What a fantastic way to start a year, I fly to New York on my way to Tokyo to have meetings with the bands agent and travel agency. The band go to France to shoot another video. Little do I know at this time that being so honest will get the band out of trouble, even though a lot of damage is caused.....
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A photo of myself and Matt Jeatt, our stage manager taking in a local restaurant for some lunch or dinner. The shows were so early still in 1984 that you could finish the show and go out to dinner by 9.30pm. To this day I absolutely LOVE Japanese food. It is just blissful to be in Japan, and try a different plate of food everyday.
It was on this tour that I started thinking about bringing sushi to London, and Kaz and I formed a partnership to create a sushi kitchen in Highgate. If we had got it off the ground Yo Sushi might well be called something different in London, that's for sure....
This time we're coming to Japan with UDO Artists as our promoter. Our agent, Rob Hallett has changed promoter and it's nice to see Mr Udo again. I have worked with him and his team several times already.
Another person very important to the band is my dear friend Kaz Utsonomiya. Kaz lives in London but is in Japan as much as he is in London. In London I see Kaz maybe once or twice a month, we go for long japanese dinners and discuss the music business and the worlds' problems in general. Anyway Kaz has created a great position for himself as the PR guru to Western bands and Japanese promoters and record companies.
He is getting the bands to perform at TV stations and radio stations too, it all helps to sell the concerts and the records. I bet he probably had a hand in this great TV advert for Suntory Whisky that is in a YouTube clip on the page too.
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Here is Tommy our trusty production manager in Tokyo. Tommy can organise anything, there is nothing that is impossible and UDO Artists are very fortunate to have his skills. I know Mr Udo was very proud to have him on his team.
One evening I ventured out of my hotel and started walking down the street. it wasn't long before I came across a couple of 'tents' in the side of the road. These tents had several people inside huddled around a mini kitchen, and it was my first experience of takeaway Japanese street style. I just loved it, freshly cooked, I'll recommend them to anyone.
BJ just worn out from all that shopping!! xx ha ha I've found some great footage of her and Charmaine performing in the US but live footage of the band in Japan on this tour seems a little scarce. Any pointers most welcome.
I can't remember what the juice held here by JT was called, but not unusually the word had a completely different context to the way we understood English.
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We were to have quite an episode from John whilst in Tokyo. His new girlfriend Janine was also in Japan on a modelling assignment but in a different city. John got rather hot and bothered about the distance he was from her and he ended up arguing over the phone a little bit to much. We stopped him from going to see her by overnight driving and I got woken up about 2am by Andy and asked to come round to John's room as soon as possible.....
I loved the fans too, they were so polite and patient, and they were EVERYWHERE..... Whether we were on a train station, on a train, in cars, at airports, they would follow us in taxis, by foot, everywhere. Amazing stuff.
Here is the front cover to the tour schedule at the beginning of this year, typed up I believe by the management before we broke up for Christmas at the end of 1983.
I flew to NYC on my way to Tokyo at the beginning of the year and was skipping between ITB, Wayne Forte's office, our trusty US agent, and with Brooks Ogden my super travel agent and dear friend.
Now Brooks had recently formed her own company, Modern Travel, and I asked her if she'd like to be my agent for this up and coming US tour in '84. She accepted and we had a blast, but as usual I'm getting ahead of myself. Check out the Itinerary for Japan in the gallery above.
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