Our friends Henk and Jan require mention here. We have been coming to Europe to tour since 2006, and no tour through the Netherlands has been complete without some visit by these two great guys. It all started at our very first show ever in Europe, at a tiny bar in Assen, NL, "Vittebal" which though being at capacity at around 80 people, is considered a place where music is discovered. Going back, I also remember a distinct Marlon Brando type character there. He was a local drunk who claimed to have been both very rich and very poor, gave us a fifty euro note after the show as a tip. And that's when the Euro was worth something!
Anyways, also at the Vittebal on that first night were Henk and Jan, who were very enthusiastic about the show. To this day they have seen close to a dozen of our Netherlands shows, and we now have an ongoing email dialog going with Henk. By 2008 we had met their wives Lia and Gepke too. This year, after a show in Spiijkeboor NL we were invited back to Henk's place, where we indulged in a special bottle of the national drink Jenever that he had set aside. They are great guys, and their enthusiasm is something that we look forward to on the often lonesome road trail. I couldn't imagine what an NL tour would be like without at least one show that featured Henk's enthusiastic cheers of "MAAN!!!!" or "OKAY !!!!" after certain songs.
Henk is the director of a children's special education school, and the photo here was painted by one of the students there. We didn't meet the boy, but it is an honour to have detailed work like this made based on our image.
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