Abney Parks Final Moscow Performance: What a catastrophe!

The night before, we had played Saint Petersburg, and the crowd was bigger, and more enthusiastic then ever before. Obviously, or popularity is only growing.

After, Instead of taking the night train, this time we slept in a beautiful Saint Petersburg hotel (our promoter has upgraded all our accommodations this time around). In the morning, we hopped aboard a high speed bullet train, and headed for Moscow.

There were a few changes kristina had requested to her synthesizers, so on the train I got out the laptop that powers her rig, and made the changes.

We arrived in Moscow, dropped our luggage off at the hotel, and headed to sound check, where...

...the laptop wouldn't turn on!!!

This is the nightmare scenario we've always dreaded. All of her synths run on that laptop. Without it, we loose nearly everything she plays, and all the drums and percussion and orchestrations. For 23 years of touring, this has never been a problem, so we gave up the insanely expensive policy of buying a duplicate laptop that housed direct copies of current show, backing tracks, and the incredibly expensive synthesizer plugins she runs. (We are talking tens of thousands of dollars.) this laptop was top of the line, and only a few months old. It should have run for years! Our last laptop ran for nearly a decade, with no errors.

After a hour of poking it, and trying different chargers and power outlets with no luck, we headed to a local "Apple Store". (This shop In Moscow, w a reseller, with no repair abilities.)

they couldn't fix it. And a new laptop wouldn't help; our files were on the old hard drive in the dead computer. AND, Even if I moved the hard drive over, I'm not sure the anti-piracy code in the synths would let it work on a new computer. Onstage, in front of a massive crowd, instead of making music, we'd simply get a pop up saying "You are not authorized to use this software on this computer."

There was no hope. And the crowd was minutes away from entering the club!

So we discussed options. We could try an "acoustic set", but we've never practiced this, and we had a new violin player who only knew the one set of songs we'd given her to learn.

We could cancel, but the way people talk online these days, I knew this would become a huge drama that would haunt us for years, and cost us hundreds of fans. Some hater online would make up a story that we had cancelled because we were being premadonnas, or white surpremists, or KGB spies who rigged the election to get Trump elected, or whatever the hell else they made up. we'd be fighting these lies for years. (The interment is a petrie dish of hateful rumors, about everybody and everything, these days.)

So I went back to the green room, and told the band the bad news. They were as horrified as we were. We had no idea what to do. Cancel the show, and the promoters would go tens of thousands in debt, refunding ticket money they already spent to fly us over. Plus, hired staff, venue fees, rentals, etc.

Then, in a moment of clarity, I said, "Kristina, me a you play around the piano every night." She improvises piano arrangements for our songs, and I sing and play accordion or Bouzouki. It's very raw, and acoustic, and...honest.

It's also how many songs were born.

"How many songs does the band know, that they could play along to...that would sound okay with just us?"

We made a list.

10.

That's vastly shorter then our two hour show planned. But there was no time to lose! Already hundreds of people were filing into the club, from all over Russia, and the world. Australia, Belarus, Romania, Spain, England; fans had traveled thousands of miles to see us. Cancelling was not just about ticket cost, but airfare and hotels, and vacation time.

A worried tone was in the air; some how our technical problems had been leaked!

So I walked out onstage. The crowd yelled, and screamed, the way they always greet our energetic, high tech shows. But I was somber, and I hushed them.

I was alone on the stage, as I explained to the sold out throng that there was simply no way we could perform an Abney Park show.

The crowd was silent. Staring blankly, hoping in vain it was just more Abney Park antics.

"But rather then just giving up, and ruining everyone's night...week...month...what if we just improvised a new show? We have no synths, drums, or backing tracks, but we've got a piano! And a bass, and guitar, and a violin, and a Bouzouki! May we try, and see if it's better then nothing?"

The crowd cheered, and the band strode nervously out on stage. I turned to the band, and mumbled, "either this is going to be the worse night of my life, or this is going to be magic. Let's see which it is, shall we?"

And we played.

And it sparkled! The music glowed, and shown, in a way nobody has ever heard before! The crowd was mesmerized, blissfully drown in a shimmering sea of music that never existed before that moment.

Out Of Darkness was now a silver sea of shimmering piano, violins, guitars and Bouzouki, with waves of bass swelling and subsiding like ocean tides. The lyrics, "we've had our share of bad luck. But Don't sit around thunderstruck! If we're to keep this show alive..." took on a whole new depth.

It was the magical moment we had hoped for, and it saved the day.

Between each song I stopped, and spoke to the audience. Telling them stories behind the inspirations of the songs, or wonderful moments the songs were reborn on stage.

And the songs WERE reborn, and the audience was in love with it.

After the show, which turned out to be nearly as long as the full Abney Park show, I jumped into the crowd. Derek then played our upcoming album, Crash, straight off my iPhone into the massive sound system, and the audience cheered each new song, while I sighed autographs, accepted hugs, and took pictures with the fans.

Over and over again, maybe a hundred times that night, fans told me this was a special, magical night. A rare treat, to see a side of Abney Park that none had seen before. In the dressing room, the promoters cheered, and poored Vodka, and thanked us. The fincail hit of canceling a show last minute would have destroyed most concert promoters, so this saved their hides as much as ours. They eagerly invited us back to perform next year. It was the worst catastrophe, but we pushed on!

So now as I sit, fully spent, back in our elegant Moscow hotel room, I'm pondering if we should play this style of show again. Or work some of these acoustic songs into our regular show?

I'm also, very carefully, and with much anticipation, I'm picking the words I have to say to the damned Apple Store when I get back home!