“9/11”

Everyone has their “September 11th” story.
Here’s mine…

“9/11”

After 3 years and 3 months, (and somewhere around 700+ shows), the “Song and Dance, Man” tour ended on November 18th, 2000 at the Blacksheep in Wakefield, Quebec.

The next day we drove to the Tragically Hip’s studio in Bath, Ontario to begin work on the follow-up album to be called “Fools For The Radio”.

By mid-January 2001, recording was completed.

To celebrate, I quit smoking.

A great idea and not one of my better ideas at the same time…

Two days later, we hopped on a plane and flew to Amsterdam for a six-week tour of Holland, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, England and Ireland.

I started smoking again.

On March 10th, we flew back to Tennessee.

I quit smoking again on March 11, 2001.

Five days later, we drove to Boston for a Saint Patrick’s Day gig.

Serious.
Nicotine.
Withdrawal.

A couple of days later we were back in Tennessee, where serious planning was underway for the release of the new album.

After countless meetings with managers, publicists and record companies, we decided that Tuesday, May 1st, 2001, would be the perfect day to release “Fools For The Radio”.

It had a nice ring to it.
It just kinda rolled off the tongue.

But then, for some reason, it was decided that May 1st, 2001 was, in fact, NOT a good day to release the new album, after all.

Back to the drawing board.

We rolled around other possible dates.

“How about July 1st, Canada Day?”
“No.”
“Ok then, how about maybe, July 4th?”
“No.”

Eventually, we all agreed that Tuesday, September 11th, 2001 would be the perfect day to release the album.

With that settled, it was, “All Systems Go”,
“Full Steam Ahead”,
“Onward and Upward”.
“High fives” and “Fuckin’ Eh’s” all around.

Then we hit the road… again.

Winnipeg, Denver, Birmingham, Charlotte, Asheville, Nashville, Los Angeles and everywhere in between.

The “Fools For The Radio” tour would begin on September 6th with seven shows in the United Kingdom.

The North American leg of the tour would start on September 20th, down in SOHO in New York City.

For whatever reason (probably financial) we decided to fly in and out of JFK.

September 3rd = JFK to Heathrow.
September 16th = Heathrow to JFK.

While we were across the Atlantic, we left our van at Jen’s dad’s place in Connecticut.

So we drove from Nashville to Westport, Connecticut and Jenny’s brother Alec, gave me and guys a lift to JFK on the evening of September 2nd.

As we were driving in towards JFK, the New York City skyline was alive.
I remember marveling at the city’s beauty.

And high above everything else were the Twin Towers.

I don’t know why, but, I took a long look.

The next morning, we hopped a flight to Heathrow.

Before we boarded the plane, we ran into Johnny Ramone.
Weird.

8 hours later, we were in a couple cabs roaring from Heathrow to our hotel in Knightsbridge.

We checked into the hotel and went straight to the pub.
Life was good.

September 4th, we hung around the hotel, dealt with jet lag and went back to the pub.
September 5th, I did a bunch of interviews with the BBC.

Then, finally, the first shows on the “Fools For The Radio” tour.

The first three gigs were great and well attended.

September 6th – Nottingham.
September 7th – Leicester.
September 8th – Glasgow.

On September 9th, we had the day off in Glasgow.

So, as usual, on days off in a new town, or any town for that matter, I went for a walk and puttered around.

Tried to be a local.
Drank coffee.
Went to a couple bookstores.
Did laundry.

It was a grey day.
It was a great day.

I started working on a new song in E minor.

“Clouds rolling in low, like a murder of crows…”

I couldn’t figure out where to go next, so I put the song away.

At about 10PM, we all gathered in my room to watch the “US Open – Men’s Final.

Pete Sampras against Lleyton Hewitt.

Harry Connick sang the anthem.

On the morning of September 10th, we had a 10AM lobby call.
Wheels up at 10:30.

Soundcheck at 4PM in Leeds.

Eventually, everyone started to gather in the lobby.
We were all drinking coffee.
Everyone but me was smoking cigarettes.

It was all I could do not to spark up.

Our sound man, Chris “Huggy Bear” Hughes was the last one down from his room.

“Someone stole my fucking passport.”
“What are you talking about?”
“What don’t you understand? Someone stole my fucking passport!”

We looked everywhere.
It was gone.

Luckily we had photocopies of everyone’s passport just in case “someone stole my fucking passport”.

Our manager, Bryan, said, “Don’t worry Chris, we’ve got a photocopy of yer passport. When we get to London in a couple days, we’ll go to the US Embassy and get you a new one. No big deal.”

We hopped in the van and our driver Bob Dye, pointed us south towards Leeds.

“Plume – Live At Leeds”.

We all laughed.

About an hour into our trip, we rolled through Lockerbie, Scotland.

“Fuck, man, this is where that plane was blown up around Christmas in 1988….”

We rolled into Leeds around 4PM and went straight to the venue to set up our gear.
After soundcheck, we went to the hotel to rest up for the show.

We went back to the club around 9.

There were about 30 people in the crowd but we played like there were 30,000.

It was a good show.
It was a great show.

After the gig, we all sat around and talked with some locals.
About midnight, we made our way back to the hotel.

I went straight to my room and slept like a corpse.

The next morning, was September 11th, 2001.
The day we’d all been waiting for.
Finally, after more than four years, we had a new album to brag about.

It was also my 6 month anniversary of being smoke-free.

It was a good day.

We had a 10AM lobby call.
Wheels up at 10:30.

Our next show was 5 hours straight south of Leeds, in a town called Bournemouth.

Bournemouth is just about as far south in England as you can go without ending up in the English Channel.

We started rolling south around 10:30AM.

5:30AM NYC time.

About 4 hours into the trip, I’d noticed that there were cars pulled over on the side of the road all along the M1.

I found it odd, but didn’t say anything.

Around 2:30PM, Bryan called the venue in Bournemouth.

He wanted to “advance” the gig.

You know, find out what time soundcheck was and how the ticket sales were…

Stuff like that.

I’ll never forget it.
Bob Dye was behind the wheel (on the passenger’s side for us North Americans).
Bryan was riding “shotgun”.
Ernie, Dave and I were in the second row.
Meck and Chris were in the third row.

“Hey there! This is Bryan from the Mike Plume Band, I’m just checking in to let you know that we’re about an hour away from Bournemouth and that we should be at the venue a little after 4 o’clock.

I could hear a British accent on the other end of the line say, “Haven’t you heard?”
“Haven’t I heard what? What’s happening? Is everything ok with the show?”

At this point, there was a bunch of “What the fuck’s going on with the gig?” being said by everyone in the van.

Because everyone was now talking in the van, I couldn’t hear what the guy on the other end of the line was saying anymore.
All I could heard was Bryan say “Oh no! Oh no! A plane?!? Two planes!?!”

He hung up the phone.

Bryan said, “Bob, can you turn on the radio please? Apparently a plane, maybe two have crashed into the World Trade Center in New York…”

We listened to the BBC’s coverage of the most monumental moment of our time.

The BBC has a sound.
No nonsense.
A calm, soothing and somehow almost sterile delivery.

As we rolled down the M1, we all sat there in stunned silence.

“There are now reports that another plane has crashed into the Pentagon.”

“WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!?”

Then Chris said, “It’s fucking Bin Laden. I just fucking know it. Fucking Osama Bin Laden. Fucking Al-Qaeda. FUCK!!!”

I must’ve been living under a rock, because that was the first time I’d ever heard the names “Osama Bin Laden” or “Al-Qaeda”

Everyone in the van lit a cigarette.

“Dave, gimme a smoke.”

I inhaled deep.

My head started to spin.
My first cigarette in 6 months.

“Hey Bob, can you pull over, man…”

He pulled into a gas station along the Motorway.

Everyone got out of the van.

I threw up.
I thew up again.
And again.
I couldn’t stop.

We got back in the van and drove to Bournemouth.

We continued to listen to the BBC’s coverage.

It was almost 3PM UK time.
“We now have report that the South Tower of the World Trade Center in New York has collapsed.”

“JESUS CHRIST! WHAT’S FUCKING HAPPENING! THIS CAN’T BE REAL!”
“I’m fucking telling you, man, it’s fucking Bin Laden.”

Five minutes later.
“We now have reports of another plane that has crashed. This time in Pennsylvania.”

More cars pulled over on the side of the road.

Half an hour later.
“The North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City has collapsed.”

We pulled up to the club around 4PM.

The doors were locked.
The streets were empty.
It felt like we were in a ghost town.
No one on the sidewalks.
No cars driving by.
Nothing.

We just stood there.

Everyone was glued to a TV set watching the world come to an end.

The promoter called and said he’d be another 30 minutes before he could get there to let us into the venue.

But there was a pub down the street.

So we walked down and walked in.
Everyone in the bar was glued to the television.

We sat down at the bar.

It was the first time I’d seen footage of what had happened.

I felt like we were the only 7 people in the world who hadn’t seen what had happened earlier in the day.

I ordered a Guinness.
I lit up another smoke.
I thought the world was coming to an end.
I wanted to go home.

But I wasn’t so sure I’d ever get back again.

I certainly had no plans on flying anytime soon.

The week before, there was an article in the newspaper about a guy (Peter Bray) who had just paddled a kayak from St John’s, Newfoundland to the west coast of Ireland.

I remember when I first read it thinking that he was crazy.
Then I started to wonder if he still had that kayak kicking around.
Paddling across the Atlantic didn’t sound like such a bad idea anymore.

After our beer, we walked back to the club, loaded in and set up our gear.

Complete silence as we set up.
That was a first.

The promoter said “Listen lads, I’ve no idea if anyone will show up tonight, so just set up yer gear, and we’ll see how it unfolds, yeah?”

“Yeah, man.”

We set up, and then went to check into our hotel.

As soon as I got into my room, I turned on the TV, sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the screen.

Dave and I were rooming together.

I lit a smoke.
Inhaled.
Deep.

“Fuck, man, Davey Boy, the world’s never gonna be the same, man. Shit’s gonna change big time, man…”
“Yep, I don’t know about you, man, but I’m not crazy about flying back to New York next week…”
“Me fucking neither.”

Around 8PM we made our way to the club.
Empty.
Completely empty.
We just sat there.
Me, Dave, Ernie, Meck, Bryan, Chris, Bob, the Promoter, a bartender and a couple waitresses.

We’d no idea what was gonna happen.

Then at about 8:45, the door opened.
A guy and girl walked in.
Then another guy.
Then another couple people.

Everyone had the same look on their face.
A combination of heartbreak, shock and disbelief.

Everyone needed something that night.
Everyone needed to get away from their TV’s for the night.
Everyone needed a couple hours of something other than the horrors of that day.

By 9:15, there were about 40 people there.

“Let’s give ‘em a show, boys. Mark my words, this is the most important show we’ll ever do.”

We walked on stage to a handsome round of applause.

I put on my guitar.
Flipped the standby switch on my amp.
Took my hat off, put on my harmonica rack, and put my hat back on.

Hit a couple chords, turned around and said to the guys “Girl In Green”.

I would quite often play a drawn out bending note on my harmonica before I’d hit the opening E minor chord to “Girl In Green”.

This time I played two notes.

I recognized them instantly and chased them.

They were the opening two notes of “Amazing Grace”.

I had no idea that I was going to play the song until I played the second note.

It was complete silence as I played the melody that we’ve all heard forever.

As the last notes to “…was blind but now I see…” rang out we launched into “Girl In Green”.

It was the beginning of a three hour purge.

After the first round of encores, I went back up for one more song.

A solo acoustic song from my first album called “Kept On Dancing”.

I thought it was an appropriate way to end the show.

The second last verse in the song has a lyric that goes,

“Someone said the world’s a stage
And everybody’s got to play their part
But man, my script was missing a page,
But I believed I could play it all by heart…”

Just before I started to sing that verse, my acoustic guitar died.

I couldn’t very well unplug my guitar, grab another guitar, plug it in and continue on with the song.

It would’ve broken the spell.

For some reason, I just stopped playing, stepped away from the microphone, walked to the front of the stage and sang the rest of the song a cappella.

And with that, the show was over.

Everyone filed out and went back to our collective new reality.

We packed up our gear, sat down with the staff and had a beer or two.

I woke up the next morning wondering if it all was a dream.

Sometimes I still do.

The next day we drove to London for our show at the Borderline.
The day after that, the tour wrapped up in Bristol.

Then we had two days off before our scheduled flight back to NYC.
I did some more radio interviews on Friday, September 14th
The rest of the time we walked around London.

Bryan and Chris spent a lovely afternoon at the US Consulate trying to get a new passport.

At midnight on September 15th, we found out that our flight was indeed going to be going forward as scheduled.

Up until that point, every flight from September 11th until September 15th had been cancelled.
Not postponed.
Cancelled.

We were advised to allow 6 hours to clear security.

We pulled up to Heathrow 6AM for our 12:00PM departure.

Armed guards everywhere.

Serious business.

Thousands of people who’d been stranded since September 11th were everywhere.

People laying on top of their luggage on the sidewalks.
Everywhere you looked.
Stranded, scared people.

Everything was kinda frozen and yet moving like a Ken Burns movie.

A security guard asked us what flight we were on.
We told him.
He pointed us in the direction of a parking garage.
He said “Go up to the third floor. That’s where everyone on your flight is gathering.”
“Ok, thanks.”

We hauled all of our gear up to the third floor.
Written on a piece of paper and taped to the wall was our flight number.

There were about 40 other people who were also on the same flight as us.

There was a buffet table set up.
Shepard’s Pie
Bangers and Mash
Coffee.
Guinness.

I had some Shepard’s Pie and a coffee.

After about an hour, we were all rounded up and went through the most intense security check any of us had been through… and we’d been through a couple by this point in our lives, I can assure you.

Once we cleared security we were sent to another area of the airport where we waited again for another hour or so.

Then we were rounded up again and went through and even more intense security check.

Finally, we were through and at our gate.

Our flight was scheduled to leave at noon.
At 11:30, we started to board the plane, but not before one more intense security check.

We were on the plane at noon.
There were only 30 or 40 of us on the plane.
Fantastic.
We each had our own row.

I figured we’d be taxiing by 12:30.

Three hours later, we were still sitting on the plane at the gate.

Apparently, what I neglected to take into consideration were all those passengers on all those cancelled flights from September 11th to September 15th.

They all had to get home too.

So 250 stranded passengers were selected and had to go through the three layers of security that we had to go through.

By the time we took off at 4PM, the plane was stuffed.

The flight across the Atlantic was the most uneventful flight I’d ever been on.

Not a bump.
Not a shimmy. 
Not nothing.

We landed at JFK 8 hours later.

As soon as the plane touched down, people started clapping, cheering and going crazy.
There were people crying.
It was intense.
I’m not sure any of us were convinced that we’d actually make it across the Atlantic.

When we cleared customs and got outside, I kissed the ground and lit a cigarette.

“Do you guys smell an electrical fire? You figure that’s Ground Zero? All the way out here?”

It was.

From 13 miles away, you could smell the burning paper, plastic, and God knows what else from the World Trade Center.

It was a fire that would burn for 100 days.

Anyway, we checked into the Holiday Inn at JFK.
We were all exhausted.
Because of the time difference and just being the type of day it was, everyone went straight to sleep.

Except for me and Dave.

Dave was going to stay with his girlfriend, now wife (Tracy), in NYC and I had to go to Connecticut to get our van from Jenny’s dad’s place.

We’d been up for 20 hours already, when we walked out of the hotel and onto our next adventure of the day.

The first thing we saw was a police officer in the parking lot.
He had a rifle in his hands.

I asked asked him for directions to the subway that would take us to Grand Central Station.

“Go over there and wait for the bus. When the next bus shows up, ask the driver if he goes to the Jamaica Station. If he does, hop on the bus and get off at Jamaica Station. From there it’s pretty straight forward…”

We thanked him and went on our way.

The smell of an electrical fire overloaded our senses.

We were almost out of the parking lot when behind us we heard “Hey! Hold up, guys!!! Hold up!”

It was the police officer.
We stopped.
He was walking towards us.
Rifle in hands.

As he got closer to us, he said, “I just wanted to tell you guys to be careful out there, ok…”
He had tears in his eyes.
Streaming.

It was completely unnerving.

“Yes sir, thanks! Take care and you be careful too…”
“You can bet I will.”

As we walked away, I said under my breath to Dave, “Fuck man, can you believe that?!?”
“No fuckin’ kiddin’, Mikey. No fuckin’ kiddin…’”

We hopped on a bus and about 10 minutes later we arrived at the subway station.
We were the only people on the bus.

We walked in, paid our fare and made our down the steps to the subway platform.

I noticed that there were pictures taped to the walls.

Thousands of pictures everywhere you looked.

Then it dawned on me.
“Fuck! These were all missing people!”
People who were last seen on their way to work last Tuesday morning.

Heartbreaking.

As we waited for the subway, I also noticed dozens of rats scurrying around along the tracks.

Fuck.

I felt like Dave and I were the only two people left alive.

I felt like we were in “The Stand” by Stephen King.

“Baby, can you dig your man…”

Eventually, the train showed up and off we went to Times Square.

There might have been 5 people on the train.

About 30 minutes later, we walked up out of the subway to street level at Times Square.

Usually, there’s tens of thousands of people walking around.

But on September 16th, 2001, there might’ve been a hundred people.
Maybe a dozen cars.
Not a horn to be heard.

An officer walked up to us and asked if we were ok and if we knew where we were going.

Dave hopped in a cab and went to Tracy’s and I walked to Grand Central Station and jumped the train to Westport, Connecticut.

As soon as I sat down on the train, I fell asleep.

The next time I opened my eyes, I was at the train station in Westport.
How I didn’t sleep all the way to New Haven is beyond me.

Jenny’s dad picked me up at the station and we went back to his house.
I climbed in the van and drove the 50 miles back to the Holiday Inn.

As I was driving in towards JFK, the New York City skyline was still alive.
And I still marvelled at the city’s beauty.

Would she ever be the same?
Would we ever be the same?

Mike Plume
Wednesday, September 11, 2019