October 8, 2007

Greetings everyone:

Well I’m finally home and have time to put a few words together. As most of you know we played the last show of our “40^th Anniversary Tour – 2007” in Aberdeen, MD on Oct 6. I must say it was a very good night. The concert was held at a Baseball Stadium and the crowd was into it from the downbeat and quite enthusiastic. You could feel the energy in the place. In the audience were some of the most dedicated members of The Pack. They came from near and far, from all over North America and Europe as well. Towards the end of the show some of them held up a large banner that read “THANK YOU FOR ALL THE YEARS”. Well that goes both ways so after the show I was glad we were able to shake some hands, take a few pictures and spend a little time with some of those who’ve seen to it that we were still thriving after “ALL THOSE YEARS” Seeing some of the familiar faces, made the evening rather special for all concerned I think, it certainly did for me.   

        Whenever we take the stage our mission is give our very best of course, but this year, knowing that most in attendance would see us for the last time, it was particularly important to us that we sent everyone home smiling. We hope those of you who saw us play in 2007 are able to say “The last time I saw John Kay & Steppenwolf, they were as good as ever”.

         Touring this year was particularly demanding on some of our people considering the logistics of moving us and our equipment all over the continent, Norway and Brazil. By early September the hectic schedule got pretty crazy and we can only thank the touring gods that everything went according to plan. Divine intervention notwithstanding; I want to express my gratitude to the usual suspects at Wolf World and Chris Bray and Charlie Wolf in particular since they were burdened with much of the aforementioned extra effort. I would be remiss if I did not also thank Paradise Artists and Bill Monot our agent. They have been an important part of the Wolf Team for many years and greatly contributed to our touring success.        

        I’ve been asked what my plans are for the near term. In 2008 Jutta and I intend to travel – primarily on behalf of the Maue Kay Foundation – to various parts of the world where we support a number of projects. I suspect that we will become even more involved for the need is great and almost endless. While I’m on the subject of the foundation, I should mention that we will auction off some “Wolf” items at:

Proceeds, as always, will go to the foundation. Charlie Wolf will send an e-blast with the auction start date. After all items are gone our ebay store will close permanently. To all who previously purchased memorabilia there, a big “Thank You” Somewhere in Cambodia there is a child with a mosquito net to prevent it from getting Dengue Fever and in Kenya a baby elephant orphan that will be raised to be reintroduced to the wild when it is grown and so on and so forth, and your dollars helped see to that.

        From time to time I intend to post a few words here, just to keep in touch. I’m holding the door open to all future possibilities, who knows what’s down the line, your crystal ball is as good as mine, so stay tuned and stay wild.

JK