BLAZE BAYLEY (ex-IRON MAIDEN, WOLFSBANE) sees his MySpace page updated with the following:

"So here we are in Italia...

The Tour That Will Not Die, European Tour, started on 25 February in Pisa. We had stayed the night at Blaze’s as we had a rehearsal the day before. The primary reason that we needed rehearsal desperately was that David Leonardo Bermudez was waylaid in the UK due to a load of Visa bollocks. What that means is that he is unable to join us until we play Germany. So... Deputy Dave enters the Blaze Bayley story.

Dave Andrews was guitarist with me in Chokehold so we gave him three days to learn to how play bass and to learn the whole one and a half hour set. As it transpired, it is fine. So if you notice that Dave has changed a bit... that is why.

As an aside, Deputy Dave writes film scores as well as playing metal. Visit his website www.two13.com. The film he’s currently working on is called A Day Of Violence. Cool!

So we arrived in Pisa courtesy of the Evil Empire – Ryan Air. In fact, for the first time ever we had a very helpful lady at check-in. Of course we still got absolutely rinsed of cash for extra baggage... but hey ho. The bus driver Bob was on our flight too. A most righteous chap, from Doodlay.

So we crash-landed on Pisa airport pretty much on time and were met by the bus. Francesco, the Tour Manager, was on board and a jolly fine chap he is. Also, the bus came equipped with the ultimate crew — Mini Max from our last Italian jaunt! Gabrielle (that’s what his Mama called him) is doing our sound this time, which is fantastic.

So we headed to a hotel for a day room and then to the gig. The bus stayed at the hotel. It’s a cool bus: 14 bunks, two lounges, etc etc. Anyway, at the gig we hooked up with the support band Ibridoma who are doing all the Italian dates. Nice blokes. We’re using their backline which took a while to settle in.

Anyway, the gig was cool. But I also wanted to see Pisa and the Leaning Tower. But did I? Well, I saw the telegraph pole of Pisa; the radio tower of Pisa; the tower block of Pisa... but nothing leaning. Bastard! Ah well... next time.

We headed overnight to Torino which was another excellent gig. The owner Tony was über cool. Lots of free food and beer and an enthusiastic crowd. The mighty Angelo was there and it was great to see him again. Also Richard from France – hello mate. The set was settling in nicely. And we were all adapting to bus life. Kind of like living in a U-boat – but without depth charges. Which was another thing…I had to finish my latest book about U-boats so was pretty much stuck on the laptop until last night. Finished! Hurrah! Book number ten and the last one on U-boats for a while.

From Torino to Milano...There we met up with the most righteous Dave and Paolo from Mainpain and their excellent other halves. Angelo was there again being extremely useful. Best of all... there was a SHOWER! Yes, we were clean again. Wunderbar!

A few hassles with bus electrics ensued which led to Bob burying himself in the engine bay until solutions presented themselves. Fortunately he builds buses so is kind of like our Chief Engineer.

The next show was Scandiano which was cool. Unfortunately Nico and I made the mistake of following Francesco and Mini-Max out for food. Well... we walked one way... then another... then five kilometres later we crawled into a supermarket and ate some anticlimactic food. Starvation had weakened both Nico and I mentally and we spent most of the afternoon barely keeping the hysterical manic laughter under control. Then we illegally jumped a bus back to our bus parked at the venue. The moral? Never follow Francesco anywhere... without a day’s rations in your pocket.

It was around this period that we discovered Mini-Max’s startling resemblance to Thompson and Thompsen from Tintin. So from this day forth he is ‘Thompsen’. He appeared disgruntled at first as I think he thought we meant he looked like Snowy the dog. But no!

So we played and then the next day headed to the hotel we were staying in for two days, one of which was a day off. Cue the joy of more showers and some laundry. We played an old cinema in Macerata where I managed to put the pedal through the bass skin. Shit! So, a brief intermission while Blaze entertained the crowd with a puppet show and I searched for a solution as we had no spare. First I thought ‘beer mat’. No good. Then tinfoil pasta tray? Hmmm... too much sauce on it. Aha! A solution appeared when I whipped the head off a floor tom and gaffa taped it over the bass drum skin. It survived the rest of the show and now the support band think I am MacGuyver.

So that’s it in a brief nutshell. Dave and I spent all day drinking Cappuccino at the hotel (1€ per cup and most righteous!) New T-shirt is selling well. Italy is cool as ever. Watching movies and drinking beer and eating pasta most of the time in between shows. Noone has been left behind by the bus yet….but it’s early days.

Conclusions so far:

1. Tortellini rocks.

2. Ibrodima’s drummer’s mother makes OUTSTANDING cakes.

3. Gaffa tape can fix anything.

4. Italy is very cool (but we already knew that)."

More photos here.