Anneke van Giersbergen

Tour Diary South America 5 - A World of Difference!

Hi folks!

Even though I felt a little pain in my heart leaving Buenos Aires after 3 nice days, I was also happy to be back in Brazil again. The temperature rises as we climb a little to the North East and that suits me just fine. Danny and I were in good spirits and we were eager to play after our day off.

Did I describe an almost sacred show in Argentina a few days ago? yesterday’s gig couldn’t be more opposite! From the moment Danny started his set, people were screaming. Of joy that is, and of support and to show us they were happy we came over. Damn they were loud! My set started off with blowing up the monitor system with the first chord of ‘Lost and Found’ Brrrrrcchhchchhrrr, it said. I decided not to care and just carried on. In the mean time a lot of stuff was going on. Peeps were singing along, a group of other peeps were shouting about other things to one another, but in front of my piano, and on my left there was a pretty little girl of about 7 years old sitting on a parent’s shoulders waving at me. I was a bit distracted by all the fuss but had fun nevertheless.

As the evening progressed, the audience got wound up even more. They were all over the place! And mind you, we were playing our quiet love songs in the midst of all that. At one particular moment I had to push danny back to the other side of the stage because he was eyeballing the obnoxious dudes in the front… while playing Dolly Parton’s Jolene. Also local film crew were there to film one of our songs, like a video. I told them before the show they should film the song The Blower’s Daughter. Little did I know then, and now I was wondering how to get our crowd to cooperate in this ultra quiet song. But I tell you, we asked politely, and whatta you know? They were absolutely fantastic! So nice and quiet. Holding their breaths for us. Lovely. Lots of beautiful people in the crowd, lots of smiling faces, but boy what a chaos!

You know how I like taxi rides right? After the show we got picked up by a cab, I am telling you, this car looked like it exploded, then put back together again, then smashed by a baseball bat, then had been in an accident and still it was running. And not only did I believe that in this particular ride it would at last, break in half while we were sitting in it with our guitars on our laps, (Talk about a diva way of leaving a venue in front of your fans) But it’s driver interpreted the red traffic lights as a warning to drive just a little slower and take a look if there is actually somebody coming from the other direction. He ran it each and every time and of course we almost got hit in the flanks just a couple of times. I have two lists of taxi rides: ‘Nice’ ones and ‘I looked death in the eyes once again’ ones. You can guess this one belongs to the latter.

So here we are in Campinas, a nice town, the sun is out and we can’t wait to play again tonight. The funny thing about traveling so much is we meet other bands, who travel a lot as well, usually on airports more than in venues or bars. Yesterday we met an Argentinean Beatles cover band called ‘the Beats’. They play all over the world. Nice lads! Check this Tube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFETuxnjPEU And today we met ‘A Wilhelm Scream’. A punk rock band from the USA, also touring trough Brazil. www.myspace.com/awilhelmscream They also play in Sao Paulo tomorrow, if we feel the need for some heavy stuff after our (early) sweet and soft acoustic sets, we might go check them out. Great stuff!

And last but certainly not least, I wanted to post a little In Memoriam for my suitcase, which I lovingly refere to as ‘the Pink Lady’. She made it till the age of 3 years. In her early days she was a model and shined on the cover of Agua de Annique album ‘Air’ and after that she spent her days travelling with me to many beautiful places. Unfortunately she was thrown in and out of airplanes one too many times and it caused her untimely death by a big belly rupture. I had to leave her behind in Buenos Aires and is now (probably) buried in the hotel dumpster. I did say goodbye to her and wanted to share my little memorial pictures with you all.

Hugs! Annie XxX

19 comments

"LOL... I love your comments Annie, I'm glad you're having such a great time in our countries =) Now I can't wait to see you again, please come back to Chile soon, U.O. us an 'In Your Room' tour XD xoxoxoxox"

GuataPeluda (Chile) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 21:24

"I loved you guys yesterday here in Porto Alegre. And I'm really sorry about the people being obnoxious and making it harder for you guys to perform. As someone who went there to appreciate good music and talented performers, I got pissed off a few times with my fellow "porto-alegrenses" myself. It really ruins the mood when you are trying to listen to you sing when a guy behind you is trying to sing along, but completely off tone and almost as loud as the speaker system. ¬¬ I hope that you remember us as nice lovers of music ones, and not as the few drunken-annoying-mood-ruining ones. The camera crew was really unprofessional to us as well. Hope that you come back in a not-so-far future! Cheers!"

Alexandre (Brazil) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 21:31

"LOL Anneke, you made my laugh with the Taxi story.. south american taxi drives can be rough sometimes.. poor you guys. I hope you have a great gig tonight and that the peepz is a lil bit more quiet. they should enjoy your voice, danny's music.. i think thats why everyone in buenos aires (including me) hold our breaths even tho we wanted to sing out loud!! Farewell to your lovely pink lady.. im sure it left this world as a happy one.. :) She served for a great porpouse ;-) you should have put it on ebay tho :P Ana ;-)"

Annity (Argentina) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 21:36

"Hi Anni... I'm so sorry for the weird day that you had last night here in Porto Alegre. We were loud, I know, but it was pure emotion to have you in front of us only a few meters of distance. I couldn't believe that I touched your hand on the begining of the concert, amazing, I could touch a legend of the music. By the way, it was a great concert, the best for me. Thanks for coming to Porto Alegre, and We are expecting you again. You are so kind and lovely. I tried to find you after the concert to take a picture, but they told me you had already left. I don't mind, I had a great day yesterday. Hey, tell danny to be more kind to the audience, ok? He was so rude sometimes, it seemed that he was going to come to us to hit my friends and me. Kisses. Guilherme"

Guilherme_Brazil (Brazil) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 21:45

"Heeeyyy!! Dear Annie!! Really, there are so many people who are very sorry for all the crazy (mostly drunk, I believe) guys in the crowd yesterday. Not very welcoming for sure.. =/ However, we all want you to know we're very glad you guys came and played as amazingly as you did!! I actually never expected I would ever be in one of your concerts, so I'm certainly really happy! Hope you'll be back here some time soon! Remember the smiling faces!!! (like mine on the second row at your left) hehe Hope you'll have fun in the rest of your tour!! Love you <333 xoxoxoxoxo"

giugiu (Brazil) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 22:17

"... I feel very privileged to have met "the pink lady" in person when you leave the hotel in Santiago... You two made a nice couple!! Others "pink ladies" will come!!... Thanx for all again Annie!! Kisses for you!!! XxXx"

Naldover (Chile) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 22:30

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Anneke!! you're a crazy girl you know? ...XD. I'm laughing out loud after reading about your taxi adventure ...XP. Here in my town, we had those "suspicious" taxi too, and I always got nervous when I have to travel on one of them... those cars are really scary, and as you've said, many of them look like as if they've been just bombed away by the entire army...XD. I'm really sorry about lovely suitcase!!! but you'll find a new shiny one to share your tours with, maybe not as pinky as this one, but clearly as good!! hehe... :-) . I'm very glad to read that you had a nice time with your fans in Brazil, they're truly loud and positive people, that's why they've screamed so much: not as a disrespect towards your music, but as a love demostration. And I agree with you: that show in Argentina was almost sacred (but I'm still wating to hear "Yalin" and "In Motion #1" live, at least once, you know? ... XD). Take care and keep having fun Anekke, your fans in Buenos Aires are already missing you... :-("

80XxbelialxX08 (Argentina) Friday, June 4th 2010 at 22:50

"i'm starting to miss you,you had a god side with the story about your taxi, but i know that you are fine, is very difficult when someone wants call the attention stay ridiculous, but doesn't matter annie, i still feeling your magic presence when we met THE BIGGEST KISSES FOR YOU!!!"

cristian_j (Argentina) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 00:08

"Annie!! You've made my most special day in life! The gig yesterday was amazing even though some jerks were disturbing us... I was carrying some cd covers for you to autograph, but unfortunately I didn't have the chance. You are so kind and your smile is divine!!! I'm looking foward to see you again! For now I'm missing you so much. I would appreciate if you came along just to say hi in my e-mail."

BrunoDC (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 02:51

"Hi Annie! I'm really sad that you guys had such a bad experience in Porto Alegre,specially about the morons in the audience. But I really hope you don't create a never-changing bad opinion about the place just because of a small group of people. Porto Alegre is a lovely city and usually very calm. It's normally know for being less "chaotic" the São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro. You know, people who travels a lot sometimes tend to have bad experiences in some nice places =/ And I can totally understand what you've been through in that taxi. You should see some of our bus's and busdrivers in Rio :P (well...no, actually you shouldn't :P) That's it, can't wait to see you and Danny here on Sunday \o/"

Gisele234 (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 04:02

"Anneke!!!!! I'm the long long blond hair guy that give you a "hand" to wald sown the stage, before the last encore with Danny and that you give a little hand before you leave. Sorry about the drunk guys in the crowd, such a unpolite people.... But let tell you that my girlfriend and I traveled about 300Km to see you, and the gig just worth every little inch of road!!! Blow our mind! my girl gave you a nice little brooch, a pin. She loves you so much!!! Thanks for the awesome show and good tour through Brazil! we really enjoy!!!! Cheers to you and Danny! xoxo"

DouglasVeiga (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 05:10

"Hi Anneke! I Went to The gathering's concert in 2006 (Sao Paulo), of AdA in 2009 (Sao Paulo) and yesterday I saw you and Danny in Porto Alegre. I am a big fan of your work for a long time. I got sad cause you gave more emphasis on the negative points, instead of realizing the excitement and happiness of most people who were there. Many of these people, like me for example, made efforts and long trips to see you two. Others, that lives in Porto Alegre, showed huge respect and admiration. But you highlighted a small part of people who was disrespectful. Danny's atitude (that you did not do mention here) was unfortunate as well, extremely exaggerated, disrespectful and unnecessary. Most of the crowd sang every song with him (and he was pleased with that), they shouted his name in chorus, twice. But Danny started a game with the "rude boy" worsening the situation. Was very unnecessary so rudely. It's a shame that you have not realized the immense love and admiration from the majority. This post, in my opinion, was very frustrating and superficial. "

Milene (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 05:12

"I'm sorry for your Beautiful Bag.... :( (I always loved that picture on the CD) Maybe this means new voayage roads are coming ahead.. :) About restless audiences....You are getting Greater and More Beautiful, by the second!!!! Tha IS a lot to take in, Annie, and some people just can't deal with it calmly...It's true. I wish for You and Danny the BEST days to come with warm, peaceful & inspireing concerts! Stars Love You . . . .!!!"

andromeda (Mexico) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 08:42

"I feel sorry for the "little mess" that awaited you in Sao Paulo! But well, just like you said, at least it was fun after all huh?! As for the cab, omg, I'm just trying to picture the scene in my head... must've been quite an adventure haha Hope today's results are better and can't wait, once more, to see you tomorrow at Estrela da Lapa, I'll be the photographer around "da house"! Oh, and my condolences for the Pink Lady btw. ;("

Alessandra_Tolc (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 17:35

"*oops, just to correct what I said previously, I meant in Porto Alegre - Sao Paulo is today, duh for me. xD"

Alessandra_Tolc (Brazil) Saturday, June 5th 2010 at 17:40

"Hello, Anneke! I would like to thank you for coming to Porto Alegre and performing a so wonderful show along with Danny. I'm really ashamed that the crowd was not so polite as expected, but i guess people here is not used to acoustic shows. Most of what comes here is plugged and very loud. Your voice is amazingly beautiful and you were very warm to the audience! Here are a few pictures i made of you at Revolution Music Pub, If you like them, feel free to copy. See ya! :) "

Juliana (Brazil) Tuesday, June 8th 2010 at 20:33

"HAHAHA, god, Annie, I'm laughing out loud because of the suitcase story [and the cab's one as well!] You're so amusing! :)"

mary (Brazil) Wednesday, June 9th 2010 at 01:19

"Annie, I'm very sorry about "the pink lady"... ;o( well i guess now is in heaven..."

MiguelBenavidesChavez (Mexico) Friday, June 18th 2010 at 18:21

"Hadn't I read Anneke's comment on those annoying drukies, I wouldn't have noticed a thing! The official recorded performance of "the blower's daughter" at that gig, is included in my list of favourite videos at youtube...Gosh, what a professionalism and a temper, too!"

koutshmaria (Greece) Monday, January 10th 2011 at 22:29

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