Photos with Brian and rock music with Paul & Gene

As we have to beg, borrow and steal access to the internet while on the road, there is a slight delay in our updates so apologies for that. Monday was another great day for us! We had the photo shoot with Brian Rudolph lined up in the afternoon, and Shaena managed to pull all her strings and score some excellent KISS-tickets for the same evening!

The photo shoot was really cool, Brian is such a pro and he made the whole experience very enjoyable. Obviously, this was totally new ground for Ethan, but he did great and was patient both in the studio and out in the playground that Brian had decided to use for the outside shots. It was truly amazing to watch Brian in action when he captured those split second baby-smiles and how he snapped fantastic, natural shots without making us feel staged or uncomfortable. We had a wonderful time, and if you guys (well, those of you who are in Winnipeg at least) would like your pictures taken, check out: www.empirephoto.ca and www.empirephotoblog.ca.

The concert later in the evening was a once in a lifetime experience! KISS had embarked on their 35th anniversary tour, 'Alive 35'. Opening act was a band called Buckcherry, which frankly I have never really heard of and they were not really that impressive either. However, when KISS entered the stage and Gene Simmons shouted out his standard opening phrase "You want the best? You got the best! KISS!", you could really feel the presence of rock-royalty!

The guys are great performers, the stage looked fantastic with all the lights, video screens, pyrotechnics and so on, and the set list was quite well put together with a mix of old classics and new material. Someone told us before the concert that KISS was the loudest concert he'd ever seen, and I have to agree. The music was loud, and accompanied by tons of explosions it made the whole gig very powerful. Another cool thing was the stage itself, as the whole band could elevate themselves 60 feet up in the air, fly across the audience, and the drum riser even rotated up in the air!

The band also had a bit of an accident on stage, as the guitar player fired shots from his guitar and shot out a few of the lights. This culminated in a part of the light rig to fall down and hit the stage! Later on in the show, the light rig caught fire where the spotlight that fell down used to sit, so they had to take the rig down and a guys with a fire extinguisher came up on stage and put out the fire.

I have to say though; Paul Stanley is a fantastic singer and performer, and to me, it is unbelievable that Gene Simmons is getting most of the spotlight and the glory in the media, but I am sure there is a good reason for that as well. Maybe Paul is one of those performers that just want to play good music and don't care about getting his own reality TV-show?

All in all, Monday was a fun-filled fantastic day, and we just got the disc with all of Brian's photos, so will post some of them here on the blog for you to enjoy.

You show us everything you've got
You keep on dancin' and the room gets hot
You drive us wild, we'll drive you crazy
You say you wanna go for a spin
The party's just begun, we'll let you in
You drive us wild, we'll drive you crazy
You keep on shoutin', you keep on shoutin'

I wanna rock and roll all nite and party every day