(Saturday July 12) bad weather struck and caused the collapse of both the North & South side stages - when we finally were able to leave the event site that day and travel an hour through the storm back to our hotel in Tulsa, we sought refuge in a nearby bar and the plan to post blogs was washed away in the rain and whiskey.

The next day, Sunday July 13, we did end up performing a kick-ass show shortly after 1 am, following Queensryche, on a makeshift stage in one of the tents.

I want to thank all of the wonderful fans who made this experience worthwhile - I met and got to hang with so many cool people from all over the world, KEELaholics who had enjoyed my music and stopped by the meet-and-greet area to chat and get photos & autographs. Thanks to those of you who were able to stick it out for our performance, for singing along and putting your fists in the air.

Depending on what reports you've heard, the storm was either apocalyptic or no big deal. I can only tell you from our perspective: we were doing a meet-and-greet when the stage collapsed just a few feet away from us, and to see and hear and feel it happen was as dramatic as any L.A. earthquake I've lived through. In the above picture, the "X" marks the spot where we were standing when it fell. I'm very happy no one was seriously hurt or worse.

As far as the music goes, besides the K2 set some of the high points for me were getting to see my old buddies Black N Blue back in action - I was front row for that, baking in the sun with all the hard cores and loving it. I also really enjoyed both Tesla and Queensryche; Kingdom Come and Trixter were both better than expected, sorry I missed Lita Ford and Triumph. - Ron Keel