I had the opportunity to see Lee at the "Romerike Blues & Roots Festival" outside of Oslo in Norway on June 21. Here comes a short summary

Me and a friend arrived in Oslo in the evening of June 20, after a 7 hour drive from Sweden. Checked in at the hotel, had a quick shower and went out to grab some food, we eventually ended up at TGI Friday's. (Over US$ 25 for a BLT Sandwich with fries and a beer. Norway is f***ing expensive I can tell you that for sure. How about US$ 8 for a meal at Burger King!!!) Then back to the hotel for a good nights sleep (at least that's what I thought, I hadn't counted on that the room had turned into a sauna!! It was HOT as hell in there.) I finally fell asleep due to pure exhaustion.

The next day we went out to check out the city, and maybe do some shopping. It ended up with me walking around half of Oslo to find a internet café, were I could check my e-mails. After that we went out to the festival (located 15 min with car from central Oslo) Finally there I went to the entrance to see if I were on the guestlist. -"There's NO guestlist here" I was told. -"You have to go to the Press entrance on the other side of the festival area". So there I was stumbling across a big field getting to the other side (No not that other side!... the other side of the festival thankfully ;-) ) Finally there, I was informed that my name was not on the guest list [SIC]. Fortunately did I have the tourmanagers phone number (but then I discovered that my cellphone didn't work, even though I'd been insured that it should work in Norway. AAARGHHH!!!) Finally I managed to get hold of the tourmanager and explained my situation. 30 minutes later we were inside [Big thanks to Bernie & the guy at the entrance who borrowed me his phone]. Finally inside we thought that we should take a quick check of the area, only to find out that we were almost alone in there (they had only managed to sell 1 500 tickets in advance to a festival that had room for 20 000) We checked so that there hadn't been any major changes in the schedule and went back to Oslo. Lee weren't supposed to be on stage for almost 7 hours and there wasn't really any other band that were of interest to me.

5 hours later we were back at the festival (after the US$ 8 Burger King meal, US$ 9 for 3 hours parking and a refreshing shower). First we went to the main stage to catch the last song from Manfred Manns Earth Band ("The Mighty Quinn" is probably the only song I recognise from these guys, even though I saw them back in 1991 when Lee opened for them on her German tour) by now there was a few more people there probaly around 6 000 (I've heard they sold around 8000 tickets for the two days of festival). We then went down to the stage were Lee were supposed to be on stage in about 2 hours. There was another band doing their soundcheck and no Lee in sight so I thought let's go back to the main stage to check out Slade, that were about to enter the stage in 15 minutes or so.

But just as were about to leave I see this guy in a shiny suit. -"Isn't that Johnny Ferreira?" I thought to myself. -"Let's go and ask him" is all I had time to think before a van pulls up and out steps Lee (as beautiful as ever)....
I walked up to Lee and introduced myself and after a few phrases I got invited to the luxurious [not really] backstage area. Where I [nervous as hell] tried to have an conversation with Lee only to be outdrowned by the loud music from the stage, we ended up shouting in each others ears (not the perfect way to try to talk to someone). Anyways Lee signed my Lee Aaron record collection [Thanks a million Lee, I hope you didn't end up with cramp in your arm]. A funny side note is that when one of the guys that worked backstage saw my Lee Aaron collection he looked at Lee and said with surprise: - "Are you famous?" LOL
Then after some delay it was finally show time (they had to shorten their set to 50 minutes. AAARGHHH!!!) Lee was sharing vocals with Johnny & Katya singing both lead and backup on Johnny's songs, in the middle of the set she did two songs from her "Slick Chick" cd, "Why Don't You Do Right" and "Teach Me Tonight" (The best part of the show... off course :) ). Her voice was fantastic as always. I liked the show, even though it wasn't the perfect settings for a good show (in front of 100 drunken Norwegians in a large tent at 2.15 in the morning) If I could choose myself I would like to see her with her own band in a Jazz club playing a full set. Let's hope for that the next time (Lee said that she was hoping to come back to Europe next year, for a tour of her own)

After the show I went backstage to talk a bit more with Lee. She was a little stressed as they were leaving directly for the airport. Anyways I had time to give Lee a couple of cd's that I bought her for her birthday [Hope you liked them?]. She seemed very happy about them and I got a hug [Yeeeeessss ;) ] Then she had to leave. So I wished her good luck on the rest of the tour, and went out in the cold Norwegian night to go back to the hotel for a few hours sleep.

The following morning after 5 hours of sleep we had to go back home. On the way home we made a stop at Tusenfryd amusement park just outside Oslo, to try their new wooden rollercoaster ["Among the best in the world" according to some sources] I don't know about that, haven't been on that many. But probably the best one I've ever tried. Check it out if you're in the area, and if you're not as chicken as my friend who didn't even dare to try it. Chicken, Chicken, Chicken... ;-)



Note: About 3 weeks later I had the opportunity to see the band live again in Weinheim/Germany. And I can tell you that they were a completely "new" band compared to the Oslo show, they were kickin' some serious ass in Germany I can tell you that. They were playing for a much larger and not drunk out of their heads audience this time around (an audience that was actually aware that there was a band on stage), maybe that had something to do with it.



The photos didn't turn out that good i'm afraid. But here they are anyway...








Planned setlist. But as they had to shorten the set due to delays they had to skip a few songs.

SETLIST(Lead Vocal)

FUNK (instrumental)
OBDACIOUS (Johnny)
BOOGIE AT MIDNIGHT (Johnny)/IN THE MOOD (Lee/Katya)
DOO WHA DADDY (Lee/Katya)
YOU'VE GOT WHAT IT TAKES (Johnny/Lee)
WHY DON'T YA DO RIGHT (Lee)
TEACH ME TONIGHT (Lee)
MEXICO (Johnny)
SLOW & EASY (Katya)
GOOD ROCKIN' DADDY (Lee)
MEAN WOMAN (Johnny)


PLAYERS

JOHNNY FERREIRA (Sax/Vocals)
LEE AARON(Vocals)
KATYA GORRIE (Vocals)
GREG DEMCHUCK (Guitar)
ELMAR SPANIER (Bass)
MARCO IBARRA (Drums)
VINCE MAI (Trumpet/Piano)
BRIAN HARDING (Trombone)
?? (Trumpet??)



Good Rockin' Daddy (live)

Big thanks to: Lee Aaron, Johnny Ferreira & The Swing Machine, Tom Dertinger (Lee's manager), Bernie Z (tour manager)