Bedford Corn Exchange Thurs Feb 18th

Before we get into today's missive, I must say a brief and humble word of thanks to you, Faithful Blogreader, for the kind words and encouragement that have been filtering back to Camp Bootlegs since we started this whole shebang. Whem it's 3.00am, you're completely shagged out and faced with the prospect of being back up at 7.30 to drive for three hours to the next show, I'd be a lying little minx if I didn't tell you that the very last thing I want to do is write about the day's fun and games. Tedious alternative pastimes like sleep tend to get in the way of the crative flow, hence the somewhat erratic nature of the postings. The fact that people are reading ( and, even more amazingly, apparently enjoying ) these literary dribblings does make the whole thing worthwhile, and I thank you very sincerely. It may not be to everyone's tastes, but I'm hoping what it DOES do is give you a snapshot of the malarkey that goes on behind the scenes out on the road so you can get an idea of what it takes to put the band onstage for that two hours every night. It's not going to be just a series of gig reviews, and it will by definition be a bit "crew-centric" because....well, because I'm on the crew. Hopefully there'll still be something to entertain you, Faithful Reader, so bear with me. So anyway....Bedford Corn Exchange. The first thing to say about the show yesterday is that as our production company Transmedia742.Net is based in Bedford, this is a very familiar venue for us. It's also a bit of a bugger, to be honest....insufficient parking, the gear gets ramped off the truck onto a loading dock but then has to be hoicked up through a hole into the wall onto the stage, so it's a sloooooooooowwww process, and rather than dropping in the lighting and projector bars one by one as we do in most theatres, the entire lighting rig has to be lowered here, so everyone has to run around in cute yellow hard-hats looking like rejects from the Village People. The staff here are great, though, especially Marcello, the mad Italian tech manager, who has been in England for about a grillion years and yet still sounds like he's trying to flog you some ice cream or a gondola ride. We're like a well-oiled machine now, though ( well, one that's had a light coating of WD40 at any rate ) and we're ready to go by 4.30pm. The band are not so lucky, however....between the unadulterated joy of negotiating the town centre's one way system and playing vehiclular Tetris in the microscopic car park, they arrive late and a tad grumpy. They're made of stern stuff these days, though, and the moment they get onstage and start the soundcheck it's professionalism all the way. Everything goes well and the guys go downstairs to the dressing room to scarf up the snacks provided by the venue. As seems to happen on tours, small things can make a big difference, and the soundcheck has totally changed the atmosphere again, so everyone's now relaxed and looking forward to the show....and what a corker it turns out to be. Arthur and I know that audiences here can be a bit non-committal, but these folks are with us from the end of the opening number. The room may not be the best for acoustics but it's got a great vibe to it, and everything LOOKS great too; this is one of those perfect stages where for some indefinable reason the band, sound and lights really come together to make A Show.You really can't out your finger on why this is....it could be just a song that he band play particularly well, or that the audience really go for. It could be that they're enjoying themselves onstage and give off some kind of irresistible pheromone - like scent. It could be that the audience are all shitfaced drunk. Or it could just be the Rcck Gods again playing fast and loose with their humble subjects. Whatever the reason, tonight has it in spades, and there are people dancing way before the usual bopfest from Mony Mony onwards. Pinball Wizard with it's sturm und drang gets a huge cheer, but so does Den's Blowing In The Wind and Jamie's solo turn on Handbags and Gladrags....as the common phrase goes ( and how we SO abhor anything common, my dears...), they're lapping it up, guv. By the time the lads take their final bow they've torn the place up. The venue staff are asking how they can re-book the show and within half an hour of the set ending we're getting rave e-mails via the website from people who were at the show. It's been one of the top two or three gigs on the tour so far, and what it's done is fuelled the band's confidence in themselves and the whole tour..they KNOW they can do this every night, and seeing the normal audience response kicked up a few notches like it was tonight makes everyone realise just what we can achieve with this thing. Despite the prospect of a schlep down to Worthing tomorrow, and the fact that it's wazzing down with cold, cold rain on the get - out, there's Big Love around...which lasts as long as it takes for those of us who live north of Bedford to realise that at some point in the night someone had towed Siberia over the North Sea and dropped it, complete with accompanying blizzards, snowdrifts and gonad -shrivellingly cold temperatures right on top of Northamptonshire. The forty - five minute drive home stretches to nearly two nerve - jangling hours, and suddenly the trip to Worthing takes on a whole new dimension. What if it's like this in the morning ? We wonder if we should sit down and try and work out some clever contingency plan involving the armed forces, International Rescue or possibly a superhero or two, but in the end we just say " Bugger it " and go to bed. Let's hope the weather's as changeable and organic as our tour....