Cerritos Fan Appreciation Day
1998

--- Cerritos, CA ---
Fans and friends of the Air Supply were invited to a special fan appreciation day event on Jan. 31st at the Cerritos Performing Arts center where the band was performing 2 sold out shows.

Beginning at 1pm, fans from all over the world gathered in the Sierra room at the performing arts center where they were treated to refreshment and Air Supply music and memorabilia. For the first hour of the event, those attending were given the opportunity to meet other fans that they had been talking to for several months via Air Supply's website, clipboard and chat rooms. It was the first time many of them had met face to face. Putting the names with faces from clipboard postings on the internet was just part of the excitement for the day.

At around 2pm the band arrived, led in by Simon Russell (fan club President). Seated at the front of the room, the band fielded questions from their fans which were mostly answered by Graham. One of the first questions asked was why the band doesn't receive recognition in the United States like they do overseas and why there were 2 versions of their latest release, "The Book Of Love". Graham answered by saying that they have a different promoter overseas than they do here in the US. He went on to say that there were two releases of the book of love due to the song "Strong Strong Wind" which is only included on the international version of the cd. This song, written by Diane Warren, was given to Air Supply only to be released overseas. The rights to this song for the US release were given to the group HEART to be included in their upcoming Greatest Hits CD.

Many fans complimented the band on their new release which prompted more questions, like why the cd wasn't more widely promoted. After some hesitation, Graham answered that Giant Records didn't want to spend any money on the band and that they still had two more albums that they were required to do before their contract would expire. Russell also commented that the band was planning to start their own label and do their own promoting when their contract with Giant was finished. But in addition to that, Graham said that although they had two more releases to complete for Giant, they would not quickly put out new releases just to fulfill their obligation. These releases would have to be quality recordings with something real to say, similar to their latest release.

Another question regarding their latest CD was which song was Graham and Russell's favorite. They both replied that their favorite song from the Book of love was the title track. The next question was in regards to the title track from this cd. In the first few seconds of the song, there are some words spoken that are hard to understand. When asked, Graham said that the words were spoken by a Brazilian musician during the recording session for the song. Although he didn't know the exact translation, Graham thought the words in Portugese meant something like "Let's do it baby." Graham said that "it just fit what they were trying to do so we kept it in." In fact, when the first masters of the cd came back, the record company had removed the phrase and Graham said he sent it back to them asking that the phrase be put back in.

The question and answer session with the band lasted for over an hour with more question about the fan club website, future plans for the band, and what songs they would sing in concert that evening. Especially for the Cerritos concerts, the band had made the decision during Friday afternoon's soundcheck to add the song Sunset to the show because they hadn't perfomed it in such a long time. Graham said they frequently added songs to a performance but once a tour is started, they stay with the basic order. When asked if they were going to perform The Power Of Love or Without You, Russell said that because these songs had been recorded by other artists and that the other artists had become successful with them that it was hard for them to bring them back to their shows.

After all the questions were taken, Simon Russell moved on to a raffle of items that were in some cases rare. Items given away at the event included tour jackets, cd singles and videos of Goodbye, promo covers of the Book of Love, ink drawings of the cd cover, 8x10 pictures of the band, and much more. When the drawing was complete, the band made themselves available for autographs and pictures with fans. Even though the event was to end at 4pm the band stayed an additional half hour longer visiting with fans. Just before leaving for Saturday's soundcheck, Russell commented that it was his pleasure to spend time with his fans and "We wouldn't be here without you."
--- Debbi Olson and Laurie Frank