Touched Again

As many of you know, Wally Tax quit the Outsiders earlier this year, after which Ronnie, Buzz, Appie, and Pieter (who was in the last Outsiders lineup) recruited a new singer by the name of Edwin de Boer. After corresponding with Edwin a few times, he was kind enough to invite my girlfriend and I to come watch them rehearse in Amsterdam. Since we were going to be in Europe for the Wild Weekend festival, we decided to swing through Amsterdam to check out the band. What we witnessed was a performance which neither one of us will ever forget. They handed me their set list (chock full of old Outsiders songs), and let me call out songs, one after another, which they played flawlessly.

They started with "Sun's Going Down", and from the very start, I was AMAZED. They ran through such classics as "Touch" and "That's Your Problem", among others, before moving on to some of their new material. The new songs are quite good, though, as they mentioned, they are still works in progress.

I was very impressed by Edwin's vocal stylings. I don't know how they found him, but they certainly picked a good front man for the band. He is considerably younger than Ron, Appie, and Buzz, and very energetic. In my opinion (and I am a big Outsiders fan), Edwin is an excellent replacement for Wally Tax. I might add that Pieter is a great guitar player, too (much better than Tom Krabbendam).

Now, as some of you may recall, the band took the name "Outsider" for legal reasons, because Wally owns the name "Outsiders". When we saw them rehearse, they said they are going to start calling themselves The Eastsiders (as they are from the east side of Amsterdam). At any rate, I am excited to tell you that The Eastiders want to come and tour the United States!!!!! As a matter of fact, Buzz even appointed me their "US manager". Hahaha...

I'm not looking in any way to profit from this, but I did tell them that I would help them get the ball rolling by seeing what kind of interest there would be among promoters here in the US. They said if they could get at least 10 dates across the US, that they would love to tour the States (as soon as possible). If anyone would be interested in booking the Eastsiders, please get in touch with me, and I will compile a list of all the interested parties, and forward the information to the band. I am only the messenger, acting as a liaison between the band an all potentially interested promoters. If the tour happens (honestly, it depends on the interest of the promoters), what you'll see is 3/5 of the original Outsiders doing lots of the old Outsiders songs you all know and love. I really dug seeing them rehearse, and would love to see them be able to tour over here. So, if any of you promoter-types would be interested, or if you know any promoters who would be, please get in "TOUCH" soon. --- TJ O'Brien
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