We measure out the guitar cord and there’s plenty of play for Ed to reach the speaker banks at stage right. That night, of course, at the climactic moment in The Meeting, Ed heads directly for the speaker banks stage LEFT. He pulls over the mike stand in the process. I head onstage to put the mike back up and then camp behind the amplifier stack (which on that tour was taller than Ed himself) to play out guitar cord so Ed can reach the left speaker banks.

There’s barely enough, the cord is stretched taut, so I decide to remain onstage to reel it back in when Ed returns to the mike to finish the song. All eyes are on Ed anyway, up on the speaker stack, nobody is going to notice me onstage.

I look away from Ed for a brief second to check the audience reaction and meet the gaze of a kid about 14 or 15 in the front row. He’s wearing big prescription glasses and when our eyes meet he points behind me. I look back over my shoulder and Ed’s amp stack is teetering back and forth, just ready to fall over on me and render me unconscious or worse.

I jump up and grab the amp right before it crashes over, Ed roars back from the speaker banks to scream out the last line of The Meeting, the audience goes nuts, I’m not killed, everyone is happy.