'Time and the devil is gonna bring me everything I need...'

Well it seems like ages since my last blog posting - probably because it is ages since my last blog posting. It turned out that it was a long two weeks, not one… it's been a busy, one might even say intense time since last we spoke - here, in no particular order, is what's been happening...

- Work has continued on the Ruts D.C. album 'Music Must Destroy'. 
Myself and Segs recorded some guitars at Jamm in Brixton and even though I say so myself, we made a pretty good job of it. There's still a way to go, but we'll get there in the end.

- I saw The Blockheads in Chelsea. 
I'd not been to Under The Bridge before - what an extraordinary venue. And what an extraordinary band The Blockheads were, are, and will continue to be. A great gig.

- Ruts D.C. rehearsed for and played at the 'Scotland Calling' festival.
A couple of short sessions at The Music Complex in Deptford set us up for a barnstorming 40 minute set at The ABC in Glasgow, which in turn set your humble narrator up for a barnstorming evening that saw much drinking, merriment and a fair bit of time spent in The Ramonas's' dressing room (no, I'm not quite sure how that happened either!) among the other many and varied highlights. Excellent!

- I worked many-a day at Balcony Shirts. 
It's a busy time in the shop so I've been helping out whenever I can.

- We made a promotional video for the new Ruts D.C. single 'Psychic Attack'. 
Filmed by Graham Trott and featuring noted actor Peter O'Connor, I've seen a rough cut and it looks bloody great. The single and indeed the video is out at the end of next week. Exciting stuff!

- Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks played at The Queen's Arms in Colnbrook.
It was Al's birthday, which went some way towards explaining the lightness of the mood - right up until the moment that someone shouted 'IT"S ALL KICKING OFF OUTSIDE' and virtually the whole pub ran to the windows or indeed went outside, presumably in the hope of witnessing said 'kicking off'. I always think that people who do things like that have never been unfortunate enough to have been caught in a violent incident, as anyone who has generally moves quickly in the other direction… incidentally it didn't all kick off outside, or indeed anywhere else for that matter. Good.

- I guested with Department S at The Fleece in Bristol supporting The U.K. Subs. 
I joined Dept. S for their last three songs and they sounded great with or without me; The Subs were of course as mighty as ever, and first band on Knock Off were pretty good too.

- Probably some other things as well.
It's hard to remember sometimes...

Obviously there's a lot to more to say about all of the above but, rather like the tale of The Giant Rat Of Sumatra, that's a story for which the world is not yet prepared. Or that I haven't got time to write up. Or something. 

More this week. Or next week. Or something.

New Year's Resolution revisited

Nothing ever really changes does it?

2015 began with your humble narrator watching Martin Turner in Ruislip, playing a Sunday afternoon gig in Colnbrook with The Upper Cut and spending rather a lot of time at The Resolution Festival at The 100 Club. 

2016 began with your humble narrator watching Martin Turner in Ruislip, playing a Sunday afternoon gig in Colnbrook with The Upper Cut and spending rather a lot of time at The Resolution Festival at The 100 Club.

As I say, nothing ever really changes does it?

I hadn't been to Tropic At Ruislip for a while; having now seen two shows there within a week of each other (I saw The Rollin' Stoned there last Friday in addition to the former Wishbone Ash man the previous Saturday) it's great to see so many people at what clearly is a thriving venue. I know that some people locally criticise the booking policy - mostly tribute acts with the 'first Friday of the month' show featuring an artist or band performing original material - but if it attracts the sort of audience numbers that these shows did it surely can't be a bad thing. And both the shows were excellent, with Martin Turner and his band sounding every bit as classy as they did last year and The Rollin' Stoned playing a great set of songs from every era of the Stones's long career to a sold out crowd.

My first gig of the year as a musician as opposed to as a spectator was with The Upper Cut at The Queen's Arms in Colnbrook. I'd not played at this pub before although the band played a short notice gig there with Pete depping on guitar last month; it being the first Sunday of the New Year it wasn't as busy as it might have been but there were still more than enough people there to make it work. That said although it was by no means a bad show the band wasn't as tight as it can be so it might well be time for a rehearsal or two before our next gig.

The Resolution Festival opened at The 100 Club last Monday with spirited sets from The Ramonas and The Duel - booked by The Crucial Talent Agency and featuring artists and bands from right across the punk rock spectrum highlights have been many and varied, although I have to say that last night's U.K. Subs show and The Members gig on Tuesday night stood out for me. I joined T.V. Smith and Vom for a few songs during their excellent performance supporting the afore-mentioned Members, and Segs joined us for the set closer 'Gary Gilmore's Eyes' - with Gaye Advert in the audience he confessed to being nervous before the show, but it all went brilliantly well as this short clip shows. All in all a great event which will hopefully take place again next year.

And tomorrow Segs and myself will be in the studio at Jamm in Brixton reviewing and working on last month's Ruts D.C. recordings. 2016 then...

'Monday I have Friday on my mind...'

I've just bought myself the new Bruce Springsteen box set 'The Ties That Bind'. It's a whopping 4 CD / 3 DVD collection that tells the story (or at least as much of it as The Boss wants us to know) of the sessions for what became 'The River', and from what I can tell so far it's absolutely amazing. The live show from Tempe in 1980 is playing in the background at the moment and is making it very difficulty to concentrate on this blogging lark - I saw the band in this tour a few months after this show and can honestly say that it changed my life. It's still probably that greatest live show that I've ever seen, and I've been lucky, I've seen some very good live shows. I must find some time to watch and indeed listen to all all 'properly' one day...

'Twas a roaringly good night on Friday, when your humble narrator journeyed up to The Academy in Islington to see The U.K. Subs supported by The Ramonas. I met up with ex - Jim Jones Revue guitarslinger Rupert Orton before the show (he doesn't drink so was having a green tea in the local Pret a Manger!) for a catch up before getting to the venue in time to catch much of The Ramonas show. They were as energetic as ever and went down splendidly well with the rapidly-arriving audience. In the interval there was time to say hello to a Sub or two as well as Darren from Crucial Talent and several audience members, many of whom seemed to be getting involved in the current Ruts D.C. PledgeMusic campaign. Excellent! 

(Incidentally all the relevant campaign information is here if you fancy being part of it. Go on - you know you want to...) 

At 8.45 The U.K. Subs took to the stage to the proverbial hero's welcome and proceeded to blast their way through a set of classics to the general approval of all concerned, although talking to them afterwards I got the feeling that they themselves weren't too happy with it. It's strange - sometimes you can stand on stage and think that it's the worst show that you've ever played while everyone out front thinks that it's brilliant. Ah well - I guess it's better that it's that way around... talking of which on Saturday evening I played with Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks for the first time in a while, at The Riverside Club in Staines. After a busy day in Balcony Shirts I don't mind admitting that I was feeling rather tired (nothing to do with drinking with various Subs and Ramonas, honest!) and I didn't feel as though I played well, although everyone assured me that it was all sounding good. Then again a chap came up to me afterwards with the words 'has my wife heard of you? She thinks that she might have heard of you, has she heard of you?' I thought that he meant the band as Al had introduced everyone at the end of the show as he often does but no, he meant me 'not the rest of them'. I didn't really know what to say so I just said something like 'I doubt that she has' and attempted a cheery smile. 'Oh' said the chap in a rather disgruntled manner, before walking off with the words 'So she hasn't heard of you then Oh well... anyway, you were too loud'. A strange evening, although the next day more than made up for it as I spent much of it going through songs for the afore-mentioned new Ruts D.C. album with producer James Knight. A very productive few hours saw us drink coffee, make notes and generally rant and rave about how great the album is going to be. I also got to play a 1913 Martin parlour guitar that used to belong to Peggy Seeger and Kirsty MacColl's Gibson Dove. How cool is that? But now the work really begins - we're rehearsing all day tomorrow and Friday, then recording on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. There's lots to do, but I'm really - make that really - no, REALLY looking forward to it...

Hey Ho, Let's Go!

And so it goes on - much of the last week was spent at The Music Complex in Deptford rehearsing for this coming Wednesday's Joe Strummer film show at Koko. Songs were learned then discarded, re-learned then re-discarded (does that last word exist? Answers on a postcard please, usual address...) and we're still not sure who's singing which song. It looks like it'll be an early start on Wednesday then... but the band is sounding good - joining myself and fellow Ruts D.C. member Dave Ruffy (that's how I got the job!) are Tim Slade on bass (he plays for Gary Numan among others) and Tom Edwards on guitar (he works with Adam Ant - I'm really do feel like a junior partner here!) and even though I say so myself we've made a good job of things. It goes without saying that I'm looking forward to Wednesday - but I've said it anyway!

I was supposed to be playing at a wedding last night but it got cancelled (our show that is, not the wedding. Well I don't think that got cancelled!) so rather than do my already-depped-out Big Al gig (I don't like that thing where band members 'take back' a gig because they become available - do you?) I went to see The Ramonas at The 100 Club. Support came from the always-worth-seeing Louise Distras who appeared with a band rather than as her usual solo self. For me her voice worked better in this format - it's sometimes a bit too much for me over just an acoustic guitar, but she sounded great here. Afterwards she told me that she's hoping to concentrate more on group shows rather than solo, so let's hope hope that it works out for her. And The Ramonas were great too - a 28 song set (I wasn't counting, Chloe Ramona said it at the end, honest!) that featured many of the best Ramones songs played at a suitably breakneck pace to a healthily-sized crowd, all of whom loved ever minute of it. A splendid evening.

Today is the 30th anniversary of the first Price show. 30 years! Doesn't time fly when you're having fun eh? Actually it flies whether you're having fun or not... we were hoping to play a show this weekend - sadly that fell through but hopefully we'll be performing somewhere soon. And what better way for me to celebrate this (ahem!) momentous occasion than by going to see The Who? So that's what I'm doing, as they're playing at The O2 Arena tonight - but first I'm off to Abbey Road Studios. Yes, that Abbey Road Studios. Strange days indeed...