meet in the hotel’s restaurant the next morning and then jump on the subway up to central park.

I would like to point out at this point that I thought Tommy might be able to guide me round the New York tube stations, but alas he is a country boy and didn’t have a clue, but somehow we managed it and turned up at the park around 9.30am. We started off in a swim just over a bridge on the boating lake. The water was green and there were algae warnings everywhere. It didn’t look good where we were, so I decided to have a walk round and as we dodged the rats, we stumbled across a swim with over hanging trees. I looked under the trees and a saw a tail of a small common just break the surface. “They’re here” I told Tommy, “let’s get everything set up”. We set the video camera up and I baited up with a couple of grains of sweetcorn and cast my float where I had seen the tail. 15 seconds later the float bobbed down and I struck into a fish! After a couple of goes with the net we landed a small common carp of 4-5lb, I went mental!! I was so pleased to catch this one, my first American carp all captured on film, brilliant!

Caddsy turned up a little while after and we hung about for another hour or so, and then we packed down and went back to the hotel, before shooting up to Wall street to touch the famous lucky balls on the Wall street bull and then onto Times square for a quick look around before we made our way to Brooklyn for the first of two shows and it goes without saying it was another superb performance!

A carp from central park!

The morning after we had decided to get as much in as we could before the second show. We had noticed there was a museum thing onboard the aircraft carrier called “Intrepid”, which was docked on the Hudson river about 20 minutes away from us, so we decided to visit there the next morning

On the Intrepid was a two-seater version of the Blackbird SR-71, the space shuttle “Enterprise” and loads of really cool stuff, including a Concorde plane just on the side of the dock, all great photo opportunities, wow! I mean a real-life space shuttle! That was great. Then we jumped in a cab and got back up to Times Square, for a better look around.

There were loads of market stall type stands up there and we managed to find a kebab vendor who made the finest lamb kebabs I have ever eaten! We met up with Laz and Sue from the Iron Maiden FC and we all went for dinner and had a bit of a giggle and a beer or two! After that we headed back to the hotel, after a couple more beers at O’Hara’s before making our way to Rector street Subway station and making our way to the 2nd gig, and the final night of the Amazing Book of Souls world tour.

It goes without saying the final gig was superb, but fate dealt me a very kind hand and my seat was absolutely perfect for taking the odd pic! Normally I am too far away for any really great pics (nearest the bar and toilet springs to mind!), but this time I was three rows back, on the left-hand side of the stage, in the seats on the side, just up from floor level, so it was an opportunity not to be missed! So I will share some of those after this little bit!

I don’t normally buy clothing merch at the shows, usually my sizes are gone straight away, but I went for a piss halfway through the show and got talking to the girls on the merch stand, they asked if I had bought a T shirt, I said I hadn’t because they never have my size and that I buy them from the FC website afterwards, and they said they had a size that would fit me and they did! So I bought one for the first time in years and it’s got a great design on it, I couldn’t help myself!

Me, Caddsy and Tommy made our way back on the Subway after the show, all agreeing what a great tour it had been, probably one of the best ever, if not the best one. The album was just amazing, the stage-show was awesome, the imagery sublime and finally the setlist was one you just could not better!

So that’s it! My story of the Book of Souls world tour. Without doubt, I will never ever be able to have such an adventure like it again and the truth is I don’t know if I want too. I just feel so lucky that it all came good for me to do the shows that I did, and see the places, and meet the wonderful people that I did, from one side of the world to the other.

As I am writing this, the live chapter is a couple of weeks away from being released and I am so chuffed that the “powers that be” have decided that, “The Red and the Black” would be represented on the album, from one of the gigs in Tokyo. My favourite track from the new album and one that every time I hear makes me think back to The Japanese and China gigs.

The Red and the Black filmed at Tokyo! Can you hear me singing along?

Finally I want to thank everyone who helped me for various reasons along the way, you know who you are, after all we're blood brothers and sisters!