- Music
- 24 Nov 08
Ice Work If You Can Get It
Ireland's The Answer have pulled off a major coup by bagging the support slot on the American leg of AC/DC's Black Ice tour. Cormac Neeson talks us through their first fortnight on the road.
October 28
Wachovia Center, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Landing this tour with AC/DC was a real surprise and the best thing that’s happened to The Answer so far. It starts today in Wilkes-Barre – we’ve never heard of it either! – and ends on January 31 in Nashville. Note to self: make sure to buy some cowboy boots. There’s so much to look forward to, not just getting to walk out every night in front of 15,000 people, but playing such famous venues as Madison Square Garden in New York and The Forum in LA. We’re nervous as shit, but then nerves are all part of wanting to play well and get our music across to a new audience.
October 29
Last night turned out to be a great start to the tour. We didn’t have a single beer bottle thrown at us! Ten minutes before we went on Brian Johnson and Cliff Williams stopped by our dressing room to tell us how delighted they are to have us onboard and wish us all the best. They were as nervous as we were, starting their first tour for seven years. Our nerves turned to adrenalin as soon as we hit the stage. It was a real buzz playing to AC/DC fans who were willing to listen to music they hadn’t heard before. They finished with ‘Whole Lotta Rosie’, ‘Let There Be Rock’, ‘Highway To Hell’ and ‘For Those About To Rock’, which has to be one of the greatest climaxes to a show ever!
October 30
We were all a bit shook when we hit a deer on the road from Wilkes-Barre to Chicago. The deer died and the bus was damaged, but we only got a few bruises. We had time to look around Chicago and visit the record stores and a few bars downtown, including Buddy Guy’s place which was really cool. We’re going to write him a letter and see if he’ll open a branch in Downpatrick.
October 31
We had Halloween off in Chicago and went to see Kings Of Leon. There are two things it’s hard to escape from here, the election and sport. We’ve hardly seen any posters for McCain. It’s all Obama. You go into most bars and there could be several TV sets with sports on, so we’ve been watching a lot of that too. I’m a Liverpool fan myself, so it feels like Christmas at the moment.
November 1
Allstate Arena, Chicago
We did our first Rolling Stone photo shoot before the show, which was one of those ‘pinch me am I dreaming?’ moments.
November 2
We went to Soldier Field for our first American Football game between the Chicago Bears and the Detroit Lions. The stadium’s like Croke Park minus Hill 16. Our crewmen Trey and Van Buren explained the rules. The Bears came from behind to win 27-23 and we had a great day.
November 3
Conseco Fieldhouse, Indianapolis
There’s a trap-door on stage for Angus to come through and I’ve spotted Brian there several times listening to us. It’s a bit unnerving, but nice too! Our set is a mix of songs from our first album Rise and the next one Everyday Demons, which is a bit more edgy and going down really well.
November 4
We watch the election results on the tour bus. We’re all Obama fans, and I think most music people wanted him to win. It’ll be great to tell the grandchildren that I was in the USA when the first black man was elected president. It felt like a truly historic moment.
November 5
Palace Of Auburn Hills, Michigan
We had a good chat with Angus and Malcolm Young today. They’re really down-to-earth. We’ve been talking to Brian quite a bit as well. This tour is generally a day on/day off, so we can do a little partying but not too much, maybe a few beers. With 38 gigs still to go, we’ll save the real bad behaviour ‘til nearer the end.
November 10
Rogers Centre, Toronto
AC/DC’s show really is amazing – they have this big smoking train engine sticking out above the drums, which gets replaced by a super-sized, busty inflatable woman for ‘Whole Lotta Rosie’. They’ve also got the giant bell, which Brian hangs off at one point, and the cannons at the end which are insanely loud.
November 11
Banknorth Garden, Boston
We’re learning so much about stagecraft from watching AC/DC, like we did last year when we toured with the Stones. Angus is a complete fucking legend – he did a solo tonight that lasted for about seven minutes, and the excitement level didn’t dip once. The AC/DC crew have done ten or eleven tours and they reckon there’s never as many people in to see the support act as there is for The Answer, and the reaction we get is better than any of them. At the start of our gig everybody’s sitting down very polite, but before long they’re on their feet clapping along. We couldn’t ask for more.
