This tour was a huge turning point of my life. On this tour i met my partner, who i am with to this day and cant see ever not being with, i (and Graham)turned vegetarian (thanks to John and his knowledge on the matter)and i decided that i was going to spend the next few years of my life doing exactly this, touring.
That is not what this post is about though, iam going to steal Chuckys idea here.
I feel this shirt and the story behind it are far to good not to be made public.
So here goes.
Throughout the tour John and i regularly discussed training/boxing/personal fitness and said that if we had a chance anywhere that we would hit a gym and do some training.
Half way through the tour we had a day to kill in Melbourne so we decided to make it happen.
Graham drove me to the hotel in St Kilda where the band where staying, the tour was super budget so we werent even staying in a hotel(from memory we slept on someones floor?), but their hotel looked fucked up anyway, there were junkies hanging around out the front and the place was fucking shot(quite fitting i guess)
John met me out the front and we went to his room so he could grab his bag and get changed into his training gear. He took his shirt off and put on the above shirt and as soon as i saw it i was like "aaahhhh fffuuuccckk", John told me that the Rock Hotel used to print up shirts for when they had a good show on and only give them to band members/crew, and in the same sentence said "here you go bro, its yours", and took it off and threw it at me.
I couldn't believe my ears, but that sums John up in one sentence, the dude would give you the shirt off his back, literally.
It was a large and a little big at the time, but i still wore it (of course).
A few years ago i got my cousins wife to take it in and it fits great now, but maybe a touch too long, but its still def wearable and i plan on bringing it back into rotation with a bunch of older shirts that i have had in retirement for the last few years.
Oh, and yeah we trained that day, at some trendy fucking gym on the water at St Kilda that charged us $100 each (John paid and wouldnt let me pay for myself no matter what i said) and i can tell you, John must be one of the fittest 40 something year olds going around.
He by his own admission was a little out of shape, but i was glad, cause if that was him out of shape, i dont know if i would of been able to keep up had he been in shape.
He took me through a whole lot of the Navy Seals training he had done, plus weights and to finish we had a nice leisurely jog on treadmills next to each other which turned into us both sprinting from trying to outdo each other by turning up the speed on each others machines.
John ran every day on the tour i did with him in Europe in 2006, and i didnt go once, i didnt have runners plus i was still asleep in my bunk probably hours after he got back(i wasent getting to sleep most nights until around 4am) but i wish i went every day.
Maybe next time...
