U.S.A Tour Diary – Ice Storm

We made ourselves known to the officials who informed us that an ice storm in Tennessee meant that our connecting flight was cancelled and, after accompanying us to customs and making a very thorough search of each and every piece of luggage, shuttled us off to an airport hotel to consider our options. Our options were the following : either wait until the next evening to catch a flight on a different airline which also ran a strong possibility of being cancelled – therefore risking missing the first show, or, find an alternative method of transport. The cruel irony was that our splitter bus for the tour had been driven from Chicago to Nashville the day before!

After much deliberation and some sleep, we took a taxi to a Hertz branch to collect not one but two Chrysler mini-vans in matching colours. We have quite an abundance of guitars and luggage with us and couldn’t find a rental company anywhere with a big enough vehicle to fit all of it and us in. We set off on the 500 mile trip, ignoring all news based travel advice and headed straight for the ice-storm.

Unfortunately, upon arriving in an extremely cold and slippery Nashville, we discovered that the show is to be postponed due to the aforementioned cold and slipperiness. It really is icy here. The only way to walk safely is to shuffle forward an inch at a time without taking your feet off the ice. Any sudden moves could spell disaster for your coccyx!

So, a slightly disappointing start to the tour. We’d loved to have played the historic Ryman Auditorium. We put up a good fight but Mother Nature proved to be the greater adversary this time. Still, our spirits have not been dampened and despite the set-back we’re eager to get to St Louis to play.