Joey Lindstrom's Trip To The UK To See
The 1996 "Premier Tour"
On March 18th 1996, I went to the Calgary International Airport and boarded Canadian Airlines flight 096 bound for Heathrow Airport in London. The mission: to spend 4 weeks in the UK, visiting family, seeing the sights, and to make my personal Pilgrimage To Mecca: namely, to see Gary Numan perform live in concert. This is the first time I've seen him live since the Teletour (in 1980), which finished up at the Max Bell Arena here in Calgary. That show was instrumental in converting me from a casual fan to a genuine, committed Numanoid.
My adventure began late in 1995. Several email messages back and forth between Matthew Holbrook and myself resulted in our agreeing to sign up together for the "Numanoids On Tour" coach tour. Matthew (bless his soul) handled all the arrangements in the UK and generally did all the footwork in getting it all together. My cost (apart from actually flying over and whatnot) was £320 (about $720 CDN) - this gives me tickets to the final six shows on the Premier Tour, plus luxurious coach transportation between each gig, plus half of a twin hotel room (shared with Matthew), and capped off with breakfast each morning. Considering the fact that I'm there to see Gary live, I'd have been happy if they'd only provided a motorcycle, a heating grate to sleep on, and an Egg McMuffin in the morning! The value-for-money ratio was unbelievably good.
| How I Spent My Vacation (& $5000) | |
|---|---|
| Before The Tour | Getting Re-Acquainted With England |
| Show #10 | The Southampton Guild Hall |
| Show #11 | The Guildford Civic Hall |
| Show #12 | The Birmingham Town Hall |
| Show #13 | The Manchester Labatt's Apollo |
| Show #14 | The Milton Keynes Woughton Centre |
| Show #15 | The Labatt's Hammersmith Apollo In London |
| After The Tour | A Week To Decompress... |
| Snap, Snap | I Took A Few Pictures While I Was There... |
Please Note: The above stories labelled "Show #10" through "Show #15" were written either the night of the show or the following afternoon, using Matthew Holbrook's portable 'puter loaded with WordPerfect. Although some minor editing and corrections have been performed, they're essentially presented AS I WROTE THEM while on the scene. My apologies if they're a tad incoherent in places. :-) If you'd like to see the complete, original, unedited text, they are available in raw text format.
