(performance tribute artists at www.bonodouble.com)
Tribute artist Pavel Sfera as Bono and Steve Richards as The Edge live at Dublin Castle, London.
When I get a client that asks to perform with Bono, it's not an odd request at all. We humans have inspirations of people we look up to. I'm so honored to be asked even if I'm not who the client really wants. I try to honor Bono's presence as a tribute performance artist. I want to have them have a moment in the sun without disrupting their dream.
I've got huge influences in my life. I remember choking up having a conversation with a Nikola Tesla look alike when I lectured at the Nikola Tesla Science Conference at the New Yorker Hotel where Nikola Telsa lived out his last remaining years on the 33rd floor of that building. He died alone. I went to that room. I was in there by myself. I felt an extraordinary amount of humility just being there. I can't tell you, but if people feel an inner stirring like I did in Tesla's room when they share a moment with a look alike, I have to say it's humbling. Very much so. I get it. I would have loved to share the stage with Elvis, or Frank Sinatra or Ella Fitzgerald or just watched Nikola Telsa just read the newspaper in his study.
I had a client in France who brought me out to London England to do a show together. I told him that I had an Edge look alike who was just outside of London. Serendipity poured out like honey from the flowers of an tangerine grove. We could tasted it. We had a few days to rehearse in our hideaway in Camdentown, a really cool section of London. Great to see my Edge buddy again. We rehearsed a few days all three of us.
An acoustic U2 show with the client on the guitar and microphone. The Edge (Steve) and I made a scene everywhere we went. Even as we late 50s men wanted to sit on top of the famous red double decker buses in London. People would ask, "what are you guys doing on this bus? You're rich and famous". Our response "hah, we're just poor look alikes". We joined street buskers and whomever else just wanted to have a bit of fun. Of course Bono and the Edge are in Sainbury's buying kefir, plain yogurt, granola, dried fruit, almonds, tomatoes, carrots and sparking water. We're healthy that way.
My client rocked it. Nobody forgets those nights. There will always be a fire in this kind of memory where a childhood dream comes to life.........even with look alike/performance tribute artists of one of the the greatest rock & roll bands in the world.
Plus, it was the only time I was able to do my joke as we walked into a pub: Bono and the Edge walk into a pub. And the bartender says "not you too again". Not one person laughed at any of the times he and walked in a pub. Just to tell the joke. I was hurt.