"We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline!"

Donald 'Duck' Dunn died earlier today. He was 70 years old.
As bass player with Booker T and The M.G.'s at the time when they were the house band at Stax Records he played on some of the greatest records ever made, working with Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Eddie Floyd and many more. He then went on to play with everyone from Eric Clapton to Neil Young, and also appeared in both of the Blues Brothers films.
For what my opinion is worth, Duck Dunn should be remembered as one of the greatest ever exponents of the bass guitar. There are any numbers of reasons why, but here's the first that comes to mind - have a listen to the original recording of 'Soul Man'; leaving aside the fact that I always think that you can tell a good singer from a bad one by whether they were educated 'at Woodstock' or 'from good stock' (the bad ones sing the latter - this explains why. Mind you, listening to the original track for the first time in a while I don't think I play the guitar riff correctly either!) no one - no one - plays the bass line quite like Duck Dunn does. And now, sadly, no one ever will again. Another sad loss to the musical world.

Never trust a spotted dog called Stripe

I got an e-mail on Monday morning:-

Hello there Mr Blues, so it's true the soul destroyer is coming your way Saturday, look forward to it, hope all is good out there in Leigh's blog world - Dave

The Dave in question is Dave Finnegan, who played Mickah Wallace in The Commitments film way back in 1991. I did a stint in Dave Finnegan's Commitments a few years ago alongside several current Chicago Blues Brothers band members who at the time were performing as 'Sweet Home Chicago' in theatres up and down the country - after depping in that show I joined as it evolved into it's current incarnation. We did some great - no, make that great - gigs together although sadly it all ended around 4 or so years ago. However as the e-mail says, the man himself is back in our orbit again, for a show at Quickmoor Farm just outside King Langley. Originally a playback gig (i.e. several of the band playing along with backing tracks) it became a 'band gig' early last week, and with Marc busy elsewhere the search was on for a drummer - all the usual deps were already gigging meaning that I was asked to call Eric on Wednesday to talk through the songs prior to us meeting for the first time at the gig. And as the above setlist shows there were rather a lot of songs to talk through...

Thanks to the wonders of satellite navigation myself and the long-suffering Shirley arrived at the venue around 4.40 p.m. - although rather peculiarly we did cross the M25 twice by 2 different bridges. Well, I think they were different bridges... we're playing in the barn, and host Jeff and Jacquie are very friendly as is Alistair the party planner. Mike and Matt have set their P.A. up (Matt tests it with a blast of 'Alternative Ulster' - excellent!) and Eric is sitting out on the patio leafing through the drum pad. Squirrel's set up and ready, Ian (returning on keyboards) arrives just as I get my amp in place, and Richard (just one horn tonight) and Dave F. are arriving later. Soundcheck is more of a rehearsal than anything, and we run out of time before we can play through everything although it's sounding good with Eric fitting in well. We've got The Pink Cottage to use as a dressing room (yeah, I know...) where I spend a bit of time with Eric going through some stops and starts. There's plenty of food for the band (hurrah!) and by the time Dave arrives the evening is in full swing with the guests arriving and the dogs of the house getting more and more excited - we're out on the patio outside The Pink Cottage (!) talking when a large Dalmation called Stripe comes over to investigate, sniffs everyone as dogs tend to do and then attempts to empty his bladder against your humble narrator's left leg. I jump out of the way just in time much to everyone's amusement including mine - I didn't think we'd sounded that bad... when we told Jeff and Jacquie of the incident she said something like 'right that's it, his balls are coming off' - again, I didn't think that we'd sounded that bad...

9.45 and it's time for our first set. The first couple of numbers are a bit edgy - 'Take Me To The River' goes a bit weird in the middle and no one had told Richard that we were playing 'Midnight Hour' in the key of Eb instead of C as we usually do in the CBB show - but once we got going we, for want of a better term, got going, and with Dave in good form up front a full dancefloor ensued for most of our set.
We're due back on in CBB mode at midnight, and I spend much of the interval hiding from Stripe and talking to Richard's son Joseph who seems to be doing very well on guitar - he'd bought along his Epiphone Les Paul which I'd restrung for him last week and was playing some very impressive Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin riffs. Good man! We're playing 2 x 45 sets with pudding being served at 12.45 a.m. - if you think that looks mad written down here it was even madder when it actually happened - and again there are a few odd moments here and there but overall Eric does a splendid job behind the drums, not least when we find ourselves playing a full version of 'Soul Man' rather than the medley which we normally feature it in. That well known Blues Brothers song 'Superstition' made an appearance in place of the 'Think'/'Respect' medley, and very good it was too. By the end of our second set there were still quite a few people wanting to dance and I suspect the evening continued (for a while at least) after we left.

We on the other hand arrived home sometime around 3.30 a.m. after the afore-mentioned satellite navigation device had taken us the wrong way on the afore-mentioned M25, without us ever going over the afore-mentioned bridges. Still, at least I'd given Stripe the slip.

St. Elsewhere

I'm sure Windsor was quite a lively place on St. George's Day - Uxbridge certainly was, if you count gangs of large shaven-headed men cheering drunkenly as they wended their way from pub to pub as 'lively'. Still Balcony Shirts did a roaring trade in printing ENGLAND on white polo shirts for quite a few of the afore-mentioned shaven-headed men so perhaps I shouldn't complain - well, not too much anyway, and I'm sure their Queen (and indeed St. George) was very proud of them... when we got to Windsor we saw someone dressed as a dragon in the car park near the theatre (hmm...) and the souvenir shops had noticeably less Union Jack flags (isn't that the flag of The United Kingdom rather than England? Just a thought, as they say...) and t-shirts than they'd had earlier in the week so I'm sure they were happy.

The theatre was certainly a lively place during our show - a much larger audience saw us play what for me was the best show so far. I was back on the white Telecaster and spent the first few numbers wondering why my guitar sound wasn't quite as raucous as the previous evening - maybe that's why I went into the middle section of 'Soul Man' a verse earlier than I should have, causing much amusement for Squirrel standing next to me and Pete in the wings. Bah! Oh and Phil the soundman distinguished himself by playing The Ramones, The New York Dolls and The Clash over the P.A. after our soundcheck - I always knew he was a man of taste!

Two nearly-sold-out shows today... can't wait!