Once Upon A Time

On 5th September 1966 filming began on 'The Prisoner' in the village of Portmeirion in North Wales. Fifty years on it still divides opinion - McGoohan's surreal masterpiece or overwrought nonsense? A brilliantly observed allegory or a clumsy mess? For what my opinion is worth you either get it or you don't - if you get it you'll argue it's excellence in the face of some of the most fervent criticism that something as seemingly trivial as a mere television show will ever receive, if you don't then you literally won't give it houseroom. Me? I think that if there's a better TV series then I've yet to see it - which reminds me, I must watch it again sometime soon. Many happy returns Number 6 - be seeing you... 

Anyway your humble narrator was a bit, erm, fragile yesterday… actually I was asleep for most of the afternoon. And before you ask - yes, I've still got a bit of a headache… but 'twas a splendid Saturday night at The 100 Club, a very special evening to cerebrate all round good bloke and man-with-lots-of-punk-tattoos Simon 'Coppo' Copson's 50th birthday. I joined Department S for their last three songs and had a bloomin' great time. And why not?

The previous evening Big Al and The Blistering Buicks played at The Sir John Gibson in Stanwell. It was a new gig for the band, and with my fellow six-stringer Pete away elsewhere I was obliged to cover some of his parts as well as my own. We played three short sets instead of our customary two hour-long spots - matters got decidedly weird in the first interval when a cheery chappie came over and interrupted myself and Dave the bass player's chat with the words 'alright lads? Sorry to interrupt…' (he quite clearly wasn't sorry) and then asked for 'some Madness, not the obvious stuff like 'Our House' and all that, I want a b-side or an album track - yeah?' The politest response I could think of was 'prepare yourself for a disappointment…' - to which he replied with 'oh yeah, and it's my mate's birthday' (people like him always have a mate with a birthday - strange but true) 'so if you could play him a Madness b-side or two' (how did I know that he was going to say that?!?) 'he'd be well happy'. Yes, I bet that he would. We played 'One Step Beyond' in our second set - I very much doubt that he even noticed.

There are three more BA and The BBs gigs this week (in Sunningdale, Burnham and High Wycombe since you've asked) as well as more days in Balcony Shirts so there's plenty to do. And on Friday the new Ruts D.C. single 'Music Must Destroy' is released on Westworld / Sosumi Records. The promo video is finished and looks great - Henry Rollins is as fearsome as ever, and even though I say so myself, we look pretty good too. That day in the cement-filled warehouse in Peckham was worthwhile after all - but more about that next time.

Many Happy Returns

Well there you have it - the biggest gap between postings that these hallowed pages have ever seen. Well, these have been busy times. Since last Tuesday I've been working in Balcony Shirts as well as playing 3 shows with Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks and appearing at The Boomtown Fair with Ruts D.C. - all of which means that this is the first chance I've had to post anything since The Rebellion Festival. 

Ah yes, The Rebellion Festival. That seems a long time ago now. And in many ways it was a long time ago, or maybe to be more accurate it feels as though it was another time. 5 days in Blackpool, during which I managed, oh I don't know, maybe 20 hours sleep at the most. No wonder I couldn't keep my eyes open several times in the succeeding few days. Still that's alright - sometimes things are too interesting to sleep through aren't they?

So - what happened?

Well some details are necessarily sketchy, while others will remain with me forever. Did I, as a teenage Damned fan, ever think that I'd be in a backstage bar discussing the merits of The Prisoner with Captain Sensible? No, I did not. But this happened, and more besides. In musical terms the two Ruts D.C. shows - one on the 'big' stage in The Empress Ballroom. the other in the cramped confines of the acoustic stage - were both as good as we ever hoped that they would be, while the show with Noel from Menace and Rob from King Kurt was better than any of us could believe! The London Sewage Company show went well, an unscheduled appearance with T.V. Smith reminded me just what a genius the man is, and a song with Bug was great fun even though my guitar chose to go wildly out of tune as soon as I bent a string. It turned out that the top nut had come loose - I spent the next morning buying superglue to repair it... all this muscling onto other people's stages (that's a joke, I was invited!) meant that I played on every day of the festival, as well as working on the Cadiz Music merchandising stall the rest of the time. Maybe it wasn't just lack of sleep that was making me tired... 

I'd attempted to use my Facebook page as a kind of 'live diary' as the festival progressed, but a mixture of bad phone signal in The Winter Gardens and being too bloody busy to remember to do it meant that I didn't manage to update it as often as I'd have liked. And it wasn't all good - I had several nosebleeds (I wasn't doing anything naughty, honest!) and received a frantic phone call from my Dad telling me that my bank had called to say that my credit card had been compromised (it seems that I'd bought several ill-defined items in quick succession while working behind the stall - the very helpful young lady on the phone sorted it out in no time) but nothing could ruin what really was a wonderful festival. But that was then, and this is now. Back to life, back to reality. Same time next year? Let's hope so.

'Where am I?' 'In the village...'

Have you ever seen 'The Prisoner'? Of course you have. You know the opening sequence where Patrick McGoohan / number 6 wakes up in what he thinks is his home but then looks out of the windows and discovers that he's somewhere that he doesn't recognise? Well I know how he feels...

As you may be aware Ruts D.C. are currently supporting The Damned on their U.K. tour. We've been travelling on two tour buses (us and the crew on one, The Damned and co. on the other) with 12 bunk beds on each. We generally leave the venue at 2 am and travel through the night - meaning that you wake up somewhere new each day. To begin with I found this rather disorientating, but it's amazing how quickly you adapt to it. Well, I've found that I've adapted quickly, to the extent that as I write this I'm wondering how I'm going to return to a 'normal' life. Mind you, I don't really have a normal life, so I think I'll stop wondering how I'm going to return to it... but a few people have asked me how this touring lark all works, so I thought I'd have a go at writing about it here. The day generally goes something like this :-

Wake up. That's a relief, as it means that we got there in one piece.

Clamber out of the bunk and attempt to find your clothes. They're exactly where you left them last night, but where was that? You could do with a bit more light sometimes; well I certainly could - either that or I need to get some glasses that I can actually see though instead of the ones that I've currently got.

Time for some breakfast. This generally involves stumbling into town (I've often teamed up with Captain Sensible's guitar tech Jon) and trying to find some food that you like the look of and, maybe more importantly, can afford. As a namby pamby poncey vegetarian this often means that I eat too many eggs (and we all know what that can cause now don't we children?) and / or beans on toast (and you know what that can cause too...) Hardly the end of the world, but you do find yourself wishing for something different sometimes. Still there's always the porridge at Yates's - which reminds me, have you ever noticed how many of the young ladies who work behind the bar in Yates's have tattoos on their hands? You haven't? Maybe it's just me.

With load-in due at one o'clock most afternoons you then (depending on what time you got up of course) have a choice. I generally try to have a look a round town (is there a guitar shop? There go the wages!) as it's nice to get an idea about where you are, and then see if the venue is open; there's no shower on the bus but there's usually one somewhere backstage. I generally try to have one as soon as I can - there are a lot of people in the buses, and most if not all of them will want to use it at some point. In the meantime you can read, go back to sleep, make phone calls, catch up on emails, try to write a song, have some more food, hurry up and wait...

The Damned soundcheck usually starts at 4pm. I tend to check my guitar and equipment around this time, and if necessary change the strings (perhaps it would be better to do that earlier in the day Leigh, it might stay in tune better during the show?) as well as checking that all the leads on my pedal board are plugged in and in good shape. Our soundcheck is at half past five so I've got a fair bit of time to check things over, which is good as you don't want things going wrong during the show. We've been going on between 7.45 and 8pm each night, so after the soundcheck is over there's time to get changed for the show (if you're getting changed for the show) and work a set out, unless we're using the same one as the previous show. I'm pleased to say that the gigs have been going really well for us, and after in-ear monitor problems somewhat scuppered their first show of the tour in Bristol The Damned have been on top form with their shows getting better and better. I've always been a big fan, and this tour has done nothing to change that. Nice chaps too.

After their set I generally find myself behind the merchandise stall; Dave, Segs and Molara have been joining me to sign stuff and talk to people, and sometimes Captain Sensible shows up too. Good fun. Meanwhile the crew (Martin, Jon, Alex and Todd) put the gear away and into the respective tour buses and trailer, then if there's a local hostelry open it's time for a drink or two. And why not?

2 am and the buses leave for the next venue. Time for some sleep before the theme from 'The Prisoner' plays again... 

And don't forget that Dave and Segs have been writing a daily tour diary for Louder Than War; it's also on the band's Facebook page which you can find here...

Enemy of the state

I'd originally intended to write an overview of my '11-gigs-in-9-days' but reading back over the 'daily bulletins' as I rather pretentiously called them (they're not quite daily but they're not far off!) I haven't really got too much to add, other than to say that maybe I should try writing short daily postings more often as they seem to me to capture things in a way that longer pieces don't - or is that just me? Anyway the gigs were mostly good and often great, the mood was generally upbeat and I can't think of many better ways to spend my time. I'm a simple soul aren't I?

Meanwhile back in the real-ish world I've been working in Balcony Shirts for most of this week, spending a fair bit of time writing copy for the new shirts appearing on the website. Unlike here where I can ramble on for pretty much as long as I like on any subject I like (I bet you'd never have guessed that eh?) I've only got 100-150 words per shirt to play with which makes it quite tricky sometimes, particularly when you consider that for search engine optimisation (no I didn't know what it was either!) I'm obliged to include certain words - have a look at the new shirts on the site and see if you can work out which they are! In the meantime I had a visit in the shop from my mate Dave who's just returned from working in China, and who tells me that when he tried to access these hallowed pages while he was over there he was unable to as they're considered to be 'subversive material'. Have you any idea how happy this makes me? Excellent! (Yeah I know it's probably blogging in general rather than mine in particular that it frowned upon as it can't be regulated - but allow me a moment of glory why don't you?!) I wonder what they'd make of the excellent Monkey Picks blog of 'revues and indulgence' (his term not mine, though I wish I'd thought of it!) which is written by a near relative of one of the Balcony boys - recent posts include a visit to a scary East End shop, a revue of Ginger Baker's autobiography and a 'Your Best Bob Dylan Album Calculator' (click here and have a go! It tells me that mine is 'Highway 61 Revisited' although I nearly ended up with 'Bringing It All Back Home' - it obviously works!) which gives a good cross-section of what Monkey sees and Monkey do's...

Talking of subversive material (of a sort) I finally go round to watching the first two episodes of the (ahem) 're-imagining' of 'The Prisoner', and very ordinary it was too - something that could never be said of the original '60's series. It was so ordinary that I nodded off during the second show - Patrick McGoohan must be spinning in his grave.

'Oil City Confidential' received it's U.K. T.V premiere last week on BBC Four (it's out on DVD in June - hurrah!) although discerning folk like myself who have already seen it would have been more excited by the re-broadcast of a 'Sight and Sound In Concert' that featured The Feelgoods alongside the then up-and-coming Ian Dury and The Blockheads. Mr. Dury had the look of a man who wasn't going to let his moment pass him by whilst although Dr. Feelgood were terrific you got the feeling that they were trying a bit too hard for the cameras - then again it can't have been easy to follow what had gone before... I remember watching it all the time and it was great to see it again after all these years, but I wonder how many more items like this are lying in the vaults, and maybe more to the point how many have sadly been lost forever. Let's hope they re-broadcast the Tom Robinson Band show next!

No gigs this week as observed in the previous posting (although mad as it may sound I nearly ended up playing in Bucharest on Thursday - then again nearly isn't nearly enough is it?) but I did have a rehearsal with the mighty T.V. Smith on Wednesday afternoon - I'm playing three shows up in Yorkshire with him next month (full details on his website) and since one of them is at his annual 'Earthbound' fan convention we're learning quite a few songs that I've not played with him before. It should be fine gathering... and I might not be gigging myself this weekend but I am going to see Iggy And The Stooges - now that's something to look forward to!

And there it was - gone!

Two great gigs to finish our Windsor week, witnessed by among many other people a young man called James who spent much of yesterday enjoying 'The Chicago Blues Brothers Experience' - an eBay auction raised a large amount of money for The Motor Neurone Disease Association and gave the (ahem) lucky winner the chance to spend a few hours in our esteemed company. I wonder what he thought of us? My main conversation with him centred around the fact that I was wearing a 'Prisoner' polo shirt - he's a fan and even has a blazer similar to those worn in the show. He also heard myself and Rob the backstage manager discussing The Ruts (always good to have a chance to tell my story!) and commented on how much he liked 'Staring At The Rude Boys' - good man!

The performances belied the fact that many of us were feeling tired after the week's efforts (God knows what we'd be like in the real world!) reflected by a very amusing onstage exchange between Tracy and the two brothers involving personal hygiene - I'll spare you the gory details but will just say that somewhere along the line 'Think' became 'Stink' and a bottle of Fabreze was used to great comic effect... but without wishing to sound too immodest the shows were both brilliant from where I was standing, and judging by the audience reaction I wasn't the only person who thought so - the man who did a voiceover for 'Paddington Bear' told me that we were 'enthralling' (he seemed to be a very nice chap who bought his bike with him backstage) and even my Dad and brother were impressed so we must have done something right?

No gigs for your humble narrator this week - I cannot begin to tell you how much I'm going to miss it...