(12-3-96) Well, we all made it there, including myself. (No thanks to my car!) There were nine of us total, but we didn't care. We gathered at the Headquarters for the great Howard Jones Information Network, aka Ti'm's house. There we talked and listened to the new album, some old material, and watched some very interesting videos, too. We even heard the newest song from Howard entitled, "You're The Buddha", which is very beat driven with great use of echo in the snare drums. It also has a great "groove" to it, insuring that if there's a twelve inch to it (nobody hopes this more than me), it'll be a succesful dance track. The lyrics are great, too, with a sort of "story/rap" type thing going on, much like the classic "Bounce Right Back" (do you remember how much the Cause and Effect Mix grooved?). It's a song that should appeal to the old school fans of his earlier work, but it still has that fresh new sound like all of A&L.

In the midst of all our picture taking, singing, dancing (Lynda knows how to get down!), and listening, we got a call from the man himself!! That's right, Howard woke up at the crack of 8AM to call us up and wish us well. We all got to talk to him on the speaker phone. We talked about his early days with Warrior, his plans for the upcoming Orchestral concert, and his new album, of course. It was the nicest thing he could have done, short of showing up for a private performance. It made my trip, that's for sure.

I just wanted to take a minute to say hello to all the folks I met out in Arizona. Everyone was cool, and we got along great.

Christine, Lynda, Pam, Tim, Mary, Rob, Bob, Julie!! You guys are all great.