Work, rest and play

As the '40 Years Of The Crack' tour gets ever nearer Ruts D.C. have been rehearsing. And rehearsing. And rehearsing. Well - failure is not an option; this can't be good, it has to be great, and it can't be great, it has to be brilliant... without wishing to sound too complacent, it's all going well although there's still a lot of work to do. But do it we will!

After one such rehearsal Dave, Segs and myself found ourselves in the hallowed confines of The Little Crown in Deptford drinking Guinness (which is excellent there, and well worth trying if you find yourself in the area!) and signing posters (like you do - well, like we do these days, there's a tour coming up you know!) when Sinead the barmaid (first name terms and everything!) asked if we'd play a show there one day. Well said Dave, we could maybe do an acoustic show - at which point someone (me!) suggested that we play there to mark the 40th anniversary of the first Ruts single 'In A Rut'. We could invite some friends, stream it live on the band's Facebook page, it'd be great... and so at 7 pm on Friday 11th January 2019 we did indeed play an acoustic show at The Little Crown in Deptford to mark the 40th anniversary of the release of 'In A Rut'. We invited some friends (including Ali McMordie of Stiff Little Fingers and MC Spee from Dreadzone - celebrity mates ahoy!) streamed it live on Facebook and it was great. I'd tell you more but details are necessarily sketchy.. well, remember how I good I said that their Guinness is... 

Besides rehearsing and drinking I managed to get along to a couple of shows from this year's Resolution Festival at The 100 Club - The Vibrators give a boisterous performance while The U.K. Subs played their first album 'Another Kind Of Blues' to the riotous approval of all concerned. And I've played my first gig of the year last night with Punky Reggae Party, at The Bread And Roses in Clapham where the heat inside contrasted with the cold outside and a fine time was had by all. I'm at The Cavern in Raynes Park with them on Saturday 2nd February, after which all roads lead to the Ruts D.C. tour, if they don't already. Not a bad start to the year then.

And in case you missed it, you can see the Deptford performance from soundcheck to gig and beyond here. Enjoy!

Theatre of the absurd

Well time has been even tighter in these here parts over the last couple of weeks, hence the complete lack of blogging. How on Earth did I ever have chance to do several posts a month? It's been hard enough to find a few minutes to update my Facebook page, let alone write this stuff… we're still busy in Balcony Shirts - this is my only day off this week, hence the chance to attempt a quick posting now - and I've been gigging with The Upper Cut (a particularly riotous night at The Dolphin a week-and-a-half ago) and Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks (at The Three Wishes in Harrow and The Horns in Watford the weekend before last) so it's perhaps not surprising that I feel as though I've done nothing but work these days. And Ruts D.C. appeared at The Know The Future Festival in Vienne, France on the Saturday just gone - we'd not played for a while but put in a good performance alongside the likes of The Damned, The U.K. Subs and The Vibrators. The event took place at The Theatre Antique, a Roman amphitheatre which had to be seen to be believed - I've certainly never played anywhere like it before. The slightly peculiar travel arrangements meant that we flew out from Luton Airport on Friday lunchtime and returned home to Gatwick Airport in the early hours of Sunday morning - I got back home just in time to do an actual birthday gig (as opposed to The Upper Cut Uxbridge show the week before, which I played as an early birthday bash) with Big Al and the boys that afternoon at The White Horse near Staines. I'm still feeling tired now… more gigs this weekend, then it's off to The Rebellion Festival next week. No rest for the wicked, or indeed for me. 

Incidentally the always-excellent Aural Sculptors blog has just posted an audio recording of our set in Vienne, which you can download by clicking here. Enjoy!

'Don't point your finger at the guitar man...'

And this week has indeed proved to be better than last week. Good!

I've spent much of it working in Balcony Shirts due to the shop being so busy; much time has been spent printing shirts for various Brunel University sports teams that are off on tour (for 'on tour' read 'drinking heavily'. Good on 'em!) this week in Europe. It's amazing what some people will walk around with written on their shirt... we also had an embroidery machine delivered this week which caused an uncommon, nay disproportionate amount of excitement in the shop. And why not?

I've also spent a fair bit of time caring for my (still!) ailing finger. In addition to having been prescribed antibiotics I was also have been obliged to soak it in salt water every day (which is apparently the best treatment for this sort of thing - it turns out that your nan was right all along!) and keep it covered the rest of the time. I've had to search out hypoallergenic plasters as I'm allergic to the usual ones but compared to the madness of a week ago it's all pretty straightforward. It's definitely getting better, to such an extent that I managed to play a gig with Big Al Reed and The Blistering Buicks last night, at the rather loftily-named Town And Country Club in Watford. The occasion was Bernie's 60th Birthday Party, and with Dave gigging elsewhere Bob Pearce returned on drums for the first time in ages. It's always good to see him, and he did a typically excellent job - although his comment 'sorry, I forgot that it was a shuffle!' after 'The Boys Are Back In Town' did follow a rather, erm, unusual performance of said song...

The band also played on Thursday night (in Sunningdale since you've asked) but I chose to miss that show, partly because of this exchange between the doctor who had just attended to my finger and your humble narrator last Monday afternoon - 

Doctor (cheerily) - 'So when's your next gig?
Y. H. N. (equally cheerily) - 'Thursday'
Doctor (still cheerily) - 'And when's the one after that?'
Y.H.N (still equally cheerily) - 'Saturday'
Doctor (nowhere near as cheerily, and with a rather serious expression whilst nodding her head) - 'Saturday...'

- and partly because there was a rather splendid evening in prospect at The Half Moon in Putney. Regular readers (assuming that I actually have any) will be aware of my interest in the much-maligned musical genre that is Punk Rock so an evening featuring a band made up of members who have all been involved in acts from said genre was not to be missed if at all possible. Class Of 76 feature Barrie Masters and Steve Nicol from Eddie And The Hot Rods on vocals and drums respectively, Nigel Bennett from The Members (and more recently The Vibrators) on guitar and former Tonight and Wilko Johnson (ok I know neither of these are exactly punk rock, but they get in under the wire!) bass player Russ Strutter and play a set that mostly consists of song from bands that they've been involved with. But more about them in a minute - support came from Headline Maniac who are three current members of The 'Ot Rods and whose excellent set went down so well with all concerned that when I attempted to buy their recently-released album I found that it had sold out. A good band, well worth looking out for in the future. It was Class Of 76's second gig, and as such they're still finding their feet with some of the material; that said versions of 'Dead Or Alive' and 'Chinese Rocks' by Johnny Thunders (Nicol played with him for a while) were suitably sleazy, and somewhat inevitably the Hot Rods and Members songs sounded about the best of all. Definitely a band that I'll be keeping an eye on, although I suppose that if someone like me didn't like them they really would be in trouble?

This week, Upper Cut and Big Al gigs, some time in the shop and no doubt more besides. Provided my hand keeps getting better of course...

From vibrators to stockbrokers

Well- that was a busy 4 days in mad-guitar-land...

Thursday it was time for a Flying Squad gig in previously unchartered territories, supporting The Vibrators at The Beaverwood Club in Chislehurst. It's a gig promoted by Pete Feenstra who I first met sometime back in the 1990's when I was playing in The Flame; he promotes at a lot of venues- have a look at his website to see what I mean- and has done a lot of work in keeping live music happening at a time when it wasn't a particularly fashionable thing to be involved with. Bearing in mind that it was Guy Fawkes Night myself and Andy (vocals) set off early, but I don't know how early we would have to have left to avoid the traffic chaos that we encountered in the course of our 3 1/2 (yes, three and a half!) hour journey...

We'd just about got out of town when Dave (drums) called to warn us against using the M25 as it was at a standstill from junction 10; we got to junction 12 before turning off and trusted the 'avoid congestion' option on the sat nav. which did a pretty good job until we neared Wandsworth Common where there were literally thousands of people on the streets, presumably on their way to a fireworks display. Traffic was at an almost total standstill and it took quite a while for us to discover the reason why- the cars couldn't move as there were so many people were on a Zebra crossing. Surely a policeman or even a lollipop lady could have prevented this from happening? Or would that be too simple?

We eventually arrived at the club not long after 8 o'clock. Fortunately Dave and Mike (bass) had been there for a while and were all set up and ready to rock- by the time I'd said hello to Eric on the door (I hadn't seen him for 10 years or more!) and introducing myself to Al the soundman I had something like 15 minutes to set up for an 8.30 start. Easy! Soundcheck consisted of checking that my amp worked (it did) and Al telling us that he didn't think the monitors were working properly (he was right, they weren't.) It took a song or two to get used to the sound and to get going for want of a better term, but we played well and went down a storm with the audience.

How well did we play? Click here to find out!

And The Vibrators were excellent too- they're another of those bands that an old punk like me watches and thinks 'oh I'd forgotten about this one' rather more times than he thought he would. With frontman/guitarist Knox still recovering from an accident ex-Members guitarist Nigel Bennett was the sole 6-stringer and very good he was too; he also did a good job of remembering the time I saw him play 'Babylon's Burning' with Ruts D.C. at The Fulham Greyhound all those years ago when I spoke to him afterwards. A top evening- and it didn't take us quite so long to get home (thank God!)

Friday and myself and East (who's asked me to mention that he was called a 'horny little devil' by not one but two ladies at last weekend's Bucks Golf Club show- well, he was wearing a pair of red horns for much of the evening...) spent the evening at The Dolphin in Uxbridge checking out The Side Project. They're a band made up from students at Brunel University who are interested in playing at The Load of Hay so we went along to see what they were like. Maybe the best word to describe them is 'quiet' as they didn't use a P.A. system (they sang through their amplifiers!) 'though anyone who plays 'Dreaming Of You' by The Coral is alright by me- I guess that means they get a gig then...

Saturday saw something completely different- a gig at The Old Bell in Enfield for a new band consisting of your humble narrator on guitar, my old mate Terry on bass (we played together in The Informers sometime in the 1990's) and ex-Chevrons Terry on vocals and Mick on drums. Currently rejoicing under the admittedly rather ironic name of YOUNGBLOOD we've managed a couple of quick rehearsals before this short notice gig came in. With a set that makes the most of Terry's excellent voice (somewhere between Rod Stewart and Steve Marriott in my not-so-humble opinion- yes, that good!) we managed to get held up on the way to the venue by, you've guessed it, a large number of people on a zebra crossing (presumably going to a bonfire party?!?) and we definitely need a bit more rehearsals if this gig was anything to go by (a couple of songs ground rather unceremoniously to a halt amid some confusion) although there was still a lot to enjoy (let's face it, if it had been really bad I wouldn't have mentioned it here!) and it'll be interesting to see how it all shapes up over the next few months.

Sunday and it's time for another Acts Less Ordinary night at The Load of Hay in Uxbridge, and they don't come much less ordinary than Attila The Stockbroker. John (his real name- yes I was a bit disappointed too!) was in fine form especially considering that he and his wife Robina have spent a great deal of time recently caring for his mum (who suffers from Alzheimer's Disease) and step dad (who's been diagnosed with bowel cancer and has recently broken his hip.) Indeed myself and himself spent a fair amount of time in an in depth discussion on the subject of caring for our mums (I spent years with my mum when she had Motor Neurone Disease) at various points throughout the evening.

East (yes, the horny little devil himself) was at the bar for much of the gig and reported 'jaws dropping' at strategic points during the show; this happens a fair bit at Attila's gigs- as the man himself says on his MySpace page, 'I don't mess about. I've got lots to say and I'm out there saying it' 'though the person who said to me that they thought he was 'politically incorrect' had surely got their wires crossed although I guess it depends on what you consider to be 'correct'! We could have done with a few more people in (don't come moaning to me that there's nothing to do when gigs like this are happening!) but it was still enough of a success for Grant the landlord to invite Attila back for a return gig next year. Excellent!

Studio tan

Yesterday saw The Flying Squad visit Roundel Studios in Kent to record 3 songs under the auspices of Roger Cotton. A fine time was had by all, and the results should be available on CD at the band's next gig- we're supporting punk legends The Vibrators (really!) in Chislehurst next month and details can be found here...

In case you were wondering, the 3 songs recorded are the Dr. Feelgood / Wilko Johnson classic 'She Does It Right', 'That's It, I Quit' (a Nick Lowe song also recorded by The Feelgoods) and 'Police Car' by Larry Wallis which I remember buying all those years ago on Stiff Records and which I heard again earlier this year on one of those free CD's that come with magazines these days; back in March we were on our way home from a gig in the early hours of the morning and Brian the driver and myself were listening to said CD when 'Police Car' came on- about 20 seconds into it we both said 'what a great song, someone should do a new version of this'. So we have! (And here is a great clip of Mr. Wallis himself playing it...) 

It's been a while since I was last in a recording studio, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoy it. Time to record that album that The Price should have recorded all those years ago then?!? Excellent!