Ooook, I should have written this a while ago, buuuuut... I didn't, 'cos I'm slow as usual
Went to see W.A.S.P. again on October 31st and November 1st in Treviso and Milan
the trip to reach Treviso was quite long and tiring (FIVE. TRAINS. AND. A. BUS.
), but it was well worth it.
On the first night, we had two opening bands, Rain and Shadowside. I already knew about Rain, they're an italian band which is quite famous here, but I never heard any of their songs, before... they rock!
As for Shadowside... well, they're good and the female singer has one hell of a voice
(and I fell in love with the bassist ), but I'm sorry to admit that they lack a lot of charisma
having them playing between Rain and W.A.S.P., who both know how to rock out even on very small stages like the one they had, put them in even bigger disadvantage. I've seen many people looking at the poor guys with pure blank faces, clearly bored and waiting for W.A.S.P. to come on stage. I'll admit that I felt really sorry for them.
Luckily, things went better for them on the second day, where the crowd was more... "alive"
Soooo... after Shadowside and a wait of about half a hour, we finally got W.A.S.P. on stage
the guys looked a bit tired, but I still loved the show. I was in the front row, really near to Doug Blair (I mean, I was so close I literally risked to to hit the strings of his guitar everytime I raised my hand
) and had a lot of fun when both Doug and Mike Duda were making silly faces looking at me (I guess I had my usual "feel-like-I'm-in-Heaven" kind of smile, instead).
I took very few pictures, but I'd dare to say they came out pretty good
here they are:
...did I say I was close to Doug?
I swear someday I'll be able to take a decent picture of you, Mickey this surely isn't 
I love this one, but...
...I love this even more 
After the show, me and Federica, the girl who came to see W.A.S.P. with me, went to the other side of the club, near to the tour bus, to see if the band was coming out.
Well... they did!
The first one we saw was Mike Duda. Now, I always said that Mike Duda reminds me of my uncle, same hair and same smile. And, in effect, when I saw him walking around the bus I was like "oh, look at that guy, he could be the clone of my uncl... HELL, THAT'S MIKE!!!"
However, we could just say hello. He was available to take pictures with fans, but... by the time I found my camera, he was gone
Damn my stupid bag.
Later, Doug Blair came out too. I think that Doug now must consider me as a sort of "hello-woman": everytime W.A.S.P. play a show in Italy, he sees me popping out of nowhere, saying "hello" with this huge smile on my face
didn't ask for autographs, as that night I wasn't really seeking for any, I just wanted to meet them and see if there was any chance to give Blackie the portrait I made for him... yeah, the one I already brought with me at Wacken
The portrait. I spent countless days in paranoia, 'cos I don't really like the way his eyes turned out. However, since I had already re-drawn them a lot of times, trying to use the rubber on the paper once again was a huge risk, so I left it as it was. Oh, the scanner obviously fucked up some details and contrasts. 
After half an hour, we noticed a lot of people moving around and following this tall guy with covered face. Yep, Blackie himself. I initially thought he would have been disappearing for a while in the bus before coming out again, but he started the meeting as soon as he entered the bus, instead
In less than two seconds, there was a whole queue of people near to the bus, ready to get autographs. Unfortunately, there wasn't much contact: we could see Blackie signing stuff inside the bus, but it was the roadie to take the items and give them to him.
For some sort of miracle, I could speak a quite decent english and tell to the roadie that I had a present for Blackie. The guy looked a bit shocked at first, lol.
-A present?- he said. I said 'yeah', and he gave it to Blackie. I was a bit saddened when I saw that Blackie apparently didn't even change his expression when receiving the thing first... but I was wrong. Later on, after signing my notebook and giving it back to me, he had a huge smile on his face and said "thank you". I thanked him back and left, feeling really, really happy.
During the first five minutes, I didn't even realized what had just happened. I just came back to my friend Federica and tried to cheer her up, as she was crying after seeing Blackie again. The meeting ended, the tour bus doors closed and I was still feeling absolutely normal.
Then, I had the following sequence of reactions:
*Thinking* "Well, at least if I become a famous artist, Blackie Lawless will be able to say that he has an original drawing of mine"
*Still thinking* "Blackie Lawless has..."
*Bursting out laughing like crazy and shouting, while jumping in the rain* "BLACKIE LAWLESS HAS A DRAWING OF MIIIIIIINEEEEEEEEEE!!!" *all of this right in front of the tour bus, in which Blackie still was
*
...Yeah, I think I managed to look like a perfect fool. The crazy laughter was the best touch, I guess.
The next thing that made me feel really strange was...
the man I admire so much, whom I've always wished to say "thank you" just thanked me.Which, in effect, was about the reason why I wanted to give him the drawing. Being finally able to give him something after receiving so much.
Still, it made me feel strange.
Anyway, I can confirm: he isn't a scary presence at all. Once again, I think he's a very nice person and I love how, even when he's clearly tired as hell, he's able to rock the whole place out even and take some time to meet fans.
The concert on the second day was even better: bigger venue, giant screens on the background and the guys sounded less tired. No pics of the second show, they turned out pretty bad, unfortunately
Soooo... well, I just felt like sharing some reviews/pictures/random fangirl stuff.
Sorry for the long post
11th November 2010, 7:20 pm
)
* Girl, you did it! Ahhh I remember Blackie mentioning some girl that gave a diary about Blackie himself to him once which was written with blood, and he was saying something like 'you know I keep those kind of things, they're precious to me but that proves my words about idol worshipping an all that' 
