Johnny at the
July 8th Vanessa Paradis concert
at the 'Estival d'Istres', South of France
Scans donated by Valou
Valou (webmaster of the late 'Tandem vp' site) reported to Jean-Yves, webmaster of 'Vanessa Paradis c'est l'enfer':
She arrived at the concert at 6pm that day and went to the parking lot where cars arrive in the hope of seeing Vanessa... there were security guys so she thought it meants Vanessa was about to arrive. She was right: 5 minutes later, Vanessa got out of a grey Mercedes 4x4 with dark windows, with Lily-Rose asleep on her nape... Johnny and some guy named Philippe (Vanessa's
assistant?) follow.... They all enter the concert auditorium without looking at the fans... A few minutes later, Johnny and Philippe came back to the car to get their stuff (packs etc..). Valou asks if she can take a picture. Philippe replies 'no'.
So, she leaves with other fans to the auditorium, buys the program (another fan buys a ticket) etc... and one of the staff guys tell them "oh look over there, Johnny is signing autographs!".... they run to him. Philippe gives a kiss to Valou, the others take pictures and ask for autographs. Valou takes 2 close shots of Johnny. Then, she asks him to sign a small slide of Vanessa (by photographer Claude Gassian). Johnny looks very surprised, he doesn't know how to sign so small but he does it. Valou takes another photo.
They were about 7 fans there. She was very excited to have finally seen Johnny in person! Valou will remember his sweetness: sweetness of his look, of his voice, of his movements... She didn't think he was SO nice (a friend of her also fan said he was probably having a good day)...
Apparently, Johnny had seen the others fans while getting out of the car with Lily and Philippe, they had asked him for an autograph and he had said "I will come back"... Which he did. :-)
Before the beginning of the concert, they bought flowers and gave them to Philippe. Vanessa must have had heard about the 'meeting' because she invited them to the next concerts!
Translation by Karelle