'Eat up - you're at your Auntie's!'

My Auntie Emma died yesterday. My Dad called me on my mobile phone while I was working in the shop - when I saw on the screen that it was him I knew it was bad news. Well, you do, don't you? She was fine (well, we thought she was) when we saw her last July, but she became ill before Christmas. While we were with her Shirley took a picture of me with her in her front room - I was thinking about posting it here but don't want to look at it just yet. She was my Auntie Emma, and I'm going to miss her. I miss her already.

Meanwhile back in mad-guitar-land it was a roaringly good evening on Friday when The Upper Cut made a welcome return visit to The Dolphin in Uxbridge. When Roger and myself arrived a serious-looking game of pool was in progress - not a good sign as the band's set up where the pool table is - however a few seconds after the game ended the table was swiftly moved and we were able to set our gear up with no problems. A fair-sized audience witnessed a boisterous performance that blew last's Friday's show out of the water, with a fair bit of dancing not least during a hitherto unperformed encore medley of 'Sweet Little Rock and Roller' and 'Johnny B. Goode' - someone kept shouting for the latter so we played the former as we often do and Terry sang a couple of verses of the latter. Someone asked me where the toilet was during the guitar solo in 'You Really Got Me' and Big Al sang 'Hoochie Coochie Man' and 'Sweet Home Chicago' - as Terry put it, 'that one made up for last week's one didn't it?' How right he was. And Dave from Balcony Shirts turned up along with some of his Action And Action bandmates - when I saw them in the shop the next day guitarist Luigi remarked that as he was watching us he wondered 'is that me in 20 years time?' A good question - if you'd have asked me during my time in The Price whether or not I'd, for want of a better term, 'end up' playing cover versions in a pub I'd probably have defiantly replied with some nonsense along the lines of 'NEVER! I'M A SERIOUS ARTIST!' and then gone home and hated myself for even considering the prospect of doing something like that (I was a barrel of laughs in those days!) But it's not a bad place to have ended up, and it's a good band to have ended up in, or it certainly is when the gigs are as good as this one was. Great stuff, and we're back there in May...

And we were back in Norfolk last night, for a Chicago Blues Brothers show at Caister Hall. When myself and the long-suffering Shirley arrived the rest of the band were set up and ready - it's a 'nearly-the-A-team' gig with Squirrel and Marc on bass and drums, local lad Dave on trumpet (the show was at a party for his friend Julie's 40th birthday) with Ian depping for Richard on saxophone, Ian returning on keyboards and Pete and Mike in the hats and glasses. We played in the same hall a few years ago - I don't remember the door to the car park being alarmed then but it certainly is now, as it went off as we opened it... and I don't remember there being a volume restriction device then but there certainly is one now (apparently a neighbour has been complaining about the noise - I'll send him the bill for the damage that my amplifier sustained when it was switched on and off quickly by said device shall I?) which turns the power off for a few seconds if you exceed a pre-set volume limit. We managed to avoid setting it off in our first set but it went off twice (during 'Long Train Running' and 'Respect' in case you were wondering) in our second set of party (i.e. non Blues Brothers) songs - apparently they set the threshold lower later in the evening. It would have been nice if they'd told us... other than that it was an enjoyable if slightly loose performance - we don't play together as much as we used too - perhaps best summed up by the moment where Mike's comment of 'I think we might be becoming a bit predictable' was met by Dave's reply of 'I knew you were going to say that'. Enough said!

In between sets I sat on my own in the dressing room, thinking about Auntie Emma. She hadn't seemed to be ill when we last saw her a mere 8 months ago, and now she's gone. She'd said then how she thought she'd had a good life, always with people to love and who loved her. I reflected on Luigi's thoughts earlier in the day, just before I got my Dad's phone call. I'm lucky to be able to play the guitar, whoever I 'end up' doing it with. I get sad, frustrated, even angry sometimes when there isn't much gigging going on (April is looking very quiet at the moment...) but that's because I enjoy playing so much. On our way to the gig we'd stopped to get something to eat - as we sat in the cafe Shirley said to the waitress how beautiful the sunset looked through the window, and the waitress wearily replied that she was always too busy to notice things like that, and that 'I ignore everything out there, what with the traffic noise and everything'. But we (and indeed the waitress) were lucky to be able to see that sunset, and I think Auntie Emma would have liked it too.

The long and winding road

So - 'Christmas is years away' as the Mega City Four once sang, and it's back to 'normal', whatever that is...

The year at Balcony Shirts has started fairly quietly - somewhat inevitably it's not as busy as it was before Christmas, so it's time for some new t-shirt designs, and indeed a new website devoted to custom t-shirts. I've been spending a fair bit of time writing copy for that and indeed the 'standard' website which I must say I really enjoy, not least because it's interesting to try to write 100-150 words on subjects as diverse as ukuleles, psychology and bread, all of which feature on new Balcony shirts. And talking of writing Dave from the shop has started a blog about... well, have a look here and you'll find out!

Friday night and (pausing only to see if there was anything on television worth staying in for) it was off to The Bull and Gate in Kentish Town for afore-mentioned Peart promotion. It was originally due to feature 3 bands, but The Meow Meows pulled out as their drummer has broken his foot (ouch!) meaning that Dirty Revolution headlined with support coming from Colour Me Wednesday. Ex-Ruts bassist Segs was D.J.-ing when I arrived (Andy had asked him to, he hadn't just barged his way into position!) and was playing 'Fever' by Junior Murvin when I went over to say hello; there was time for a few words before Colour Me Wednesday took to the stage - or rather 3 of them took to the stage, as singer Jennifer was nowhere to be seen. She eventually ambled up to the microphone, took off her glasses which she placed (rather riskily I thought) at the base of the mic stand and the show began. They've improved immeasurably since I last saw them, and their punky pop sounded good to me although it's still a bit hit and miss in places - a false start here, a botched ending there - and Jennifer the singer looks at the floor a bit too much to really draw the audience in, although maybe that's just me that thinks that? And let's face it, any band that has a song called 'Purge Your Inner Tory' must have rather a lot going for them.

Coming on stage to the strains of 'Bankrobber' by The Clash isn't something that most bands would relish (nice one Segs!?!) but Dirty Revolution seemed to take it in their stride, roaring through a breathlessly efficient set of ska-crossed-with-punk that went down well with the assembled multitude. Two guitars clashed over a thunderously tight drums and bass, while an almost cheerily melodic vocal floated over the top tying everything together. Good stuff, and although I'm never going to be the biggest ska fan in the World I'll be keeping an ear out to see what they do next.

Afterwards Fast Tony took over the job of the D.J. and there was time for a chat with Segs (remind me to tell you his hilarious 'Rat Scabies at Paul Fox's funeral' story one day!) to bring a highly enjoyable evening to a close. And it was great to be back at The Bull and Gate - always a classic indie venue, it's still a stage for original bands to perform on which is sadly something of a rarity these days.

First gig of the year for your humble narrator on Saturday, with The Chicago Blues Brothers at Butlins in Skegness. We did the same show at the same time last year - it's a brass band weekend! - and once again it was a great gig. Myself, Richard (sax) and Graham (depping with us for the first time on trumpet) made the epic journey without too many problems, although as always the last 20-or-so miles seemed to take forever - the road winds it's way through The Fens and some very picturesque countryside but time seems to stand still when your on it. I'm always half-expecting to see Doctor Who somewhere along the way... we arrived about 7 p.m. which was just in time for Richard and Graham to do their soundcheck with The British Philharmonic Big Band (modestly named don't you think?!?) who they were playing 2 sets with in Reds (the smaller of the two venues) before joining us for our show at The Main Stage at 11 o'clock. I watched a bit of their soundcheck, made some phone calls and generally hung around - the rest of our band we're due to arrive for quite a while yet - then went to get something to eat. I saw a couple of numbers by the band (very good they were too) before going across to The Main Stage to see if any of the band had arrived yet - they hadn't but The Central Ohio Brass Band were on stage for the first of their 2 sets, a young man played a euphonium at mind-boggling speed as the man next to me said 'very difficult that' to nobody in particular. Back at Reds The BPBB are still going strong when my phone rang - it was Mike to tell me that I should join them all in the main building for a free pizza. Oh well... I had a pint of lager instead!

Matt 'n' Mike are Jake 'n' Elwood, Ian's on keyboards, Squirrel's on bass and Marc's on drums for a show that started a bit strangely from my point of view - my guitar sounded out of tune but was fine when I checked it on the tuner, then sounded bad again in with the band, then three or four songs in it suddenly sounded good. Nobody else said there was a problem so maybe it was just me? And we went down excellently well with the audience, with much dancing and merriment more-or-less from the first number so I really should stop moaning. There - I've stopped moaning. For the moment at least...

The long drive home is enlivened by Whispering Bob on the radio - we got back to Richard's at 4 a.m. to find the long-suffering Shirley waiting to take me home. That's why I call her long-suffering...

Nothing much happened on Sunday. Well, it probably did, but I slept through it... a day in the shop yesterday was followed by an Upper Cut rehearsal in the evening - as I say, back to 'normal, whatever that is...