70 not out

It doesn't seem that long ago that the name Wilko Johnson was everywhere. And it's not that long ago that it was, in relative terms at least, nowhere. Everywhere and nowhere baby... it's certainly been an unprecedented few years for the Canvey Island assassin, from his unforgettable appearance in the Dr. Feelgood documentary 'Oil City Confidential' and his subsequent 'who'd have thought it?' recruitment to the cast of 'Game Of Thrones' to his now-well-known diagnosis and subsequent cure from cancer it's been an extraordinary time. Last night he played a 70th birthday show at no lesser venue than The Royal Albert Hall. Strange days indeed. I went along with my good friend Pete Sargeant who was reviewing the night for 'Blues Matters' magazine - as we settled into our seats we reflected on how we - all of us - had got to where we were. Pete used to see The Feelgoods in the London pubs before they started making records whereas I missed the band with Wilko on guitar - I was a bit young, and anyway I didn't have any friends to go to see a band like them with. But however you look at it the band made an indelible impression on us both as they did with so many people.

Our evening starts by coming full circle (if that's not too much of a contradiction in terms) as Eight Rounds Rapid take to the stage. Simon 'son-of-Wilko' Johnson prowls around as Dave the singer tells us that his mate's a bit tight, but he's alright. They're a great band - see them in a pub or club and they'll blow your head off, but in The RAH they have trouble ruffling each other's hair. It's not their fault of course - this is simply the wrong venue for them, they're not loud enough and seem dwarfed by their surroundings. Mind you, who wouldn't be? After their set I bump into Cadiz Records supremo Richard England and Vive Le Rock editor Eugene Butcher. They're even more disappointed by what they just saw and are looking for a bar to drink away the memory in - there are enough of them to choose from but I can't help thinking that there isn't enough money in the world to get drunk here. 

Next up is Benjamin Tehoval, a one-man band who manages to operate an electric guitar, some bass pedals, a kick drum and his voice simultaneously and at the same time. He also manages to get much of the audience wondering what the hell he was doing there. When he was told that there was only time for one more song he played 'Like A Rolling Stone' - that's six minutes of our lives that none of us will ever get back again. Pete thought it was funny, I thought it was the sort of thing that only a hopeless hippie who was sufficiently self-obsessed as to not care about the rest of the evening would do. Oh well - it wouldn't do for us all to like the same thing now would it?

Next up ladeez 'n' gennelmen, The Bard Of Salford himself, Dr. John Cooper Clarke. As a long term fan of the great man I was naturally delighted by his presence whereas Pete took the opportunity to catch up some much-needed sleep. Well as I say, it wouldn't do for us all to like the same thing... among the unmissable moments he, er, missed was a previously unheard (by me at least) tale of our hero making enough money to hire a 'snooty butler' who he assumed would be available whenever his services were required; when he came in from a gig at 2 a.m. to find said butler wearing a 'wife-beater vest' and responding to his asking for 'a couple of rounds of Mickie Most and a mug of splosh' with the words 'your dietary requirements are no concerns of mine' he replaced him with a chimpanzee. Genius.

Interval time - looking around the venue it was all a bit... 'nice' if you know what I mean. Whilst it was impossible not to be impressed by our surroundings, having seen Wilko countless times over the last 40 (40!) years it was all a bit incongruous. For every rocker in t-shirt and jeans there seemed to be several people who looked as though they'd come straight from Harrods. Maybe they had? 

9.40 on the dot and it's time for the main event - Norman Watt-Roy looks out into the auditorium and mouths 'Wow!' as Wilko plugs in and 'All Right' crackles into life. 'If You Want Me, You've Got Me' follows before the always-excellent 'Dr. Dupree' slows things down a bit - but only a bit. There's already drops of sweat on the floor of Norman's side of the stage as they swing into 'Roxette' - and suddenly it's early 1975 and I'm calling my mum in from the kitchen as Dr. Feelgood roar through an unforgettable (for me at least) rendition of the song on 'The Geordie Scene', changing my life in the process. I didn't stop talking about it for days - to be honest I'm not sure that I've stopped talking about it much ever since. Here it gets the muted approval of the all-to-polite audience, as does the rest of the set - how often have the band played for over an hour to a fully-seated audience? It takes the final one-two sucker punch of 'Back In The Night'  and 'She Does It Right' to finally break the spell and get a few people onto their feet - the security staff who up until this point had been unsubtly stopping people from doing anything as anarchic as taking photos swung even more unsubtly into action, but at least there was a bit of atmosphere at last. As demands for an encore grew Simon's amplifier was set up and speculation as to who would be joining the band was rife - I doubt that few if any had expected that the special guest to be JCC playing Simon's barely audible Telecaster on 'Bye Bye Johnny', but that was what they got. As the crew readied themselves to take the gear off the stage the band returned once more, sending the security staff into meltdown in the process - 'Route 66' bombed out the last pockets of resistance, and everybody (except I suspect the afore-mentioned security staff) went home happy. 

Or did they? On the train home I reflected on what we'd all just seen. As previously stated I've been watching Wilko play live for four decades. I saw him on his first post-Feelgoods tour and I've watched him ever since through thick and thin, playing blistering, heart-stopping shows everywhere from  small, smoky, sweaty back rooms of pubs to large outdoor festivals and all points in between, in front of handfuls to hundreds to thousands of people - it's strange to see him now, after the trauma of the last few years, as a successful act playing bigger and bigger venues to so many people wearing his name on their chests. This wouldn't, indeed couldn't have happened at any other point in his career, and it's great that it's happened now - but has he lost something in the process? It was a great gig and an event to have been at, but I have a suspicion - indeed, a sneakin' suspicion - that he just might have...

Cockney Rebel

Paul Fox would have been 65 years old today. I miss him as both a fabulous musician and as a lovely bloke - here he is in 1979 with The Ruts in the promo video for 'Something That I Said'. Great stuff!

With the ever-improving finger ever-improving gigs are thankfully getting a bit easier to get through - Thursday with Big Al and co. at The Sunningdale Lounge and Friday's Upper Cut show at The Dolphin in Uxbridge were both much more enjoyable from my point of view than last week's pain-powered performances so hopefully things will continue to get even better this week. I was due to play with The Buicks in Northwood on Saturday night but I rather extravagantly decided to take the night off (if you ever hear me moaning about not having any money feel free to poke me in the eye!) to go to see The Cockney Rejects at The 100 Club. I went with my brother Terry who has long been a big fan of the band - he used to play 'Greatest Hits Vol. 1' and 'Vol. 2' so often when they first came out that I think I know them even better than he does… we met up with Cadiz Music supremo Richard England at The Ship in Wardour Street around 7.15 and made it down to the venue as Geoffrey Oi!Cott were roaring through their set - it was all a little bit one dimensional for me (or I guess to be precise a bit two dimensional, as their songs are mostly about Yorkshire and / or cricket) but they certainly went down well with all concerned, especially the comedy compere who at the end of their set asked them to repeat 'Robin Hood Was A Yorkshireman'; it transpired that that they hadn't played it at all. Oops! Next up were The Heavy Metal Kids who in their first incarnation were just a bit before my time; I'm very glad to have caught them this time around though - 'They should have been as big as AC/DC' bellowed Manic Esso as their set thundered to a close, and I'm bound to say that on this showing I'd have to agree with him. And what can I say about The Cockney Rejects that hasn't already been said? They hammered through an hour or so of classic punk rock, driving the assembled multitude into a veritable frenzy in the process. Terrific stuff - and after having been a fan of the band for over 30 years my little brother finally got to meet his heroes after the show. Excellent!

More Big Al gigs this weekend. Don't point your finger at the guitar man, as previously discussed…

In the name of love

This piece has taken quite a while to write, which is probably not that obvious from reading it. I'm not entirely sure that it's any good, or if it covers all or even most of my feelings about the extraordinary weekend that I've just experienced, but for better or worse here it is...

So there we are then, The 2014 Rebellion Festival. And what a wonderful event it was - well, I had a good time anyway! I spent a fair amount of it working behind the Cadiz Music merchandising stall with label supremo Richard England and his assistant Blaise, and although it was hard work (yes ok, not as hard as digging a hole or something like that, but you know what I mean!) it was generally really good fun. In addition to various Ruts and Ruts D.C. items (including the re-issue of 'Rhythm Collision Volume 1' and our new live album 'Live On Stage') we had albums and t-shirts from Wilko Johnson, The Cockney Rejects, Electric River, Eight Rounds Rapid and more, and over the course of the four days of the festival we met and spoke to literally hundreds of people; yes there was the odd nutter but overall it was something that was a real pleasure to be part of. 

It was good to catch up with various people too, many of whom I hadn't seen since last year's gathering while some like John King I'd arranged to meet at the festival. Somewhat inevitably this involved late nights and lots of drinking - well, why not eh? It's only once a year after all... 

However the real reason that I was there was of course to play with Ruts D.C.; following our performance at The 12 Bar Club back in February we were invited to play an acoustic show on Saturday evening as well as headlining The Pavilion Stage (formally known as The Bizarre Bazaar) the following night. In addition to these two gigs Segs and Dave were interviewed by Garry Bushell on The Literary Stage on Sunday afternoon, which was an amusing and lively session ostensibly to discuss the upcoming book on the band ('Love In Vain - The Story Of The Ruts and Ruts D.C.' which should be out in October) but which ended up covering all sorts of unrelated topics featuring much banter between all concerned. All good entertaining stuff, as was Bushell's interview with Pete Haynes earlier in the day, where Pete spoke of his new book 'Cool Water' and even gave your humble narrator a name check for encouraging him to pursue his gift for writing all those years ago. Well - I did!
The acoustic show took place at 9.20 pm on Saturday evening in the bar - throughout the preceding days I'd been aware that while many visiting the stall were looking forward to Sunday's electric set it was the acoustic show that had really caught people's imagination. 'What are you going to play?' was a common question, as indeed was 'how are you going to play it?' In an attempt to answer these and many other queries Dave, Segs and myself gathered in Segs's hotel room at half past three in the afternoon - well, there's nothing like leaving it until the last minute is there? As we were setting up before the show it became that we were going to be playing to a full house, to such an extent that by the time we kicked off the show with 'Something That I Said' there were so many people in the room that a visit from the local fire department would have surely resulted in the show being closed down. Given the unusual nature of the gig we chose some less likely songs from the band's back catalogue (including 'Dangerous Minds' and 'Despondency' from 'Animal Now') as well as giving the first-ever public performance of a new song 'Second Hand Child' - as the set progressed I for one was aware of the growing intensity of the show, and by the time we got to 'Babylon's Burning' things were at fever pitch with our last song 'In A Rut' instigating the sort of standing ovation that people like me can usually only dream about. Amazing. But things didn't end there, as next up was the mighty T.V. Smith. He began his set as a solo act but then invited me to join him and bassman Jonathan from his band The Bored Teenagers for a couple of songs before getting the rest of the band up to finish the show with three Adverts songs. You can see how it all ended by clicking here - yes, that is Attila The Stockbroker joining me at the microphone near the end, and yes, the drummer really is playing a cardboard box!

But if that was a good gig then the electric set the next evening took things to another dimension entirely. I wrote last time about how we were following Glen Matlock whose band was to feature Earl Slick on guitar - I'd hoped to meet him and so was well pleased when I bumped into him (literally - he came through a door as I was about to walk through it in the other direction!) and he turned out to be a very nice chap, as did drummer Slim Jim Phantom who was also playing with Glen. I missed most of their set as we were getting changed and working out a set list - as I walked towards the stage to get ready for our show I saw Mr. Slick again (I'm starting to sound like a stalker now aren't I?!?) who's comment 'all black - that's the way to go man!' has all but guaranteed that I'll never wear any other colour clothing on stage again. Well I will, but you know what I mean!
We were introduced on stage by Irvine Welsh, who is a friend of Segs's and who had also appeared on The Literary Stage earlier in the day; as he wrote 'Trainspotting' there was of course only one possible opening song... we usually open with a reggae - style song so starting with 'H-Eyes' caught everyone by surprise. Once again some less-than-obvious songs featured in the set, not least 'Demolition Dancing' which has always been a big favourite of mine - judging by the audience reaction quite a few other people like it too... without wishing to sound too big-headed there are some shows that you just know are going to be special, that are just that little bit better than usual, and as we neared the end it was clear that this was going to be one to remember. Despite being told that there was a curfew and that we couldn't come back for an encore the audience simply refused to leave, even when the crew began dismantling the drum kit. We eventually returned for a blazing romp through 'Society' which ended what was a truly unforgettable performance and - dare I say it - one of the best things that I've ever been part of.

Gatherings such as this seem to contain so many high points, and yet I've found that there's often a defining moment which somehow focuses the overall feeling into a few words or a single statement - this time the one that sticks with me occurred in the backstage bar in the early hours of Sunday morning after our acoustic show. Segs and I were talking to Doug, who knew Malcolm Owen when he (Doug) was in his early teens. I said something about how it must have been an extraordinary experience - Doug just smiled and said 'he taught me dignity, and he taught me pride'. 

His words hung in the air. I can still hear him saying them now. I hope that I hear them forever. 

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...

'A working class hero is something to be...'

I've just heard that Bob Crow has died - shame. He seemed to me to be a decent man who stood up for the rights of working class people, which in these days of evil presidentes is something that should always be applauded don't you think? I've just heard that two-faced clown Boris Johnson describe him as 'a man of character', a term that could never be applied to The Mayor Of London. A sad loss.

The second Gypie Mayo tribute gig took place at Surrey Blues Club on Friday evening - house band Game On started proceedings with a half hour or so of blues standards (enlivened no end by their guitarist playing violin on one number) before The Band Of Sceptics took to the stage. With frontman / guitarist Pete Sargeant in fine form their varied set included an excellently jazzy version of 'Only Happy When It Rains' next to the likes of 'The Pusher' and 'For What It's Worth'. Once again they invited me to join them for 'Gimme Dat Harp Boy', and once again they then asked me to stay for the rest of the set - Rick Danko's 'Java Blues' (also recorded by Dr. Feelgood with Gypie on guitar) and 'Dream Within A Dream' by the latter-day Gypie-featuring line-up of The Yardbirds. All good stuff, and it set the scene for a Flying Squad performance that I felt was a bit better than last week's Ruislip show. Pete joined us to play harmonica on 'Ridin' On The L&N' and slide guitar on 'Back In the Night', and we once again finished the evening with 'Killing Floor'. A good night at an excellent club.

Saturday night saw a rare occurrence - a short notice Upper Cut gig. We were only asked to play at The Jameson in West Kensington a few days earlier - with the Hammersmith Roundabout teeming with Stranglers fans (they were playing at The Odeon) we found the venue with surprising ease, and were set up and ready to play in no time. It's always a bit depressing when the staff are telling you to play quietly before you've even picked your instruments up, not least because as we'd not played there before we had little if any idea of what constituted playing quietly in that particular place; needless to say it didn't take long before they were asking us to turn it down. Bah! However by the end of our first set there was a fair bit of dancing, and with more people arriving all the time our second set turned out to be good fun with the band playing well and the audience responding well. As we were leaving Gavin the guv'nor said that he'd be in touch about a return booking, which I for one would not have predicted at the start of our show It just goes to show how little I know doesn't it?

And last night it was back to The 12 Bar Club for another Reggae Punk Monday which featured among others the astonishingly-named Dogshite. I must say that they were nowhere near as bad as their name might have suggested, although I suppose you could argue that it would be quite hard for them to actually be that bad... in the meantime Cadiz Music supremo Richard England and his assistant Blaise joined myself and Segs in a worrying amount of drinking - well, a worrying amount for a Monday night. Actually it was a worrying amount for any night, judging by how my head feels this morning... 

'Weren't you here last night?'

Another busy few days with very little blogging time - well, it's better than having nothing to do isn't it?

With the first ever Ruts D.C. acoustic show upcoming on Monday 10th February at The 12 Bar Club in London Segs, Dave and myself met up on Tuesday morning armed with two acoustic guitars and a variety of percussion instruments to put together a set for said show. A few hours later it was all starting to make sense - some unlikely songs from the band's illustrious back catalogue may well find their way to the stage alongside the more familiar material, and we all agreed that it should be a very interesting evening. Segs and myself found ourselves at The 12 Bar Club that night too, along with Ruts D.C. (and quite a few other people's) sound man Nick and Tara from The Duel (she's putting the Monday night shows together for 13 weeks following our gig) ostensibly to discuss the show but somewhat inevitably to also have far too much to drink. Well, I certainly did. Ooops! The next day in Balcony Shirts was a little, shall we say, fragmented from my point of view, as well it might have been...

On Thursday Ruts D.C. were back in the familiar surroundings of The Music Complex in Deptford - this time Segs and myself had electric instruments and Dave was back behind a drum kit for a rehearsal that saw us continue to work on new material as well as revise songs from last year's live shows and try a few more tunes from the back catalogue. Any or all of the material attempted might find it's way to the stage at this coming weekend's German shows - and it might not as well! On the way home I stopped off at The Ship in Wardour Street for a birthday drink with Richard England of Cadiz Music - when I left things were in full swing, and Richard certainly seemed to be having a good time. Excellent!

Sam, Leigh and Pete
prop each other up after
an epic BTZ rehearsal.

By an odd twist of fate I played two consecutive shows with two different bands at The Admiral Nelson in Twickenham on Friday and Saturday. The first night featured The Upper Cut (our singer Terry was suffering from the full horror of ManFlu but gave a good performance all the same) while Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks gave a suitably energetic show on the second night. And today Back To Zero had their first rehearsal of the year - we've got a gig in Stoke-on-Trent on Saturday 15th February and with regular bassman Johnny Squirrel unavailable for the show friend-of-the band  Pete Jones (he used to play in Public Image ltd - excellent!) has stepped into the fray alongside founder members Sam and Andy. Judging by how he played today he's going to make a very good job of things. I also recorded some guitar parts for an upcoming 7'' vinyl single - more news on that in the not-too-distant future.

Ok - this week more studio stuff, more rehearsing, and I'm playing with Big Al and co. in Colnbrook at Ye Olde George Inn (again!) on Sunday afternoon - if I get back from Germany in time...

'Back to the studio...'

Well with the German dates and The 12 Bar Club show in the horizon it was at last time for Ruts D.C. to get back into the rehearsal studio - but first a visit to Warwickshire was in order. On The Damned tour I spent a fair but of time with Captain Sensible's guitar tech and all round good bloke Jon Priestley, who revealed that in addition to working for the good Captain and playing guitar in Reign Of Fury also runs a recording studio in The Midlands. So it was then that Dave, Segs and myself made our way to Abatis Studios in Honiley (didn't Puff the Magic Dragon live there?) where we spent a very enjoyable few hours with Jon checking his studio out and even going so far as to making a test recording. What did we record? That would be telling...
  
Thursday saw the band make their first visit to The Music Complex in Deptford since before the afore-mentioned Damned tour. Segs and myself have been putting together some new song ideas over the last few months, and with three of them starting to sound more like songs than ideas it was time to get into the studio and see how they sound with the band. I'm pleased to say that the rehearsal went very well indeed, with the new ideas coming together well and everyone very optimistic about how things are going. After the session we adjourned to The Little Crown near the studio to meet up with Richard England from Cadiz Music - he promoted the show we played with Wilko Johnson at Koko back in October, and it was good to see him again.

Friday I returned to Tropic At Ruislip to see Lynyrd Skynyrd tribute band Aynt Skynyrd. I must admit that I'm not the biggest Lynyryd Skynyrd fan in the world, but I thought it would be interesting to see how the band handled the (many) guitar parts in the band's songs. I must say that they made a very good job of it - that said I missed pretty much the whole of the first set as I was on the phone to Segs, who had called to discuss our studio days from earlier in the week. Exciting stuff!

I played my first gigs of the year this weekend - good! It's been nice to have a bit of a break but it was great to get back on the boards again. On Saturday night The Upper Cut returned to The Dolphin in Uxbridge for a night of no little jollity, not least as Noel the landlord had a fair number of family members over from Ireland. The exact details are sketchy as I was still in there drinking at 3am... and the next afternoon we made our first visit to Ye Olde George Inn in Colnbrook for many months (I'll be there again next Sunday with Big Al and co.) for a 5pm show that saw us play two energetic sets to a very appreciative audience. 

And last night it was back to The Three Wishes in Edgware for the Monday jam night. Hmm... maybe I am getting just a bit fed up with some of the ruder people there... ah well, no time to worry about that now, as I'm off to meet Dave and Segs at another recording studio. Maybe, just maybe, those silly little people last night really are jealous of me. Oh well... let's hope so! He he...