'...the sun's not yellow, it's chicken...'

After the euphoria of last weekend it's back down to Earth with a bump for your humble narrator this week with the news of three deaths:-

Roy Chuter was a man that I can't claim to have known well, but I have very good memories of the time that I did spend with him. Back in the late Eighties and early Nineties The Price were often featured in 'Wake Up!' fanzine, and Roy was a good friend of Dave T. the editor who I saw at gigs here and there and at Dave's legendary 'Womblestock' parties. Lately he'd been running The Duke Of Wellington pub in Shoreham where I played with both The Price and T.V. Smith in recent years. I heard of his passing from an email from Dave, and I had chance to talk to Attila The Stockbroker about him at The Rebellion Festival who told me the sad story of his demise. The depth of feeling for the man can be seen by even a cursory glance at the Brighton And Hove Albion F.C. North Stand forum - Roy is someone who will be missed by many many people.

The man I always knew simply as 'old Michael' died earlier this month - a familiar figure in and around the pubs of Uxbridge, his tales of the London jazz scene of the 1950s and '60s never failed to amuse and entertain. He came to see The Upper Cut not-so-long ago - when I next saw him he came up to me with the words 'too loud man!' Let's face it, he was probably correct... in recent years East saw more of him than I did, but he'd always have plenty to say whenever I did see him, and would often leave us both with the words 'I'll see you two reprobates later'. Again I won't pretend that he was a close friend but he was someone that I spent some good times with, and a night at The Load Of Hay will never be quite the same again.     

And talking of The Load Of Hay, it was in said establishment last Thursday evening that I heard that Chicken Legs Weaver had died last month. I saw Andy play there on several occasions (I also saw him at The 100 Club supporting Wilko Johnson, and he played with The Flying Squad at Tropic At Ruislip back in February 2010) and I'll remember him as a great character, a fine musician and a fiercely committed bluesman who played his music with a fire and a passion that many aspire to but only very few achieve. I'll also remember him (and indeed Roy and Michael) as being a very nice guy, which I think you'll agree is a pretty good way to remember anyone.

Having played a show with Utter Madness earlier this month it was with great interest that I made my way over to the afore-mentioned Tropic At Ruislip on Friday evening to see It Must Be Madness. They seem to be a popular bunch as over 200 people turned up for the show, and very good they were too with many an obscure album track among the expected hits. I missed much of their second set as I was on the phone to Dave Ruffy attempting to plan this weekend's Ruts D.C. appearance at The 3 Chords Festival in Penzance (we never close!) but they certainly had the crowd dancing by the end of the evening. And it was great to see the club so full of people - we could do with more venues like this couldn't we?

Saturday night it was over to The Admiral Nelson in Twickenham to see Midnight. As I didn't have a gig myself I probably would have gone along anyway to give Big Al Reed (he plays saxophone in the band) a bit of support, but with the man himself Terry Peaker busy elsewhere the prospect of seeing my old mate Johnny Squirrel depping on bass was just too good to miss. He made a very good job of it too, often in the face of adversity given the shall-we-say 'eccentric' nature of some of the performances. He made a very good job of depping in The Blistering Buicks the next afternoon at Ye Olde George in Colnbrook too, where our three sets were lapped up by the faithful and the landlady offered us two more gigs in the next couple of months. Excellent!

Monday morning in Balcony Shirts began with the first person through the front door asking if he could use the toilet, then looking astonished when he was told that he couldn't. I heard myself say 'this is going to be a weird day' to new-ish recruit Simona, and much as I might be wrong about a lot of things I was proved right about this one, with the next person asking if they could have an envelope (that's 'have' not 'buy', and why they thought a t-shirt printing shop would be the place to go for such a thing is anybody's guess) followed by a chap asking if we sold tennis racquets. Some people even asked if we printed t-shirts... all in a day's work I guess, although things brightened up no end when a young lady told us that she ran The Blue Plague Printing School - 'it's an anti-Tory printing workshop, we'll be doing it again soon, you should come along' said she cheerily. You know, I just might! 
From there it was over to Soundlab Studios in Loughton for a Back To Zero rehearsal where an enjoyable and very productive session saw new songs tried alongside some cover versions to be played at a private party this coming weekend. A long day, but a good one - as I sit here thinking about the three gentleman featured earlier in this posting that feels like a great thing to be able to say. Well, I think that it is - don't you?

Good times are back

A good gig for The Upper Cut at the Load of Hay last night, a bit under-attended (well it was cold outside and in, at least until Grant the landlord lit the fire) but great fun nonetheless. And it had been a good 3 days before that, playing gigs in Wellingborough, Ipswich and Shoreham with T.V. Smith. Here's what happened - well, here are the bits that I can remember, it seems ages ago now...

It being busy times at Balcony Shirts your humble narrator did Thursday morning behind the counter before buying a mobile phone charger (you always forget something don't you? Well - I do!) and heading off on the Metropolitan Line towards Kings Cross Station. Progress was slow but steady (anyone would think it had been snowing! Actually most people that I spoke to in the previous few days didn't think I'd make it as far as the train let alone going anywhere on it; why do we always think that everywhere grinds to a halt just because the media says it does?) and I was there around 20 minutes early for a projected 'about 1.45' meeting at St. Pancras with the man himself. I was just spending far too much money in The Camden Food Co. when T.V. arrived, and we were on the 2 o'clock Corby train with a few minutes to spare. My guitar wouldn't fit in the overhead racks (surely it's not that big? come to think of it my bag wouldn't fit either - maybe the rack was small? Mind you T.V's guitar fitted! Help!) so the nearby unreserved seat 53 became it's resting place for a journey that saw some beery blokes attempting to explain why their tickets weren't in order to a clearly unimpressed inspector (one of them said 'don't worry mate that's mine' when my guitar fell out of the seat; when I said that he didn't have to worry as it was actually mine he said 'well, you've got to try haven't you?' I despair of people sometimes) but was otherwise uneventful. As we stepped off the train at a freezing cold Kettering Station T. V. smiled and said 'welcome to the T.V. Smith touring experience'. Excellent!
We were originally booked to play at Sawyers in Kettering but sadly the venue has just closed; however promoters Bambi and Trina (both members of the excellent 'urban rail punk' band Eastfield) found an alternative venue in the shape of The Horseshoe Inn at nearby Wellingborough. Bambi met us at the station and we went back to his and Trina's house where support act and Blyth Power guitarist Steven Cooper was already present and correct. A couple of hours of coffee and television followed (I nearly typed 'Coffee and T.V.' there! Ooops!) with England's ill-fated bid to host the 2018 World Cup caused particular merriment, not least when Martin Peters said 'I'm gutted' just as T.V. said 'he'll say ''I'm gutted" in a minute'. As the commentator put it, 'the paint's hardly dry on the announcement yet!'
6 o'clock and with Trina staying at home nursing a bad leg it's off to the venue for the rest of us. The poster behind the D.J. booth said 'THE BEATINGS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES' and although they seem to put bands on regularly at the venue it seems unlikely that they're of the punky variety. 'There'll be no one here so I'm applying the 5 pint rule' says Steven cheerily as he ordered his first drink, promising 4 more before his appearance - T.V. and myself soundchecked with 'Third Term' (T.V. noted that he was plugged into P.A. channels 2 and 6 - 'half a crown') before Steven sets up his amplifier ('I've hired it for £6!') and I walked down to the nearby kebab shop for some chips in a pitta bread. Well - you're allowed to eat stuff like that when you're on tour!
9.15 and with considerably more people in that he'd anticipated (many of the old Sawyers crowd had made the journey) Steven rather unsteadily took to the stage for a fine if rather, shall we say, loose set of original material. 'Am I slurring my words?' he asked smiling broadly; 'I was the 60th Whiskey Priest, the umpteenth Blyth Power guitarist at least' - now there's a chorus that only he could write! He also referred to T.V and myself as 'Jedward' on a number of occasions...
10.15 and we're on with 'No Time To Be 21'. We'd not had chance to rehearse together so had decided to stick to our 'chronological set' of the last few gigs, and with only a few moments of madness it all went rather well. I'd hoped to use my MXR Micro Amp pedal to boost the volume of my solos but that had refused to work at the soundcheck (good job I'd tried it then as it had worked fine at home) so I used the tried and trusted 'hit the stings harder during the solos' method - still I use it all the time when playing electrically so I'll have to either fix it or buy a new one. Bugger! Our set finished with the 'Adverts trilogy' of 'Gary Gilmore's Eyes', 'Bored Teenagers' and 'One Chord Wonders' to plenty of applause and at least one cry of 'awesome' from a younger audience member. A good first gig of 3.

I woke up the next morning at 10 o'clock, though I think that I'd have slept a lot longer if I hadn't set an alarm. I'd taken a sleeping bag and there were 2 quilts on the bed since there was no radiator in my room - I wasn't cold in the night but I guess with that lot on I shouldn't have been! When I went downstairs Bambi was loading footage of our gig onto his computer; whilst doing so he showed me some Sawyers footage, it looked like a really good venue but as he said, 'it's time to move on' Let's hope it works out for them in Wellingborough.
'What was going on at the end of 'Gary Gilmore' last night?' said T.V. rather pointedly; well I don't know so let's have a look at the footage... one too many riffs from the guitarist. It's a fair cop!
A thankfully recovered Trina dropped us at the station at 1 o'clock ('one down' said T.V. as we walked away from the car) where we learned that our train was delayed by 15 minutes. This gave us time for coffee and a scone (punk rock eh?!?) before heading over the bridge to catch our train back to St. Pancras. Yes, St. Pancras - strange as it may sound it's easier for us to go back to London then up to Ipswich than to cut across country directly. Given my storage problems on the way there we opted to use our reserved seats as luggage space and sit in nearby unreserved seats - T. V. produced a book written in German as I caught up on phone calls. From St. Pancras we made our way to Liverpool Street via the Underground where we checked the departures board - ominously there was no platform indicated for our train - and stocked up on caffeine. At 3.25 and with our train due in 5 minutes there are still no clues as to where we're leaving from - an announcement says that the 3.30 train is about to leave from platform 10 and panic grips the assembled multitude. Somehow we get on board just as the whistle blows - as the train pulls away I make vain attempts to store my guitar on the crowded carriage, eventually (almost) wedging it in a luggage rack with my bag and sitting as near as I can to it so that I can keep an eye on it. We had reserved seats elsewhere on the carriage (mine was C60 - one for the cassette users among us!) but the ensuing chaos meant that things had descended into a free-for-all with people saying things like 'there are no reserved seats on delayed trains' as they elbowed people out of their way. As I say, I despair of people sometimes... 'welcome aboard the delayed 15.30 train to Norwich' said a cheery voice, before saying something about 'signaling problems at Ipswich'. At least he had his seat.
As we pulled in to Ipswich Station T.V. phoned the venue to tell them that we'd arrived. He came off the phone with the words ' look out for the blue Escort'. Outside the station the snow was thicker than we'd seen up until this point on our travels, and there were cars, taxis and buses everywhere in a 'it's-nearly-5 o'clock-on-a-Friday-evening' state of near-emergency. We managed to signal our presence to the blue Escort before it got caught in the chaos, and we arrived at The Steamboat Tavern a few minutes later where Val the landlady showed us to our rooms (to be precise she showed me as T.V. has played and stayed there many times before) then offered make us some food which we were both very grateful for - it had been a long time since the scones.
Soundcheck time - Rikki from Red Flag 77 is running the gig, and also on the bill is the splendidly named Ed Ache (yes!) and local poet Rowan. I lent Ed a lead so that he could use an in-line guitar tuner, and with him due on at 8.30 we're given a stage time of 9.45 with Rowan doing a set inbetween our 2 acts. With quite a few people in Ed in onstage on time, he's got dreadlocks down to his knees and uses a ukulele for the first few songs and an acoustic guitar for the rest, both of which sound like a chainsaw as he roars through his material with great energy. 'Here's another song about having no money, it's called "£12.50 a day" - he's going down well and the atmosphere is good with a great evening in prospect, when suddenly the lights go out, the P.A. goes off and the initial audience cry of 'Whay-hay!' is replaced by confused murmurings. I look out of the window at the flats opposite, there are lights on so it can't be too bad - or is that emergency lighting on the stairs? Bar staff with torches eye the fuse box warily as Val produces a bewildering amount of candles and people wonder if they can still get a drink or not. Ed carries on singing then Rowan bravely begins his set, gripping his pint glass like his life depended on it as people struggle to hear him. Meanwhile people are asking how come the lights are still on in the toilets as T.V. and myself wonder what to do - do we go on or do we wait to see if the power returns? We're at the bar speculating furiously when there's a sudden burst of light, then darkness again, then light again with another cry of 'Whay-hay!' - people start blowing candles out as we get ourselves ready to play. 'No Time To Be 21' ends to relieved applause, it's all going to be alright and everything's going great until 'The Suit' when the power suddenly dips for a split-second, then again a few seconds later, no 'Whay-hay!' this time but we get to the end of the song in one piece. 'Runaway Train Driver' sees a conga around the pub (Val banned them from going outside as it was too dangerous!) and the Adverts Trilogy sees more than a little pogoing. Great stuff, although I can't help wondering what I would be typing if the power hadn't come back on...
After the show it's time for a drink, and with Me First and The Gimme Gimmes on the Cd player everyone seems relieved that it all went well in the end. T.V. and myself sign birthday boy Stalkie's gig poster as an 'are Gogol Bordello any good?' debate begins and Rikki attempts to tell us about his 'other' band The East Town Pirates - 'we get called ''The East End Pirates'', I mean what's that all about, do people think we're going to go "da da da da daa daa daaa" then shout "OOO AH ME HEARTIES'?'

Saturday began with coffee and Marmite on toast - a good start. T.V. sits changing his strings as we talk through the day to come - catch the train down to Stratford, then from there T.V. is off to do a late afternoon solo gig in Hove before meeting myself and the long-suffering Shirley in Shoreham for our evening show there. Baz gives us a lift to the station, it's busy as Ipswich are at home to Swansea but we get there in time for the 12.08 to Stratford - which is of course delayed to 12.30. A man asks me if I'm 'on the fiddle' as I'm getting my ticket out, I misheard him and thought he'd said something about the football but he points at my guitar case and looks pleased with himself. I smile and join T. V. on the platform, pausing to read the 'leaf fall update' by the ticket machines - it seems that they've 'implicated an extensive line side vegetation management programme' which I guess means that it's not leaves causing all these delays then... on the platform the '2010 Timetable Change Surgery' notice sits next to the 'New Footbridge and Lift' information which thanks us all for our 'support and co-operation while we undergo the enhancements'. Hmm...
With the platform full of Swansea City fans our train arrives in the nick of time.It's not too full so we anarchically choose seats in coach F instead of our allotted coach C (punk rock eh?!? Mind you T.V. was now reading Steve Ignorant's book so maybe anarchy really was in the air...) and, passing through T.V.'s birthplace Romford on the way, arrive at a busy Stratford Station without any problems. The Central Line train back into town is full as quite a few of the other lines aren't running due to maintenance work (how annoying is that every weekend?) and I'm very relieved to meet Shirley at West Ruislip Station where we make a detour to drop some posters off at The Bell in Ruislip for the upcoming Upper Cut show there this Friday before coming home. A shower and some food are both much needed from my point of view, and at 6 o'clock we leave to wind our way down to Shoreham. As we pull up outside the Duke Of Wellington it's pouring down with rain, we're steeling ourselves to get indoors as quickly as we can when a bedraggled Attila The Stockbroker arrives on a bicycle carrying a violin. We go inside to find him and T.V. ordering drinks, the pub has an excellent selection of real ales which Attila is something of an expert on. We set up and soundcheck in no time, and Peter from Peter and The Test Tube Babies arrives just as we finish. I attempt to describe his band to Shirley but give up after telling her the title of their first album... by the time we go on there are a few people in including ex-Blyth Power guitarist Wob who I'd not seen for ages abut who now works behind the bar at the pub. Attila is right at the front for most of our set singing along, he joins us on violin for 'Lion And The Lamb' and 'Runaway Train Driver' in the middle of our set and 'One Chord Wonders' at the end, he speaks emotively about how T.V. inspired and continues to inspire him, eventually persuading T.V. to play 'Not In My Name' to end a great gig, in fact a 3 great gigs which I'll remember for a very long time. And talking of remembering things...

I was at an Attila gig sometime in the late '80's, I think at the Mean Fiddler Acoustic Room although I could be wrong there; Attila said something like 'I'm going to play a song by one of Britain's greatest ever songwriters' before performing 'The Suit' on mandola. One of the people I was with asked who T.V. Smith was - I turned to them and said words to the effect of 'you must heard of T.V. Smith, he was in The Adverts, a great songwriter, a genius in fact...' and as I said it I realised he and Gaye Advert were standing right behind us. I think I managed an awkward hello and then said 'well - you are!'

He doesn't remember it happening, but I do. I've just played 3 gigs with him, and as I say, I'll remember them too.

Making poetry history

Here are a couple of photographs from Saturday night - I'm the (ahem) blurred action figure wearing an ill-advised hat in the top one, while the second one was taken in the last minutes of the evening and features on the left T.V Smith, in the middle John Otway and on the right Attila The Stockbroker. I'd imagine that Attila is holding the remains of a pint of 30th anniversary ale...

More about that in a minute - first things first though, and it was a roaringly good evening at The Horns in Watford on Thursday when Wilko Johnson entertained a capacity crowd as only he can. I sometimes wish that I'd kept a list of gigs that I've been to for many reasons not least to see how many times I've seen Wilko play - I must be up in the three figure area now, and I've never come away disappointed. Some relatively rare performances ('Western Plain', 'Hello Josephine') sat next to the expected classics, and the addition of Jerry Tremaine on harmonica and vocals for 'Twenty Yards Behind' (only harp on that one) and 'Roxette' pushed the level of mayhem up even further. Excellent stuff as always. Support came from The People's Republic Of Mercia (great name!) who went down well but who I found to be a bit ramshackle in places - and it wasn't good ramshackle if you know what I mean... still they were working that night and I wasn't so they must be doing something right! And The Horns are definitely doing something right - it's a great venue that's always good to go to. When I'm there I often think that I'd like to live nearer to it or somewhere like it given the standard (and indeed the diversity) of the acts that play there, and then I remember that I should occasionally be doing a few things other than watching people playing music, like playing some myself...

2 gigs with the mighty T.V. Smith this weekend, and the first one was a real one-off - a show at The Ropetackle Centre in Shoreham to celebrate 30 years since Attila The Stockbroker played his first gig. Joining Attila (both solo and with his band Barnstomer) and T.V. on the bill was the incomparable John Otway, and when we arrived everyone was present and correct - well everyone except the soundman, who it turned out had been told that the gig was on Sunday. Doh! After 4 soundchecks in 20 minutes (that's the way to do it! Or is it..?) the show began with a solo set from Attila before T.V. and myself took to the stage. Halfway through the first song 'Tomahawk Cruise' I realise my vocal isn't in the monitor and T.V. can't hear his guitar (it went off altogether during 'In The Arms Of My Enemy' - I turned mine off and we played acoustically until his guitar came back on) so maybe our soundcheck was a bit too rushed after all... still we go down very well, and with Attila joining us on violin for our last 3 songs ('One Chord Wonders', 'Lion And The Lamb' and 'Runaway Train Driver') our set ends to tumultuous applause. It's good when that happens! After a short interval there was a suitably surreal set from John Otway including excerpts from 'Cheryl - The Rock Opera' with Attila, before a final set with Barnstormer bought a cracking evening to a close. Just before we left I happened to find myself in the dressing room with the 3 stars of the show, and in what was a rather unusual move from your humble narrator, I took the photo that you can see at the start of this posting. I never do things like that! Still, it turned out rather well don't you think? Oh and I'm told that the 144 pints of Anniversary Ale that were on sale at the event sold out in 1 hour and 43 minutes - Attila had predicted that it would take 4 minutes more...

And Sunday night's show at The Load of Hay turned out rather well too, with our 23 (23!) song set running from the start of T.V.'s career with The Adverts and The Explorers through his solo albums (including this song) right up to the present day, finishing with the as-yet-unrecorded 'Man Down' then encoring with some old Adverts favourites. We're playing in Croydon next month with Dave Sharp - that should be a good night. And the evening had a real ale moment of it's own - East offered Upper Cut bassman Terry a drink who asked for 'a half of Doom'; East replied ' would you like DO or OM?' He went for OM... I forgot to wear the afore-mentioned hat (which is becoming something of a trademark at these gigs, albeit an accidental one) until halfway through the show, and T.V. earned the undying gratitude of the bar staff by removing a spider from the kitchen. They all agreed that he can come back anytime - so that's how you get gigs!