The Eton Rifles

It was the 75th anniversary of the Battle Of Cable Street on Tuesday - given some of their more dubious links there's a peculiar irony about it taking place during the Conservative Party conference don't you think? I somehow doubt that there were any commemorative events being held at the conference... still I did see an item on the London News about it, and The Mirror had quite a big article on it so at least it wasn't completely bypassed by the media. Back in the late 1980s The Price did a few gigs for Cable Street Beat (perhaps best thought of as the musical arm of Anti-Fascist Action) at a time when it seemed that extreme right wing politics were everywhere; at a show at The Electric Ballroom in Camden Town (we weren't playing - I think it was The Men They Couldn't Hang among others?) I met Solly Kaye whose memories of the day itself really were extraordinary and whose speech from the stage redefined the word 'inspirational'. In the meantime the ever-excellent Daily Mash summed up the Tory gathering better than I ever will - many a true word spoken in jest, as they say...

In the meantime 2 great - make that great - guitarists have recently left the building -

I only saw Bert Jansch play once (at a blues festival in Oxford since you ask) but I'll never forget it. I'd heard his name a million times but had not really heard him play - as he hunched over his acoustic guitar playing finger-busting chords whilst singing with a chilling other-worldy voice I realised why the likes of Jimmy Page always name-checked him as one of the all time greats. Along with Davy Graham he defined acoustic guitar playing for many, and he'll be very sadly missed.

I never got to see Marv Tarplin play but I've certainly heard him. And so have you although you might not realise it - his work with Smokey Robinson And The Miracles mark him out as one of the great players and indeed songwriters of what for many was Motown's golden era. That's him on 'Tracks Of My Tears' and 'Going To A Go-Go' for instance, and if that's not proof of his brilliance then I for one don't know what is. Another sad loss.

And away from music Steve Jobs has died, although I'm sure that you're aware of that as it's been in the news rather more than the above two stories. As I sit here typing on my MacBook I feel that even I owe him something, although I'm not really sure what. I'll have a think about that and let you know if I come up with an answer!

The Chicago Blues Brothers returned to The Theatre Royal in Windsor this weekend for 3-shows-in-2-days - previous visits have been for longer which I guess is indicative of how quiet things are for the band these days compared to the last few years. Still they were 3 good shows with Friday evening probably just edging Saturday evening in the 'best of the bunch' stakes; the Saturday matinee (hey, that rhymes!) was a bit odd to say the least, with only a hundred or so people in the audience and although we still gave a good show it was difficult to 'get going', if you know what I mean. Ben was depping for Dave on trumpet on Saturday (it was the A-Team all round apart from that) and he did a wonderful job, particularly on 'Minnie The Moocher'. Around halfway through the second Saturday show Squirrel and myself both realised that the black dots that were appearing on the stage were sweat that was dripping from Matt - that man's energy never ceases to amaze. After Friday's show Mike, Matt and myself decided to go for a drink - sometime after 2 a.m. we left The Old Ticket Hall in a rather more confused state than the one we had arrived in. Maybe that's why we decided to walk though Eton to the Slough Travelodge where we were staying rather than get a cab? Maybe that's why the matinee show was a little odd? Maybe that's why the last section of this posting is somewhat disjointed?

Well, maybe.

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...

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!

'And I, wanna be...'

So - did you observe a 'Minute Of Mayhem'?

Your humble narrator attempted to touch the spirit of anarchy by playing The Sex Pistols in the kitchen - as the long-suffering Shirley and myself were having lunch with 'No Fun' roaring out in the background she rather ruefully asked 'wasn't it only supposed to be a minute?' as the clock ticked past 12.20. Sorry Shirl! Thanks Malcy!

Meanwhile we've had a revue in The Surrey Herald - modesty forbids me from saying any more than that but you can find it here if you'd like to see what they thought of us...

Two shows yesterday then, preceded by a soundcheck that included attempts at 'Get Ready' and 'Guilty', both possible additions to the show; the former sounded promising (I hope we play it again, I loved it!) and the latter actually made it into the afternoon show, replacing 'Natural Woman' in the second set to give Tracy's ailing throat a rest. Matt returned but Pete depped for Mike this time (this is getting confusing!) in a performance that included a lady falling asleep three rows from the front, a man asking to excused to go to the toilet and someone inexplicably shouting out 'Lady GaGa' which Pete misheard as 'where's your car parked?' Don't you just love matinee gigs?!?

Since it was Thursday and I was in a theatre I decided to change the strings on my main guitar during the interval, then in typically obtuse fashion play my spare guitar for the evening show - I hadn't used it for a while, it took a bit of getting used to as it sounded much 'rockier' to my ears. (Incidentally when I suggested to Matt afterwards that it might have been a bit much for our show he looked horrified! Good man!) Dave returned on trumpet and Matt 'n' Mike were in the hats 'n' glasses (I told you this was getting confusing!) and the show was somewhat more conventional than the earlier one, although it had it's moments - maybe mayhem for lunch wasn't such a good idea after all?

Practice makes perfect?

Show number three was witnessed by a full Balcony Shirts contingent, ex- Price manager Eddie Richards (that's him on drums in this clip!) and... well, not many other people really... actually that's not really true, it just wasn't as busy as the first two nights. Those that were there saw Pete depping for Matt in the role of Jake, an experimental version of 'Minnie The Moocher' (we tried it faster than usual, more like the version in the film - it didn't work!) and your humble narrator play a horrendously out-of-tune note in 'Stand By Your Man' amid much merriment from various band members; I'd just recovered from that when I made another mistake during the introduction of 'Do You Love Me?', this one even more noticeable as the intro is just guitar and vocals. It's strange - once you've done one you're almost allowed to do another one, or in my case another two as I then got the riff wrong in 'Jailhouse Rock'...

Two shows today - twice as many chances to make a mess of things!

Tuesday's gone

A smaller crowd for our second night, but a boisterous evening never-the-less, not least thanks to a birthday being celebrated in the front row of the circle - pity they were pretty much the only people up there! With Dave away for the next three shows Adam replaced him on trumpet, and we dropped 'Looking For A Fox' which will replaced, possibly tonight, by... well, another song, to be decided, possibly tonight. It's great to be back in showbusiness!!

Actually - it really is great to be playing these shows; in my not-so-humble opinion we've got a show that works really well, although like so my acts there's not been much work around for us lately. I for one really hope it picks up, and not just because it allows me to earn a living - as soon as a gig finishes all I want to do is play another one, if you know what I mean. Good job we're doing it all again tonight then!

Oops I did it again!

Oh dear - once again your humble narrator got carried away during his solo in 'Green Onions' (go back to the first posting in March if you're wondering what I'm blathering on about) and once again the end result is him having to wash his guitar after the show. Still, at least I took a picture of it this time... a fine start to our Windsor week saw Steve (depping for Marc on drums) playing the full theatre show without sheet music (no one can find it!) for the first time - he made an excellent job of it, and it was a very good show all round which has hopefully set us up for a memorable run of gigs. I'll try not to cut my hand again 'though - it really stings this morning!

Blue Five alive!

A great gig last night - the first one this century! - for The Blue Five. Pete a.k.a. Voltarol arrived in Uxbridge around 2 o'clock - I found him sitting outside The Three Tuns on the High Street enjoying a pint of bitter in the sunshine. After a quick walk around town to show Pete how much it has changed since he was last there (in case you're interested Pete's Gig Shop began life in The Arcade before moving out onto the High Street to where Prontoprint is now situated; Thames Valley Guitars was in Belmont Road where The Belmont Medical Centre can now be found) we went home for some (fairly) serious rehearsal. Somehow we managed to put an hour or so or music together including several pieces that we'd never attempted before - the long suffering Shirley provided pasta before dropping us off at (somewhat inevitably!) The Load of Hay, the site of our first ever performance together over 20 years ago. There were a few mad moments but overall it was thoroughly enjoyably although looking up just before a solo to see the guitar hero that is Steve Simpson watching intently (he and Pete are old friends) did nothing for my nerves...

Time for The Chicago Blues Brothers to begin our week in Windsor then - excellent!

Coming soon to a venue near you!

I'm not been out gigging this week, a situation that normally has me moaning my head off in these hallowed pages (and occasionally in real life too) and wondering if I'll be able to survive past teatime without swinging my right arm at a guitar; however since there's rather a lot of live shows on the horizon I'm telling myself that it's good to have a few days calm before the proverbial storm breaks. So in yet another blatant bit of shameless self-publicity here's what you'll hopefully be reading about in the next couple of weeks:-

This coming Friday (the 16th if you're taking notes) sees The Price following up our 25th anniversary shows last month with a gig supporting The Members (I haven't seen them play for about 30 years!) at Tropic At Ruislip. The Attendants are also on the bill (I haven't seen them play for about 30 years either!) and you can get in cheap by going on the venue website and booking a ticket (make sure you're coming to see us, it'll look as though we've got some fans!) or by printing off the leaflet that's currently on our website. It should be a great night! In a desperate attempt to ensure that we have a few people watching us Huggy and myself are appearing on Hayes FM this coming Tuesday evening - we're on Hughie Dixon's show at 9 p.m. so listen out for some off our favourite music, quotable quotes that mean absolutely nothing and no doubt lots more besides...

Saturday night it's time for a Youngblood (or whatever we're called these days) gig at The Pear and Partridge (great name!) in London Colney. I really enjoy our gigs - having spent years playing along with the recordings when I was learning to play it's great to be playing songs by the likes of The Stones and The Faces in a band at last! Sad to say I've missed a fair few gigs due to me being out gigging elsewhere - they always seem to clash which is a shame as I don't really want to end up depping in my own band. Let's hope I don't!

The next night sees your humble narrator returning to what was on paper at least one of the unlikeliest musical situations of his (ahem!) career. If you were looking to buy a musical instrument in the Uxbridge area in the late '70's/early '80's then the chances are that you bought it from a man who is these days known to members of the blogosphere as Voltarol. In those days he ran various shops ('Thames Valley Guitars' and 'Pete's Gig Shop' among them - I bet you've just guessed his first name!) and before that he was a member of The Jugular Vein, of whom John Peel once said 'The Jugular Vein also played'... quite how a miserable punky depressive like myself ended up playing in an acoustic guitar duo with him is a story perhaps best left lost in the mists of time, but somehow I did, and very good fun it was too. We played everything from jazz standards to Pete's own compositions, and left many-a folk club audience almost as confused as we often were; our antics were unfortunately curtailed when Pete moved away, but he's back in the area for a few days so we're opportunistically squeezing in a gig at - you've guessed it! - The Load of Hay. I'm not quite sure what we're going to play given the lack of rehearsal time available to us, but it should be good fun - well, it always was so why should this time be any different?

(Talking of The Load Of Hay there's a potentially extraordinary gig happening there on Sunday 25th - have a look at this website and tell me that you're not intrigued..!)

Around 2 years ago The Chicago Blues Brothers played a thoroughly enjoyable string of dates at The Theatre Royal in Windsor, and I'm pleased to say that from Monday 19th through to Saturday the 24th we're doing it all again. Excellent! Tickets are still available from the venue website (2 for the price of 1 on the first night!) and I for one am really looking forward to a great week's work. If only we had a few more week's like this! Ah well, mustn't be greedy I suppose.

Blogging opportunities may be few and far between given what's going on - my intention at the moment is to try to do some sort of short daily bulletin (Pretentious? Moi?) and then maybe some sort of overview when it's all over, but we'll see how it all goes. I'll see you sometime in the next couple of weeks...