Whole lotta shakin' goin' on

As I think I mentioned a posting or two ago in the midst of various gigging expeditions both near and far over the last couple of months I've also been (somehow!) managing to do some days at Balcony Shirts. With the gigs a bit fewer and further between for the next few weeks it's been back behind the counter for your humble narrator, and I'd all but forgotten how busy it can get in there, with stag and hen parties, holiday shirts, corporate work wear and more alongside the t-shirts that the shop usually produces. Back to work in the real(-ish) world then! Still not playing as much myself gives me chance to get along to see some bands, starting with Lee Thompson's Ska Orchestra at The Dublin Castle in Camden Town on Tuesday evening. A great show saw the band joined by Bitty Maclean for a few songs including their excellent new single 'Fu Manchu'; fellow Ruts D.C. man Seamus Beaghen is on Hammond Organ, and with eleven people in the band the stage was almost as crowded as the venue. After the show Seamus introduced me to former Stiff Records boss Dave Robinson, who I met briefly many years ago when I was playing with Neck - he did a good job of remembering me, although I somehow doubt that he actually did!

Wednesday it was off to Bonners Music in Eastbourne to check out a secondhand Marshall Vintage Modern 2266C 50W combo. My good friend Paul Cope had lent me one when Ruts D.C. played in Southampton last month (you can see and hear the amp in this clip of 'Staring At The Rude Boys' from the show) and I had been so impressed with it that I immediately started looking for one - I found this one on eBay a couple of weeks ago, and as luck would have it Big Al Reed was doing some shows in the area - he went to the shop, tried it and on finding that it sounded good suggested that I went down to try it. Somewhat extravagantly I not only bought the amplifier but got myself an Electro-Harmonix Neo Mistress Flanger pedal as well. There go the wages! Well - the amp sounded great and the pedal will be useful for the dubbier parts of Ruts D.C.'s repertoire. Now I've just got to sell my Fender Blues Deville combo as quickly as possible...

Talking of Big Al Reed I played two gigs with him this weekend, the first of which saw The Blistering Buicks visit The Three Mariners in Bagshot. With Dave the drummer gigging elsewhere Howard made his first appearance with the band, and he did a very good job in my not-so-humble opinion. Mind you he usually plays for Shakin' Stevens so he must be pretty good if you think about it... as a show it was definitely a game of two halves - in the first set it was a case of 'if anything can go wrong, it will' - I had a faulty lead, Big Al's acoustic guitar wouldn't work through the P.A. system and then his electric guitar wouldn't work either before a drink was knocked over all-too-near to his effect pedals; most spectacularly of all Chris's keyboard stand collapsed during 'Hoochie Coochie Man'. He did a heroic job of putting everything back together, to such an extent that he was set up ready to play a solo before the song ended! Fortunately the second set could hardly have been more different, and it was definitely a case of 'all's well that ends well' - in the end. Compared to the dramas described above Sunday's duo gig at The Feathers in Chalfont St. Giles was a straightforward affair - three 30-odd minutes sets, some songs with backing tracks and some without, and good fun all round. As always Al conducted the meat raffle - he pulled the first number out with the words 'and the winner is - Big Al', then when he read what was actually on the ticket he discovered that he had indeed won; I was asked to pull the next ticket out and, you've guessed it, I'd won too. (Yeah I know a vegetarian shouldn't buy a meat raffle ticket - but I thought I'd try to support the pub. Would anyone like some steak? It's no good to me!) From there is back home to make my latest appearance on the Music Scene Investigation podcast. Tom was unavailable due to illness so has place was taken by John who along with Ian and myself reviewed three excellent tracks by new artists - I say it every time I'm on there but the standard of the material submitted really is very high as you can see if you watch the latest episode here - I don't think I was too hard on Ian... was I?

Yesterday it was another busy day in Balcony Shirts followed by a visit to the jam night at The Three Wishes in Edgware - all good stuff, and there's hopefully a good day in prospect today, as Ruts D.C. are rehearsing. There are no gigs on the immediate horizon so we're getting together to run through some different songs from the band's back catalogue and to try out some new ideas. Should be interesting... actually I'd better get going or I'll be late!

The rough with the smooth

As Thatchermania grips the country (I'm with Brian Reade and Morrissey myself, as you might well imagine) here's a look back at the last couple of weeks in mad-guitar-land :-


Back To Zero have continued their Sunday morning rehearsal schedule (bloomin' tiring if you've done a gig the night before I can tell you!) to great effect - today's session at Soundlab Studios in Loughton carried on where the previous week's one at Southend's Mushroom Studios left off, with the band sounding better and better each time we get together. (Yes, I know that's what supposed to happen - but it doesn't always work like that, believe me!) Next month's gigs are getting closer...

As I wasn't gigging this Saturday evening I took the opportunity to see Steve Conte and The Crazy Truth at The 100 Club. (Yes, I know I should have had an early night but, well, I should do a lot of things but I don't!) I loved Conte's playing in The New York Dolls so a chance to catch him with his band was definitely not to be missed, and I'm pleased to say that it was an absolutely storming show. Most of the debut album was played alongside a new song or two, and some splendid guest appearances from various members of The Jim Jones Revue and The Urban Voodoo Machine pushed things to even greater heights. A cracking night.

Big Al earlier today,
contemplating his latest career move.

Gig-wise your humble narrator has worked with the always-excellent Big Al Reed three times over the last week-and-a-bit, twice with The Blistering Buicks (yes, he really has called the band that!) and once as a duo. Last weekend's band gigs (with Big Al on vocals, guitar and saxophone, Chris on keyboards, Terry on bass and Dave on drums) were actually quite different from each other, in that odd way that consecutive shows sometimes are. The Friday night show (the 5th if you're taking notes... incidentally if you are taking notes, why are you taking notes?!?) was at Hayes Working Men's Club, where I depped for The Good Old Boys back in February. That was the first time that I'd played there - it's very easy to be cynical about a gig like this (you'd be surprised what people say to you when you tell them that you're playing at a 'working men's club' - it brings out snobbery, spite and more) and I'd be lying if I didn't admit to having the odd 'bloody hell, this time last week I was playing 'Babylon's Burning' with Ruts D.C.' moment but overall the gig went well despite us being worried that we didn't have enough material to fill 3 x 40 minute sets. We featured quite a bit of slower, laid back material as befitted the venue, so you won't be very surprised to hear that I for one preferred the next night at The Dolphin in Uxbridge when the show was more uptempo (again as befitted the venue) and therefore a bit more fun from my point of view. (That's not to knock the other songs but.. oh, you know what I mean!) With Dave away gigging elsewhere Bob Pearce made a fine job of depping on drums, and for the second show in a row I found myself on the same side of the stage as Chris and was therefore able to hear his playing clearer than on previous gigs. It reminded me what a very fine musician he is although having said that everyone played well on both shows. And I have just - just! - got home from an afternoon duo show with Al at The Feathers in Chalfont St Giles. After initial hilarity from Al when he saw that he was billed with a meat raffle (I was somewhat relieved to have not been billed at all!) we loaded in, set up and then set off in search of food. Suitably fortified we returned to play a good humoured show where we were once again joined by Ekkie on saxophone for a few numbers (he always seems to be there!) and which went down well with all concerned. And in case you're wondering, Al presented the meat raffle too!

This week The Upper Cut return to The Dolphin on Friday 19th, and then it's time for some Ruts D.C. gigs - more about that next time, but before then it's that funeral on Wednesday. If like me you think that the money that it's costing would be far better spent in any number of ways then why not protest by reviving the ancient English custom of Rough Music. No, I hadn't heard of it either, but I don't mind admitting that now I have I rather like the sound of it - follow this link for the plan!

Twin towers

Well it's been a busy few days for your humble narrator in mad-guitar-land, but first things first - I was saddened to hear of the death of Andy Williams. His brilliance as a singer is surely beyond dispute - indeed the word 'singer' hardly does him justice - but I remember him from 'The Andy Williams Show' when I was a lad, with The Cookie Bear and him shouting 'NOT NOW, NOT EVER, NEVER!' when the bear asked him for milk and cookies each show. It was funnier than it looks written here, honest! And talking of funny, Herbert Lom died last week - his extraordinary portrayal of Inspector Dreyfus in the 'Pink Panther' films was one of the funniest things that I'd ever seen when I first saw it way back when.

Time for another reunion, and this time a unexpected one. Back in the mid-1980s I did quite a few shows with Pete Turner, then the owner of local musical instrument emporium Thames Valley Guitars, as part of an acoustic guitar duo called The Blue Five. Pete was a bit older than me (he still is!) and liked some very different music to the racket that I usually listened to; one day we were in the shop talking when for no apparent reason Pete handed me an acoustic guitar and began playing some chords on another and I, more by luck than judgement, joined in. We played for several minutes before a customer came in and we obviously had to stop so that Pete could serve them (!) Both of us liked what we heard, and this led to us getting together at his house one afternoon - that same evening we made our way down to The Load Of Hay which at that time was home to Uxbridge Folk Club. If I remember correctly we played one of Pete's compositions called 'Jackie's Tune' and the old classic 'Basin Street Blues' - this began a somewhat unlikely musical alliance that sporadically continues to this day. (Here is a clip of us playing at the L of H back in 2010 - our first gig this century!) He was up in Uxbridge on Thursday morning, and it was great to meet up for some coffee and some 'do you remember when...' moments, not least when we walked around town trying to remember what shops used to be where and what that pub used to be called. Great stuff. Pete mostly plays percussion these days, notably with Silvia Nicolatto and The Anglo-Cornish Project which from what he says seems to be going well. 

It's always good to be gigging with T.V. Smith and Friday's show was no exception, being part of his annual Earthbound gigs which T.V. plays for 'T.V.'s United Tour Supporters', also known as The TUTS. I was lucky enough to be asked to play at the 2010 shows up in Yorkshire, last year's took place in Germany and my show with him this year was in the splendid surroundings of Carshalton Water Tower.
I stumbled out of Carshalton Train Station around quarter to five in the afternoon. After a few minutes attempting to find a friendly passer-by (there wasn't one!) I decided against my better judgement to use my phone to find the venue. I found the postcode on the website - so then, left out of the station, left again then left into West Street... as I walked around the block wondered if I could have just turned right out of the station? As I passed the footpath to the station (bah!) I heard someone call my name - it was Shaun, who told me that the venue was further up the road but that The Hope was only a couple of hundred yards away... there we met up with Tony a.k.a. Fleagle the promoter (well, he organised the weekend's shows!) and various TUTS - T.V. was playing in a marquee in the garden the following evening, and it was obvious why the pub has just been named by CAMRA as one of the best pubs of 2012, it's really friendly and just 'right' if you know what I mean.
After a couple of drinks (only a couple, honest!) Shaun showed me around the Carshalton Ponds (very interesting) before making our way to the Water Tower - as we arrived T.V. was setting up his merchandise and the scene was set for a fine evening. Also on the bill were The Dirty Spoons who theoretically were supporting but were going on after us so that everyone who had travelled over by train (like me!) would be able to get home before the last train went.
After a quick soundcheck we agree to go on at 7.45. Our 26 song set takes in material from all of T.V.'s career, from The Adverts to the present day - I've gushed in these hallowed pages on quite a few occasions about how I feel about playing his songs, so this time I'll just say that every one was a reminder to me that he's simply one of the very best songwriters of them all. (See for yourself, as here we are playing 'Good Times Are Back' - excellent!) And I really enjoyed The Dirty Spoons too - a line up of banjo, mandolin, violin, bass guitar and washboard put on a fine show, and even included a version of T.V.'s 'The Lion And The Lamb'.  

Saturday evening saw The Upper Cut return to The Kings Arms in Harefield, and with my (previously) trusty Blues Deluxe combo still in the menders it was another job for the Blues Deville. Last time I played at the venue was back in July with Big Al Reed and the Cardiac Arrests, when Al's amp (a very expensive Egnater combo) went wrong; this time I thought I heard a few crackles here and there from mine but decided that it was just me getting paranoid... the band were a bit loose to begin with and took a few numbers to get going but by the time we started our second set we had a very active dancefloor, including a rather intoxicated young Irish lady who kept trying to talk to us during the songs. I always find it a bit weird when this happens - don't they realise where all that noise is coming from?

I don't mind admitting that I felt a bit bleary on Sunday morning - it's been a while since I did two late gigs in a row along with a Saturday in Balcony Shirts. Still no time to worry about that, as it's off to The Feathers in Chalfont St. Giles for an afternoon gig with Big Al Reed. When we arrived the pub was all but deserted, and we were told that there'd been 'a bit of trouble'... details were sketchy to say the least, but we decided to delay starting in the hope that a few people would arrive, and to play mainly without backing tracks (i.e. just on two guitars) in the hope that it might suit a 'quieter' venue than we're used to. All in all things went very well, with Ekkie joining in on sax here and there, the unsuspecting Pete from The Cane Toads being pressganged into joining in on a few songs, and even a few people in the audience by the end...

And last night saw that rarest of things -  a short notice Chicago Blues Brothers show. (Come to think of it CBB shows of any type have been pretty rare this year, but maybe we'll talk about that another day...) This one took place at The Guoman Tower Hotel which I last visited back in October 2008 (sometimes this blog comes in really handy, I'd never have remembered that otherwise!) and featured Pete and Matt in the hats and glasses, Dave and Richard on trumpet and saxophone, Squirrel on bass, Steve on drums, Tracy on vocals and, for the first time in quite a while, Roger on keyboards. Overall it was a pretty standard corporate show - it ran late meaning an appointment with the last train home (we - myself and the afore-mentioned Pete from The Cane toads who had come along to check the show out as he's doing some depping for me this Autumn - only just made it!) and I'm convinced that everyone there had forgotten that we'd played a minute or so after we'd finished our last song. Oh well, I guess every show can't be a T.V. Smith show, or indeed a Ruts D.C. show - we're in Birmingham this weekend, which should be a good one...

Jam yesterday (and maybe next month too)

Let's continue with the sad stuff - Dave Beal has died. I hadn't seen him for a few years, but remember him very well from his days promoting in Rayners Lane back in the 1990s. Along with Pete Feenstra and the late George McFall he worked tirelessly to promote live music in and around London - often in the face of no little adversity - and latterly he'd been involved with Club Ska as well as working with Los Pacaminos. I'll remember him as being a wonderfully enthusiastic man, whether he was expounding the virtues of the latest band that he'd booked to play or talking passionately about his beloved birdwatching, of which he had the most extraordinarily detailed knowledge. I'll also remember him as being a very nice guy.

Time for the first Flying Squad gig of the year, supporting The Clashed at Tropic At Ruislip on Friday night. I saw The Clashed at the same venue last year when they played with The Pistols - this show was better than that one, a 1 1/2 hour set that spanned the whole of The Clash's amazing career. They've still got things the wrong way round (the little chap in the middle sings like Mick, the tall chap on the end sings like Joe) but they made a good job of some very tricky material - it's hard to go from punk to funk and back again via reggae and rock but I thought they did it well. And even though I say so myself The Flying Squad played a very good show, with everyone on top form and a great audience reaction. We're back there in December supporting Dr. Feelgood which should be a very interesting evening, not least because we'll be obliged to learn an almost completely new set of songs - after all, we can hardly play 'She Does It Right' and 'Back In the Night' now can we?

The rest of the weekend saw two shows with Big Al Reed, the first of which was at The Royal Oak in Knowl Hill. It's a year since John the landlord first took the pub over, and comedian Adga Brown was also on the bill. Gigs with Al are always good fun if a little nerve-racking from my point of view since there's no telling what song Al's going to call up next - still it keeps me on my toes, as they say. Barring the odd 'how does this one go?' moment it was a good show, as was the gig at The Feathers in Chalfont St. Giles yesterday afternoon, which was distinguished by Al's mate Ekkie making an unannounced appearance with us by walking in through the front door playing saxophone, and the amusing (not to say astonishing) sight of Al's 84 year old mum dancing to several songs. I hope I'm as fit as she is at her age. Actually I hope I make it to her age at all!
We finished our last song around 7.30pm; after packing our gear away in record time we arrived at The Swan in Iver an hour or so later, where an open mic night was in full swing. Now I've always shied away from events such as this - the idea of jamming (maaan!) has always struck me as being far too hippie-ish for an old punk like myself to get involved in, although there are a lot of jam nights taking place these days and I'm often told that they're generally good fun and well worth going along to. This one is run by John who's an accomplished musician and guitar builder, and who has been cajoling me into coming along for quite a while. So it was then that Al and myself (accompanied by Tony on bass and Mark on drums) performed two songs which went down well enough for us to be asked to perform three more at the end of the session, the landlady approached Al with an offer of a gig, and I had a chat with the legend that is Les Payne - good stuff all round. I can't see myself seeking out too many similar events (although I suppose you never know - after all, plenty of people do!) but I enjoyed playing and I'll be making an effort to attend the next session (it takes place on the first Sunday of every month) on October 7th. 

In the meantime I'm playing at The Proms in Hyde Park this weekend - now that's a sentence that I never thought I'd ever type...

One step backwards, two step forwards

'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of it's noisiest authorities insisted on it's being received, for good or evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only'

- 'A Tale Of Two Cities' (1859) by Charles Dickens

Back in the Middle Ages it was illegal to use the musical interval of a tritone in a composition. Medieval ears liked to hear perfect intervals when listening to music (for an explanation of the musical terms used in the ranting that follows then please click here, and I apologise in advance if I'm even more pretentious than usual in the next few paragraphs) so the sound of a flattened fifth was considered to be the most dissonant of them all as it split the octave exactly in half and therefore was as far away from home as could be imagined. Some (so-called) learned folk found the sound so offensive that they named the interval in question diabolus in musica - the 'devil in music' and wanted anyone who used it in a composition to be put on trial for witchcraft. It sounds crazy, but, incredibly, it's true.

Fast forward a few hundred years to the 1960s and the sound of the flattened fifth has been picked up by those well-known purveyors of witchcraft The Jimi Hendrix Experience whose classic single 'Purple Haze' starts with a tritone between Bb on the guitar and E on the bass; soon after Black Sabbath are using it in songs like 'Symptom Of The Universe' and 'Black Sabbath' itself, and bands like Metallica and Slayer use it extensively to this day, with Slayer even going so far as to name one of their albums 'Diabolus In Musica'. I suppose heavy metal musicians and indeed fans like the idea of being allied to Satan and all his little wizards although as far as I know no one involved has ever been put on trial for witchcraft; I must admit I always thought was a rather extreme thing to suggest for simply putting two musical notes next to each other, but what do I know?

Well I thought it was a rather extreme thing to do until sometime around 9.30 pm last Wednesday, when I found myself gripped by an unreasonable desire to inflict pain, torture, painful torture, even death on Phil Collins and Lamont Dozier for writing 'Loco In Acapulco'. If you've got five minutes have a listen to it here and tell me if I'm being unreasonable. You might disagree but I cannot for the life of me work out how The Four Tops, one of the greatest Motown acts of all time, managed to get involved with such unspeakably unlistenable tosh. Or am I wrong? Is it actually better than classics like 'Reach Out I'll Be There', 'Standing In The Shadows Of Love' and 'Bernardette'? What do you think? There's not a flattened fifth in sight but as far as I'm concerned it's proof that The Devil exists. No punishment is too great for anybody who had anything to do with the production of this song. Kill 'em all! Now! Argh!

In case you were wondering what I was up to as I contemplated such murderous violence, I was on stage with Pete and Matt (Jake and Elwood) and Richard (saxophone) playing a Chicago Blues Brothers playback show in front of a room full of people who couldn't have cared less whether we were there or not. I've more or less driven from my mind where we were and what we were doing there, and I have absolutely no idea why we were playing the song in question as it's got about as much to do with the Blues Brothers as, say, 'I Can't Help Myself'. Mind you we played that as well. As I put my guitar down at the end of the show I thought to myself 'that was my least enjoyable show of 2011'. And it was. It was horrific. The only thing that got me through it was the thought of the next two nights with Ruts D.C....

...which thankfully didn't let me down. (I don't know what I would have done if they had!) The Bournemouth Academy show was great but the London show at The Forum in Kentish Town was something else again. We'd bought 'In A Rut' into the set at Bournemouth - when we ran through it at the soundcheck we got a round of applause from The Alabama 3 members and crew who saw it, which bode well for the performance of the song that evening. The show was the best one so far, but the next night pushed things to greater heights; with the venue pretty much full before we went on we started well with 'Whatever We Do' followed by two songs from the new album 'Mighty Soldier' and 'One Step'. Molara's fine vocal on 'Jah War' got a great reaction from the dancefloor before a medley of a new song 'Smiling Culture' and the old Ruts classic 'S.U.S.' led us into 'Fools'. Next it's the afore-mentioned 'In A Rut'; Segs had invited Ainsley (who sings on some of the new album) to join us for the middle section which you can see here - he's very good isn't he? We prefaced 'Babylon's Burning' with a short section from 'Weak Heart' - as I put my guitar down at the end of the show I thought to myself 'that was my most enjoyable show of 2011'. And it was. It was terrific. Does that mean that I've just proved that God exists?!?

Back to basics on Saturday night, with The Uppercut returning to The Dolphin for the first time in a while; the evening marked the 24th anniversary of Noel and Bridie first taking the pub over, and was a suitably wild 'n' wacky affair. We hadn't played together for a while (they'd played some shows while I was away in Dubai with Pete depping on guitar) and so were a bit loose here and there but the energy of the performance more than made up for the odd mistake. Well, I think it did... Noel took to the microphone towards the end of the evening to thank everyone for coming and then to lead everyone in what he referred to as 'the universal football song', 'You'll Never Walk Alone'. A cracking evening.

My third Sunday afternoon gig in four weeks (I don't think that's ever happened before!) saw myself and Big Al Reed return to The Feathers in Chalfont St. Giles. No sign of the chap with Tourettes Syndrome this time (apparently he'd been out the night before) but everyone there seemed to enjoy our efforts despite Al suffering from a bad throat. He's invited a mate of his called Barry along to play a few songs on slide guitar - when I asked him what he was going to play he didn't really know as he was not used to playing solo, and would I like to join him on lead guitar? Of course I would... as he started the first song I realised that I had no idea what he was going to play, or indeed if he was able to play at all - fortunately he was excellent, and it was really good to play some blues with him.

With Christmas looming it's all systems go at Balcony Shirts, meaning that I've been in the shop every day this week. But The Uppercut were out again last night, at The Six Bells in Brentford celebrating bass maestro Terry Peaker's 60th birthday. He'd invited a lot of his musician friends along, many of whom got up to play a song or two - it all got a bit chaotic in places with far too much hippie-ish jamming for my not-at-all hippie-ish liking, but everything went well and Terry was well pleased with the evening.

So there you have it - in the course of this posting I've played my best gig of the year, my worst gig of the year, and proved that God and The Devil both (probably) exist. Not a bad week's work then...

I swear I was there

I'm bound to say that the worst thing about leaving something on a train isn't leaving something on a train - it's feeling like an idiot. Well, it is for me anyway. On Monday morning I called The 12 Bar Club to check that I hadn't left it there (even though I have a recollection of struggling through the front door with both hands full and my bag over my shoulder) and then attempted to call the London Transport Lost Property Office. After what felt like ages on the phone waiting to get through I decided to try their website - it didn't take too long to fill the form in so let's hope it's as easy for them to find my pedal board...

In the meantime I spent most of Sunday attempting to do very little - I actually managed to run through a fair few songs for next weekend's Ash Bash show so it wasn't a completely lost day although I also fell asleep on the settee... I felt a bit better in the evening and so made it down to the Load of Hay to see The Bullet Blues Band, and very good they were too. I even managed to join them for a few songs at the end of their performance - I got up from my seat to go to the bar and Eddie the singer said something like 'let's get Leigh up to help us with this one'; it's difficult to say no in situations like that (well maybe it's more accurate to say that it's difficult for ME to say no in situations like that...) and it was good fun to say the least. They're a great band, and they deserved a bigger audience than the one that they had. It's Steve Simpson on the 20th then Pimp My Jazz on the 27th - if you're in the area why not come along?

Tuesday it was back to Brixton for the last Ruts D.C. rehearsal before the upcoming gigs. I arrived at Jamm just as Dave was finishing setting his kit up; Seamus arrived soon after me (Molara sadly couldn't make it) and with Segs marshalling the troops we were set up and playing in no time. There were a few last minute arrangement changes here and there but it all sounded good to me - the first show is in Manchester this coming Thursday followed by Bristol on the 26th then December 1st in Bournemouth and Kentish Town on the 2nd. With the album still to be finished Dave from Balcony Shirts has done some design work on the 5-track sampler CD that will be available at the gigs, and we're also making some t-shirts to sell at the shows - it's all getting nearer by the minute. Excellent!

A long day Wednesday saw The Briefcase Blues Brothers return to Bibi's Italian restaurant in Leeds. I travelled up with Adam the drummer - we arrived to find Rob (keyboards) and Kylan (bass) more-or-less set up, with Mario and Matt (Jake and Elwood) getting the P.A. system up and running. After a quick soundcheck it was time for some food - I certainly ate far too much but it was so nice I couldn't help myself! We then walked around to Becketts Bank for a drink (As we passed The Queens Hotel Matt and myself reflected on the fact that if we'd been there a day earlier we could have seen Jimmy Saville lying in state) before returning to the venue for a boisterous show in front of an audience that danced a lot more than I would have been able to after the amount of food that I'd eaten. A good gig.

A fairly quiet Saturday in Balcony Shirts (the calm before the storm methinks... hopefully...) was enlivened no end by a visit from Big Al Reed who (a) bought some strings and (b) asked the ever-interesting question 'are you working tonight?' When I said that I wasn't he said he needed someone to do a duo gig with him in Chalfont St. Giles - was I interested? Of course I was...

When we arrived at The Feathers we were greeted by a barrage of shouting and swearing from a chap sitting at the bar. 'He's a bit loud' said Al, eyeing him suspiciously. Well that was one way of describing him. Meanwhile a somewhat over-refreshed but very cheery Irish lady asks if she can sing a song - we're hardly set up before she's wowing her friends and the sweary man with 'Summertime'. Al takes it all in his stride, singing a few swing numbers before inviting me to join him for a few songs. He plays some on acoustic and others on electric guitar, some with backing tracks and some without, and he was excellent. I don't think he needed me there, but I'm glad he invited me along. Then again we were invited back in December so we must have done something right.

As we were leaving we met the over-refreshed but very cheery Irish lady out at the front of the pub. She loved us, as did John, one of the locals. 'Did you meet ''Tourettes''?' he asked with a smile. It was fairly obvious who he meant. 'We call him "Tourettes" 'cos he's got Tourettes'.

Ah, that explains it.

And Sunday it was Ash Bash 5 - as previously mentioned I'd missed last weekend's rehearsal so had been attempting to learn the songs on my own but was glad to have a run through with Simon on drums and most of the band (fellow Flying Squad members Andy on vocals and guitar and Mike on bass with Tina on vocals; Max joined us on keyboards at the venue) before heading off to The Forest Suite at Bracknell Leisure Centre. After loading in and setting up we had a quick (and I mean quick - a verse or two at most) soundcheck with each student before Simon introduced the show. The idea of the event is that some of Simon's drum students get chance to play one or two songs with a live band (us!) and as such it's a very enjoyable event to be part of. In all too many cases the students knew the songs much better than the band (!) but we managed to get through it all without too many mishaps; at the end Simon joined us for a very enjoyable romp through 'Children Of The Revolution' (oh yes!) to bring a splendid event to a close. Great stuff.

Right. My next gig is with Ruts D.C. Here we go...