A excerpt from 'Labour Of Love The story Of UB40'

[rhondda rudie]

Originally Posted by bt/ub40

I have to bring this back because I LOVE THE AMOUNT OF REPLIES AND HITS IT MADE....now how can We generate more posts like this...errr !!! I have an idea...UBTV...im afraid you have had it too easy for too long..
im going to need Extra hits to upload the TV bits...Answers to your questions soon come..

Right you are Bri.Got a new target in mind?

[bt/ub40]

Not too big..just 100 replies per clip..that'll do for now....i s'pose if the replies bore some relation to the clip it would be worthwhile/ interesting conversation...

[nani]

Really enjoyed the read, thanks Brian

<bump>

[rhondda rudie]

Great blast from the past.What a brilliant thread that was.

[Chronic]

Originally Posted by bt/ub40

Not too big..just 100 replies per clip..that'll do for now....i s'pose if the replies bore some relation to the clip it would be worthwhile/ interesting conversation...

Hi BT

Any chance of some more extracts?

Best regards

Chronic

[Rebel Soul]

Originally Posted by bt/ub40

Thought you might like to read short excerpt from the a book Ive been working on........page 25 - 32 part one

DUBAI TO NEW ZEALAND

Its not long before Emirates flight EK 404 is boarding at gate 21. We take our seats, its early morning 3:25 am, most of the passengers are sleeping, our lot are watching movies, I can see their faces lit up in the dark. I choose the new Kevin Costner movie; ‘ Mr. Brooks ‘ his conscience is played by William Hurt, the premise being that he is an addict, addicted to killing people. He is very clever, cleaning up the crime scene so well that the cops can’t catch him. Anyway I wont tell you the rest, I wouldn’t want to ruin it for you, plus the fact I didn’t actually make it to the end and that’s about all I saw before I fell fast asleep.
I’m awoken by the announcement that we are about to land in Singapore for a one hour stop over, we have to de-plane with all our hand luggage, take the mile and a half walk in tropical temperatures from the air bridge down the full length of the concourse and then line up again back at the same gate and security point to be re-searched and then re-boarded onto the aircraft. While all this has taken place they have cleaned the plane and made it smell fresh, its wasn’t that bad where we were but its good for the economy passengers who are packed in like sardines, it also gives everyone a chance to stretch their legs, and do a little deep vein thrombosis prevention. Its now 2:30 am Singapore time, I haven’t a clue what time it is in the UK, I’m now under the control of what ever time I’m told it is. The Singapore security is incredibly thorough, they search everything and of course this takes ages, Singapore is famous for its zero policy on drugs, if you were caught smuggling even a single joint of marijuana, purely for your own consumption the penalty is death by hanging, its not a joke. Our guys have learnt from past experience never smuggle anything through airports and any way, as soon as we land the smokers amongst us will be inundated with care packages from our many friends in New Zealand but more of that famous South Pacific hospitality later.
Back on board settled into my seat I give ‘Mr. Brooks’ another go, its no good I’m soon back in the land of nod. The seats in first class have certainly come on since we started touring all those years ago, back then they were like posh deck chairs whereas they are now electronic massage, press button luxurious flat beds with wide screen plasma monitors pumping out music, games and hundreds of movies to watch on stereo noise canceling head phones, you can even make international phone calls from the seat on the built in phone. Even little mini bars built into the seat divide. Admittedly in the old days we were always in economy but as young guys barely out of our teens we didn’t care, you could smoke in those days, it must have been hell for non smokers, all seventeen of us would sit round playing cards, telling crappy jokes only we would laugh at, smoking, drinking and generally being loud and obnoxious for the twenty eight hours it would take to get to Australia and New Zealand. I cant believe we didn’t get more complaints, of course we got our fair share but I suppose we just didn’t care or take it on, we would get drunk and sober three times on a journey down under, we would sneak a quick joint in the toilets, it was a different time no one cared, although we did make an effort to be courteous, always helped pregnant women and old lady’s with their luggage. Of course as the years went on and we moved onto bigger gigs, the standard of travel was also raised exponentially, when Richard Branson started Virgin Atlantic we would have the whole of the upstairs bubble on the jumbo 747’s to ourselves, it was like a party at the playboy mansion with Hugh Hefner minus the bunnies...Boo Hoo ! The seats all around the edge of the bubble, Bar in the middle very rock’n’roll Led Zeppelin style. There were no rules really, we would get all our road crew up there smoke a joint and drink champagne and laugh all the way to New York, of course the Virgin crew didn’t know what we were up to, they just left us alone and probably turned a blind eye. Those were the days. It’s all changed now, you cant even congregate for a chat during a flight, regulations have been tightened to the point of (related in American security speak)
“ Return to your seat Sir, Step away from the carbon based life form (Robin) Now…. or we will have you arrested. You will be imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay and have your hair messed up every morning by the prison bully. Am I making myself clear Sir? “
911 changed air travel forever.
I’m awoken by the Singaporean stewardess and a plate of chicken noodles, just right as I’m unexplainably starving, I don’t know why, all I’ve done all day is eat. The noodles are delicious, the stewardess is very giggly and excited, she wants to talk about UB40, and Paul Hunter has given her a signed photo of the band, which she is asking me to dedicate to her. She tells me her Mom came to see us in the late eighties; she was too young to go. She’s making me feel very old all of a sudden. We toured all through the far east in those days multiple times, but only went to Singapore once, she says every Sunday we had a disco in the garden and UB40 was always on as it was the DJ’s (her Moms) favorite band, I’m flattered she feels comfortable enough to tell me about her family.
Thinking she is a bit of a fan I say “ I suppose you have heard about Ali then? ”
She says, “ Who’s Ali? “ Rather than explain I point to his seat a few rows in front where he is fast asleep, snoring, she takes a look and says “ is he in the band? “
I’m not joking, Martin and me kill ourselves laughing, what can you say? There are no words for moments like that, at times like these.
Its only a six hour flight to Melbourne then we have a stop over for six hours Paul tells me he has booked us Hotel rooms so we can clean up. As we come in to land the captain says over the intercom “ the time in Melbourne is 12:15 am “ its now February 1st, we lost the 31st of January somewhere between here and Dubai. Australian Customs and immigration can take a long time but its pretty smooth, the immigration officers are good guys, joking with us, one said I thought The Specials split up years ago, I reminded him we reformed after England beat Australia in the Rugby world cup, remember Johnny Wilkinson’s right foot? Remember our version of Swing Low? The tune that played every time they scored?
“I really hated that tune,” one of them say’s.
They are a good-humored people the Australians and love a joke, they don’t take themselves too seriously and don’t mind having their legs pulled.
By 2 :00 a.m. we are done and proceed to check into the airport Hilton as its now five hours before our connection to Auckland. Of course our bags have been booked all the way through so I get a razor from the hotel, get to my room shower, shave and try to grab a couple of hours real sleep in a bed. I drift off thinking about all the good times we have had down here over the past 28 years. (continued in next post)

First time I'm reading this....I've some catching up to do.

[Jaye]

Thank you kind Sir, lovely read.

Jaye

[nani]

Originally Posted by Rebel Soul

First time I'm reading this....I've some catching up to do.

I particularly loved the excerpt featuring Raggamuffin in Rotorua. At work, I'll find and repost it...if someone else doesn't beat me to it

[nani]

It's taken a while but worth the wait

Originally Posted by bt/ub40

Greetings comrades...OK..deal was if there were 250 replies I'd post another excerpt..s'pose i'll just pick up whet I left off..heres the next few pages...

ROTORUA NEW ZEALAND
After taking a shower changing into some fresh clothes I realize its early morning in the UK and decide to make some calls home. Everyone is just waking up, it feels like we have been gone a week already not one and a half days, before I know it I’m getting calls to come down for sound check this is the first time I feel the real jet lag and start yawning uncontrollably, even though I’ve done nothing but eat and sleep all the way down here I feel very tired now. By the time the lift hits the lobby I’m almost sleepwalking, signing autographs and having photographs taken, feels like I’m in a dream. Apparently the gig has sold twenty five thousand tickets and the promoter is expecting another a massive walkup, as the Maoris never buy tickets in advance, a bit of a generalization if you ask me but I understand what’s being said. Thousands of people have traveled into Rotorua for the gig for the ‘Ragamuffin Festival’ posters everywhere; as we drive down the road the locals give us the thumbs up shouting “ hey UB’s see you tomorrow. “. I personally can’t wait to hook with our old mates The Wailers and Maxi Priest and his Band, great guys to a man and in my mind some of the best musicians in the world, what a party we are going to have on Saturday night. Elan who opened for us in the US on our 2007 tour is now lead singer with The Wailers; it really is going to be in the words of the great Bob Marley himself a Punky Reggae Party! We have played this gig on our last visit to Rotorua, its doesn’t seem like two years since we were last here, even the guys working at the stadium greet us like they only saw us yesterday, it feels like being at home, its that South Pacific hospitality again. We sound check a few numbers, our crew have done a great job as it sounds good from the first note, we play ‘Impossible Love’ ‘ Tears from my eyes’ ‘ Guilty’ ‘End of war’ and ‘Food for Thought’ only the last two make it into the set but they sound great, we have been told we have to cut down our stage time to a festival set. There are a few guys out there in the dark who give us a cheer at the end of each number, we cant see their faces but its just nice, like old mates who have come to check out how UB40 are doing. We decide to keep it simple on Saturday, loads of old hits and a few new numbers. We are soon done and headed for the bus, we see Al Anderson from the Wailers, and one of the world’s great guitarists, when he plays it makes everyone else sound good as well. He reminds me of Eric Clapton who did exactly that honoring us along with John Meyer with a guest appearance at our ‘Teenage Cancer Charity fund raiser ‘ at the Royal Albert Hall In 2006. Which reminds me of a brilliant thing Roger Daltry said about teenagers in an Interview on Harvey Goldsmiths TV show, “ Where would all us musicians be without them? “ He’s quite right of course; I love that kind of simple talk.
Al Anderson and myself have a brief chat, just catching up with things but then he tells me no one told him or the Wailers that we were going to put the version of ‘ I Shot the Sheriff’ on the live discs, the ones DEP put out via our website on the 2005 tour. It’s a little embarrassing to say the least but he’s dead right, I’m ashamed that I couldn’t give him an answer. I honestly thought all that stuff had been sorted by our merchandise office and of course its now 7:00 am back in the UK so I cant really call anyone, although I’m tempted to wake them up and tell them its simply not good enough. I’m not kidding sometimes life sucks, its the last thing I needed today on top of everything else, why me? Why not talk to the lead singer? Get him to sort it out. I cant keep my eyes open, the jet lag has got me by the eyelids tugging them down, but I must stay awake and get to the bottom of this. I can’t bear the idea of any member of the Wailers thinking we would stiff them; they are such great guys and deserve more respect. We get back to the hotel and bump into the Maxi Priest gang, they got in a few days earlier and have been out playing football in the park, we chat for a while, Maxi says “ sorry to hear about Ali, don’t worry about it Bri, Life goes on, take your time, it will heal the wounds “ he’s dead right of course, He’s a very wise guy is Maxi. I tell him “ that’s what we think, although we do have someone very close in mind to replace him, in fact they have been asked if they are interested and have said,
“Are you kidding? Of course, when do I start? “
Maxi, Marvellous Marvin (Maxi’s son) and Karl ‘ Beniton ‘ Zanders plus his musicians, I’ll name them all later in this tale have just recorded a studio version of funnily enough ‘ I Shot the Sheriff ‘ with UB40. I don’t seem to be able to escape this song at the moment, anyway I make my excuses and leave with the full intention of sorting out the confusion around this enormous sheriff shooting, very un-irie like screw up, of course I cant get hold of anyone back in the UK. I compose a very serious email to send back to the UK but before it’s finished I’m sleeping in my chair, its no good, I surrender to the sandman and hit the mattress.

Six am February 2nd I’m wide-awake bolt upright in my bed, I’ve had a great sleep and now I can call the UK. I’m watching the sun come up over Lake Rotoruahana, Te Puia, on its banks is a geothermal wonderland, mud pools and steaming geysers, it really is a magical place, very special, lots of spa and health treatments are situated around the lake. It would be great to go check it all out but I have stuff to do today, and the gig is tonight. I spend most of Saturday on the phone and sending email, I’m trying to get this ‘Live’ disc thing sorted for Al Anderson and then there’s everything else to finalize, what set are we going to do? That has to be written down and got to the crew at the stadium, they have to program the digital desks to have each mix in line ready for the next number and then there’s the lights. Our lighting man Dan Hardiman is a bit of a legend in the industry, he takes it all very seriously and it shows in his work, he likes to know exactly what’s going to be played as each number is a completely different sequence to the last. Robin as always puts the set list together, its a tradition that I’m happy to keep, he tries to keep a balance to the songs, taking into consideration where we are, what was a hit, what the audience is going to expect. We have had a great deal of commercial success down here in New Zealand so its not hard but there are some numbers that we simply cannot leave out. And then we also have a responsibility to try and inject new material into a set, its not good enough to just keep playing the same tunes over and over.’ Maybe tomorrow ‘ has to be played, the crowd have this whole Maori war chant they sing over the top of the horn phrase. You have to hear to believe it, absolutely brilliant and never fail to send shivers up our collective spine, its incredibly powerful.
The day soon passes in a half awake dream, jet lag is a strange thing, and there no remedy you just have to live with. We reckon it takes about an hour a day for every hour you are out of sync so that’ll be February 13 th by the time we are back to normal. I order an omelette for lunch, breakfast whatever it is,

[nani]

10th April 2010, 05:36 AM

Maybe I shouldn’t even think about writing anything until February 13 Th when the jet lag has leveled out? What If I say stuff that I’ll later regret? That would probably be the most interesting stuff to read anyway, what If I don’t say enough? I’ll simply tell it like it is, that’s the best I can do, no covering up embarrassing moments, you the reader will make your own mind up anyway.
Before I know it its 8:30 pm time to meet in the lobby and depart for the gig, we have two bus’s a non smoking and a smoking, Ali travels on his own in a separate car same routine as the UK tour, driving to the stadium we hardly see a soul out there on the street, a good sign it means they are all at ‘The Ragamuffin’ that’s the title of the tour by the way, not ‘ The Ragamuffin show ‘, or tour, just ‘ Ragamuffin ‘. All this is the brainchild of Andrew McManus our promoter, well, actually an amalgam of his money and organizational genius and our desire to play a festival with loads of great Reggae bands, we spoke about it last time we were down here, he said
“ Leave it with me Pommie’s bedwetters, it will be done! “
He has brought us down here on three occasions, during the last trip we chartered a Qantas airbus and he put shows on all through the south Pacific Islands, Tonga, Fiji, Tahiti, new Caledonia then on up to the Hawaiian Islands. It was the trip of a lifetime, Lesley flew down to Auckland to join me on the tour and it was totally incredible, the memories will stay with us forever, we often talk about it. Every place we landed there would be that massive Pacific welcome on the airport runways, drummers and beautiful girls dancing in grass skirt’s and the gigs, well the only way I can describe it is Beatle Mania, breathtaking unconditional love from the audiences. Even the king of Tonga invited us to a civic reception; we were presented with medals from the Royal House. Anyway Andrew McManus being not only a man of his word but one of the world’s great promoters, actually more than simply a promoter, he’s what I would define as an Impresario. There’s not many like him, its like this, we’ve worked with many promoters who I’ve never met, couldn’t tell you what they look like, they are just a name on a cheque. Andrew McManus after putting a bill together then turns up at sound check, strolls the gig with his assistants taking notes, listens to the sound, checks the toilet facilities, the first aid service, water supplies, security teams etc, its all about catering for the audience in the best possible way. That’s why A.M. P. ~(Andrew McManus presents) is one of the great success stories in Australian entertainment. As Harvey Goldsmith, Andrews fellow ‘do’er of good’ in the UK says
“ You ain’t a proper promoter till you’ve lost a million quid on a gig “ That’s the real point, real promoters put their money where their mouth is and don’t always win, but when they do its a great gig to be part of. And our business wouldn’t exist without them.
As we approach the Rotorua Stadium we are knocked back by the sheer size of the crowd, think of Wembley Stadium packed to the roof although I’m told it’s merely a thirty-five thousand-person capacity and its full. Its not that we haven’t played lots of gigs like this before It’s just very exciting to be playing down here again. As we drive back stage The Wailers are mashing up the crowd with an extended version of ‘Exodus’ Elan playing up to the huge crowd and everything feels good. Its only a matter of minutes before we get the call from Paul, “ fifteen minutes everybody “, we change into our stage clothes, tune the horns, Norman gets his hair done by Sonia the newest member of the crew. Laurence blows the cobwebs out of his horn, some big super high octave notes. Caroline Summers our last wardrobe mistress has called it a day while she stays at home to have a baby; Paul Hunter is the proud father to be. We are all looking forward to another little UB40 baby, but pull Paul’s leg about how hard it is going to be like the experienced Dads we are (how predictable), truth is I would love another little kid, two or three even running round the house, I missed that while mine were growing up, we were always on the road. Of course we will miss Caroline she’s a great girl and had a very calming effect on the back stage atmosphere, especially when the Diva’s were getting all important about themselves, She could suppress a hissy fit in seconds, stop a swinging handbag with a few well chosen words of a ‘put downable’ nature anyway this is Sonia’s first gig with us but she seems to be taking it all in her stride, she comes from the theatre so this is easy stuff, usually she has a cast of hundreds to dress for the stage . I walk over first just to check it all out, and in turn blow a few cobwebs out of my tenor horn, its an incredible scene all these thousands of people just dancing to our ‘ Dub Sessions ‘ album that only took two weeks to put together, and is selling like hot cakes at the gigs even made number two on the iTunes download chart. We had to have something to promote on our UK tour, as our studio album Twentyfourseven was put back to accommodate the release of Ali’s solo album even though we had a sell out tour all lined up.
Of course standing there on the side of the stage with a smile like a cheshire cat is Andrew McManus, checking right up to the last minute that all is well. I shake his hand and he say’s “ What a perfect night for music “ he’s absolutely right, all the stars have lined up in perfect conjunction to give us a wicked starlit event, the southern sky is very different from our northern hemisphere constellation , the southern cross can be clearly seen up there. As we line up behind the back drop, there’s a few pre gig nerves being brought under control, some of the guys have a cigarette, some a spiff, some stroll up and down, Ali swigs back a big glass of white wine then its time. We hit the stage to our new intro tape, its a medley of some of our hit tunes orchestrated by Martin Meredith, in fact we used it on our 2007 UK tour and he received a million compliments, and lots of requests to purchase it, its the perfect arrangement to get us all ready to play, we open with our first single ‘ food for thought ‘ the crowd goes totally ballistic, I’m not joking when I say I couldn’t hear my self play over the roar from the crowd. And that’s pretty much how the whole gig went, they sang along word perfect to every song and even joined in with the ones they had never heard before by the time we hit the last chorus. Astro as always gives himself over to the audience, Ali played up to the crowd more than he has for months, I’m pleased because it only reflects on him when he is uncommunicative, and when he plays the crowd he show’s them just how good an entertainer he can be, there were a lot of comments in both the press and on our web site about him not talking or making contact with the audience on our 2007 UK winter tour and I think it damaged his reputation as a musician, But he’s making up for it tonight.
Before I‘m ready to leave, the gig is over. We are about to go back on for an encore, Paul tells us “you have to cut it down to two numbers or we will go over the curfew “ Shit we wanted to play the audience ‘ Ill be There’ a number from our next album 24/7, not released for another few months, so we finish with ‘Kingston Town’ the crowd sang along with my instrumental solo at the beginning, and ‘Maybe tomorrow ‘ just so we could experience the crowd doing their incredible chorus. They sing this chant over the horn riff that makes us all smile, a little bit nervously at just how powerful this thing is, I’m wondering at this point will we ever come back to New Zealand and hear this again? Who Knows? For now I just feel privileged to have been tonight.