Posted 24 June 2004

Norah's UK/Europe/Scandanavia tour began 9 April. Here we are, 10 weeks later, with the end of our European tour is just three days away, and I've written diddly squat here on the NEWS page. Check the archive and you'll see I used to be a dog for the blog. Nowadays — I don't know what to tell you. It's not that I haven't been having lots of adventures. I guess I've simply felt less inclined to sit down with my laptop and write about them. Mabye it's the spring weather? I long to get outside and enjoy our field trips, and don't feel up to writing the report. I'd rather get involved in the next field trip, and the next, and the next. You know?

Still, I can't let this tour end without one more posting, so here we are. Once again, I'll let the pictures do most of the talking. I must fess up, though: Many of the following pix were not shot by me. I borrowed/stole/appropriated them from other band and crew peeps. How's that for a lame disclaimer?

This is Amos Lee, the opening act on Norah's tour. He's really, really, really good, and full o' soul. He'll be recording a CD for Blue Note this summer, produced by Lee Alexander (of Norah Jones' Handsome Band).
This is Lee Moro, our "front-of-house" sound engineer. He makes Norah and the band sound good. (Thank you, Lee Moro.) In 2002, we opened for Prince; after the show, one of the first things Prince said to us was how great our mix was. Thank you, Lee Moro. Earlier this week, the band TOTO came to see our show in Copenhagen, Denmark; after the show, one of the first things they said to us was how great our mix was. Thank you, Lee Moro. Though they have different aesthetics, both Prince and the guys from TOTO are serious about sound quality. Who do they love? Sing it with me now — Thank you, Lee Moro! All right, now just the ladies, sing it....
Like I said, (above), the band TOTO dropped by to check out our show in Copenhagen. I'm glad I didn't know this until after the show, or I would have been a nervous nellie. [Left to right: Mike Sponarski (Norah's tour manager), Bobby Kimball, Tony Spinner (Toto 2nd guitar and vocals), Steve Lukather (TOTO guitarist), Robbie McIntosh (Norah's other guitarist), me, Greg Phillinganes (keyboards, subbing for David Paich).]
This is me, alone at soundcheck. I showed up early — once. Here is proof. Okay, I admit this shot could be me arriving so late that the rest of the band has already finished and gone. But it's not! I. Was. Early. To. Soundcheck. Once.
Football is huge in Europe, and there have been many big matches going on during the past few weeks of our tour. While we were in Holland, we got the spirit. Here tour manager Mike Sponarski and Norah show their colors.
This is Norah & the band at full-tilt boogie, from the p.o.v. of our patented "usher cam."

In a Zurich hotel, too rainy outside to go wandering, bored witless, I discovered that my bathroom had an infrared light in it. It seemed very interesting at the time. So interesting, in fact, that I shot myself.
Self portrature is not the only way to pass the time, of course. There's always.... limbo! A push broom can be easily substituted for a regulation limbo pole. The limbomaniac pictured here is Russ Wilson, our stage monitor engineer. He's the one who makes the music sound good for us. You dig? Thank you, Russ Wilson. Once more, with feeling — thank you, Russ Wilson!
Still bored? Okay — how about a cigarette? Idle lungs are the Devil's playground.
Still suffering from tour-induced ennui? Failing all else, there's always the Ice Bar (Stockholm, Sweden). No clever wordplay here. The Ice Bar is exactly that: a bar made of ice. Even the drink "glasses" are ice. Here lighting tech Tavi Black and backline tech Kelly Macaulay — decked out in heavy weather gear (supplied by the bar) — enjoy refreshing beverages.
 
Currently spinning in my iPod:

    1. Dayna Kurtz — Beautiful Yesterday
    2. Selecter — Acoustic
    3. Taj Mahal — Blues with a Feeling/The Very Best of Taj Mahal
    4. Eric Gale — Forecast
    5. B.B. King — Do the Boogie!/B.B. King's Early '50s Classics
    6. Larry Goldings — Sweet Science
    7. Ray Charles — The Best of Ray Charles: The Atlantic Years
    8. PJ Harvey — Uh Huh Her
    9. Fastball — Keep Your Wig On
    10. Munir Bashir — The Art of the Ud

Posted 22 June 2004
Well, kids, what can I tell ya? A month has gone by, and I've been dead quiet here on the NEWS page. In that time, Norah and the band have been all over western Europe, touring our little butts off. We haven't had much time to get out and explore the cities we've played in, because the pacing of this tour is so quick and dense. Still, there have been sweet moments throughout. We've been blessed with beautiful sights, yummy food, even yummier wine, and an abundance of kind (and cute!) people. Highlights from the past week or so: a kick-ass hike to the tip-top of Zurich; all three of our German shows — Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Berlin — where fans lit sparklers (yay!) during Norah's best-loved songs; a spa attached to the venue in Berlin; also in Berlin, the onstage celebration of the birthday of our opening act Amos Lee; disarmingly good Korean food in Düsseldorf, and equally delicious and anomalous Mexican food in Copenhagen; also in Copenhagen, a smokin' jazz trio busking in near the waterfront — Norah and I heard them while lunching at cafe, and like them so much we followed (stalked?) them when they moved to another cafe nearby, and then again to yet another cafe. We're in the time of summer solistice now, and up so far north. The days here are l-o-n-g, and the early-evening light is beyond my powers of verbal depiction. Next stop: Stockholm, even farther north.

Posted 23 May 2004
Starting a new News page once again. My previous page spanned nearly a year, so it's definitely time to make a fresh start. What's the news, then? Well. I'm touring Europe with Norah Jones & the Handsome Band. This is our second trip to Europe this year. The earlier one, in March, was a quickie, just for promotional appearances. Mostly TV talk and variety shows. Now we're not doing promo, it's just concerts, concerts, and more concerts. This concert tour is about 11 weeks long. We started with two weeks in the UK, and have been all over Europe since, moving at a quick clip. I'll let these snapshots tell the tales....

One of our first stops was in Nottingham, England. You know, Nottingham. That fabled town of the Robin Hood story. Here's some of the band and crew piled onto the town's big bronze statue of Robin Hood.
This is another photo from Nottingham. It is little known that our bassist Lee Alexander is also a gifted painter. Here, he unveils his latest work — a drumhead, emblazoned with a pastoral Colorado scene. Our drummer Andrew was born and raised in Colorado, you see. Andrew is clearly pleased!
 
We have our own catering team (a twosome) along with us on tour. They feed us all sorts of yummy stuff each day, always using the freshest ingredients available in each new city. In the UK, our caterers used potatoes especially cultivated for musicians. Unfortunately no "tour" potatoes were available, but the "record" potatoes were mighty tasty.
Here I am with our guitar tech Kelly Macaulay, near the Italian-Austrian border, having a technical discussion: "Okay, Kelly, every night when I come out on stage I want to see my amplifier surrounded by a wreath of fresh lilacs. Got it?!?"
In Milan, Italy, the venue provided some water that was really my style. Levissima, baby.
The Milan venue also provided the requisite chips & salsa for backstage snacking. Uncle Ben's salsa. Uncle Ben's salsa? I didn't know that old Ben had diversified so. Can you get this in the States? I've never seen it — not that I was looking. I must confess, though, it was very tasty. Uncle Ben made a convert of me. (There's a joke in there somewhere.)
 
We have a new second guitarist on board now, the esteemed Robbie McIntosh. He plays like a blessed demon. I asked him to show me some of his cool licks, and he said sure he would. But he plays so damn fast, I couldn't make any sense of what he was playing.
Here Robbie slows things down a bit, for my benefit. Thanks, Robbie.
After an unfortunate incident in a Bologna hotel, I decided to hire my own full-time security guard. His name is Luca Gorilla. If you meet him, do not mess with him. And do not feed him. Anyway, this reminds me of one of Robbie's favorite jokes. Q: What do you call a gorilla with a banana in each ear? A: Anything you like — he can't hear you! (Robbie told me this joke once at normal speed, and once more at half-speed so I could transcribe it. I hope I got the phrasing right.)
In several cities, they've given us the lighters treatment for Norah's signature ballads, "Don't Know Why" and "Come Away with Me." No punch line here. I just think it's incredibly sweet. We'd never gotten the lighter treatment before this tour. This shot is from Salzburg, Austria.

We currently have an 11-day mid-tour break, and we've all gone our separate ways. I'm in Barcelona, doing nothing in particular until our tour resumes in Paris next week.

My iPod is working overtime lately. Here's some of the things I've been listening to, in no particular order:

Oh, hey, I almost forgot — here's some actual news. In the brief time off we have this summer, I'm working on three CDs: 1) a new disc of my own, with my Buttermilk Junior band (Brannen Temple on drums, Red Young on organ); producing a CD for the Hot Club of San Francisco; and making a guest appearance on the Blue Note debut of Amos Lee. Too soon to say when any of these discs will be available, but check back here for details. Eventually....

To read postings from the archives, please click here.