Theatre of the absurd

Well time has been even tighter in these here parts over the last couple of weeks, hence the complete lack of blogging. How on Earth did I ever have chance to do several posts a month? It's been hard enough to find a few minutes to update my Facebook page, let alone write this stuff… we're still busy in Balcony Shirts - this is my only day off this week, hence the chance to attempt a quick posting now - and I've been gigging with The Upper Cut (a particularly riotous night at The Dolphin a week-and-a-half ago) and Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks (at The Three Wishes in Harrow and The Horns in Watford the weekend before last) so it's perhaps not surprising that I feel as though I've done nothing but work these days. And Ruts D.C. appeared at The Know The Future Festival in Vienne, France on the Saturday just gone - we'd not played for a while but put in a good performance alongside the likes of The Damned, The U.K. Subs and The Vibrators. The event took place at The Theatre Antique, a Roman amphitheatre which had to be seen to be believed - I've certainly never played anywhere like it before. The slightly peculiar travel arrangements meant that we flew out from Luton Airport on Friday lunchtime and returned home to Gatwick Airport in the early hours of Sunday morning - I got back home just in time to do an actual birthday gig (as opposed to The Upper Cut Uxbridge show the week before, which I played as an early birthday bash) with Big Al and the boys that afternoon at The White Horse near Staines. I'm still feeling tired now… more gigs this weekend, then it's off to The Rebellion Festival next week. No rest for the wicked, or indeed for me. 

Incidentally the always-excellent Aural Sculptors blog has just posted an audio recording of our set in Vienne, which you can download by clicking here. Enjoy!

Mad dogs and Irishmen

It's hot isn't it? There - I thought we'd get that out of the way... 

And the busy times continue - last week I worked 6 (6!) consecutive days in Balcony Shirts which to a sad little man like me is all too close to having a real job... I also played The Three Wishes in Harrow and Ye Olde George in Colnbrook with Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks - with my usual six-string partner in crime Pete unavailable it fell to your humble narrator to attempt to cover his parts as well as my own (that intro to 'Wicked Game' is deceptively difficult I can tell you!) and while I somewhat inevitably didn't have as much time as I would have liked to work on them I made it through the shows reasonably unscathed. He's back for this week's shows - good!

Last Friday The Who played Hyde Park. I arrived just as Johnny Marr was playing the introduction to 'Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before' - he looked great, sounded even better and by the time he swung into an unlikely cover of 'I Fought The Law' (well, I thought that it was unlikely, maybe he does it all the time!) he had the crowd on his side. He finished with 'There Is A Light That Never Goes Out' and 'How Soon Is Now?' - The Smiths really were rather good sometimes weren't they? Next up were The Kaiser Chiefs who I've always had a bit of a soft spot for - I'm not really sure why as I've got their first two albums but have lost touch with them since then. Their excellent performance was more than enough for me to rectify that situation, or at the very least look out for a 'greatest hits' collection. (Don't worry, I'll wait until it's cheap somewhere!) Main support came from Paul Weller, whose singles-packed set had the audience on his side from the word go. You forget how many hits someone like him has had sometimes don't you? Miles Kane joined him for 'That's Entertainment' in the middle of the set, 'Friday Street' was a forgotten classic (well I'd forgotten it!) and the set-ending one-two knockout punches of 'Start!' and 'Town Called Malice' provoked an audience reaction that wouldn't have been out of place for a headline act. Ah - but they were up next...
'You're a long way away' said Pete Townshend in typically obtuse tones - halfway through the opening song  'I Can't Explain' it was as though we were all on stage with them. And so began two hours of stunning rock 'n' roll brilliance, probably the best I've seen them play since, ooh I don't know when. Highlights were many and varied - 'Bargain' soared, 'Love Reign O'er Me' had jaws dropping left right and centre, the biggest E chord ever on 'Sparks' shook the ground beneath our feet and the inevitable set closer 'Won't Get Fooled Again' bombed out the last pockets of resistance with effortless aplomb. A textbook performance from a band who, incredibly, just seem to get better and better. It won't be the same without them will it? 

Tuesday was spent in the company of Adam Ant guitarist and all-round good bloke Tom Edwards. I worked with him back in March when he told me that he was due to make a trip sometime soon to the Marshall factory near Milton Keynes to pick up some amplifiers and would I like to come along? That, my friends, may well be the very definition of the term 'silly question'... we spent a splendid few hours there during which he introduced me to Artist Liaison Manager Joel - maybe, just maybe I might be using Marshall amps in the not-too-distant future. 

And yesterday I (re)joined my old buddies Neck for a gig at The Mevagissey Feast Week in Cornwall. Yes yesterday, Wednesday 1st July 2015, officially the hottest July day on record. Well I don't know about that but it was bloody hot in the van - and it was a bloody long way, although the countryside looked fantastic and Stonehenge was clearly very popular indeed. I spent much of the journey down listening to the songs on headphones, something which I generally don't like doing (my ears are bad enough as it is!) but was something of a necessity as, you've guessed it, I hadn't been able to spend as much time as I'd have liked on the material. Mind you, fiddle player James had arrived back from Peru only a few hours earlier (other people's lives eh?) so if anything he was even more of a disadvantage - fortunately my headphones did the trick for him, and a highly enjoyable show went down well with all concerned. (Incidentally, am I the only person that thinks there should be a Mega City Four tribute band called The Mevagissey Four? They could play all their songs a sea shanties, or something... I think the heat must be getting to me!) Mind you that all seemed a very distant memory when I walked thorough the front door at some unearthly time this morning - it was a bloody long way home too, although I suppose it would be if you think about it. And it's bloody hot now too. Too hot for me. Mind you, we'll all be moaning that it's too cold soon...

Beautiful Nights in December, busy nights (and days) in June

After a relatively quiet few days the busy times are back, as with one of the Balcony Shirts staff on holiday and the shop the busiest it's been for ages I should be in there most days this week. Whilst this is hardly bad news as it's a chance to earn a bit of money but it does leave little time for anything else aside from working in there and learning songs in the evening. The latter is about to become particularly important as not only am I about to play a couple more gigs with Neck but I'm also going to play an acoustic set with Noel Martin from Menace at The Rebellion Festival in August. All this (ahem!) frenzied activity (by my standards!) means that there's precious little time for blogging - there's just time to mention that I saw The Godfathers blow the roof off The 100 Club on Wednesday (a 30th anniversary show that was up there with many that I saw them play back in the day) then returned to said venue on Saturday night to see '60s soul man James Royal - backed by several Good Old Boys it was sadly a somewhat scrappy show as the band hadn't played together or indeed in some cases even met before the show. That said I'm glad I got there early enough to see a great support set from The Mynd Set - I'll be keeping an eye out for them in the future. Oh and Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks (aided and abetted by Back To Zero drummer Andy depping for a holidaying Dave) had a riotous night at The Dolphin in Uxbridge on Friday - fellow guitarist Pete can't make this weekend's shows in Harrow and Colnbrook so I must remember to run through some of his parts before then.

In the meantime and following on from last week's Australian tour poster here's one for 'Beautiful Nights', a series of shows due this coming December that will feature The Levellers, Dreadzone and Ruts D.C. - I must say that it's shame that there's no London gig scheduled (sorry if that sounds a bit greedy!) but they look set to be a great run of gigs even if they do seem a long way off at the moment. Well they are a long way off at the moment. But they'll come around...

Back to Brixton and beyond

Before last weekend's Ruts D.C. shows Thursday evening saw Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks return to The Sunningdale Lounge in Sunningdale. This was our third appearance there in 2 months which I thought was pushing our luck a bit in terms of us getting an audience, but as so often happens I was wrong (!) and the place was all but full. It just goes to show what I know eh? Our set was well received by all concerned including Graham the guv'nor who again offered us a return gig almost immediately - this time however Al went for a show in a few weeks time on July 24th. Hmmm... that's my birthday...

Ruts D.C. rehearsed on Friday, after which we met up with Richard from Cadiz Music to consider options for future releases. Talk was talked, drinks were (inevitably!) drunk and plans were planned - hopefully there are exciting times ahead... on the way home I called in to Tropic At Ruislip where I arrived just in time to catch Ian Dury And The Blockheads tribute band The Blox who were supporting my old mates The Pistols. With Dury being one of the most distinctive frontmen of them all and The Blockheads being famously brilliant musicians a tribute act has a lot to live up to - I thought they did a good job especially the deputy Dury (although he's got to watch the timing of his tambourine playing - did Dury ever play one?!?) with the band following him every step of the way. Mind you, none of this explains why they played 'Madness' and '54-46 Was My Number'... meanwhile the Pistols were as great as ever, and it was good to catch up with them all again.

I seem to be spending a lot of time at Jamm in Brixton these days, what with us gigging there and then working on Ruts D.C. recordings there at various times in the last few days. After our show there last Monday I met Pete 'Manic Esso' Haynes at The 12 Bar Club - I hadn't seen him for a while and there was a lot to talk about. His latest book 'Cool Water' is published by Caffeine Nights later this month - let's hope it goes some way towards giving Esso the success that his hard work deserves. I was back in Brixton during the day on Tuesday but in the evening I went to Rough Trade East to see Electric River play a launch show for their new album 'The Faith & Patience'. The afore-mentioned Richard was there (Cadiz are putting their album out) as was 'Vive Le Rock' editor Eugene Butcher who manages the band. I hadn't seen them for a while and I thought they sounded terrific. I've since been backwards and forwards to the studio quite a few times since - maybe I should see if there's a Travelodge nearby?!?

And this posting ends as it began, with a BA & The BBs (that's so much easier than typing 'Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks' I can tell you! Mind you, I've just had to type it again to tell you that... bugger!) gig last night at The Three Wishes in Harrow. With the Froch v Groves fight being shown in the venue our show was somewhat inevitably compromised - we played a short set before and a longer set after the boxing, and all things considered it all went pretty well. There are three gigs for the band this coming weekend, although it'll depend on how the studio work goes as to how many of them I'll be able to play. Let's see what this week brings shall we...

Ruby Tuesday

I have just - just! - returned from playing with Ruts D.C. at The Fat Tuesday Festival in Hastings. And what a great night it was - we played three sets in three venues (The Dragon Bar, The Lord Nelson and The Carlisle - this timetable shows how well-planned the schedule was) and played a different set each time - it really was a terrific event to be part of. I must say it was quite an intense evening - as our first set finished the next band were queueing up to get on stage and we were being told that we had to get a move on to get to our next venue, which might not sound particularly 'intense' here but certainly felt it at the time. And in the midst of the madness Girlschool bass player Enid came over and introduced herself - I saw them play with Motorhead all those years ago. Mind you, so did lots of people!

We rehearsed for said Hastings gig(s) in the familiar surroundings of The Music Complex in Deptford on Friday. A jovial first hour or so some very unexpected oldies both from the band's back catalogue and elsewhere (did we really play 'Roxette'? Yes, incredibly, we did!) as well as attempting to put three sets together for the shows. After a coffee break progress was swift, although I'm still not sure how so many Spandau Ballet lyrics managed to find their way into quite a few of the songs... 
Rehearsal finished at 4 o'clock - 2 hours later I was back at home readying myself for a Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks gig at The Paddington Packet Boat in Cowley. Due to other commitments it had been quite a while since I'd last played with the band (my good friend Pete Kerr has been dong a splendid job in my absence) and with this in mind I ran through a few songs on Thursday afternoon before leaving for The Brewery in Moorgate to see a Q&A session with Roger Daltrey and Wilko Johnson. This was an interesting evening (you knew I'd say that now didn't you?) with Daltrey bemoaning the amount of time people spend with their mobile phones held in front of their faces and Wilko telling a hilarious story about Lew Lewis attempting to syringe his own ears with a bicycle pump (!) among the many highlights. It goes without saying that I'm really - make that really - looking forward to getting their 'Going Back Home' album later this month but, well, I'll say it anyway - I'm really looking forward to getting their 'Going Back Home' album later this month! 
Anyway back to the Cowley gig, which was, erm, ok... the band played well but I made a few too many mistakes for my liking. I always find this annoying although it didn't seem to bother anyone else (or if it did then they didn't say anything to me!) However the next night's show at The Three Wishes in Harrow was much more like it; indeed I'd even go so far as to say that it was one of the best shows that the band has ever played. That's more like it!

Back in 2010 The Band Of Sceptics and The Flying Squad played together at Tropic At Ruislip; on Sunday evening the two bands reconvened at the same venue to play a tribute show to the late and undeniably great Gypie Mayo who had played with The Band Of Sceptics at the afore-mentioned gig and who also of course played for Dr. Feelgood, The Yardbirds and many more. Joining myself and singing stalwart Andy in The Squad were Johnny Squirrel on bass and Andy Moore on drums, and with regrettably no chance for the band to rehearse before the show we all resolved to get to the venue early to run through as many songs as time would allow. When we got there John had already set up the (excellent) P.A. system, so all that remained was for us to set up and get going - we managed to play quite a few songs and work out some endings before time caught up with us and we made way for The Band Of Sceptics to soundcheck. By the time the doors opened it was raining heavily and there were fears that this would put people off from coming, but in the event there were more than enough people in the audience to make the evening work. The Band Of Sceptics were up first - led by the irrepressible Pete Sargeant their engaging West Coast-powered set found favour with the Tropic crowd. They very kindly invited your humble narrator to join them on stage for Captain Beefheart's 'Gimme Dat Harp Boy' - I ended up staying with them for the rest of their set, which was great fun to say the least. Our set started strongly with 'I Can Tell', and despite the odd mad moment here and there it all went well with a great reaction from those present. We finished with the Dr. Feelgood classic 'Down At the Doctors' before Pete joined us to jam on Howlin' Wolf's 'Killing Floor' which bought a highly enjoyable evening to a close. We raised several hundred pounds for The Dorothy House Hospice who cared for Gypie towards the end of his life, and we're doing it all again on Friday at Surrey Blues Club. Excellent!

This week's Reggae Punk Monday at The 12 Bar Club featured Bug on the stage and GLM at the bar - both fine sights to see. I'd not seen the three ex-Lurkers together for a while - when 'Shadow' came on over the P.A. I attempted to get them all on stage to mime to it, but sadly to no avail... Bug roared through a breathless half hour set before an increasingly appreciative audience. Frontman Phil described the band as 'Northern monkeys' on more than one occasion - maybe he was trying to get the put downs in before anyone else did, but if he was then there was no need as the band sounded great. And Monday nights at The 12 Bar Club really are getting better and better, which is a good thing to see in these troubled times. 

Right, time for some food. Or some sleep. Or something. Hmmm... I think last night is catching up with me... I told you it was intense...

'We're off to see the wizard...'

There's not been much blogging time over the last few days, and I'm tired so I'm going to bed soon. Poor little me... anyway, apologies if this all seems a bit garbled :-

Last Tuesday and Wednesday I joined Dave Ruffy and Segs at Jamm in Brixton for a couple of days of studio sessions - no playing or recording this time as we were going through some old material as well as listening to a show recorded in Bremen last year. I'm pleased to say that the live stuff sounded great, so much so that we're hoping to put it out as a live album later this year. And the old material was just fantastic - we've had lots of requests for a re-issue of 'Rhythm Collision Volume 1' which has been unavailable on CD for many years, and this seems like a good time for it re-appear. We also went through some BBC recordings made by The Ruts and Ruts D.C. in the late '70s and early '80s - I remember recording some of the sessions on cassette from The John Peel Show back in the day, and it really was fantastic to hear them again. There were also a fair few things that I'd not heard before, including a Ruts Kid Jensen session and a Ruts D.C. session for The Richard Skinner Show. Great stuff! The older material was all being remastered while the live recording from last year was being mixed - and at this point I must say that Greg the studio engineer was absolutely incredible; they call him 'Wizard', and it's not difficult to see why... and it was good to see Rob and Jake from The Alabama 3 who were there working in the other studio and who I'd not seen for quite a while. A very good couple of days work.

Talking of work (or what I rather euphemistically call work anyway! Mind you I've been in the shop in between all this music lark so no wonder I'm tired...) I had three gigs in three days over the weekend. With my good mate Pete depping for me with Big Al Reed and the Blistering Buicks somewhere in Harrow I found myself at Nettlebed Village Hall for a gig with The Repertoire Dogs. Their usual guitarist is Mick Ralphs (yes, that Mick Ralphs!) who wasn't playing the show but who I was told might be along to collect the money on the door. Sadly he didn't make it to the gig, a shame as I'd like to have met him if only to discover why I was playing instead of him... I played the same venue with the band back in July last year - that was a good night, but this one was even better with a bigger crowd and plenty of dancing and merriment. After the show a chap came up to me and asked if I still saw Richard Cole - he was somewhat disappointed when I explained who I was...

Saturday saw BAR and The BBs (ooh that's much easier to type!) return to The Chippenham in Maida Hill (where it was Christine's 50th birthday party) while on Sunday we made a 5pm appearance in Colnbrook at Ye Olde George Inn (didn't I play there last weekend?!?) Two great and very enjoyable shows - if ever there was a band that's getting better and better it's this one, and Al's already got 40-something gigs booked for this year with more coming in all the time. Excellent!

Right - time for some Ruts D.C. rehearsals. Acoustic tomorrow, electric on Thursday, the shop in between, busy busy busy...

Can you (afford to) see the real me?

The Who have finally announced British and European dates for the 'Quadrophenia' show that they're currently touring America with, and unlike the Wilko Johnson farewell shows tickets seem to be reasonably easy to obtain - well they are as long as you join the fan club on the band's official website. And it's even easier to obtain a V.I.P. package although with standard ticket prices edging ever nearer to the £100 mark I dread to think how much these would be. Actually I could just brave looking them up couldn't I? Hang on... oo-er - the Emerald Package is £245, the Ultimate Fan Experience £375 and the Signature Fan Experience £495. Am I the only person that thinks that this has all gone too far? 'Quadrophenia' is one of my all-time favourite albums and I guess I'll be at one or more of the shows, but it's all getting far too corporate for me. Maybe that's just how things are going these days, but I for one don't like it. Then again perhaps I should cheer up and go along and enjoy the music? It is the mighty 'Quadrophenia' after all...

Friday's Good Old Boys gig at Hayes Working Men's Club turned out to be a highly enjoyable affair on several levels. It was a rather longer evening than I for one was expecting, with three 40 minute sets meaning more than a few 'we-haven't-done-this-one-for-a-while' songs appeared among the expected material. This of course made little difference to me as I didn't know any of them! I played a few numbers with the band back in 199-something at a birthday party for ex-Episode Six drummer John Kerrison and did a show around 2003 in a very big house out in the sticks but other than that I was, as I think the saying goes, 'flying by the seat of my pants'. Simon was very helpful, Hud made all the endings slightly more obvious than usual, Alan was as authoritative as ever out the front, and Nick - well, standing a few feet from him I was all too aware that this really was the bloke out of Johnny Kidd And The Pirates, Deep Purple and all those other bands. I'd not really met him before bar a quick hello here and there but he was a thoroughly nice chap with some amazing stories as you might well imagine. We played 'Shaking All Over' (shame we didn't play 'Hush'!) and as the solo approached Simon gestured over at me with a smile - at the end of the song Nick said something like 'Johnny Kidd would have been proud of that solo'. I have rarely stopped smiling since.

The Upper Cut returned to The Half Moon in Harrow on Saturday evening for a show that was definitely a game of two halves. Terry vocal microphone wasn't working properly from the word go - the P.A. amplifier had just come back from Roger the amplifier repair man so we knew that was (hopefully!) working properly so it had to be a mic problem. It's a radio mic so he changed the batteries but with no improvement he used my mic for the first set, which was a somewhat scrappy affair - maybe we were a bit unnerved but a couple of songs went wrong and the whole thing was a bit of an uphill struggle. During the interval Terry discovered that the output level in the transmitter was set lower than usual - thankfully turning it up cured the problem and we went on to play a second set that was the polar opposite of the first, with everything falling into place and an encore of 'Route 66' bringing the proverbial house down. We're back at The Dolphin in Uxbridge this Saturday for a birthday party - hopefully we'll carry on where the second set left off.

Sunday saw the first Back To Zero get-together, in which Sam, Andy and myself ran through arrangements for eight songs which should make it into the live set at our upcoming Mods Mayday show. Using the 'It's All Relative' album as a reference (it features Sam and original singer Brian in home studio mode with programmed drums and overdubs a-plenty) we split guitar parts between myself and Sam while Andy, who is actually the drummer in the band, played along on bass. It all sounded pretty good to me, and another meeting is planned to run through the rest of the proposed set before full rehearsals with a bassist and keyboard player in the not-too-distant future. There's lots to look forward too here, and there is already talk of more gigs and possible recording sessions. Excellent!

And last night it was up to The 12 Bar Club with Esso and Nigel from GLM (and previously The Lurkers of course; incidentally there's a great article on the Nuzz Prowling Wolf blog about GLM which you can read here) and their mate Scottish Stuart to catch a solo show from Tug Wilson. When I was a lad Tug was in a band local to us called The Injections, and these days he plays with Nigel in Pack Of Lies. His 35 minute set showed that he's not lost the knack of writing good songs (I saw The Injections a couple of times back in the day including a support slot to Wild Horses at Brunel University, the band's material was mostly written by him and very good it was too) and it all went well especially considering it was as far as I know his first solo gig. Also on the bill were Alpha Earth Light and Boss Caine - the former are a Austrian guitar and drums duo (now there's something that you don't find yourself writing every day!) which made a fearsome sound for a two piece while the latter (on this occasion a chap called Daniel Lucas, although I think there is a band line up too) had the chap next to me calling him a 'British Tom Waits' which isn't a bad thing if you think about it. In the meantime much drinking and jollity ensued - a good evening all round.

This week there's the afore-mentioned Upper Cut gig along with Big Al and co. at The Admiral Nelson in Twickenham on Friday - and then things start to get very interesting indeed. More about that next time.

What is a 'booking fee' anyway?

Well - the Wilko Johnson farewell gigs have taken over the World! Ok so that's probably a bit of an overstatement, but the March 6th show at Koko in Camden sold out in no time as did an added date on the 10th and indeed the rest of the shows. It's sad in a way as obviously the increased interest is due to his illness, but also great to see such support for the man. That said there are quite a few tickets on eBay and less reputable agencies for vastly inflated prices which is a great shame - as usual the 'real' fans either miss the shows or are obliged to pay whatever price the ticket touts decide is 'reasonable'. Surely more can be done to stop this from happening - there are stories on Wilko's Facebook page about people able to buy as many as twenty tickets when the limit should theoretically have been eight. Very poor. I managed to get tickets for both of the London shows - I'm sure I'm not the only person who considered giving them a miss and remembering him as I do now, but in the end couldn't resist seeing him just a couple more times. In the meantime Wilko gave an excellent interview on BBC Radio 4 this week in which he demonstrates his fabled guitar technique, reminisces about his career and tells of how his cancer diagnosis made him feel 'vividly alive'. It's inspirational stuff, as you can hear here -  these are going be very emotional shows.

On a (much) lighter note the excellent Music Ruined My Life blog currently has last December's 12 Bar Club show from myself and T.V Smith (joined for a few numbers by Pascal Briggs) available to download - you can read my story of the evening here if you'd like to, and can download our hour-ish long set here. I must have a listen to it myself! Blogmeister Jeffen is promising 'more of this under-appreciated figure's accomplishments' very soon. Amazingly I think he means me! Oo-er!

Two very different gigs this weekend, during the course of which I played over 50 different songs. On Friday Big Al Reed and The Cardiac Arrests (I wonder if I'm the only band member who thinks that we could do with a better name? I must ask them next time!) visited The Swan in Iver. Al and myself generally attend the first-Sunday-of-the-month open mic night there (indeed we'll hopefully be there this coming Sunday) but this was the first gig for the band, and it generally went well especially considering that we hadn't played together since back in December. I still think we could do with some rockier material to balance out the slow stuff, but there's no denying Al's ability to sing a ballad. Overall a good gig, as was Saturday's show depping for Mr. Tibbs at Tropic At Ruislip. The venue usually puts on shows on Friday nights, so this was something of an experimental evening for the club. It was rather experimental from my point of view too, as I only had one rehearsal with the band and had to get to grips with material from the likes of INXS, Duran Duran and Simple Minds among (many) others, none of which I'd played before. In the event the evening exceeded expectations both in terms of the number of people in the audience and the band's performance - I thought that I'd made any number of wrong turns during the show, but talking to people afterwards everyone seemed to think that it sounded great - and I for one wasn't about to tell them that they were wrong.

Sunday night I appeared on the Music Scene Investigation podcast for the first time in several months - I initially had problems hearing the tracks to be reviewed (fortunately I decided to check that they were working before the broadcast began!) and there were a few issues with Tom's video signal during the show, but generally this was probably the most enjoyable MSI show that I've been involved with. The three songs were all of such a high standard that it was very difficult to decide which one came should come out on top, and somehow I ended up with the casting vote which I don't mind admitting was quite nerve racking. You can check out the three artists concerned via these links - Garrett Harbison, Athena Creese and World5 - and watch the show here - see if you think we (or indeed I) made the correct decision.

And last night myself and the two Terry's from The Upper Cut (Roger couldn't make it sadly) got together to discuss ideas for new songs, getting more gigs and general band stuff - we're at The Half Moon in Harrow this coming Saturday for the first time in ages which should be a good night, although I remember last time the venue had problems with neighbours who thought that the bands were playing too loud. An interesting evening in prospect then...

I knew I should have kept a box of them under the bed...

Now here's a funny thing - the first Price single for sale on eBay. Most of these were sold at gigs out of cardboard boxes, and incredibly it was made 'single of the week' in the NME although that was a bit of an inside job as the writer in question already knew of the band; his name was Steve Lamacq - I wonder what happened to him? It feels a bit strange to see it there - how naive does 'pay no more than £1.30' look now? - but it's nice to think that we haven't been totally forgotten. You can see the full listing here - and no, I don't have any spare copies!

Following on from Muhammad Ali's 70th birthday last month it was sad to hear of the death of his trainer Angelo Dundee. Boxing was very popular in our house when I was young (my brother Terry was a boxer and dad a big fan of the sport) and so I know his name very well - he was a great character as these quotes show Would Ali have made it without him? Now there's a question... and Witney Houston has died - I don't know much about her music as it's not really my type of thing but with the media gearing up for another paparazzi-powered feeding frenzy I'm sure we'll all have chance to find out far too much about her over the next few days and weeks.

Anyway, amazing news - I actually played two gigs this weekend. At last! Every musician I talk to seems to be suffering at the moment, and while I'm lucky enough to have gigs on the horizon these are definitely tough times for all and sundry. Still The Uppercut returned to The Half Moon in Harrow on Friday evening for a show that didn't start well - even before we'd played a note we were being asked to turn the volume down. Bah! Our first song 'Dock Of The Bay' was so quiet I could hear the unamplified strings of my guitar louder than the sound from my amp. Not good, and although we managed to sneak the volume up a bit later in the evening it put a bit of a dampener on proceedings. Under these circumstances I thought we played well but it was harder work than it should have been.

Sunday night I accompanied Big Al Reed at The Anglers Retreat in Staines; once again Barry the slide guitar player got up for a few blues numbers (and very good he was too) and Al was his usual larger-than-life self; his spontaneous Frank Spencer impression during 'Polk Salad Annie' induced audience hysteria and had to be heard to be believed. It was something of an experimental evening for the venue as it was the first Sunday gig - let's hope they decide to continue.

And last week I saw T. Rextasy at The Beck Theatre in Hayes. I got there early to meet up with ex-Chicago Blues Brothers drummer John Skelton who's been playing with T. Rextasy for several years now; it was good to catch up with him and great to see him doing so well with the band, whose 'Children Of The Revolution' tour celebrates 40 years since the release of 'The Slider' (How long? I remember saving up my milk round money to buy that when it came out!) as well as marking the 35th anniversary of Marc Bolan's death in September. This was only the second date of the tour - John said that they were due to play several songs for the first time at the show, having spent most of their soundcheck running through them. It all sounded good to me, with Danielz as mind-bogglingly like Bolan as ever, and the band sounding solid and strong. The audience loved it too, with plenty of dancing and even a fair bit of screaming from some of the ladies present. Despite playing in several tribute bands myself I still can't make my mind up about them, but for people like myself who didn't see the original band T. Rextasy deliver as faithful a rendition of Bolan's music as we're ever likely to witness. Great stuff - mind you, where was 'Buick MacKane', 'The Slider', 'Shock Rock'... (continued on page 94)

The director's cut

I was saddened by the news that Ken Russell has died, aged 84. Always a controversial figure, he turned the already reasonably bonkers story of 'Tommy' into one of the maddest films any of us are ever likely to see; mind you most of his films managed to annoy people in one way or another, but it always seemed to me that said people either wanted to be annoyed, or indeed deserved to be annoyed by them. In these days of mediocrity we are sadly unlikely to see his like again, which is a great shame.

On a lighter note I had an absolutely splendid time on Music Scene Investigation last night - Tom, Ian and Rich were all on good form and I managed to ramble on about all sorts of things for what seemed like ages. If you'd like to see the show then click here but be warned - I've got those big headphones on again, and I still can't hear the bass... I could definitely hear the bass at The Load Of Hay where I managed to catch the last few numbers from Pimp My Jazz who feature Terry from The Uppercut on said instrument - you can always hear him! From what I saw an heard the band sounded tighter and more together than their first show there back in June (which was their debut gig) and it'll be interesting to see where they go from here. It's The Undersound this Sunday 4th, then The Uppercut on December 18th - come on down, as someone once said...

Time for another Ruts D.C. gig supporting The Alabama 3, this one on Saturday at The Academy in Bristol. The Static Jacks started the evening, and from what I saw of them they started it very well indeed; they certainly got the energy level up and got a lot of attention in the rapidly-filling venue. We walked out onto the stage to a fair amount of applause (and at least one shout for 'Babylon's Burning' - we finished the show with it) and played a tighter set than in Manchester, with audience reaction building up to the extent that we probably could have done an encore. It's good when that happens! Both Dave and Segs seemed to be pleased by the way things went for us, which bodes well for this week's shows in Bournemouth and London. And I managed to see most of the Alabama 3's set, and very good it was too.

It was my first Uppercut gig for what feels like ages on Friday, at The Half Moon in Harrow. The gig was originally supposed to feature Awaken who have since broken up in the interim period between booking the gig and now leaving guitarist Pete (who deps for me in The Uppercut when I'm elsewhere) with a gig but no band. Rather splendidly he suggested that we could do the show, which I'm pleased to say that our new friend Hetty (who books the gigs at the venue - she's Ginger Baker's daughter! Really!) thought was a good idea. To repay Pete's generosity in putting us up for the gig we invited him to come along to play a few songs with us, and with this in mind he and I got together on Thursday evening to see what songs would sound good with two guitars rather than one. In no time at all we'd written ten or so songs on a piece of paper - at which point we decided that we'd done enough work and went down the pub. It could all have gone tragically wrong at this point, but it actually went very right indeed (I wouldn't have been writing about it here if it had been terrible!) with Pete ending up playing with us for most of the evening, dep drummer Geoff excelling himself and Hetty offering us three gigs in the new year. As I said earlier, it's good when that happens!

More gigs this week, then it all get worryingly quiet...

Back on the streets

Well my phone didn't ring, but as the computer clock clicked over to 14.50 'City Of The Dead' by The Clash was playing on the Balcony iPod. No really it was... and how sad is it that Gary Moore has died. I saw him play a few times, notably at the '50th Anniversary of the Fender Stratocaster concert in 2004 at the Wembley Arena where his version of Jimi Hendrix's 'Red House' stood out among an evening of standout performances. He was a fine musician who always gave 100% to every show - no, every note - and he's a great loss to the World of the electric guitar.

Talking of electric guitar - the absence of gigs for your humble narrator means that there's been chance to get out and see a few gigs in the last week or so, although oddly enough most of them have been at The Half Moon in Harrow. Last Friday (the 4th in case you're taking notes) Awaken played a fine show in front of an enthusiastic audience that even managed a bit of dancing in the second set; all such behaviour stopped during the 2 songs that I played with them (since you've asked they were 'Sweet Home Chicago' and 'Hard To Handle' - Pete has offered to get a longer guitar strap for me if I borrow his guitar again!) but I enjoyed myself all the same. Saturday I met the aforementioned Pete at the venue to catch the riskily-named Beaver (do your own punchline!) powering through 2 sets of harder rocking material than the previous night had featured, but no less entertaining all the same. I've known Clint the guitarist since my days in Pro Music (remind me to tell you what happened there one day... actually someone said to me the other day that 'no one goes there now that you don't work there as it's staffed by kids that don't know what they're talking about'. Surely that can't be true - can it?!?) and he's a fine player - he wasn't too happy with his performance as he had an ear infection and couldn't hear out of his right ear (I know the feeling!) but I thought he played well. I must try to catch the band again.

Wednesday evening I was down at The Load of Hay in Uxbridge to set the P.A. up for David Ferrard; it was a show organised by some Brunel University people (I never did really find out what was going on!) and when I got there around 7.45 they were pretty much ready for the show to start - maybe the students all go to sleep earlier these days? After a (very) quick set-up David performed 2 sets of folky originals mixed with a few Robert Burns songs (the students didn't seemed to have heard of him!) and American traditional numbers reflecting David's Scottish and American heritage. In true folk club tradition there were a few floor spots (where an audience member gets up and does a song or two) including a couple from Brunel lecturers whose prowess behind the microphone clearly caught their students unaware. A good gig - and the Acts Less Ordinary gigs start there again on Sunday 27th February with The Noisy Boys (as one local wit put it, 'they are neither noisy, nor are they boys...') with more to follow. With that in mind myself and East retired to the bar after David's show to discuss the possibility of a Price show there in the not-too-distant future - yes, we could be going to do it again just one more time...

One of the latest batch of Balcony Shirts proudly states 'Real Men Bake Bread'. In a moment of inspiration Scott (it's his design) came up with the idea of writing a song that would teach the listener how to make their own loaf (he does things like that!) which meant that first thing on Saturday morning Balcony Shirts became Balcony Studios as your humble narrator sat behind the counter of the The Custom Bar recording his Telecaster onto Scott's Pro Tools equipped laptop. The plan is to make a video to go with it, put it on YouTube and, well, take over the World. It sounded good so why not? Well, realistically there are any number of reasons why not, but I'll let you know how we get on. The day turned out to be a busy one, with probably the most unusual request coming from a young lady who had a t-shirt made to wear on an upcoming episode of 'Total Wipeout' - on the front it said 'THE BOY BASHER', on the back 'IS BACK' and I for one wasn't about to wind her up.

For the evening it was back to The Half Moon in Harrow to see The Bolaji Blues Band. Ken from Awaken is on bass and I've known guitarists Danny and Dave for quite a while but had never managed to catch the band before - I arrived just as they were starting their first number 'Worried Life Blues'. They sounded good and they're all excellent musicians, but I found that most if not all of the solos (and therefore the songs) went on rather too long for my liking. As I say the playing was terrific (the keyboard player hadn't played with them before - you'd never have known) and at it's best it all sounded fabulous - but at other times it reminded me why I like punk rock so much. Then again I found out later that they normally have a saxophone player who couldn't make the gig so they extended the guitar and keyboard solos to make up time so maybe I should stop moaning... Pete from Awaken got up with them for the last 2 numbers and to my surprise they invited me too get up too, but I declined the offer - I'd had far too much to drink by then! It turned out to be a good decision as they then played 'Rambling Man' - I'd definitely had to much to drink to get that one right!

No drinking last night (well, not too much!) as it was time for a gig with The Ali Mac Band at The Bulls Head in Barnes. The last few gigs with Ali and co. have been in an extended format, but this time I joined the standard line-up of Ali on vocals, Bill on bass, Hud on drums and Simon on guitar - I've depped for Simon with Bill and Hud before but this was the first time we've all played together. When Ali told me about the gig I was keen to be involved as George McFall had run The Stormy Monday Blues Club there for many years; it was the first time that I'd been back there since his untimely death last year and I wasn't the only person who kept expecting him to walk in... it being Valentine's Day there weren't too many people in attendance, but those who were there saw an excellent performance. Ali sang well, Bill and Hud were as solid as the proverbial rock, and Simon and myself must have been doing something right as we were getting applause after each guitar solo. That's never happened to me before! A great gig all round.

Back down to Earth - no gigs this week. Bah...

The National Trust disco

Sorry about all that ranting last time - it was the heat I tell you, the heat... but you can click here for the last word (in these hallowed pages at least) on England's calamitous World Cup campaign courtesy of the excellent Monkey Picks blog. I couldn't have put it better myself, as they say...

Funnily enough my phone came back on a couple of hours after I finished the afore-mentioned cyber-rant; I'm not sure it's working properly (a NETWORK LOST message keeps appearing which is a bit of a worry) but at least I could see if Macca or E.C. had left me a message. They hadn't. Oh well - maybe next time?

Meanwhile back in the land of the gigging The CBB roadshow rolled in to Surrey on Friday for an outdoor show at Polesden Lacey. Bev's in for Richard on sax, and with Ian away with Ray Davies Chris is on keyboards; the voice on the entryphone on the outskirts of the property sounds suspiciously like Stephen Hawking, and when the long-suffering Shirley and myself arrived at the stage ('just drive up to it' said Pete - so we did!) everything was set up and ready for soundchecking. Quite how we managed to attempt versions of 'All Right Now' (I made a right mess of the solo!) and 'Brown Sugar' with Pete on bass (Squirrel was due along later) and Matt on drums is a bit beyond me (thinking about it how '2-4-6-8 Motorway' made an appearance is a bit of a mystery too) but we eventually got back to the script with 'Sweet Home Chicago'. It sounded good to me but since I've still got the hearing problems that I mentioned last time I'm probably not the best person to judge things - monitor problems for Tracy and Pete (both on backing vocals) persisted all the way through the gig so sadly it wasn't all good news. Backstage before the gig Matt got a bit confused as to whether he is a member of The National Trust or The National Front (definitely the former!) and some very helpful staff bought in copious amounts of sandwichs and organic lager - excellent! The show itself was a bit of an odd one - we played well but it all seemed a bit, for want of a better word, 'muted' although the fact that there was a large dip in the ground (which would have made a good mosh pit although the only people I saw in it all night were bored-looking security men) between us and the audience could well have contributed to this. Not a bad show by any means but there was a bit of an odd feeling at the end, if you know what I mean.

One of the people who'd been trying to contact me in the earlier part of the week (actually he was pretty much the only person trying to contact me, but obviously I'm not going to admit that here) was Pete Kerr, guitarist with local heroes The Cane Toads and all round good bloke. He'd had a call from Caithriona at The Half Moon in Harrow who needed a band for the coming Saturday evening, and, confirming his 'all round good bloke' status, Pete suggested The Upper Cut (and yes, we're definitely called that now!) After a quick (landline) ring-round everyone - Terry on vocals, Terry on bass and Roger on drums - confirmed their availability, and the gig was on. We all turned up at the venue in the midst of the Spain vs. Paraguay game (everyone seemed to be missing penalties in the bit that I saw!) and attempted to set up as unobtrusively as possible. Terry the bass was on fine if rather surreal form - his opening comment of 'I think I've had flu all week - well I haven't had all the symptoms but it did take me 4 hours to put my socks on' will stay with me for quite some time... since Pete depped for me at a recent show we invited him along to join us for a few songs, and he ended up doing 5 or 6 with us all of which sounded good to my admittedly still-ailing ears. There was the inevitable exodus at the end of the game but those who were there saw the clock above the stage fall off the wall and nearly land on Terry the singer's head just a few moments after Caithriona had asked us to turn down a bit as they'd recently had complaints about volume levels from the neighbours. We weren't that loud! Terry the bass uttered the immortal words 'I was playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order' at the end of 'Layla' (he was right, he was!) and there were a few, shall we say, unusual arrangements here and there but overall we were pretty good even though I say so myself, and we've been asked to play there again next month (on Friday 13th!) so we must have done something right. It's good when that happens - I'll be cheering up if I'm not careful...

Happy holidays!

You join your humble narrator in a post-Christmas (purple) haze of YouTube clips and scribbled chord sequences as he attempts to learn the songs that he's playing on New Year's Eve- I'm guesting with Price bassman Huggy's band Sweeney (isn't there another band called that?!?) at Buckinghamshire Golf Club. They're playing some really good numbers so I want to get them right!

As December arrives people often say things like 'I bet you're getting really busy with gigs now aren't you?' Well you might think so but it's not always the case; I think that with the advent and subsequent popularity of karaoke coupled with the fact that many acts have slimmed down to a duo-with-backing-tracks rather than a band it's now quite a hard time to be a gigging musician; 'though the last thing I'm going to do is sit here complaining- I'll leave that to everyone else... this year your humble narrator has managed to stay reasonably busy (for once!) to such an extent that the last week or so has been a bit of a blur...

Friday 18th I depped with The F.B.I. Band for the first time since September, at a Christmas party for Boehringer Ingelheim at the Bracknell Hilton. It's an event that the band's played at for the past 3 years 'though with upcoming redundancies this might well be the last one; joining the ever-present Tony (vocals) and Ian (sax) are Jon on bass, Paul on drums, Gabriel on trumpet and after a somewhat impassioned phone call from Tony on the previous Tuesday ('you don't know any keyboard players do you?) we've got the excellent Dave Dulake on keyboards. I met Dave several years ago and he struck me as a good person to contact for the gig as we'll be playing a mixture of soul, Blues Brothers and Madness material and Dave scores very highly on all accounts. Oh, and he runs a pub which is always a good sign...

Myself and the long-suffering Shirley made the journey through a snow-covered Windsor Great Park (which looked amazing) and arrived at the venue just as Tony and Ian were setting up the P.A. system- we're playing in The Wentworth Suite and have time to set up, soundcheck and run through a couple of songs before it's time for food. 'Welcome to the F.B.I. Band Christmas party' said Tony waving his lager in the air as Gabriel and Paul blew up those long balloons that fly off into the middle distance when you let go of them- no, I don't know what they're called either but you know the ones that I mean don't you? A suitably festive atmosphere meant for a well-received show that saw Tony battle his way through the set despite has voice gradually giving out ('I had a cold a week ago and it seems to have come back') to such an extent that by the end of the show he could barely speak let alone sing. As we were leaving the alcohol seemed to be taking it's toll on some of the party-goers- one young man appeared agitated as he loudly described himself as being 'like an octopus'- an evocative image I'm sure you'll agree.

Saturday 19th saw a Youngblood gig in The Elizabethan Barn at Ferny Hill Farm near Barnet. We were playing at a horror themed 25th wedding anniversary party (hmm...) and when Terry the bass and myself arrived it was cold, dark and seemingly deserted- calling Terry the singer revealed that we were at the wrong part of the farm which was something of a relief as it looked like the sort of place that gangland executions might have taken place at. Mick had set his drums up underneath a ghostly apparition, I had an upside down hanged man above my head and the bar consisted of cans of beer floating in a bath which also contained a skeleton in a deep sea divers outfit. Excellent! We were due to play 3 30-minute sets and the first one started earlier than expected as the belly dancer was late (yes, you read that bit correctly!) It was cold- so much so that I had to walk around with my hands in my pockets while we were waiting for the heaters to warm the place up for fear of my hands being too cold to be able to play- see how I suffer for my art? It warmed up a bit as people got into the evening with a fair bit of dancing ensuing though this might have been due to some of the cake on offer... a good night all round even though it started snowing just as we were loading our gear back into our vehicles at the end of the evening. Real horrorshow don't you think oh my brothers?

It was Chicago Blues Brothers time again on Monday 21st and Wednesday 23rd, the former being our last visit to The Pizza Express in Maidstone this year. With Ian back from gigging with Ray Davies and Marc returning from panto ('oh yes he is!') it was the first A-team gig for a while; with the weather still pretty rough Shirl and myself set out early, not least as we'd seen on T.V. how Operation Stack had effected traffic in that part of the country. In the event our journey was uneventful until we got to Maidstone itself when an articulated lorry clipped us as we waited to change lanes. When he eventually stopped and got out the driver's first words to us were 'which part of my lorry did you hit?'- when we pointed out that we'd been stationary when the incident occurred and so it was probably him who had hit us he looked disappointed to say the least. Silly boy.

The gig itself was an odd one- it being only a few days before Christmas you might have expected something of a raucous evening but it was probably the most restrained audience that we've ever played to there. That said we played well and there was a fair amount of dancing by the end of our show so maybe I'm being a bit over-critical?

Mind you if that was an odd gig the one in Wolverhampton 2 days later took things to another level. In no lesser venue than The Civic Hall (the 'home of rock' according to the poster at the side of the stage) it was a Christmas party organised by Beacon Radio (more about that in a minute) and it took Richard, Ian and myself (joining us on baritone and alto sax for a rare 3-man horn section with Dave and Richard) a mighty 3 1/2 hours to battle our way up the M1 and M6. We parked in Corporation Street and phoned Pete to come out and let us in- since it had been snowing Richard and Ian readied the snowballs which were duly dispatched as the stage door opened; sadly the first person through the door wasn't Pete but was a burly security man who fortunately saw the funny side... Bootleg Abba were doing their stuff as we loaded our gear in, they sounded ok to my 'I-never-liked-Abba-much' ears. With Marc off elsewhere Paul is back on drums and Pete is in for Mike in the hat and glasses; when Bootleg Abba finished their set I went on to the stage to set my gear up, only to be told that there was another band on, they featured the radio station boss and were called Bad Radio, I said to the stage hand that I'd get off straight away- his reply of 'BOSTIN'!' reminded me which part of the country we were in. (If you're wondering what on Earth I'm going on about click here.) As they began their first song I realised that they were aptly named- then again it's the 'as a matter of fact I do own the company' moment... with things running late we opted to play one set rather than the two that we'd originally planned, and a strange set it was- onstage sound wasn't brilliant (very echoey and indistinct) which contributed to some timing discrepancies here and there although it all went down well with much merriment all round which I guess that's the main thing?

It's rare to have a gig on Boxing Day but this year I depped with The Cane Toads at The Half Moon in Harrow. With regular band members Malcolm (guitar) and Bruce (drums) away elsewhere original drummer Russell joined myself, Pete (guitar) Ken (bass) and Martin (vocals) in two 45 minute sets of rock covers in front of a small but appreciative audience who included my new friend Mick who's in a band called Harmonica Lewinsky (oh yes! I'd put a link here if I could find them; I did however find this chap, this band and indeed this band- I guess it's too good a name to only be used once!) and a Scottish gentleman called Swindell who is a bagpipes instructor. I like this venue!

Incidentally Russell, Ken and Malcolm used to be in a band called The Attendants who were well known in our area when I was a lad; plans are afoot for them to make an appearance with The Price at some point in the not-too-distant future- remember where you heard it first!)

And if that wasn't enough last night The Flying Squad played their final gig of 2009 at The Load Of Hay in Uxbridge. (Sometimes booking gigs at a venue really does have it's advantages! Incidentally the extraordinary John Hegley will be there on Sunday 10th January...) We were a little loose in places- it's been a while since we last played- but all agreed it was a good way to end our year. And it was great to see some friendly faces, not least legendary Price fan Mark Delderfield (a.k.a. 'Mark-from-the-football-club') who bought along a collection of Price videos dating all the way back to 1988-91, most of which I've never seen. It'll be very interesting to see what they look like!

So that was Christmas- well it was from my point of view anyway. I'm sure I had a day off on or around the 25th but can't really remember...