JPF Home Page Forums General Messages Brian Austin Whitney Blog Wednesday, September 5, 2007

Hi Folks,

We have announced our 2007 European Roadtrip Tour Dates. Though there may be a few minor changes, we think this is pretty close to the route we'll be taking around Europe and the dates we'll be in the cities below. Some of the days are listed as Drive days meaning we have long drives between 2 major cities. In those cases we will be taking the route between those two cities and would love to meet with any members we pass near on the way. In general, because we've never visited before, we hope to meet locals and folks traveling through these areas to solidify future trips, events and showcases. If we have enough interest for an event or showcase in a given city, we'll announce that as well. For now, our hope is to meet as many musicians and songwriters as we can during the tour from these diverse places. And we also plan to do some tourism stuff along the way. Any advice/help is appreciated. Contact us at justplainfolks@aol.com and place the location in subject if you can help us out.

Enjoy these photos from each of the areas we'll be visiting. Hopefully we'll have many cool ones to share when we return!

Brian



Tue, Sep 25: Bruges, Belgium



Wed, Sep 26: Amsterdam, Netherlands



Thu, Sep 27: Burg Rheinfels, Germany



Fri, Sep 28: Bacharach, Germany



Sat, Sep 29: Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany



Sun, Sep 30: Fussen, Germany



Mon, Oct 1: Munich, Germany



Tue, Oct 2: Prague, Czech Republic
Wed, Oct 3: Prague, Czech Republic



Thu, Oct 4: Drive Day CZ to Poland



Fri, Oct 5: Krakow, Poland
Sat, Oct 6: Krakow, Poland



Sun, Oct 7: Drive Day Poland through Slovakia to Hungary

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Brataslava.jpg[/img]

Mon, Oct 8: Budapest, Hungary
Tue, Oct 9: Budapest, Hungary

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Budapest.jpg[/img]

Wed, Oct 10: Vienna, Austria
Thu, Oct 11: Vienna, Austria

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Vienna.jpg[/img]

Fri, Oct 12: Salzburg, Austria

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Saltzburg.jpg[/img]

Sat, Oct 13: Hallstatt, Austria

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Hallstatt.jpg[/img]

Sun, Oct 14: Austrian and Italian Alps Drive

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/AlpsDrive.jpg[/img]

Mon, Oct 15: Venice, Italy
Tue, Oct 16: Venice, Italy
Wed, Oct 17: Venice, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Venice.jpg[/img]

Thu, Oct 18: Florence, Italy
Fri, Oct 19: Florence, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Florence.jpg[/img]

Sat, Oct 20: Rome, Italy
Sun, Oct 21: Rome, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Rome.jpg[/img]

Mon, Oct 22: Vatican City, Vatican

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Vatican.jpg[/img]

Tue, Oct 23: Pompei, Italy
Wed, Oct 24: Pompei, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Pompeii.jpg[/img]

Thu, Oct 25: Naples, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Naples.jpg[/img]

Fri, Oct 26: Orvieto, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Orvieto.jpg[/img]

Sat, Oct 27: Sienna, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Siena.jpg[/img]

Sun, Oct 28: Pisa, Italy

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Pisa.jpg[/img]

Mon, Oct 29: Monaco, Monaco

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Monaco.jpg[/img]

Tue, Oct 30: Nice, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Nice.jpg[/img]

Wed, Oct 31: Arles, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Arles.jpg[/img]

Thu, Nov 1: Avignon, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Avignon.jpg[/img]

Fri, Nov 2: Chamonix/Mont Blanc, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Chamonix.jpg[/img]

Sat, Nov 3: Montreux, Switzerland

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Montreux.jpg[/img]

Sun, Nov 4: Drive South France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/SouthFrance.jpg[/img]

Mon, Nov 5: Blois, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Blois.jpg[/img]

Tue, Nov 6: Mont St. Michel, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Mont-Saint-Michel.jpg[/img]

Wed, Nov 7: Caen, France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Normandy.jpg[/img]

Thur, Nov 8: Paris, France
Fri, Nov 9: Paris, France
Sat, Nov 10: Paris France

[img]http://www.jpfolks.com/2007EuropeRoadtrip/Paris.jpg[/img]

Sun, Nov 11: Return to US

You can post any comments you want on this post! = )

Looks like a really fun time to be had.

Wow those pictures are amazing! Thanks for sharing Brian. What a trip of a life time to be had.

Tammy

www.tammyedwards.com
www.myspace.com/tammyedwards1

I think you're gonna need a vacation after this vacation!! I got tired just looking at the photos!!!

Herbie

WOW! I'm speechless.

Why are you speechless Vanessa?

Brian

AWESOME pics! Have fun you lucky bastards!!!{I'm in awe, but unlike Vanessa, I'm NEVER speechless!}

We're very excited about the trip. Part of me wishes we had set up a lot of JPF showcases rather than just meeting some members here and there, but part of me is glad we'll have time to see the sights as well. We're still considering this a business trip and hoping to help build the future of JPF in Europe by planting some goodwill seeds and getting the lay of the land for future trips. It will be very cool to meet folks we've touched in some way from this little idea I started with 60 folks and a few emails back in 1998.

Brian

Hi Brian,
I hope your trip is un-eventful as well as eventful. A lot of intresting places to see and not enough time to really see a lot of them. Smooth Sailing!

We are pretty flexible on the trip. We didn't make any hotel reservations as we leased a Renault Trafic for the entire trip. It's a van that allows us to camp in it if needed. We will likely meet members anywhere they are available on this route and if we love a place, we'll stay longer, and if we decide we've seen enough castles or ruins or museums or mountains, we can skip a place or simply drive on through to the next place. I wish we had 14 weeks to double the time in each place, but I am sure after 7 weeks we'll look forward to being back home. My hope is to meet JPF members in each country and make new musician and non musician friends everywhere we go. And the next time we visit, we'll be able to do a USA style Roadtrip complete with showcases in each city. But we need to scout out all the places first and get our bearings. I probably WILL need a vacation from the vacation but for me it's work. For my wife it's work/vacation. I hope I don't wear her out too much since she has to come back and work 3 non stop weeks of 12 hour days to make up for the time off. I think it will be worth it though. We never do anything in a small way!

Brian

Is there a reason you've excluded UK?

As we said in the newsletter, we'll be visiting the UK for 3 weeks in 2008. We decided the 5 days we had to see the UK and Ireland just wasn't enough. That seems like a better idea to us. Plus, our hope is that we can do it more like a US Roadtrip where we have showcases most nights. In Europe, we're mostly just meeting with 1 or 2 members in each city and may not do any showcases on this tour simply due to language barriers, lack of sheer numbers and not knowing all the cultural issues we need to overcome to do our US Style events. In the UK, the communication barrier is removed and the cultural differences are much smaller. We also have far more members per city than in Europe.

Brian

Post deleted by L o r e l e i

Well just remember to help us put it all together. I've actually heard that the hardest country for US artists to get gigs and support in is the UK. I've heard stories of US artists being literally turned back at the airport because they had guitars and told them they were there to do shows. So we'll likely focus on UK artists only but we'll need to get a lot of help setting up venues and getting local artists to participate. We generally go for a minumum of 20 artists in the US for showcases. This year we ranged from a low of 13 to about 50.

Brian

Post deleted by L o r e l e i

Lorelei,

Good to hear you'll be there when we come around. I think we'll learn a lot on this tour that will serve us well in the UK/Ireland. Things are pretty easy for the most part (assuming we can find enough interested artists of course) anywhere we go in the US. But it will be tricky to communicate with venues from other cultures. It's sometimes hard here in the US to make people "get it" but we can always drop the names of well known venues who love us here to help asway any concerns venue owners have. Over there, we're pretty much starting from scratch.

We decided to go to some off the beaten path places like Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic on this tour with hopes of simply making friends as we go in many places where we have too few members to do events. Plus we're going through a lot of places in a short amount of time and we have some freedom to shift gears in some cases to stay longer or skip entirely as we go where needed or wanted. We never have that freedom in the US where we keep a very tight schedule both time wise and event wise so there's no room for error or changing directions. This is our grand experiment in many ways and we think it will be a lot of fun. Based on how it goes, we'll plan our UK/Ireland tour and future North American tours accordingly.

Brian

What an incredible opportunity....The pictures are so enticing!!!Have a wonderful time....Stay Safe,.and maybe even get a bit
of sleep.. for health's sake......

Best to you and Linda.....
Kaley

You are like our International Ambassador of Good Music! All those great sights complimented with great music! I am jealous! Have a wonderful trip making many musical memories!

Post deleted by L o r e l e i

I think we're adding visits to Slovenia as well as Le Puy-en-Velay, France and Poitiers, France where we're visiting FutureScope. Anyone been there?

Wow, Brian, gonna be a fab tour, by looks of it. Enjoy...

so it looks like today, Brian is smoking pot and enjoying the women in Amsterdam...I'll be right there dude

No pot was smoked.. we skipped Amsterdam and stayed in Ghent where we met a great new friend, and really got to hang out and see the real town... it was POURING rain very hard so we decided to stay put and we're glad we did!

Brian

I just registered in this site after searching for an online musicians community. I just wanted to say that this whole tour idea is absolutely fantastic!! Wish you could consider visiting Greece too guys... It is great here for musicians organizing live shows. Have fun on the road

Hi Brian,

Hope you're enjoying the tour - looks like you have a really packed itinerary !

I just wanted to add quickly to notes that Lorelei has already left and offer my help, should you need it, when you come over here to the UK and Ireland next year. Us Brits don't all sound like Oasis I promise !!!

Take care, and all the best for a great vacation

Ian

Those pics are amazing!

~C

Hi Brian,
hope you're still having a good time! Is there anything you can tell me already about the November 3rd, Montreux evening? We live in Switzerland, but about 3 hours away from Montreux by train, and would soon need to book a hotel and organize the trip.
Thanks a bunch in advance,
Peter

Hi Peter,

We're not sure we're going to make the Montreux stop right now. Due to the timing, the sites we wanted to see in Chamonix will all be closed aleady and the mountain pass we planned to take is iffy. Though it's been warmer than usual so far on this trip, we're not sure we want to risk roads being closed or needing chains on the tires of our leased van. We might make our way over to Zurich, but we won't know that until the last minute most likely. We were invited to visit Zurich by some young musicians we met in Venice. We didn't hear from anyone else unfortunately in Switzerland about hosting us or helping with a show so there wasn't a chance to put on together.

Where do you actually live?

Brian

We're having a great trip. We have tons of photos to show eventually when we get the time to sort through them and post the best ones. Right now we're in Pompei getting ready to go to Orvieto, Italy. We're pretty much on schedule (slightly ahead by a half day actually) and we have 12 cities and 4 more countries (we've visited 11 already) in the next 12 days. Then we'll be in Paris for about 4-5 days at the end.

Brian

By the way, we've seen every single one of the places pictured above so far except that windmill in Amsterdam. (we visited one very similar in Belgium however).

Brian

Hey Brian, thanks for your message! We live in Basel, which is less than an hour from Zurich by train, so we could easily come out and see you, and play/sing a bit. In any case, I'd love to help put together something for JPF in Basel on your next European trip. I look forward to hearing from you,
Peter Croton

Awesome photos, Brian. Welcome home!!