TOUR1998
Facing the animal...
It was a bit of a surprise when Yngwie called me up in early ’97.
We had met after his show - at Gino/Stockholm - a couple of months earlier. He was a fan of Abstrakt Algebra and also an old friend of Leif Edling’s.
I flew to Miami in february to start writing songs.
Because of the jetlag, I woke up early every morning with a 12-year old’s energy and Jerry Springer on the tv, a new sensation...
I wrote lyrics like crazy every morning&night at the hotel, during the days I was at Y’s home/studio working with melody lines and recording demos. Y had ideas on one tape, that were more riffs than complete songs - I particularily liked a slower,groovier on the tape.
A week later I was on vacation up north in Sweden with my girlfriend, listening to the tape. Next time in Miami, I showed Y ”Facing The Animal”. We recorded it together with a number of other songs for the preproduction demo.
I also brought a song I’d written and recorded myself, Y recorded a solo for it and I thought it might end up on the album - yea right...
It was written with Cozy in mind since he was to play drums on the album. I’ve always been a big fan of the four first Rainbow albums, this song had a bit of that epic touch to it. I soon understood it was an impossible mission to have one of my songs on Y’s album, no matter the other guys’ support.
I fought hard to get ”Facing...” recorded during rehearsals, noone really seemed to care for that song at the time.
Chris Tsangrides (producer) wasn’t really that keen either, but eventually it was at least recorded.
I was pretty surprised later when I found out that ”Facing...” was to be the title track and possible single for the album...
The first time me & Y played that song together, was live on swedish TV 3 during the promotion for the album (a talkshow called ”Adam”).
We were told it would be playback, but arriving at the studio we soon understood they expected us to perform it live with the studio band...
It went ok, I think the guys thought it was a bit cool to play with Y.
The drummer Micke Syd normally played with ”Gyllene Tider”, fronted by Roxette’s Per Gessle.
Around this time, we also made two promovideos (total crap...) in New Jersey for the two ballads on the album (for the asian market).
FTA was supposed to be released in the fall of ’97, but the financial markets in southeast Asia went mayhem and therefore Pony Canyon pushed the release date forward about six months. This would have it’s consequences...
The band started rehearsals in March ’98 for the tour, I’d join a week later. Still in Sweden, I got a call from Peter Rooth (guitar tech, tour manager) regarding Cozy. He’d hurt himself in a motorbike accident prior to rehearsals and didn’t feel fit enough to do 2 hour shows every night - a huge disappointment of course. I’d been looking forward to play some Rainbow songs live with him and the band.
Peter spoke to Jonas Östman, I hooked up with him and gave him demos to listen to on his flight to Miami.
Cozy’s drum tech Eddie still joined the tour. After 5 warm up shows in the US, we flew to Japan for 14 shows in 19 days. Originally we were to play around 20 shows, but because of the financial situation in Japan and Cozy not being in the band, some shows were canceled.
The day of the third show (Tokyo), Eddie received the news about Cozy’s death. He died in a car accident.
Went to a bar after the show, pretty emotional.
Cozy was one of the nicest and most down to earth guys I’ve met.
The first time we met in a hotel lobby in Miami, he introduced himself and bought me a strawberry daquiri. The next following week we hanged by the pool discussing soccer teams and I was all ears listening to old Rainbow and Whitesnake stories from the past. We never got to tour together, but I got to meet him and rehearse with him - that’s a great memory.
After Japan we had a couple of days off in New York before playing six shows in Argentina and Brasil. In Brasil we recorded the live album with Jeff Glixman engineering. We had a week off at home before the european tour that started in Greece and ended at Bospop in Holland.
We were second on the bill at Bospop, Van Halen headlining.
Many of us looked forward to seeing/meeting Van Halen, but Alex van Halen got injured a couple of days earlier-Status Quo replaced them...
Ninety percent of the crowd returned their tickets (can’t blame them), so we played for 1000 people instead of 10.000. Scheiße.
The second leg of the european tour never happened, and neither a proper US tour. Even though FTA received Y’s best reviews in years, the record sales weren’t enough to support the whole world tour.
The record sales in general in Japan, went down with 30-40% during this time and Japan is Y’s strongest market. I think we sold about 130.000 copies in Japan.
After redoing backing vocals + a couple of lead lines in Miami (summer ’98), I went back home to relax and play with Southpaw.
Playing with Yngwie had it’s ups and downs, but it was a good experience. We met up last summer at the Sweden Rock Festival, he was in great shape and so was his playing. We’re still good friends and who knows, maybe we can do some kind of collaboration in the future.
Almost forgot, except the first gig at Hard Rock Café on Y’s birthday in ’97, we played one show at Anchor in Stockholm (1999) when Y was promoting ”Alchemy”. With Marcel Jacob on bass and Peppe on drums, we played a combination of old Yngwie stuff and covers - my last show with the animal.
DATA
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★ Year
1997-1998
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★ Records
2
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★ Shows
50
BANDMEMBERS
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★ Yngwie Malmsteen
guitar
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★ Barry Dunnaway
bass
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★ Mats Olausson
keyboard
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★ Cozy Powell
Jonas Östman
drums
LIVEFAVOURITES
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★ Rising Force
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★ Facing The Animal
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★ You Don’t Remember
© Uzi G. MMVI
From left: Steff Granström in Miami with Yngwie, Mats Olausson and Peter Rooth.
