Telford The Place Thursday March 29th

One of the weird things about being on tour is that you tend to exist in a sort of bubble, and to a large extent the events of the outside world pass you by, unless it’s something totally cataclysmic like the death of a world leader, Newcastle United losing at home or an imminent national shortage of chocolate. A couple of days ago we started to hear about the possibility of a fuel tanker driver’s strike and the fact that panic buying had started as the result of an ill-considered phrase by a government suit ( actually, I’m amazed anyone managed to filter one single statement out of the constant stream of effluent which emanates from the corridors of power, but there you go ). Today we actually saw a little bit of this panic buying and suddenly we realise that it could have a very real impact on the tour. On top of the bus problem and the farrago with the projectors, I’m beginning to wonder if those good old Rock Gods are trying to test our mettle. We can do a LITTLE bit of legislating for potential poo, but if the whole country goes mad we’re screwed, to be honest. We try and put this out of our minds as we pull up at The Place in Telford….we’ve got enough to deal with during the day, and there’s not much we can do about it all anyway. We played here for the first time on the last tour, and it was a great night, so we’re hoping for something similar today. Rachel and Gary, the house crew, are really nice, friendly folks as well, so there’s a pretty mellow atmosphere onstage today. When it’s going like this it’s a great job to do….you’re with a good bunch of blokes, all of whom you can totally depend on, and the banter’s great. We’re not making widgets in a factory or staring at the same view out of an office window every day, and although there’s by definition some uniformity to the days, you genuinely don’t know what to expect . There’s a downside, of course….no company pension plan, private medical insurance, sick pay or weekends off, and it IS bloody hard work, but there’s an amazing sense of achievement when you’ve carted all these cases of gear into a venue, connected miles of cable, built speaker stacks, lined up projectors, plugged in instruments and got everything working, especially when you see the audience reaction at the end of the night. It’s even better when you get a shower afterwards then jump on the bus for a couple of beers and a bit of a laugh before climbing into your bunk and being rocked to sleep by the rhythm of the road. No such luck for us yet, of course, and so it’s another post-midnight hotel check-in, usually being done by some poor sap who speaks English as a third or even fourth language. Which leads me neatly on to tonight’s crew meal. As everyone else was still doing something, I decided to head into Telford and get the grub for the boys. Armed with a list ( three pie and chips, two sausage and chips, one fish and chips, one curry sauce….none of this healthy rabbit food cack for THESE boys ! ) I walked up to the main street, which actually looked as if it had been lifted piecemeal from downtown Baghdad….smashed concrete, haphazard holes and an air of general destruction were everywhere. All the shops on either side of the road were shut too, and the streets were deserted; for a moment I wondered if there’d been some terrorist outrage that had somehow passed us by. I swiftly discounted this idea, though….Telford already looks like a bomb’s hit much of it, so even the most desperate Al Qaeda cell would pass it up as a waste of time as a target. No, it was just the usual work of the great British Town Planners, so I picked my way through the rubble until I saw a little shop with a Pukka Pies sign outside. In the same way as the kite mark or the Queen’s “ by Royal Appointment “ denote quality, a Pukka Pies sign is a guarantee of excellence, so I headed inside, to be welcomed by a young man of indeterminate but distinctly foreign origin. I duly handed him my order. A straight enough undertaking for a fish and chip shop, you’d have thought, but no. You would have thought I had asked him to decipher the Rosetta Stone or work out the square root of two million, two hundred and thirty – seven judging by the furrowed brow, constant frustrated puffing out of the cheeks and frenzied scribbling on his little notepad. After ( and I’m not exaggerating ) about five minutes of this, he says “ so that’s three pies, a fish, curry sauce and six chips, yes ?”I nodded assent, at which point he began to tell me he’d charge me x pounds for the chips, y quid for the pies and z wonga for the fish and sausages, but that as it was a big order he’d give me a discount of…..at this point the frenzied scribbling started again….fifty pence. Slightly puzzled by this unasked – for largesse and his frankly mental way of breaking the order down, I thanked him and handed over the requisite funds. Now, call me old fashioned, but by definition a fish and chip shop is the very epitome of fast food. Not here, though. People of Britain, should you ever find yourself in Telford and gripped by a sudden and unquenchable desire for an infusion of lard, do yourselves a favour and do NOT go the Fish Inn on the High Street. This is NOT fast food. This is slow food. Very slow food. Tectonic plate – slow food. Having finally mastered the apparent complexity of my order, he finally placed the fish and chips in the fryer. “ Well, at least it’s fresh “ I thought, grasping for a redeeming feature. It began to dawn on me, though, that if he was just starting to cook it now, I wasn’t going to get back to the theatre until perilously close to showtime, so I asked him
( quite politely, as it happens ) if there was any way we could speed things up a bit. Wrong move. It just panicked him into some odd jerky little movements, as he turned first to the fryer, then the counter and finally the hotplate, then back again,
clearly unsure which activity to afford priority to, finally looking at me with lost, pleading eyes. “ Errr….just do your best, then “ I muttered. Too late….the poor kid was going into a flat spin, only made worse by the arrival on the scene of another young man of similar foreign extraction, who started doing odd things with the chip fryer basket whilst babbling in his mother tongue to the fraught youngster who, it slowly became clear, was actually the manager of this fine establishment. Things were rapidly going totally postal, and the expression on the face of the next customer who came in was all I needed to confirm that it wasn’t just me…they really WERE having a meltdown. I looked at my watch to see if it was still feasible to get back to the theatre in time, but he must have seen me, and interpreted it as the actions of an unhappy customer, as he barked something to his pal in a strangled voice and then started flinging chips out of the fryer and into the drainer. At least it looked like things were moving along, but then he did this really weird thing. He put a sort of household plastic bowl on the counter with a sheet of greaseproof paper in it, and I thought “ Hang on…surely he’s not going to put all of the food in these ? ” He didn’t. What he did was get the chips from the drainer, put a portion into the plastic bowl, and then tipped the portion into a Styrofoam container with another piece of greaseproof paper, which was standing on the counter next to the bowl. He repeated this process with Every. Single. Item. On. My. Order. Several aeons later, he’d managed to get everything into bags and thrust them at me with a triumphant smile on his sweating, flushed face. “ Surely he’s not going to say it “ I thought….and then he said it. “ Thank you for your custom, sir ! Please do come in again ! “. I smiled grimly and bit back the obvious “ not as long as my arse points downwards “ retort before hurrying out and back to The Place. The final irony was that as I dashed out I’d seen a sign on the window saying “Under New Management ! We pride ourselves on our excellent food and speed of service ! “ Well, if they’re the new management, I foresee another “ To Let “ sign going up in Telford in the not too distant future…..At least the food WAS good, but there’s nothing worse than having to bolt grub down as showtime’s looming. Anyway, that’s the story of dinner…!! Oh, did I mention we did a gig tonight ? I didn’t ? Well, we had a gig tonight. It was great. Best audience of the tour so far, in fact. You know how they go by now ! It only remains to leave you with today’s thought, which comes from M’boto Kadogo, also known as the Wise Old Man…..” He who can outrun the mountain leopard must be f*****g fast on his feet “….

Hayes Beck Theatre Wednesday March 28th

This morning we got the confirmation from Geordie John that the bus is no more. It has ceased to be. It has gone to the great MOT Testing Bay in the sky. And failed…This is, needless to say, a Very Bad Thing. We’d been kind of hoping that he’d be able to get some kind of mechanical medicinal jollop and pour it into the engine to make it go again, but I’m reliably informed that it’s a little more complicated than this. Bugger. John tells me that he’s in the process of buying another bus, but that he won’t have it until next Monday. Double bugger. With an extra helping of cobblers. It’s not so much the actual self-driving that’s the problem for us, it’s just that driving every day, checking in and out of hotels, hoiking your bags into different rooms and finding somewhere to park gets a bit wearing after….well, about two days. The other aspect to it is that it dislocates us…we’ve got three guys in one van, three in another, and the band in their own cars. We’re missing the camaraderie that being on the bus together brings, and there’s a practical element too…most of the administrative burden of sorting the hotels and alternative arrangements out falls to me and Arthur, and it’s really hard to do anything properly or efficiently when you’re driving,. As it’s full – on from the moment we arrive for load – in, we’re starting to get a bit backed up. Venues need invoicing and then chasing for payment as well….these payments are the lifeblood of the tour, after all…but it’s almost impossible to do this from behind the wheel of a van. We make the decision to hire a car ; this will at least get the band boys travelling together, and Nick can drive them, which also means we have a bit more space in the vans. Whilst you CAN get three people in the front of a Mercedes Sprinter, it doesn’t help when they’re the size of me, Arthur and Tomps. Whoever rides with us does tend to end up a little bit like the filling in a Bloke Sandwich, and it can’t be pleasant. As Arthur’s getting the train to Milton Keynes to collect the car from our mate Ray Mayes at Longmarsh ( purveyors of superb hire vehicles at excellent prices….book yours now ! ), Pug makes the most of the chance to stretch out a bit, and so the run down to London is almost comfortable. Almost. When we arrive at the venue, we’re shocked to see a couple of beached whales on the grassy bank behind the theatre. I mean, we’re not close to the sea OR the Thames…but as we get closer we realise that it is, in fact, Nick and Tomps basking ( the latter, rather terrifyingly, shirtless ) in the unseasonably hot sunshine. Rodders is also stretched out, but he’s so skinny he disappears when he turns sideways. We join them on the grass for a while and it’s all very lovely and warm and cosy and……I doze off almost immediately, for nearly a whole minute, and wake up with a start wondering where I am. If I could just……have….another…little…dooooooooze…..WAH ! Woke up again ! I realise that this just won’t do, so I get up and we pull Nick’s van onto the load ramp ready for the get in. I say “ load ramp “ but I could just as easily have said “ ski slope “. This thing really does have the most ridiculously steep gradient…I mean, I’ve seen funicular railways running up shallower inclines. It’s as though the architect who designed the place did so without remembering that the theatre itself is on the first , and not the ground floor. You can almost hear him as he proudly shows the prospective occupants round the site…
” …and as we walk around to the back of the building, you can see where the visiting companies will just pull their vehicles up to the shutter door for a nice easy load – in straight onto the stage…..Oh crap….”.The other thing we find when we get in is that the house techs haven’t actually set the lights up for us yet, and that’s poor. Rodders, however, is one of the most even – tempered and equable people you could wish to meet, and rather than shout and stamp his feet like some people would do, he calmly gives the techs some direction and thereby shames them into working even harder ! Good work, fella….The Beck is a really nice theatre with a big stage, so we’ve got room to spread out and don’t get under each other’s feet. This means we can get everything done quite quickly, and all is going swimmingly until the band arrive, at which point Den tells us that they’re going to change the setlist around. For what it’s worth we totally agree with the sentiments….the pace of the set isn’t quite right in the second half….but as the visuals are synchronised to the music of the show, it means a fair bit of jiggery-pokery with them. Again I’m reminded of how this would once have sent me into a tailspin of weeping despair; now it’s just a mild annoyance, as we’ve had a very good local Indian restaurant recommended to us, and Tomps and I are both worried about anything eating into our Tikka Time. As it happens we needn’t have worried…. it only takes about fifteen minutes, and so we’re able to steam into the nosebag with everyone else. The changes to the show make a real difference, and the new medley works really well…in fact the band are already talking about other possible changes to kick it all up yet another notch tomorrow.. The last tour was very much “ The Organic Tour “ where we changed things as we went along, but this one’s much more structured, and really all we’re doing is tweaking. They’re a very “ up for it “ crowd tonight, and apart from a minor hiccup at the start of Go Now where Chris’ keyboard is in the wrong voice setting ( it sounds more
“ industrial – sized washing machine” than “ piano “ ) it’s another excellent set. Only one gripe from the crew end….the idea was to have an encore number which would be selected literally as the band came onstage, and it even says in black and white on the set list “ ENCORE – Changes Nightly “. This statement, however, would fall foul of the Trades Descriptions Act, as thus far every night’s encore has been “ Do You Love Me “, to which the answer from the crew is a resounding “ No, we bloody don’t”. Nothing wrong with the song as such, it just feels a bit throwaway after the Stonker – Fest of the main set. Although the crew’s TRUE preference would probably be something like Saxon’s Wheels Of Steel or AC / DC’s Thunderstruck, we have to accept this isn’t ever going to happen. Just NOT THAT SONG ANYMORE !!! Time for a change, because the crew are revolting. But then you already knew that.. And finally, the philosophical thought for the day : You can lead a headbanger to water, but you can’t make it wash…….

Crewe Lyceum Tuesday March 27th

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but Crewe Lyceum was the place we did the very first “ official” out of town Bootleg Sixties show three years back, so it’s always been a bit special for us. It’s a lovely old theatre, and these buildings are great to play anyway, but this particular one is a belter. It’s not as though the facilities are especially great….you offload the gear onto a cobbled street, so even just getting it inside the building would test the endurance and inscrutability of the toughest Sherpa. After that it’s a long push up a corridor, and finally you’re onto the stage, where the rake is so steep you have to lash yourself to something solid to stop you hurtling off the edge and into the front row. It’s cosy and intimate, though, and the staff there are great, ( even if they’d forgotten to rig up the lights the way we needed them before we got here ! ) Last time around we had lunch in the pub next door, which after a few minutes we realised was a gay bar, and that pretty much set the tone for the day. Today, however, we find the pub’s been refurbished, though like the pub we, too, are smart, efficient and businesslike this time !! There is, I must add, a brieft period where I find myself amassing all of the profanities known to the English – speaking world, reassembling them into even more fruity compounds and phrases, and unleashing them all at two small, innocent pieces of metal. These pieces of metal are the plates from which our two poorly projectors normally hang. Today, thanks to the assistance of one Mr Ian Robson of TechPro Services in Castle Ashby ( cheers Robbo…that’ll be a tenner ) we have two spanky new LED projectors. Problem is, they come with a bracket that looks like a cross between a stage prop from Star Wars and an instrument of torture. It’s all knobs and knurled grunion rods and swivel clamps and weird sticky – out bits, and despite the collected efforts of the Bootleg Sixties crew Brains Trust, it steadfastly refuses to attach in any way to the drop-poles we use to hang the projectors from the lighting bars. Time to call in…DIY Man !! Yes, I’ve brought along a selection of tools to help maintain ( or permanently maim ) our gear. “ How hard can this be ?”, I thought to myself…place a piece of paper over the new projector, pop a pencil through the screw-holes in the top of it where the weird-arse bracket is meant to go, and…Hey Presto ! A perfect template with which to mark out three holes on our existing plates, drill ‘em out, fit them onto the poles, and the jobs a good ‘un. But no. Firstly, a piece of advice. Paper does not a good template make. It’s bendy. And foldy. Second problem…the plate is made of a metal, presumably of alien origin, that will not allow a pen to make a mark on it. No, really. Whatever I try, there’s no visible result. I then have to scrape some kind of mark with a sharp object instead, but it soon becomes clear that I’m going to need a tungsten – carbide – tipped megatool, ( and I left THAT one at home…). I finally manage to etch some kind of vague scratch on the metal, but sadly this doesn’t really lend itself to precision engineering, as I find to my cost when I try to line up the holes I’ve drilled with the holes on the projector. The Space Metal or whatever the bloody thing’s made of is resistant to my drill, too, with the result that far from smartly drilling a little hole, the drill bit skitters across the surface and I narrowly avoid skewering my own leg. It’s at this point that the aforementioned tirade of sweariness was unleashed, and I have to tell you that the plates ended up looking like especially hard pieces of Gouda, they had so many bloody holes in them, No matter though…..it worked in the end, even if this five-minute job ended up taking about the same length of time as the gestation period of an elephant. We were still in “ dead efficient and businesslike “ mode ( apart from DIY Man, of course ), so the build and soundcheck scoot by without mishap. To my relief, the projectors don’t fall out of the roof due to my crappy handiwork, either. One of the other things we really like about the Lyceum is that the audience are right on top of you, and as such, there’s a really good energy connection with band right from the start ( God, that sounds SO much like Californian bullshit, doesn’t it ? ). Only real curveball of the day was when the band arrived for soundcheck and announced that they were going to drop in a totally new medley and change the setlist around a bit. Long-term Faithful Blogreaders may well recall me describing the sheer scrotum-shrivelling terror we used to experience in the early days when even the slightest element of deviation from the show occurred. These days, though, we’re made of MUCH sterner stuff. In fact, far from hurling myself to the ground and drumming my heels in a fir of pique, my main concern is that the changes to the show visuals we have to make could well cut into the time allotted for our fish and chips, and that just WON’T do !! Next to me, Tomps serenely re-jigs all the computerised inserts as though he was doing nothing more challenging than playing Solitaire, whilst Rodders and Arthur take on board the changes and make the necessary programming amendments with nary a whisper of protest. Pug doesn’t know what’s going on during the set anyway, so it’s no big deal to him…..! The show itself goes pretty seamlessly, too, and the duty manager later tells the band that the feedback he’s been getting from tonight’s audience is the best he’s had for many months. The big frustration is that we keep hearing this, but it’s not always being reflected in audience numbers. Just got to plug away, I suppose….Tonight’s the first night of the tour that we’re all in the same hotel overnight, so Den, Steve, Arthur and myself grab the opportunity to have a “ State Of The Union” meeting. After a couple of hours, we conclude that we all hate each other and would rather be working in Morrison’s, so THAT’S all right, then….Anyway, my poor old mother – in – law’s not been well. She had terrible hayfever, and then they told her she was diabetic. So I sent her some flowers and chocolates……

What Tomps Did Next.....Monday March 26th

Well, I'm not too sure if others will be blogging today so I've taken it upon myself to cover this, the first day off of the tour. SPOILER ALERT....anyone looking for tales of wine, women and debauchery is going to be sorely disappointed !!! Now, it was a long old hike home last night, and after finally snuggling into my bed at 2:30am this morning after driving back from Croydon, it just took what seemed like 20 minutes for it to become 9:15am. And so it was that, bleary eyed, I set about my jobs for the day. First off was to get the “ show blacks” washed and ready for them entering the suitcase. “ Show blacks “ are the clothes we have to wear onstage during a gig so that we’re not so visible to the audience. They’re also great at hiding muck and mankyness, and whilst they’re not exactly the cutting edge of fashion, they’re dead useful on tour ! It turns out that I actually own around 27 black t-shirts which is more than enough to cover the first couple of weeks before the wash - stop in Bedford ( thanks, Mum !). Next job was to drop my car keys at the mechanic’s place as my MOT is due whilst we're out there somewhere in Theatreland UK, so I cross my fingers and hope it isn’t going to be TOO painful......One of the other things about this business is that you’re often working on several things at once, so my next task was to digitise some video footage which I need to get edited ( whilst in the back of a tour bus, somehow !! ) before Easter Monday. All of this conspired to give me quite an appetite, so there was only one way to go at lunchtime...! MIXED GRILL !! Nomnomnomnom.....)Having got all of that lot out of the way, I thought I’d go REALLY rock and roll this afternoon, and the first task was to finish off the painting of the garden fence, followed by collecting my boys from school and upgrading my youngest's mobile phone. Pete Doherty eat your heart out.......With everything successfully completed, it would normally be dinnertime, and I’m usually one of the first to the trough, but not tonight....even MY considerable girth was still fit to bust from the earlier feast. Instead, I began packing for.....well, however many days we’re going to be away. Packing for a tour is a bit like packing to go on holiday....you don’t know what you’re going to need, so you have to throw in things to cover every contingency. After sourcing a rather large suitcase from my loft, I decided that this time I’m probably not going to need the car trolley – jack, the scale model of the Titanic, or the dog, so I began filling it with my 27 t-shirts, 31 pairs of socks and both pairs of pants ( actually, that's not strictly true.... I have enough pairs of pants to clothe most of a third world village....thanks again, Mum ! ). Bags packed, I realise again what a long day it’s going to be tomorrow, so it’s off bed and into the Land Of Nod ( can anyone remember where that saying comes from, by the way ? ). Crewe ( and the crew ! ) await....

Croydon Ashcroft Theatre Sunday March 25th

So we’re sitting in the car on the way home after last night’s show, and Tomps casually mentions that the clocks are going forward tonight. We stare at him, vainly hoping that this is some off – kilter joke, but no….his noble features simply exude truthfulness and integrity. It’s true, and it’s already 02.00am…except it’s not, of course, it’s bloody 03.00am, and I’ve still got to drop Tomps and Rodders off in Rushden, Pug in Northampton, and then get myself back to Oundle, near Peterborough. This is deeply, deeply unpleasant, and once again I’m reminded that many people still think this job is actually glamorous. Applicants wishing to trade places should apply to the usual address……It’s actually 04.30am by the time I reach the sofa I’m crashing out on tonight, and believe me, I DO crash !! I’ve got to be back up at 08.30 to go and pick the boys up for the trip to Croydon , so when my noisy alarm finally goes off I’m so sleep – fuddled that I think I’ve woken up in the middle of an air raid, and leap off the sofa, cracking both shins on a low coffee table. It also becomes rapidly, painfully obvious that all is not well in the plumbing department. Now, I reckon we’re good enough friends, Faithful Blogreader, for me to share with you the information that I was then gripped by an attack of what my old mother – in – law used to colourfully describe as “ the running brown bears “. It could have been the bag of mixed fruit and nuts that I munched through last night in a vain attempt to be healthy….by interspersing my regular McDonald’s sessions with something like nuts or yoghurt I reckon I’m bound to lose weight. I’m certainly losing weight this morning, but not in a good way. I actually start to fear I might not be able to get out of the house, which would be pretty awkward. It’s Immodium time…..Without further rmishap or damage to the upholstery of the car seats the boys are duly picked up, and we roll into the backstage area of Croydon Fairfield Hall twenty minutes ahead of our scheduled get - in time of one o’clock, only to find that Brother Lee Love and his Latter - Day Church of The Holy Pains In The Arse are having some kind of evangelical whoop – up in the theatre, and we can’t get in until 2.30. I have a Damascene conversion, and in a flash of light decide immediately that from here on in I’m going to practise Satanism and ritual sacrifice, starting with this lot. The technical manager pleads that he HAD sent me an e-mail telling me about this….and indeed he had…. this very morning, as I was driving down here. Useful. At least it gives us the chance to grab some breakfast ( SO much better for us than the extra couple of hour’s sleep we could have had…grrrrr ) and for me to test the efficacy of the Immodium I took earlier by chowing down on a healthy, nutritious cheeseburger. Luckily my little chemical friend is as good as he says he is on the packet, and the balance of nature remains stable. One of the nice things about playing here is that we get to use the house PA system, and it’s just as well given this delayed get – in, but despite everyone’s tiredness and my previous intestinal scourging, everything gets built quickly and easily. It’s a big old stage as well, so Rodders gets the first chance of the tour to really have the full benefit of the moving lights we’re carrying with us. We’re still running with just the one projector since the demise of the other two last night, but because of the height of the place, the image it projects is absolutely mahoosive. The audience numbers are unfortunately a little bit thin tonight ( possibly due to the venue sticking an extra £ 2.50 on top of the price of each ticket as a booking fee ! ) but there’s a lot of a-whoopin’ and a-hollerin’ going on out there, and the band are picking up on this. I really can’t stress enough how important this kind of feedback is, even for a band as professional as The Overtures…if you finish the first number and there’s a bit of sporadic applause and a load of “ go on and impress me “ faces out there, it’s a lot harder for any performer to get the enthusiasm flowing. No such worries tonight, though….the audience is totally onside and the set just flows along beautifully. Just to show that there’s no hard and fast rule as to what’s going to be the highlight of the set, the biggest cheers tonight are for Strawberry Fields, which, admittedly they DO play brilliantly. Light My Fire is probably next on the Cheer-O-Meter ( this one often gets a great response, and I’m always slightly surprised by it, as it’s a pretty uncompromising, balls – to – the wall rock and roll wig – out. Polite it isn’t, and I’m waiting for some of the older audience members to start passing away, but no….they seem to love the duelling guitar solo mentalness and Chris’s keyboard histrionics. Jamie’s solo take on handbags and Gladrags is always a winner, too, no doubt thanks to the female element in the crowd, but I have to say I’m really happy to see how well the new songs are being received as well, and Blackberry Way really IS a major grower. There’s some nice off – the - cuff banter onstage tonight as well, there’s a lovely feel to the night overall, and I have to say that we really HAVE hit our stride already…..it’s not just my wishful thinking !! It’s a pretty satisfied bunch of band and crew who leave the venue into the freezing south London air. As Gordon Ramsay would say, “ Great gig….DONE !” ( actually he’d probably say a lot more which I couldn’t repeat here, but you get the gist ! ). It’s nominally a day off tomorrow ( Arthur, Rodders and I have some gear – shifting and replacement projector – hunting to do, so we’re still on parade ) and as such we make the relatively short hop to Beaconsfield and the Etap hotel. Don’t know if you’ve ever stayed in one of these, but they’re somehow reminiscent of youth hostels…still, it’s a bed, and there’s a McDonalds next door, so we’re sorted. It’s not QUITE so simple for the other crew lads, as Tomps and Pug are taking the Hendermobile back to Northamptonshire, and that’s a loooong way. In fact, I’ll let Tomps narrate how that turned out himself tomorrow. In the meantime, did I tell you about the time I saw an old lady struggling with a cash machine ? I went up to her to see what the matter was, and she asked me to check her balance. So I pushed her over…..

Edmonton Millfield Arts Centre Saturday March 24th

You know that feeling when all you want to do is get home, and everything seems to be conspiring against you to prevent it ? Well, last night we all piled out of the gig with a general feeling of a job well done in the face of a fair amount of adversity, all looking forward to being able to get home quickly as the gear was staying in the venue overnight. We had, however, reckoned without the whims of whichever thrice-accursed, pencil – pushing, desk – bound, anally – retentive, mean – spirited, small – minded, cone – loving, hi - vis jacket wearing onanist it was who decided that tonight was the VERY night he’d stop everyone leaving London by throwing a blanket of diversions, road blocks and
“ none shall pass “ signs across what seemed to be most of the Home Counties. Less than 100 yards ( sorry …I’m old school…I don’t do metric ) from the gate of the venue we found a line of flashing beacons and barriers telling us we couldn’t turn right onto the North Circular, and thus make the very short trip to the A10, along which we’d escape from the metropolis. Slightly miffed, we duly turned left, and like good little motorists followed the diversion signs. At first all was well, but as we went deeper into the hinterland of north London’s suburbia, the roads got narrower, the people coming the other way got more aggressive, and our MIR ( Miff Index Rating ) began to increase exponentially. After twenty minutes or so of fruitless shuffling up and down the mean streets of Edmonton, the diversion signs suddenly ran out. Completely. Hopelessly lost, we popped Doris the sat nav onto the dashboard and trusted to her directional omnipotence to get us out. Now, Doris is a game old bird, and she’s guided us out of many a tight spot, but even she just couldn’t deal with the avalanche of “ Road Closed “ signs, and ended up taking us right back to the gig. Bugger. Being made of stern stuff, however, we thought “ this’ll be OK….we’ll just turn left then come back on ourselves at the first junction, and this we duly did. The roadworks were not confined to the little slip road out of Edmonton, though…oh no. The whole access to the A10 was shut. “ Don’t worry chaps “ I said brightly to my increasingly disgruntled travelling companions, “ We’ll just go along to the A1 and then take the M1 turnoff. “ Sadly several thousand drivers had had the same idea, so this relatively short hop took another twenty minutes or so. We’d just started to breathe easily again when another phalanx of cones and flashing orange lights came into view and….I think you know where I’m going with this… the M1 slip road was closed too. A few corrosive epithets were bandied about, but we continued grimly onwards to the main A1 roundabout…..only to find that it, too was closed, so the only option was to go even further west and finally achieve escape velocity on the M1. By now we’d had nearly an hour in the car and we were just leaving London, many miles away from where we wanted to be. I have thus resolved, Faithful Blogreader, to firebomb the Ministry Of Transport on Monday and shoot anyone who escapes from the fiery inferno, if any of you fancy joining me. Anyway, this little hiccup aside, today was yet another example of how well we all work together….we came up with a workable alternative to the projector problem, the band decided to drop one of the new songs which they weren’t happy with, Jamie remembered he had to come back onstage, the little jokes and audience communication reappeared, and if I’d thought last night’s show was good, this one was even better. There are two of the new songs in particular which are just breathtaking; a version of Eleanor Rigby which features Chris and Den playing the same keyboard, and a take on The Move’s Blackberry Way which is definitely going to become one of the highlights of the set. Strawberry Fields has made a welcome return, and the “ duet “ with Cher on All I Really Want To Do is both big AND clever. There was a really relaxed feeling to the show tonight, and I really DO have to remind myself that we’re only two shows in, not twenty – two. In fact, I’d go so far as to say it was one of the best, most complete gigs we’ve ever done, and it takes quite a lot these days to please my jaded palate. Considering that there’s still plenty we can do to improve things even more, all of the portents for the tour are excellent. This is a great place to start the tour, too….it’s a lovely little theatre, and the staff are brilliant. Maybe we’ll go for a week’s residency next year…..! One thing that I really must do before we consign Edmonton to blogworld history is to say a very big thanks to the lovely Dawn, who left some cards and gifts for us all yesterday to wish us luck with the tour. She also left some little bits and pieces which have a high potential comedy value at future shows, so I’ll say no more about those for now !! Dawn is one of our uber-fans, but she supports the band in a quiet, dedicated way, and doesn’t ask for any special treatment or recognition in return. Dear lady, we thank and salute you !! Anyway, a Japanese, a Chinese, a Cambodian, a Korean, a Vietnamese and an Indonesian try to get into a nightclub. The bouncer says “ Sorry, you can’t come in without a Thai……”

Edmonton Millfield Arts Centre Friday March 23rd

Yes, yes, I know…usually I post some rambling pre-tour nonsense about how I can’t believe a year has gone by already and all that malarkey. This year, however, I have been, to use a phrase popular in the American Deep South, up to my ass in alligators, and so my very first chance to draw breath and collect my scattered thoughts is now, on the second show at Edmonton. Before I go on to describe the highs and lows of yesterday’s opening night, let me give you a brief outline of what’s changed since the last tour…..apart, that is, from having gained an extra year’s general decrepitude and significantly increasing the “bald patch to hair” ratio on my bonce, One major change is that the lovely Pug has taken a sabbatical from his missionary work amongst the colonial n’er – do –wells of Australia, and is back on board for this tour. As is often the case, it’s almost like he’s never been away….he’s still crap and has no idea how to operate a mixing desk…but it’s genuinely fantastic to see him again. His return meant that Chris “Junior” Stocker, our monitors guru from the last tour, has had to sit on the bench this time, but Junior’s not the forgotten man by any means….oh no. As Arthur was already committed to a period of work abroad which cuts across the tour, he’s going to have to leave us for ten days or so after South Shields, so Junior will be coming back for those shows, with Pug moving up to do the front of house sound. The other big change as far as this blog itself goes is that I’m trying to get other crew members and the band themselves to do the odd entry instead of it being my constant bleating. To be honest, I think there’s more chance of Sylvester Stallone donning a pink tutu and singing “ I’m A Little Teapot “ than this happening, but hope springs eternal….Some things HAVE stayed the same, luckily….all the usual suspects are on board….the band, of course, and the Six Musketeers, Tomps, Nick, Arthur, Rodders , the returning prodigal Pug and yours truly….so if nothing else we know we’re in for a bit of a chuckle. Now, after the last tour I was berated ( again ) for talking too much about the crew and all the poo we have to wade through, and for not reviewing the shows enough. I’ve already gone through this once, but just to make the position totally clear, this blog ISN’T about reviewing the shows….I’ve never even seen the bloody thing from the front of the stage anyway, as I’m always stuck in the wings….it’s about having a little glimpse behind the curtain, of seeing how shows like these really run, of trying to give you, Faithful Blogreader, some of the sights, sounds and smells of the tour ( actually, forget the smells…..I have to sit next to Tomps every night and it’s taken me nearly a year to repair the olfactory damage his rampant trouser-coughs caused last time ). Let us go, then, directly to the Millfield Arts Centre in Edmonton, scene of some of our finest gigs. So fine, in fact, that they asked us to come and do two nights this year, and we were more than happy to oblige. As I’ve described the strains,stresses and mild hysteria of opening – night shows in previous postings, I’ll not mention the fact that this time we got a call to say the tour bus had broken down in Brussels and wouldn’t be arriving after all. Nor will I refer to the many bits of new gear that we had to learn to use, and the many bits of older gear that steadfastly refused to let us use them. Or the fact that two of the three projectors, having been fitted that very day with several hundreds of pounds – worth of new bulbs, virtually burst into flames and had to be switched off, meaning that Tomps and I spent the entire two hours of the show trying to work out what the hell to show on our one remaining screen. No, shan’t mention them at all. What I WILL say is that tonight was still pretty damn good…in fact, this band would play a great show even if EVERYTHING stopped working. With ten new songs in the set, one of them featuring another “ virtual “ guest star, it’s yet another step up in the growth of the whole Bootleg Sixties project. This is our third annual tour now, and with Arthur’s sound, Rodders’ lights, Tomps’ AV and the band’s own performance, we’re actually getting established as one of the best shows on the touring circuit, and I honestly say that with no false modesty. Sometimes on an opening night things can be a bit cautious and tentative, but the only sign of ring-rustiness tonight was when Jamie wandered offstage after one number, anticipating a video insert that wasn’t actually there ! The new songs already sound like they’ve been in the set for ages, and everyone’s doing new intros and links. It’s not totally seamless, but there are plenty of bands who would be happy with this show as the LAST night of a tour, let alone the first. Part of this, as I’ve said before, is trust….we know the band will always deliver, and can deal with most of the chaos that sometimes goes on around them. They in turn trust us to do our jobs and to make them look and sound as good as possible. OK, the loss of the two projectors means a compromise on the visuals, as we’ll not be able to try and source replacements for another two days, but they know it’s out of our control and we’ll do the best we can to compensate for it. There’s a looseness about things now that we didn’t have at the start of this little journey of ours….problems are still problems but they don’t derail us… and even though it’s by definition a very structured show, we’re now at the point where we can all just shift that structure a bit if we have to and STILL make it rock. All we need to do now is find a tour bus and a couple of projectors, and the 2012 tour is well and truly up and running. Anyway, welcome back, an please stay with us on this latest little jaunt along the highways and byways of this Sceprt’d Isle. Before I go, here’s a thought to leave you with. God says to Noah “ Noah, I’ve got another Ark job, mate “. “ Not another bloody Ark “ says Noah. “ ‘Fraid so “ says God, “ but this one’s different. I want you to make it REALLY massive….at least twelve decks high…and this time I want to you fill it with fish . “ “ You don’t mean…..” started Noah” “ Yep” says God, “ I want you to build me a multi-storey carp Ark….”