Taunton Brewhouse Theatre Tuesday April 24th

We’ve only got five shows to go now, and I’m already starting to feel the slight panic I get when a tour comes to an end. Partly it’s the prospect of having to sort out all the finances ( and I’d rather stick needles in my eyes, if I’m honest ) and part of it is having to return to “ normal “ life, without the support and friendship of these brilliant guys. It’s not like we don’t speak between tours, of course…Rodders and Tomps in particular are always just a phone call away when things get a little fraught and I need a dose of sanity…but here on the bus and in the theatres we’re a little army, and I can put all the other poo out of my mind for a while. It’s been a bit of an “ annus horribilis” for me in many ways, and there’s a lot to be afraid of when I get back, but there’s also one very good thing to look forward to, so hopefully I’m not going to feel quite so cut adrift when I’m home. I’m moving back from Norfolk to Northamptonshire, and will be sharing a house with me ol’ Mum ( gawd bless ‘er ! ) so I need to look at all of this as a new start. Today’s a new start for the show as well…we’re in virgin territory here in Taunton, and although we’ve heard very good reports about the Brewhouse Theatre we don’t really know what to expect. The early signs are all good…it’s got a very pretty riverside location, and there’s a Morrison’s just over the footbridge, so we’re sorted for cakes and ale. Inside, it just gets better…a new building with a big stage and loads of wing space, plus the seats are raked very steeply, so it’s as though the audience is right on top of the band. We also know we’ve done a good advance sale here, so we’re in decent shape as we head into soundcheck. The theatre staff have also arranged for us to leave the bus and vans here tonight, which means we get the chance of showers and breakfast, and this also gives me the chance to launch a mini-tirade against the bunch of superannuated NIMBYs who live in the swanky new “ retirement complex” opposite the theatre. Basically, the Brewhouse was here first, but then these high-end condos got built opposite it along the edge of the cricket ground. They’re specifically for well-heeled and well-connected crumblies, and no sooner had Colonel and Mrs Bletherington-Ffarnes-Barnes moved in than they started to make waves about the noisy theatrical types from across the way, especially the vehicles that come in and out of The Brewhouse’s loading bay. The access road is, of course, a right of way belonging to both the theatre AND the complex, but this bristle-‘tached old buffoon and his coven of cackling geriatric witches have been trying to ban anything bigger than a tricycle from coming in to the area where the theatre load dock doors are. You know the score….”too much noise, ruining our view with their nasty tour buses, common long-haired men standing around wearing t-shirts and smoking cigarettes”….and what’s REALLY annoying is that generally, these kind of people manage to wear councils down with their incessant bleating , unless timely death intervenes first. Now, I’d be the first to jump on the NIMBY bandwagon if someone suddenly put an airport on top of my potting shed or something similar. I also believe an Englishman’s home is his castle, and I have my generation’s innate respect for the elderly ( I mean, I nearly AM one…). What I DON’T agree with is a situation like this, where a new development has come in and the residents are trying to bend the existing community and facilities to their will by playing on their status as senior, or privileged citizens. The theatre is gamely resisting this tide of Saga-sustained pressure, and that’s one of the main reasons we don’t pick up the interfering old git who ostentatiously walks around noting down the registration and operator’s licences of the vans and bus and throw him in the river…the Brewhouse have got to use firmness and courtesy in their struggle, so the “accidental” drowning of one of their opponents probably wouldn’t help their cause much. Shame. I’m also aware that many of these old boys would have fought in previous wars just to allow young whipper-snappers like me the freedom to drivel on in forums like this, and for that they’ll have my eternal respect…as I was saying to my friend Sue just the other day, I’m fiercely patriotic and anyone who fights for this country IS a hero in my eyes…but that doesn’t give them the right to then start to start displaying the fascist tendencies that they fought against in the first place. If, say, Admiral Nelson moved in to the road where I’d been happily living for the past ten years and started campaigning to have my conservatory demolished as it was lowering the tone of the neighbourhood, I’d probably put his other eye out, Trafalgar and The Battle Of The Nile notwithstanding. The Brewhouse is a great little theatre doing a fantastic job, with minimal impact on the surrounding area, and no wrinkly-come-lately should be allowed to stop that. Blimey….I AM ranting lately, aren’t I ?? Sorry folks…end-of-tour psychosis must be setting in. So…back to the gig ! Tonight is one of those slightly odd shows that has what we call an “ applause “ audience. They’re very appreciative, and their applause is genuine and fulsome, but there’s not much a-hootin’ and a-hollerin’. Doesn’t mean the boys aren’t going down well, it’s just that there isn’t the mayhem that often characterises the shows. With audiences like this here’s always a slight worry that when the band exhort them to get to their feet, they simply won’t, and that would be a tad embarrassing. I’d say it takes them almost right up until the end of the first half and the “sturm und drang” of You Really Got Me before the noise level ratchets up, but after that things improve significantly. I definitely get the impression tonight that people are actually watching the show, and I have to keep reminding myself that they’ve never seen it before. We tend to forget that it IS a bit of an assault on the senses, and sometimes you just want to sit and take it all in. Jamie’s turn on Handbags And Gladrags is especially well-received tonight, and partly that’s because he’s so close to the audience. It’s always been a bit of a tour de force but tonight he really wows them, thrashing his guitar and stamping the stage as though he were trying to eliminate an armour-plated rodent…and when you’re sitting just a few feet away from that voice, you’re not going to forget the experience quickly. The pyros in Pinball Wizard actually get a cheer of their own ( in fact I’m thinking of setting up a Facebook page for them ) then Blackberry Way seals the deal. This song really has been one of the musical highlights of the tour for us…just brilliant. The closing medley with it’s new drum intro sees everyone on their feet, and by the time the house lights come up we’re already getting fantastic feedback from both the venue and the audience. To paraphrase the immortal words of Arnie, “We’ll be back !”.

Christchurch Regent Centre Sunday April 22nd

Let me start this morning’s sermon by saying that some of you may find its’ content somewhat offensive. If so I apologise, and in my best disclaimer voice let me say that the following are my personal views and are in no way representative of the opinions of The Bootleg Sixties LLP or any of it’s employees. Thank you. Anyway, despite the fact I’m resolutely aetheist, I’ve always worked on the “live and let live” premise, but where the wheel comes off is when you ( and when I say “you”, that’s a universal “you”, not “you”….oh, you know what I mean….) start to impose your beliefs on me. If I’m having a pleasant, relaxing day at home and some Jehovah’s Witnesses come to the door, they are going to get the shortest of shrift. Not interested, go away. I mean, has ANYONE in the whole of human history had that knock on the door from these earnest souls and gone “ You know what ? Thank goodness you came round. You’re EXACTLY what’s missing in my life ! “) .It’s the same with amplified muezzin calls to prayer., saffron – clad Krishna baldies shuffling down Oxford Street chanting and bashing little cymbals, and to some extent even church bells. Keep your religion to yourself, please. I don’t want it, and I REALLY don’t want it being imposed on me.. It is thus with clenched teeth that I must relate the events of this morning. So I’ve got to bed about quarter to four, and that’s fine, as I don’t have to be up until noon. However, some time around 8.45am on this quiet Sunday morning, my sleep is interrupted by the incessant thump of a drummer playing a rock beat... badly. It’s not in-yer-face loud, it’s Chinese water torture loud. You can’t ignore it, and it seeps into your ears, driving blessed sleep away ( and co-incidentally rousing the “old man’s bladder”, who reckons that as I’m awake I may as well have a wee ). My first thought is that it’s a local band rehearsing in a nearby garage or something, and I quickly run through in my mind what we may have on the bus that I can use as a lethal weapon. As I become more orientated, however, I realise that the sound is actually coming from the Regent Centre itself, and I’m also aware of guitars, keyboards and voices too. As I step outside the bus in my fetching t-shirt and shorts combo I’m painfully aware that it’s also LOUD. It sounds like a full-on concert going on in there, and as it’s Sunday morning, it can only be a bloody modern, happy-clappy, rock-music-as-means-of-worship church service. When will these people ever LEARN ? Don’t they know the saying that the Devil has all the best tunes ? Rock music is dirty, and sexy, and visceral, and belongs in the gutters and the clubs and the bars, not in bloody churches. I mean, the very term “ rock’n’roll” is slang for doing the horizontal bop…it’s got NOTHING to do with religion. Show me just ONE picture of Jesus wearing a low-slung Fender Stratocaster guitar and I’ll change my mind, but until them I’m afraid my take on it is that Christian rock is one of life’s great abominations, like Marmite and Sunderland F.C. As I can’t find a single door that’s unlocked, my initial idea of setting fire to the place is stymied, so I briefly consider invoking the spirit of Beelzebub to see if he can use some of his satanic shizzle to visit a flood or a storm or a plague of tadpoles or something on them. Luckily I stop myself in time. You can only dance with the Devil once. The legendary bluesman Robert Johnson sold his soul to the Devil at the crossroads in exchange for worldly fame and riches, and he ended up getting murdered just a few years later. When I make MY pact it’s going to involve lottery wins, Marabou chocolate, a Lamborghini Countache and possibly Kiera Knightley, so I’m not going to waste it on these numpties. Instead I get dressed and stomp off into town to see if I can find a tramp to berate, but this is Christchurch, where even the homeless have houses. I’m oddly discomfited by this unwelcome interruption of my much-needed beauty sleep ( and by gum , it is MUCH needed…) and the mood only dissipates when the word finally comes in that all of the singers and players have gone, hopefully to painful futures involving legions of biting insects. My mood is finally lightened when it’s time for the load-in, and along comes Shaun Luckly, house tech extraordinaire and a man who looks like he should be a rock hero in his own right, with his long black ringletted hair and saturnine looks. One thing he IS though, is a really nice geezer, and it’s always a real pleasure to come here and work with him. Never fazed, never flapping, and always ready with a cup of tea or a quip, the theatres of Britain could do with an army of Shauns. That’s fifty quid as agreed, please mate…..Despite the fact that the only way into the venue is to hoik the kit up onto a 5’ high loading dock , take it in through a side door and THEN hoik it up onto a 5’ high stage or run it up a dizzying series of disability access ramps, it all goes in pretty well, and despite the tightness of the stage we’re well enough versed now in how to deal with these situations.. One slight hiccup does occur as one of our number is attempting to put a PA stack together, and has opted for a “ geometrically pleasing “ rather than a “ won’t fall over “ approach, with the result that…well, it falls over. Luckily no real damage is done and all continues apace. We’re not totally sure what to expect from tonight’s show….when we played here eighteen months ago we had a good crowd, but the way things have been going on this tour, we just can’t second guess audience numbers. We’ve had some do well that we expected to be a problem and some “bankers “ which have been, frankly, pretty poor. Luckily, tonight is one that actually improves on last time’s turnout…which is what we’d been hoping for on ALL the dates….and it’s also got a decent sprinkling of younger folks, which is something else we’re aiming to increase. As the Regent Centre’s got a long, narrow auditorium, it looks even fuller than it actually is, and this in turn funnels the crowd’s energy back towards the stage. As we’ve found several times on this tour, it’s the more raucous numbers which seem to be going down best for some reason….when the intro to You Really Got Me comes thundering out of the dark, we can always hear shouts of recognition from the crowd, and the cheering at the end of the guitar and keyboard wig-out-fest of Light My Fire has been long and enthusiastic. In fact, so up for it are the people here tonight that we’re a bit surprised when the band decide on You’ll Never Walk Alone as the encore, but the audience aren’t bothered, and bellow along merrily. It’s been a real success, and the Regent Centre has definitely moved ahead of Wimborne Tivoli as the place to play when we’re in this part of the world. We gee-up the load-out as much as we can to help Nick get away…he’s got to head back to Hertfordshire tonight as he’s got some personal business to attend to at home tomorrow…and the fact that it starts to rain adds to our need for speed. It’s going to be a bit odd not having the old chap with us tonight…in fact, we’re TWO sleepers down, as Chris has opted to self-drive the last few dates of the tour as they’re all within striking distance of his home. In fact, when I saw him at soundcheck today I realised I hadn’t even really spoken to him for the past two days, as he’s arriving just before soundcheck starts and leaving as soon as he’s offstage. At first everyone though that he might be making a mistake and that he’d miss not being part of the Bogey Brigade, but as tiredness kicks in and the final dates of the tour stretch out before us, more than a few of our happy band start to think that he’s got the right idea ! Only a few more to go, chaps. Tonight’s one of the nights when you realise what being on a tour bus with a bunch of your mates is all about…. we’re all crammed into the back lounge with a few beers, the banter and the jokes flow, and it’s just brilliant. THIS is what I miss when we’re off the road. The last tour I did earlier this year was just me and the American artist I was looking after, and it was weird. I mean, we got on great and it was all fine and dandy and civilized, but there’s such an “ All for one and one for all” thing going on with the twelve of us here that anything else is just a bit lame. Big John has become as much a part of the family as anyone over the past two tours as well…he’s got a seemingly inexhaustible supply of jokes and a fund of interesting trivia which will serve us all well in future pub quizzes, and he can be guaranteed to lift you out of any Slough Of Despond which you may unwittingly sailed into. His unswerving loyalty to Newcastle United FC has, of course, nothing to do with my relationship with the big fella…..!!!! We’re staying here tonight for tomorrow’s day off, so I realise I can stay up an hour or two past my bedtime and Mummy won’t be too unhappy….but by two o’clock I’m flagging and so I crawl into my little womb-on-wheels and as Baloo the bear once said, I’m gone, man, solid gone….

Burgess Hill Martlet Hall Saturday April 21st

When you’ve done a belter like Aldershot, there’s always the danger of it being a case of “ after the Lord Mayor’s show” for the next gig. To be honest, the signs for Burgess Hill aren’t great….in fact quite literally, as we can’t even find the bloody place at first despite the best intentions of our two Dorises and Big John’s Why Aye-pad. We finally rock up just a few minutes late, and it’s a nice surprise. Although there are no moving bars for the moving lights and projectors, which means Rodders will again have to do his Amazing Spiderman act up a ladder, it’s a lovely little theatre. Advance sales had been pretty dire, but the way the seats are set out means even a half-decent crowd will look good in here. As it turns out, when I check with the box office, sales have almost doubled from what they were when we last asked, so that’s a bonus for starters. The build takes longer than usual as we have to mount two of the projectors on stands rather than fly them on a bar, and that always has a high fannying-about quotient. The stage is also a little cosy, but we’ve played smaller without any problems. In short, it’s all good. It even has the benefit of a Waitrose almost next door, and, feeling the need for some healthy nosh, I go in and stock up on mung bean and badger bile extract curd. Yum. (Note…this may be slightly inaccurate. But I DID get a Snickers bar, and that’s got nuts in it, which are healthy,
right ? OK, I know, I know…so has squirrel shit, and that’s not good for you either…). Despite the pernickitiness of the build, we’re only about twenty minutes later than normal getting set up, which is another testament to the teamwork we’ve got on this crew. The band do their bit, too, cracking on through the soundcheck at a speed which enables Nick to do a fish and chips run, and allows us to eat it without risking chronic indigestion. Normally when we’re ahead of schedule we chill out on the bus for a bit, but the venue haven’t been able to give us power for it for some reason, so the Bogey is dark and chilly. It’d also a late show tonight, so this DOES create a bit of a lull in the proceedings, which Den and I try to fill by changing some of the slides around for the projections. There was a time, Faithful Blogreader, when any computer that came within several yards of me would inexplicably stop working, or lose it’s memory, or melt, and I began to wonder if I was like Magneto from X Men, with an invisible forcefield that threw machinery into disarray. Turns out I’m just crap with computers, but thanks to the wise tuition of Professor Tompkins, I’m now a bit of a whiz.. Apart from being able to handle Powerpoint as well as any normal seven year old, I’m fully computer literate, and my skill set is vast…sending e-mails, reading e-mails, deleting e-mails…I could go on. It’s also a big football day today….the Mighty Magpies of Newcastle United spank Stoke City 3-0 and move up to the nosebleed-inducing heights of fourth in the Premiership, at least until Spurs play their game later today. When the news filters through that Spurs have lost one nil, Big John and I offer profound thanks to Spurs for rolling over today against the ten men of lowly QPR ( sorry, Sue ! ), as well as pinching ourselves to make sure we’re not dreaming. Arthur, being a Spurs fan, is fairly disgruntled, but then I’ve never seen him actually gruntled, so I can’t really tell the difference. Showtime comes around, and we’re not really sure what to expect from this crowd. Den’s got a couple of friends in and Jamie’s wife, the lovely Michelle, is here too, bringing one of their daughters to see Daddy in action onstage for the first time, but otherwise we think this is pretty much virgin territory, so there’s a smidgeon of trepidation, but as ever, we needn’t have worried. They’re a noisy and enthusiastic bunch tonight, and right in the front row at stage left in front of Jamie is a row of people who, we later discover, are fans from Worthing, and apart from the usual applause and whistling, they display a fantastic routine of formation dancing…whilst still in their seats. I wonder for a moment how they rehearsed it….” Yeah, come over to mine about eight….bring a bottle and I’ll get a pizza in. And don‘t forget to bring all your chairs….” but they’re clearly having a ball, and it doesn’t take long before they’re on their feet and bopping around. The band aren’t quite at full throttle in the first half, but they’ve got this show totally nailed, and what we sometimes have to remind ourselves is that even if we don’t think a show has been especially good by our own high standards, to people seeing it for the first time it’s fantastic, and what’s especially pleasing on this tour is the amount of people who HAVE seen it before telling us that they think this is the best we’ve done yet. It’s harder for us to be objective as we see it every night, but it’s been such a constant comment that we must be doing SOMETHING right. The rockier songs seem to be the winners tonight, but Jamie’s Handbags And Gladrags gets a special cheer ( and it wasn’t just Michelle ! ). The triple whammy of Pinball Wizard ( with fully operating pyros ! ), Blackberry Way and Green Onions has already got most of the house on their feet even before the final medley, and by the end of THAT, this gig has changed from a “ singlaong encore “ to a
“ rocking out encore” , and Spirit makes it’s second appearance in two days. If anything this one’s even meatier, and the place is heaving at the end. Job done !! There’s a moment of farce as we prepare to leave; the massive steel automatic barrier opens to let Arthur out…then closes again and steadfastly refuses to have anything to do with either the bus or Nick’s van. As we know the whole place is shut tomorrow, being a Sunday, we have visions of having to take an oxy-acetylene torch to the damn thing so we can get out and get to Christchurch, but luckily the obligatory “ little man” who works these kind of things turns up with some kind of key fob malarkey, and we are released. Arthur’s feeling rough so our little convoy hits the first services and he stocks up on jollop and pills, then he swaps with me and I “race” Nick to Christchurch. I say “ race” but it’s more a case of me tearing past him when I’m going downhill, and him laughingly passing me as I wheeze up the hills, but it helps to pass the journey. We roll into the car park at The Regent Centre at a respectable 3.15am, and as we’ve escorted John here through the labyrinthine back streets of the town, we can jump straight aboard. The only downer is that the bus has to be parked sideways on a hill, so she’s far from level. This seems OK until I actually get into my bunk and start rolling downhill due to the camber. I manage to rig up a protective wall of pillows and clothes, but when I wake up at five to have the first of my “ old man’s bladder” trips to the loo, I find my face is mashed against the side of the bus again, and that’s SO not a good look. In fact, when I get up, the camber seems much steeper, somehow, and I make it to the loo only by bouncing off various bunks, musicians and assorted hard or pointy surfaces on the way. For a minute I toy with the idea of totally bottling out of the return journey, but the old lids are drooping again, and I can hear the siren call of my bunk. I’ll be fine. I can DO this. Taking a deep breath, I release my hold on the galley door to stagger bed-wards…..and promptly plant an elbow right in Phil’s head..Oops….!

Aldershot Princes Hall Thursday April 19th

We had a day off yesterday, and the good folk of the Princes Theatre in Aldershot kindly agreed to let us park the bus up and use their facilities. All of the band except Phil have gone home again, and of course Junior has sadly left us to go back to his “ proper job”, so it’s only six of us on the bus. Big John immediately set out to lay waste to the female population of the town while the rest of us enjoyed more genteel pursuits, such as watching DVDs, eating incessantly, drinking beer, sleeping, farting (Nick) and tour accounts (me). The day hadn’t started especially well….Rodders and I had arrived at 4.25am to find major building developments going on around the venue, as well as a totally new and confusing car park. Being the good citizen that I am, I neatly parked the van and left a note in the window saying we were playing at Princes Hall and were waiting for them to open so we could pick up a permit. I also left a footnote with my mobile saying contact me in an emergency, never for one moment thinking someone actually would….I mean, the bloody car park was huge and totally deserted. I had, however, reckoned without the pettifogging, parsimonious small-mindedness of the local council officials. At 8.45 am my mobile wakes me from an exhausted sleep, and some pillock tells me that I’ve parked in the wrong place, and if I’m at Princes Hall I need to park on the RED bays, as the other bays belong to the council and magistrate’s courts. I trust I’m not stretching the bounds of your credulity when I tell you that I felt like I’d been Superglued to my bunk, so tired was I. However, like a good little soldier I dragged my carcass upright, threw on some clothes ( don’t know whose they were ) and staggered, blinking, into the grey, rainy morning. I walked to the car park, hoping I wasn’t blocking someone in, hence the call…only to find it was still almost totally bloody deserted, with the van sitting forlornly but unobtrusively in one corner. Faithful Blogreader, it is at this point that my inner caveman came to the fore, and I started bellowing abuse at the blank windows of the court offices, hoping to coax my tormentor into plain sight, whereupon I could extract his liver through his earhole and make him eat his own foot. No such luck…the only response was from two policemen who were just coming off duty, and, clearly wanting to avoid extra paperwork this late in their shift, let the madman rant on as they warily sidled into the police station and clocked off. Eventually the rage subsided, and just as I was contemplating ram-raiding the council offices in the van just for the hell of it, I spotted Steven, one of the house techs from the Princes Hall, turning up for work. Within minutes he’d sorted me out a vehicle pass, and my first thought was “back to bed”……but I’m up now, aren’t I ? I’m awake, and it’d be pointless trying to sleep. Instead I decided to have a shower, which, though welcome, was an experience in itself. So caked with limescale was the showerhead that the water actually came out at right angles, and I only managed to get wet by standing next to the cubicle door and letting the water catch me as it ricocheted off it. It was hot, though, and I felt a zillion times better when I came out. I actually tried to put off doing what I had to do for a while, and just wanted to chill out with the other lads, but in the end the demands of duty were not to be denied, and I set to it. I don’t know about anyone else, but there’s something about pages full of numbers and figures that is innately depressing, and to add to the downer factor we’ve still only been paid by FOUR of the theatres we’ve played, so I’m desperately trying to spread around what little cash we have had in. This, of course, is firefighting, and that means you’re always going to make SOMEONE unhappy, but there’s nothing else I can do….to use the catchphrase of last year’s tour, it is what it is. So frustrating and misery-inducing was this whole process that I got a bit overwhelmed and finally gave up. The gloom was lifted for a bit when Pug, Tomps, Nick and I sat and watched a DVD, but I got into my bunk feeling decidedly dejected. However, my default setting is normally fairly bright, so this morning, after a decent sleep, I decide it’s time to take off the Trousers Of Despair and pull on the Shorts Of Optimism. Arthur’s rejoining the tour today, and he’s flying in to Gatwick from Berlin, so I pick him up from North Camp railway station and take him to Tescos for a Full English breakfast fix…..as he’s been in the Grand Duchy of Foreigny for a couple of weeks he’s sick of morning repasts consisting solely of ham, eggs and bread rolls…and then we head to the load-in. We’re in full effect these days, even being a man down since Junior left, and we’re all set and ready to go by 2.45 pm again. There’s brief talk of a change in the setlist for tonight, but I in the end the band decide to keep things as they are, the only slight tweak being the reintroduction of The Hollies I’m Alive as a segue into Just One Look. Aldershot is always a corker; it’s the one show we do which is promoted by an outside source, in this case the inimitable Mr John Martin, toppest of top blokes, and it seems that he sells tickets to people based purely on the degree of rabid fandom they display. There are never any neutrals at the show here…..it IS something of a case of preaching to the converted , but hey…there’s nothing wrong with that. Our diehards are right there in the front row too….there’s Marilyn, enjoying her birthday today in the best possible way, and Debbie, and Dawn and Jim and Linda. It’s great to look out and see these faces, especially when you see they’re genuinely enjoying the show still. Guys, we couldn’t do this without you and people like you. Apart from some dimmer channel weirdness on the house lights and a few misfiring pyrotechnics, the production itself is as close to faultless as it gets. Den’s a bit more relaxed talking to this audience, and the band are just totally in the groove. To be honest, tonight’s a bit of a done deal right from the off….they’d have to play like total spaniels to go down badly here…so the sense of triumph isn’t quite as strong as it was at Bedford, where the audience was made up of a lot of people seeing the show for the first time, but it’s still brilliant…the sheer volume of the crowd response alone gives me goosebumps. With an audience like this there can only be one encore, and Spirit In The Sky is simply blistering…..at times it’s almost hard rock, with Phil stepping out over the monitor line and ripping solos from his Strat, and it’s totally glorious. Afterwards we say our goodbyes to our friends, and as Dawn leaves she calls out “ See you next year!” It’s only after she’s gone that I realise I can’t remember if I’ve told her that we’re planning a short winter tour this year as well, so Dawn…watch this space…we’ll be back in November 2012 ! With all the friends and fans around and after such a triumphant show we’re expecting to find the bus deserted and the band being borne around the pubs of Aldershot on litters of peacock feathers and unicorn hair by adoring acolytes, but to our surprise as we clamber aboard we find them sipping tea and eating cake in a most unrockstar-ey manner. “We’re a bit tired “ they plead, so we leave them to their Earl Grey and decide that we’ve had enough of healthy stuff…there’s only one thing for it….KEBAAAAAAAB !!! Luckily for us, Mustafa’s Salmonella To Go is still open, and looks suitably unprepossessing, so in we troop. Luckily there are no regiments of drunken squaddies in here tonight or the whole exercise could well have a different outcome. We DO get one window-licker who sings to himself in a high, keening voice the entire time he’s in the place, but we’re otherwise undisturbed as we set about out mystery meat with vigour. I’m about halfway through when my teeth crunch into something metallic. I fish it out and am slightly puzzled that it appears to be a disc of metal of some sort bearing the word “ Tiddles “. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about though…..Sated by our unsavoury repast, we stroll back through the freezing rain to The Bogey to find that the band really MUST have been tired…there’s not a soul to be seen. I have a wry chuckle at the irony of it all….so many people have a misconception of what life on the road and specifically on a tour bus is all about. They think it’s all sex and drugs and rock and roll. Well, we DO have the rock and roll, but the sex is only in our fevered imaginations and the drugs are never stronger than Weston’s cider and Ibuprofen ( mind you, some of the cider Tomps and Rodders drink is so strong it could be classified as an offensive weapon ). In fact, we get much more excited when someone finds a beer tucked away at the back of the fridge or if there’s an unopened packet of crisps in the food cupboards. We may well be a motley crew, but we CERTAINLY aren’t Motley Crue.....!

Newark Palace Theatre Wednesday April 18th

Paul McCartney may well wake up to the sound of music, with Mother Mary talking to him, but I wake up to the sound of the Lincolnshire rain hammering on the roof of the bus, so I Let It Be and go back to sleep. This is most unlike me…normally I wake quite early and then I’m up and at ‘em…but today I just can’t drag myself out of my bunk. I mean, we DID arrive quite late this morning…about threeish…but that’s no biggie for us on this tour. I think it’s the cumulative effects of the long days and nights and the stress of trying to keep all the financial plates spinning, plus, I’m sorry to have to admit, it’s the simple passage of time. I’m nearly 55 now ( June 7th, folks… all donations / presents / cakes / loose women / spare tickets for Newcastle United games / bundles of tenners gratefully accepted ) and at least once every day my mind writes a cheque that my body can’t cash. In fact, not only does it not cash it, but it sets off the panic button, brings down the security shutters and sends in the armed response team. I can still chuck the gear about almost as well as I used to when the occasion demands, and I reckon my basic strength’s still OK, but almost every joint is starting to feel as though it’s full of gravel, and my knees long ago decided that they didn’t want to play anymore and took their ball home. It’s got to the point where I’m almost as useless as a Dalek when it comes to stairs,
and as if they know this, it seems as though all the theatres we’re playing are on about nine levels, with the two things I need to access most being on levels one and nine. So come on, boffins of the world….invent a bloody anti-gravity belt or else a fat lad – sized indoor jet pack or something. I’m struggling here !!!! When I finally roll out of my scratcher it’s half ten in the morning and so I immediately go into “ I’ve wasted time !” mode. Luckily Rodders is on hand, as he so often is, to remind me that I’m being a big jessie and that there’s nothing wrong with sleeping when you’re tired. Big John’s Wetherspoons – Seeker app has obviously been in full effect, as our very own Breakfast Club of John, Rodders, Nick and Tomps have all been out and troughed down by the time I get up. It appears that on this tour it’s Pug who has drawn the Magic Bunk in the allocation lottery, for he’s still peacefully sleeping despite the cacophony of talking, laughing and farting that’s going on just inches away from him. Mind you, judging by the noxious emissions that Nick’s producing this morning, maybe there’s another reason he’s not conscious….Come one o’clock and the rain’s still not eased, so we just have to grit our teeth and get on with it. Luckily the get-in is not too bad, and everything gets chucked in quickly. Once inside it’s clear this is the perfect kind of theatre for us. Good size, nice big stage with plenty of wing and dock space, decent dressing rooms with showers and a management that really want to help. So perfect is it, in fact, that we’re actually finished and set up ready for the band at 2.45pm, the fastest we’ve ever done it. Told you this was a bloody good crew…..Nick and I take advantage of the early finish to scoot off to a local ATS and pick up a new tyre for his van, the Black Pearl, and I’m feeling so chilled out that I only cry a thimbleful of tears when they give me the bill for
£ 108. Back at the venue it’s oddly deserted….the band have been in and showered, so they’re either on the bus or mooching around Newark ( VERY pretty place, by the way…well worth a visit. Only make sure you do it next time we’re playing there and bring everyone you’ve ever met in your life with you….). We’re so on top of this show now that in all honesty, once we’re set up there’s no real need for anyone to be here until the boys come back for soundcheck, and giving the crew this extra bit of downtime has been a real morale booster. They’re all totally professional, responsible lads, and don’t need me on their backs every five minutes to make sure the job gets done and done well, so it means everyone’s more relaxed and there’s a great atmosphere. I make use of the quiet time by grabbing a quick shower, and then it’s accounts a-go go. Oh, the joy….Tonight is one of those shows where there are some acoustic oddities. As the stage is quite deep, Tomps and I are quite a long way back from the crowd, so even without our comms headsets on, the applause seems a bit muted. Going by the expressions on the band’s faces, though, this isn’t the case at all, and from the stage itself the applause is long, loud and warm, and the band slide into one of the most effortlessly masterful performances I’ve ever seen them do. It’s got power, but it’s controlled power, less hell-for-leather, more….. hell-for-suede. It’s relaxed but focused at the same time and is an absolute joy to watch. The lads have also FINALLY decided to start the “ Sixties Party” thing right at the beginning of the last medley rather than wait for Mony Mony at the end, and it works a treat…this way from now on, please !!! To our surprise ( and delight, of course ) Den calls Spirit In The Sky as the encore. I’m slightly miffed, as tonight I’m going out to the merch table again before the end of the show and I bloody LOVE the way they play this song, but as I head to front of house I suddenly realise I’m getting an opportunity I’ve actually never had before….to see even part of this show from the audience’s perspective ! I slip through a side door…and it’s mayhem. I’m nearly beaned by the meaty fist of a bloke who is punching the air, and everywhere it’s clapping, dancing, singing people. The band look and sound amazing, and I finally see what it is we pay Mr Rodwell for when he does the lights !! ( Nice one as ever,
Rodders …! ). Weirdly I feel as though somehow I’m trespassing into a forbidden area…..that’s what happens when you’ve been stuck in the stage right wings with a set of headphones on for the past three years….but it’s a fantastic glimpse behind the curtain at what the audience see when they come to this show. I begin to wonder if I can buy a ticket for the next show in Aldershot….As this is our first time here, there are plenty of people who want to meet the band afterwards, and the feedback both we and Sean, the venue manager, are getting is superb. This is definitely on our “ come back asap “ list.. Lovely gig, lovely people. The loadout is quick, too, which means we can set off for Aldershot sooner than planned. Steve’s taking the Black Pearl home again tonight to do another day’s admin catch-up on The Overtures diary, and John’s dropping the rest of the lads off at home. It’s Jamie’s birthday tomorrow and the last thing he wants is to be in Aldershot with a load of old lags like us. Den’s just going back to recharge the batteries a bit and Chris is sorting out his car as he’s going to be self-driving the gigs from here on in, but Phil’s stuck with the bus….THAT’LL teach him to go living in Gothenburg !! Rodders and I drop Junior off in the Grand Duchy of Furzeton, Milton Keynes, then head to Toddington services south and the 24 hour Burger King. Or not….the 24 hour one is only on the bloody northbound M1 ! WHAT MADNESS IS THIS ?! We briefly consider driving to Luton just to turn around and come back north, but finally agree this is just a little bit mental, so after making do with a ( surprisingly fine) all-day brunch, we swap drivers and set off on the final leg to Aldershot. It is at this point, Faithful Blogreader, that I must make a confession that is neither big nor clever. I was already quite tired before I took the wheel, and it’s not long before I’m drooping. The fact that the van’s heater is now permanently stuck on it’s “surface of the sun” setting doesn’t help, either. Rodders has already done his stint, and the poor lad’s already nodding off, so I’ve got to stick with it. I think I’m doing OK until I see a blue junction sign come up on the M3. As our friend and colleague Tracy Jacobs lives along this drag, I know that her junction is the first one we come to. As I get up to the sign, though, I get a real jolt to see that it’s actually the one after hers, and it’s the one I need to take for Aldershot. This REALLY gets the adrenaline going…somehow I’ve driven along a stretch of the M3 with absolutely no recollection of having done so. Clearly I was in control of the van, and knew where I was going, but I’m proper scared by this fatigue-induced amnesia. This must not happen again. It doesn’t take long to get to the Princes Hall, and luckily John rolls up within five minutes, so we get aboard and head for bed. It still takes me a while to drop off, though…..I realise that for all the fun and games and jokes and japery that go on here on the road, all it takes is one second of tiredness or an error of judgement and everything could change for ever. I know it’s not my usual style to close a post on such a sombre note, but this was a wake-up call to me and I’m passing it on to you. It’s better to get somewhere half an hour late in this world than twenty years early in the next. If you’re driving at night and you’re tired, don’t be a sap…take a nap.

Wakefield Theatre Royal Tuesday April 17th

Another red letter day today…it’s Tomps’ birthday, and he’s finally old enough to buy cider without an adult in attendance. I’m sure he had something more exciting in mind than sitting in the back seat of the bus with me and Nick ( a.k.a The Flatulence Kid ) on a rainy Humberside morning, but them’s the breaks, as they say. After a day off in sunny Scunny, we set off for tonight’s show in Wakefield. As with South Shields and a couple of the other gigs, the recession has bitten deep, and the theatre is struggling a bit. When we played here on the first tour three years ago we were pleasantly surprised at the size of the audience given the fact that we’d never been here before, but we have to be realistic and appreciate that’s not going to happen this time around. We love the theatre, as it’s one of the classic little old former music halls, but one major drawback is that as it sits on a major road junction, we can’t park the bus here. That means we all have to bail out, and Big John has to take the Bogey to a nearby truck park. He’s more miffed than normal because he took her through a truck wash this morning, and he’s justifiably proud of her shining…err…greenness. Now, instead of impressing the good folk of Wakefield, she’s tucked ignominiously away next to a load of manky old pantechnicons. It’s just for today though….her luxurious verdant coachwork will be back on display tomorrow in Newark. As it’s a short drive from Scunny, we arrive a bit early, and the local techs rather grumpily tell us we can’t come in as they’re re-rigging the lights from last night’s Cirque du Ceil show, so we scuttle off through the wind and rain to the theatre’s bistro for a very rock’n’roll cup of hot chocolate ( although one member of the party, who shall remain nameless but is sometimes called Pug ) decides a beer is more in order. Bad lad. By the time the actual get-in time comes around the attitude of the house crew has softened considerably ( they even make us tea ) and everything drops back into the groove. John has driven off to a truck park a short walk away but it still means we’re stuck in the theatre for the day, and once we’ve finished our work and we’re waiting for soundcheck, time DOES seem to hang heavily, even for the birthday boy, who finds a little nook behind some flight cases and catches forty winks. I try to catch up on my accounts, but I’m feeling really tired too for some reason, and decide it’s a bad idea….last think I need is to have to re-do the bloody things at a later date. Normally by showtime there’s a degree of adrenaline kicking in, but I have to say it’s just not working today…maybe the schedule is finally catching up with us, but the crew are all weary, and even during the first half I find myself dozing at my station, which just won’t do. The interval comes, and with it the ice cream tubs. Feeling as tired as I am there’s only one way to wake up, so I stick my face totally in the ice cream tub, much to the bemusement of Tomps. Works, though, and I’m fine in the second half once I’ve licked the mess of my mug. No weariness for the band tonight, though…..they’re banging through the set at full throttle, and this small but very enthusiastic crowd is lapping it up. The only odd thing about the Theatre Royal is that the merchandise position is in the bar, which is upstairs. To get there involves several doors, keys, more stairs, electronic fobs, even more stairs, retina scanning systems, some stairs that alarmingly seem to lead to the ladies’ toilets, and finally you have to give the sacred password to the Ancient Gatekeeper who guards the Chasm of Doom ( well, it feels like that anyway ). About three days after I set off, and totally knackered, I arrive, panting, in the bar to find….no-one. Yes folks, here’s a useful sales tip if you’re trying to catch those post-gig buyers…..try and have the merch table somewhere on the ground floor where people will actually pass you, as opposed to them just streaming out of the main doors several storeys below, blissfully unaware of your presence. As it transpires we DO have a few hardy souls who find our secret hideout, so I tip my hat to you good folk. This hardy band includes a friend of Phil’s, a delightful lady from Sweden called Barbro, and a young couple who I am convinced have wandered in by mistake. Turns out they’d just fancied coming to something different and had loved the show. Rodders had spotted them in the first half and thought much the same thing as myself, and when he couldn’t see them after the interval thought “ Ah…they’ve sloped off under cover of darkness”. Far from it, though….they’d switched seats so they were right in front of the stage, and were bopping away with the best of ‘em. We need more people like this, please !!!! Big John being Big John, he’s brought the bus up to the venue anyway, and trust me, there’s not a traffic warden in the land who would dare approach him when he’s on a mission. This means the band can get straight aboard after the show and begin work on seeing off the contents of the bottle of Jack Daniels which had appeared that day. Mild intoxication may have ensued….We’re in Newark tomorrow, and as that’s just about eighty miles we’ve decided to do the post-show shuffle again. Big John can’t leave until quarter past midnight due to his driving hours, so the vans set off a little early, seeking the Holy Grail of the 24 hour Burger King. So far we’ve found only one, but hey…hope springs eternal. As it turns out, our hopes are dashed again. We pull into Blyth services near Doncaster to find nothing but locked shutters and switched-off lights where there should be Whoppers, Bacon Double Cheeseburgers, and Chilli Cheese Bites. DENIED !! There IS, though, a Costa-style place open, populated by a sullen teen who tells us listlessly she’ll be with us in a minute, then returns to sorting carrots into different shades of orange or something equally useful. It soon becomes clear she’ll not be with us in a few minutes, or, indeed, in this lifetime. A somewhat overweight truck driver comes up behind us, and to our alarm starts to pick up trays of crockery and move them about. It takes a while to realise that far from being some scruffy trucker, this chap actually works here….maybe the apron and paper cap just didn’t fit…but he cheerfully takes our order and even has the good grace not to get upset when I pass out at his feet after being given the news that two pieces of bread and a scraping of cheese and ham will cost me £ 3.69. We figure that by now the bus will have left, and as we are driving out of the services Big John is actually turning in, so the vans pull up to wait for him. It’s at this point that Nick realises one of his back tyres is flat. Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever changed a big tyre on a van or truck, but it’s not a pleasant business. Add to that the fact that it’s bloody freezing and blowing a gale, and the whole process just gets even worse. “ God, that looks horrible “ I reflect from the warmth of my van cab as I watch Nick manfully struggling alone with the wheelbrace. To be honest, we all jump out to try and help, but apart from Rodders, who actually gets the spare out of the van, the rest of it is just window-dressing, and we are mere spectators. The evening is given a surreal twist when the bus pulls up behind us, and Steve, no doubt fuelled by Jack Daniels as well as the milk of human kindness, starts running around the assembled group, popping squares of Cadbury’s chocolate in our mouths before disappearing into the night. Afterwards it’s one of those “ Did I imagine that or did it really happen ?” moments, but the tell-tale choccy marks on my fleece provide the answer. At last we’re back on the road and make Newark without further incident. I resolve to do a tiny bit of work before climbing into my bunk, and pull my stupidly heavy office bag up onto the seat beside me….which is where it still is when I wake up an hour later, the zipper having made an attractive impression in my cheek. Note to self…try sleeping in the bunk next time……..

Scunthorpe Plowright Theatre Sunday April 15th

It’s almost as though the Gods Of Rock have decided that, having given us a glimpse of what we COULD be doing in the future when we played the Bedford show, they’re going to give us a swift kick in the biffins to remind us of what lakes of stinking ordure we still have to swim through in the here and now. Having survived the Gig In The Greenhouse in Morecambe last night, today we find ourselves in Scunthorpe, at the Plowright Theatre, which has been one of our favourite shows of the past two tours. We’ve pretty much sold it out both times before, and we love the crew here, for whom nothing is too much trouble. This time, however, the chill wind of the recession, fanned by the rancid, flatulent emissions of the American-based corporate numpties who now own the place, have combined to blow over half of our audience away. About ninety per cent of the people who come to theatre shows do so because they read about forthcoming attractions in the theatre’s brochure. When the tossers who put these things together, and please bear in mind this now includes a four-person marketing department whose sole job it is to do just this kind of thing, totally forget to put your show in the brochure, you’re going to struggle. Guess whose show wasn’t in the brochure ? Got it in one. As it happens we aren’t alone…our agent also manages The Searchers, and they’re not in the bloody thing either. As such no-one knows we’re on, and despite an admittedly game attempt by the marketing characters to try and salvage something from the wreckage, it’s too little and way, way too late. Whereas this used to be a “ banker” date for us, this time we’re looking to change the first letter of that word. And I don’t mean to a ‘t’. None of this is any reflection on the people here at the theatre, who are genuinely pleased to see us back and make sure we have access to all their facilities even before the load – in time. The problem is when globe-buggering corporates start to stick their greedy little fingers into things they don’t fully understand, and then sob into their balance sheets when things don’t work out just as the avaricious drones back at head office had planned. For some reason known only to the misguided berk who conceived this sad excuse for a plan, this big American leisure corporation, SMG Leisure, which owns venues of all types across Europe, has decided that the place to start it’s quest for UK domination is in Scunthorpe, presumably due to it’s well documented history as the town at the very centre of every significant musical trend of the past fifty years. Oh no, hang on…wasn’t that Liverpool ? Or was it London ? Or Manchester ? Shit…we’ve bought the goddam place now….it’s too late….!! Apart from the Plowright Theatre, Scunthorpe actually boasts a very nice 2000 capacity hall called The Baths. Because it used to be the swimming baths ( see what they did there..? ). Both previously council-run, whilst the Plowright is a reasonably recent development, The Baths has trundled along in happy semi-obscurity for about 100 years…. closing , re-opening, hosting gigs, bingo, discos, closing again, re-opening again….without ever once seriously troubling the touring circuit in the UK. SMG Leisure, ( surely stands for Sadly Misguided Gits ) in their infinite wisdom, decided that this was the very place for them, so they’ve taken it over, spent a boatload of money on refurbing it…and now it’s haemorrhaging cash, so they’re dumping staff and cutting back, and the planned refurb of the backstage at the Plowright never happened. Because, of course, they own the Plowright too. No doubt someone in East Lindsey council, the previous owners, is now driving around in a VERY nice new car, or is enjoying an exotic holiday somewhere….Anyway, enough ranting at this latest form of corporate rape. It’s happening all over the world and we’re stuck with it until we stand up and tell SMG or Live Nation or whichever morally bankrupt bunch of bastards it is to stick their chequebooks up their jacksies. As you may have guessed, this is something I feel a WEE bit strongly about….anyway, on to the show. All is going splendidly during the day until with a loud click and crack during soundcheck, all the power goes off. We put it back on. It goes back off. We put it back on, It goes back off . We out it back on. It goes back off.
( are you seeing where I’m going with this ? ).Finally, it goes off once too often and when we go to put it back on THIS time, our mains distribution unit, through which all power to the PA , moving lights, projectors and instruments runs, has finally turned up it’s toes, and steadfastly refuses to switch back on again ( or, indeed, do much of anything at all ). This, even the less technically minded among you may have gathered, is a Very Bad Thing. To use a dash of Cockney rhyming slang, we’re Donald Ducked, unless a solution can be found with the speed of many antelope. We are fortunate on two fronts. One is that Matt and Steve, the two theatre techs, are both really good blokes and know what they’re talking about, and the other is that we have with us Professor His Royal Highness The Right Honourable Martin “Rodders” Rodwell, a wise and learned sage, well versed in the ways of all things electrical. Not for him the girly tantrums and chewed knuckles favoured by yours truly at times of stress. Oh no. Armed only with about four miles of cable and a little thing that goes “ beep” when he plugs it in, he, Matt and Steve set about doing….well, something electricky. Whatever it is, it works, and I go to change my trousers. It’s always unsettling when something this potentially disastrous happens, but there’s a general air of negativity about today anyway….things just feel wrong somehow. This should be a sold-out show tonight…I shouldn’t be anxiously looking into the foyer to see how many people are coming in. We always have such a blast here that I feel cheated. I mean, it’s not that the show’s bad, nor is it that the audiences don’t like it…quite the contrary…it’s just that I feel there are forces at work here that are out of our control, and they’re messing with our futures. The band, as ever, don’t let us down, but by their standards, tonight’s a little lacklustre somehow. They play brilliantly, and to anyone in the crowd there’d be nothing amiss, but there’s a missing spark somewhere, and having seen them level Bedford just two nights ago, it’s even more apparent. At the end of the show I ask a little gaggle of people at the front of the stage if they’ve enjoyed it, and they say they have in a slightly puzzled way. A little puzzled myself at their response, I continue coiling cable until my ageing eyes finally swim into focus and I realise that two of the strangers are actually Marilyn and Debbie. No wonder they sounded puzzled, with me asking them politely about the gig and displaying no sign at all of recognition. Ladies, I apologise….just put it down to my incipient senility. We crack on with the load-out and get done in almost record time. We’re staying here tonight, so there’ll be a little bit of playtime before Mummy sends us up the apples and pears to Bedfordshire. I’m feeling totally drained and can hear my bunk calling, but suddenly Big John appears and the jokes start flying thick and fast. Out comes the iPad and we start watching classic comedy sketches, until at one o’clock I realise that if I don’t get myself in my bunk soon I’m going to be totally wiped out tomorrow, and I REALLY need to do some admin, plus Rodders and I have to try and find a part to replace the bit that had the eppy before the show. I pick my way across the various bodies sprawled, guffawing, in the downstairs lounge and haul myself into bed. It takes about 3.2 seconds before the darkness falls and The Roaring Walrus reawakens……

Morecambe The Platform Saturday April 14th

I’m still buzzing the adrenaline of last might’s show as we jump in the vans and set off on the long old poke up to Morecambe, and fuelled by a single can of Red Bull, it’s way beyond Manchester before the stealthy fingers of fatigue start to gently squeeze my eyeballs and blur my vision. Even the van seems to have acquired a new lease of life, and she roars happily up the motorway at something approximating normal speed. Behind us, Nick’s faithfully kept pace the whole way, but as we see the signs for Charnock Richard services, my mobile buzzes, and there’s a text from him. It contains the single word “Piss”. Ascertaining that this cryptic message presages an urgent need for the old boy to micturate, I turn off and pull in to the services. I see his door open and am about to ask if I’d guessed correctly when a streak of something black and hairy and trailing the heady scent of Eau De Marlboro Lights flashes by me at almost supersonic velocity. Stunned, I turn to see what this dark missile could be, just in time to see Nick’s back disappearing into the Gents. He’s in there a very long time indeed, and I muse just how long he’d been gritting his teeth and crossing his legs. When it comes to driving, I’m convinced that Nick is actually an alien. These days, after a couple of hours behind the wheel I normally feel myself growing a little torpid, and so these night drives we’re doing are a killer. Nick, however, will drive forever, seemingly without fatigue or distraction. Just give him Radio 2 and packet of fags, spark up Doris the Sat Nav and point him in the right direction, and he’s as happy as a sandboy ( whatever one of those may be ). Eventually, the main vein having been fully drained, he comes out with a spring in his step and a big dopey grin on his chops, then immediately orders an enormous tea and starts refilling. Odd boy. We’re all pretty jaded as we finally pull onto Morecambe sea front and run along to The Platform to find the bus……still not there. This isn’t good, but a phone call to John confirms that he’s just three miles away, so I say I’ll go out into the road and show him where to turn. Now that, Faithful Blogreader, is a very easy sentence to say. In practise it was a very hard thing to do. Whilst it’s not hosing down with icy rain as it was last time we were here, it’s still 5.45am on the west coast of England on a very cold April morning. I’m in my obligatory shorts and a fleece. The wind off Morecambe Bay has surely got “ Made In Siberia” stamped on it somewhere, because it’s bitter. It’s also relentless, and manages to find it’s way into every chin k in the inadequate armour of my clothing. Most specifically, it blows up the legs of my shorts and shrivels my undercarriage. I’ve already mentioned mini cocktail sausages. This time, however, it’s worse. As I’d “ gone commando” after my shower at Bedford, there’s not even a thin layer of cotton to protect the chaps from this wintry blast. This time we’re talking, say, an acorn and a couple of Maltesers. My ‘nads are, in fact, so cold they’re frantically trying to return to those happy pre-pubescent days of yore and clamber back up inside my body where at least it’s a BIT warmer than hanging around out here. If last night was a peak, then this is the absolute nadir. Tired, freezing and miserable, I reflect on my life and wonder what happened to that once-promising career. How did that happy, ambitious young tour manager end up (literally) freezing his nuts off on a godforsaken piece of Lancastrian coastline ? The sight of the Flying Bogey trundling up the prom makes me almost sob with relief, and we get John in and parked up without further ado. Turns out he’d been blocked in by the carelessly-abandoned cars of the booze and drug-addled scum who populate Bedford’s pubs and clubs, and hadn’t been able to get out until one am. He ended up having to take the registration numbers of some of these cars as he needed the assistance of the police to get them moved, so I ask for these numbers and vow to hunt down the thoughtless bastards and murder them in their beds, ideally by carelessly parking my car on their vacuous heads. It’s warm on the bus and as the life slowly stars to return to my nethers I briefly consider speeding the process up by lowering everything into a bowl of warm water, but in time I remind myself that extreme temperature changes tend to make things very brittle, so I settle for just curling up in my bunk until the circulation has returned to the Deep South. Exhausted, I again fall asleep lying flat on my back, and commence the animal impersonation known to the others as
“ The Roaring Walrus “. I can’t help it, lads, sorry……About ten seconds later, or so it seems, I’m awake again. As we’re parked outside a pub and restaurant, there’s only one thing to do…Full English ! Pug and I chow down eagerly, but not TOO eagerly as we know the vans are being unloaded right now ! There’s another new face of the team today; due to a prior commitment, Junior can’t do today’s show, so we’ve enlisted the help of our good buddy Ben Dorrington, soundman extraordinaire and all round top bloke. Ben arrives looking incredibly fit and healthy, and on being quizzed about this modestly admits that he’s running the London Marathon next weekend. I worriedly scan his face for signs of insanity but can’t find a single one, just the calm, focused determination of the person who has got a purpose and a goal. And two legs which work properly, which is always a bonus, I find. Exhausted just from hearing about it, I stagger into the venue. The Platform, you may recall, Faithful Blogreader, is the old railway station building, specifically one of the platforms ( wonder how they came up with THAT name ??) and it’s a bit odd but good at the same time. It’s got a glass roof so the sound can be a bit lively, but Pug will be fine, just as Arthur was last year. Rather sadly, it hasn’t sold as well as last year for some reason.’ But we’re gloomily coming to accept that this is the story right across the UK; theatre business overall is down by a significant percentage and the question is what to do about it…but that’s a topic for another day. We’re all set and ready for showtime when something patently obvious begins to dawn on us. When we played here last year, it was about three weeks earlier, and certainly before the clocks had gone forward. What this slightly later date means is that, with just five minutes to go until showtime, it’s broad daylight outside which, because of the glass roof, means it’s also broad daylight inside. We can see every face in the audience and every nook and cranny in the venue. What we CAN’T see is anything being projected onto the screen or anything that the lights are doing. This means that the opening montage is a collection of vague shapes on the screen, and instead of taking their places onstage in the dark ready for the first number, the lads have to shuffle on in full view and try to be as unobtrusive as possible. The same thing happens after Go Now, when they change instruments for Not Fade Way, and when they do the clothes change during Pretty Woman. It’s decidedly odd, but the saving grace is that the crowd, relatively sparse though it may be, is fully engaged and making a decent amount of noise. Even odder for the crew is that there are no comms in the building, so we can’t talk to each other as normal. This means I can’t cue the video inserts and the blackouts as normal, so Rodders is totally on his own with this. Fortunately he knows the show well enough by now to handle it, but it all feels oddly dislocated and distant. Luckily darkness falls before the end of the first half, so something approaching normal service is resumed by the time the lads go back onstage. In the end it’s not a bad little gig at all, and the crowd is suitably appreciative. The only complaint was from a biddy in the front row who asked us to switch off the smoke machine as it “ plays ‘avoc wi’ me asthma “ We smile sweetly and avoid pointing out to the daft bat that the smoke fluid is totally water-based and contains no chemical elements whatsoever that could affect any medical conditions ( I’m mildly asthmatic myself and yet night after night I sit in clouds of the stuff ). Everyone else seems to have loved it, even though there’s a pure Spinal Tap moment after the show; the merchandise area is way over in the corner of the room and we genuinely don’t think people had noticed that the band had gone over there to meet and greet afterwards. I glance over and the five of them are standing forlornly with Nick, for all the world like The Tap when they’re at the deserted record store signing with hapless record company man Artie Fufkin. It only takes a couple of people to spot them and folks gradually start to drift over, but it WAS chucklesome for a moment. We load out quickly and grab a shower, then it’s out to the bus for a blissful night of non-travelling sleep; the venue have agreed to let us stay here until the morning. Ben’s done a grand job and joins us for a swift ale before heading off into the Morecambe dark, but Steve’s in full comedy flow tonight, and despite my best intentions to have an early night, we’re still chortling away at two a.m. I’m going to pay for this tomorrow……

Bedford Corn Exchange Friday April 13th

So we decide to go overnight to Bedford, and figure that this time as John’s got a short detour to drop the band off in Welwyn, we should get to Bedford at about the same time. For once it actually works…Rodders and I arrive in the van just far enough ahead of him to realise that the venue haven’t left out the power cable for the bus or opened the load bay gates for the van. Great. We head off around the block to find somewhere to park
( without success ) and when we return the Corn Exchange’s burglar alarm is blaring like the Crack of Doom. John pulls up at that very minute, and we realise that there’s no way we’re going to be able to park up and have people try to sleep right under the hellish din. I call the local police but the building hasn’t got a police response arrangement, so there’s nothing they can do. Tired and fratchy from the five – hour drive, we’re having trouble even thinking, let alone sleeping, when as if by magic, it stops. The ensuing silence is blissful, so we pile aboard and crash out as soon as we can in case it starts again. Today’s a day off, but the Corn Exchange guys are really helpful when we wake up at 9.00am and go to see if we can have access to the showers, so as soon as the power cable’s out we’re set fair for the day. For me it’s a day of catching up on work AND sleep, for Tomps and the others it’s a chance to see how much cider can be consumed by the average human within a twelve – hour period. The answer, unsurprisingly, is quite a lot. Tomps has an almost superhuman capacity for the juice of the apple, and although he’s having trouble with the odd thing like walking, talking and staying upright, we just know he’s going to be fine in the morning, which just isn’t fair. He decides quite late in the evening to wander off to his girlfriend’s house and sleep there. As she lives in Doncaster this presents quite a problem. As expected, he tips up the next morning looking as fresh as a daisy, whilst all around him is carnage. Even I feel hungover, and I’d just had a single pint. We decide that as we’re already here, we’ll do the load-in early, so we get the first van emptied in record time, and then Steve and Jill turn up in the second van, nice and early as they’d promised, and by one o’clock we’re all loaded in and ready to start building. The head technician here, Marcello, is a seriously good bloke, and we’ve known him years, so it’s always a pleasure to come back and work with him. Today he agrees to let Rodders use all the house moving lights as well as our own, so our boy gleefully sets to work plotting some magic. We know tonight’s done well, too, added to which we’ll have a good few guests. Arthur and I were based here for many years and as such a lot of our suppliers are local, so this is a nice opportunity to get them along and say “thanks”. It’s also close enough to the band’s home patch for friends and rellies to come up, so it’s with some trepidation that I hand in the guest list with thirty – six names on it ( we’re allowed ten ! ). We have a good and long-standing relationship with the Corn Exchange, though, and there are no issues about this. One of the things we like about the venue is that it’s a got a visible, aluminium truss-style lighting grid rather than the conventional theatre lighting bars which are masked by tabs and drapes, so it actually looks like a big touring rig. This makes everything look more upscale than it actually is, and we’re really looking forward to seeing it in action. Rodders runs through a few of his programmed plots for Steve and Jill during the afternoon, and Steve’s very impressed….like the rest of us onstage, he’s never actually seen the show, so it’s good for him to get even an idea of what the audience see. When the doors finally open, I’m very surprised to note a large number of young people coming in, and even more pleased to see that most of them are female ( purely from a demographic point of view, you understand ! ). I make a mental note to ask the Corn Exchange where they advertised….one of the things we’re very much after with the show is to widen our appeal to younger people. These songs are SO timeless that literally everyone knows them, even if it’s via the soundtrack to Vampire Diaries or some such brain- numbing American poo, and so there’s no reason why everyone shouldn’t get SOME enjoyment out of the show. We’ve also got the .Uber-Booties like Marilyn and Dawn who support us through thick and thin, and I can see from her position in the front row that Marilyn’s ready as ever to lead the charge as soon as the band ask the audience to get up and
dance ! Right from the opening announcement, which gets a huge laugh, tonight is special. It’s a big crowd and they make a big noise, and you can see from the band’s faces that they know this is going to be a good one. The sound is great, and the lighting looks amazing, and as the band go into the psychedelic section and Rodders fills the stage with swirls and swathes of colour and movement, I suddenly realise why this is all so exciting. It’s because I can see the future. I don’t mean in a “ you’re going to meet a tall, dark stranger who will tell you he can help you reclaim PPI insurance on any loan you may have taken out over the last five years “ kind of way, but in a “ I can see where this show will be in a couple of year’s time “ kind of way…on big stages, with a touring lighting rig that’s totally bespoke to our needs as opposed to us having to adapt what’s already in the building, and with crowds that respond to all the high, lows and nuances of the set. It’s almost impossible to pick out a highlight tonight…Den’s solo Dylan turn gets as big a cheer as the band’s stormtrooping You Really Got Me, and even the pyrotechnics get a cheer of their own in Pinball Wizard. Den knows he can do and say no wrong here…it’s what a football pundit would call “ a partisan crowd”. The Corn Exchange have a slightly odd policy of not letting anyone dance in front of the stage, so we’ve got plenty of people bopping away in the side aisles long before the end, but as Mony Mony kicks in. Marilyn jumps to her feet, and like a little Boadicea leads her hordes in a joyful celebration of this music, this band, this show. It’s just beautiful. The band go off to a roar of acclamation more befitting Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge than this little town in Bedfordshire, and when they come back on, only one thing is going to satisfy these rabid fruggers. The sustained feedback into of Spirit In The Sky kicks the volume of the cheers up another couple of notches, and as the signature guitar hook winds sinuously out of the squall of noise, literally everyone in the place, crew included, is clapping along and grinning with pure daft pleasure..When this finally gives way to Steve’s heavy artillery salvo of drums and the full band get the motor running and head off down the highway, I’m suffused with the utter certainty that this is the best show I’ve ever seen us do. EVERYTHING is right…venue, sound, lights, visuals, band, crowd….and it distils the very essence of why we do this. It justifies the hard work, the miles of travel, the lack of sleep, the worrying about money. It’s a total vindication of our belief in the whole thing. It’s cost us time, months of effort, cash ( LOTS of cash ) sleepless nights and even relationships, but tonight I see that this, our brainchild, our baby, has finally grown up into a tough little bruiser that isn’t going to be bullied into submission or have sand kicked in it’s face by other shows. So listen up everyone else out there in theatreland…..start looking over your shoulders because the new kid on the block has laid down his marker…..

It's a Pug's Life.....Day Off, Bedford, Thursday April 12th

Got up. Had a shower. Went for breakfast. Had a beer. Had a curry. Had more beer. Had even more beer.Laughed at Tomps who had had more beer than anyone. Went to bed.

( He's a man of very few words......)

Porthcawl Grand Pavilion Wednesday April 11th

I’m actually starting to hate the van. I mean REALLY hate it. Not in any kind of driver-ey, performance-y, miles – per – gallon-ey way, but in the way you hate someone you spend way too much time with, especially when you’re in discomfort. After the show last night, Nick Rodders and myself took off in the vans heading for Wales, anticipating that the bus would be relatively close behind us. As it’s literally downhill all the way from the West Midlands to Wales we managed to keep up a decent speed, and as tiredness started to really kick in we decided to take a break at Strensham services on the M5. After a fairly leisurely snack and a coffee we climbed back in the vans and headed onto the M50. I texted back to Junior on the bus to try and find out how far behind us they were, only to learn that they were literally just reversing out of the car park at Leamington !! We decided that it’d be pointless waiting where we were as fatigue was starting to be a real issue, so we pressed on. It was at this point that the heater quit on us again. And yes, we WERE wearing shorts. At least it wasn’t snowing, but it was still BLOODY cold. After an enforced coffee stop to try and thaw out we managed to get the heater working again, which was just as well. We arrived at the venue at 3.30am, did a quick status check with the bus and realised that it was still a couple of hours away. There’s nothing to do but sit and wait, and this is when the hatred of this little metal box really starts to take hold. We’re parked outside a residential area, so we can’t really keep the engine running, and that means the temperature drops. And drops. And drops. We try to doze but it’s too cold and cramped, and I have to say that, apart from the Misery On The Mountain a couple of days back, this is just the worst. To add insult to injury the venue haven’t left out the power cable for the bus when it DOES arrive, but right now I’d settle for sleeping in the luggage bay . John finally pulls up at about 5.20am, and as we haven’t got the power cable, tells us we’ve got about two minutes to get to bed before everything has to switched off, so we jump aboard and wrap ourselves in our duvets…..for about an hour, after which the sleeping compartment, bereft of the air conditioning and super-heated by the effluvia of several flatulent members of the touring party, has turned into something resembling the Black Hole Of Calcutta. Gasping for breath I wrench open the bunk curtains to try and get some fresh air, only to be met by the sight of a semi-naked Pug, sweating like Gary Glitter in Toys R Us and hoofing his duvet onto the floor. It’s not pleasant. Although it’s still way to early to be getting up, this just isn’t bearable, so I drag my sorry carcass out of the bunk and trudge over to the venue for a shower. At least the sun’s shining again, just as it did when we were here last year, and there’s no doubt about it, it DOES lift the spirits. It’s way too chilly to have a yomp up and down the beach, but it’s still very pleasant , and the brisk wind blows the cobwebs away a bit. The Grand Pavilion is a strange old gaff….. it was only converted into a theatre relatively late in it’s life, and has a very strong kind of “ music hall” vibe about it. It’s got an octagonal dome which the venue blurb describes as “ interesting “, but this is, of course, using the much lesser known meaning of the word , which is “ acoustically, as much use as tits on a
bull “. The sound goes up. It goes down. It goes around. It goes up, down and THEN around. It echoes here. It’s dead there.. It booms here. It’s dry there. In short, it’s a swimming – pool of crippling natural echoes, reverbs and laws-of-physics-defying acoustical fart-arsing around. It’s pants. Nice house crew, though….When we were here last year it was Junior’s birthday, and we were a mere day or two away from the end of that tour. This year we’re just over the halfway mark, so there isn’t quite the same “ de-mob happy” air around the place, but everyone’s still pretty chilled. We’re cracking through the build and soundchecks at record pace now, and that means more time to do the important stuff, like source out the best local fish and chip shops. Unfortunately it turns out that our navigation skills aren’t up to our information gathering skills, and we can’t actually find Finnigan’s, acknowledged as the best chippy in the country, apparently. We make do with Beale’s, Purveyor By Appointment To The Chavvy Holiday Hordes Of South Wales, and the hunger gap is duly filled. The show itself is an odd one…..in addition to the mental sound characteristics of the venue, the stage is also inordinately high for a theatre of this size, and the combination of the audience being so far below, with their applause going straight upwards, swirling about the dome for a bit then doing a left towards Swansea or somewhere, all makes for a weird sense of dislocation from the crowd. I see that Den’s struggling a bit to make the connection tonight, but as ever with these boys, it’s really only us that are aware of the problems; to the audience it’s just a great show, and this is borne out by the attitude of the folks who come back after the show to get autographs and meet the band. The amount of times we hear “ This is the best show we’ve seen for ages “ or “ We’re going to tell all our friends to come next time “. If success were measured by audience response alone, we’d all be sitting in our Beverley Hills mansions ordering a flunkey to bring us a cup of fresh unicorn tears or something equally exotic. Instead, we’re getting aboard the Bogey and heading for a day off in the fleshpots of Bedford, where, to slightly paraphrase a Disneyworld sales tagline, the magic never begins. The band will be dropped off en route and we’ll rendezvous with them on the showday at the Corn Exchange in Bedford. One of our party is on a mission, though….Steve’s getting in one of the vans to head back straight home by himself. It was his wedding anniversary today and he’s off to see the lovely Jill directly…..none of this wasting time doing detours and drop-offs for him…like a little homing missile he roars off into the Welsh night, and hits the M4 as if he were Sebastian Vettel on amphetamines. For Rodders and I it’s back in the Van Of Hatred , and we head for Bedford at a more leisurely pace. A MUCH more leisurely pace. Now, if only we can get there at about the same time as the bus…….THOUGHT FOR THE DAY…..If the worst comes to the worst, you can always be a bad example.

Leamington Spa Royal Spa Centre Tuesday April 10th

There’s a very definite case of “ Day Off Syndrome” at work here today…..we had Easter Sunday and Monday off and now we’re trying to get our groove back !! You don’t exactly forget what you’re meant to be doing, but you DO lose the “ autopilot “ mentality a bit. There’s also a little post - alcohol sluggishness to contend with in some cases, though I’m not naming any names, Pug. As most people could get home quite easily they did so after the Bromsgrove gig but for Rodders ( St Ives ) and John ( Newcastle ) it wasn’t practical, so they stayed with the bus. However, we didn’t want to just stick them in a lay-by somewhere, so I came up with the wizard wheeze of getting John to park the bus outside my house in Oundle, Northamptonshire. Only one teeeeeeeny tiny problem…I haven’t actually moved in yet, but no matter…I have the keys and thought the lads could at least use the shower and loo. As it transpired, one of my sisters – in – law was using the place as her “ to be sold on eBay” store, so there was an unexpected three-piece suite in the otherwise empty gaff. The electricity was on as well, so they could stay warm, and there are plenty of good local pubs and places to eat. It’s a in a very quiet part of a very quiet town, though, and I hadn’t reckoned on the impact that the arrival of a bloody great green double-decker bus would have on the neighbours. They were doing everything but run guided tours to have a look at the Bogey, and I’m reliably informed that there’s one nosey old witch in particular that had to be persuaded not to call the police as she though that “ the gypsies were moving in”. Daft bat…I mean, you ALWAYS see gypsies and travellers in tour buses, don’t you ? She could apparently be spotted day and night at her window complete with binoculars, checking for signs of washing being hung out or scrap metal being bought and sold. All I can say is just wait until I actually LIVE there, Mrs Sticky-Beak….THEN I’ll give you something to bloody talk about. Just as Tomps has an inbuilt mental Wetherspoons app, so John can find boozers and someone to talk to with unerring accuracy. As I was zooming about the country all weekend I didn’t really see the lads on Sunday at all, but I’m reliably informed they may a significant contribution to the retirement funds of several local publicans. When my daughters and I turned up on Sunday night to take John and Rodders out for something to eat, John decided to pass as he had a bit of a stomach upset. I asked him if he’d eaten anything that hadn’t agreed with him, and he replied, slightly puzzled,
“ Nah, man, ah just had six pints and a curry this lunchtime….”. As I explained, if I’D had six pints and a curry at lunchtime I’d have been in A & E, but he said he’d be fine on his own, so the four of us went out for a very nice meal. When we got back he wasn’t there, so we figured he’d either gone to bed or was resting on the bus. But no. He’d had
“ a bit of a thirst on “, so he’d headed back into town for a further several pints and a cheese board. The man’s an animal…..By the time I go to the house this morning to pick Rodders up, John’s already left to go and get the band, so we drive off to get the other lads, waving gaily at Mrs Curtain-twitcher as we pass. There’s a SLIGHT logistical issue today, as we’ve got to work out how to get four of us into a three – seater van. We only need to go as far as from Pug’s place to Watford Gap services, as Nick will meet us there in his van, but it’s still far from a jolly prospect. True to form, Rodders steps up to the plate and agrees to ride in the back of the van with the gear. We surround him with as much shock-absorbent material as we can find then leave him sitting on a case like a little gnome and lock him into the darkness. Luckily the journey only takes about fifteen minutes, so the poor chap’s not too bone-shaken by the time we get there. Nick and Junior are waiting for us in Nick’s van, so we welease Wodders from his rattly tomb and decant Pug into Nick’s van before setting out on the final twenty – odd miles to Royal Leamington Spa. The last time we played the Royal Spa Centre is was, frankly, a disaster. We were only the second show in after the place had been closed all summer for refurbishment, and no-one seemed to know the theatre was open again. We’d decided we wouldn’t come back, but the management had assured our agents that all was now sorted out, and that things would be much better this time around. All of which just goes to show that you can’t believe a word of what some people tell you. I’d realised there was a problem back in January when I was trying to get information to put on the posters, and couldn’t get it. To add to the mystery, every time I asked the box office for a ticket count they tried to put me through to the management or publicity departments, and I began to get the distinct feeling I was getting the runaround, so I got the agent on the case. I then went off on tour with another artiste, and when I came back everything seemed to be sorted….except that when I rang the box office for the first time on my return they didn’t even have our show on their listings. Cue BIG ranting at the agent, who in turn dispensed an earhole-bashing to the venue. To be totally honest I STILL don’t know the full story…all I do know is that we didn’t want to start cancelling shows, so we pushed on. As we arrive at this large place today, we see a solitary poster advertising our gig, and a massive one hundred and six tickets sold. OK, so some shows will do better than others, but this is just bloody maddening….after all the hoo-hah about “ doing better next time “ they’ve cocked up again. It’s disheartening for the lads and makes my blood boil, but we’re stuck with it now….just got to do the best show we can, however many are in. The only saving graces are that they’ve got the bleacher seating in, so the space in front of the stage doesn’t look quite so tundra-like, and the other thing is that the audience themselves are suitably up for it. It might make it harder for the boys, but you’d never know it, and if anything they even seem more relaxed as there’s some quality unscripted banter flying around as well as the usual top-drawer performances. As if to give the middle finger to all the tribulations of the day, they encore with Spirit In The Sky, which always makes the crew squeak with pleasure and ensures that structural repairs to the roof of the venue will be required tomorrow. Simply spectacular. It gives us a real boost, and along with the excellent house crew we get everything down and into the vans in almost record time. Tonight we’re heading off to Welsh Wales and the majesty of Porthcawl Grand Pavilion. Let the games begin……

Bromsgrove The Artrix Saturday April 7th

Another short hop today, so we make good use of the showers and the local facilities for breakfast before heading off from Market Drayton. I’m travelling with John upfront in the bus this morning, so I say I’ll pay for the diesel on my card as it’s going to be billed back to us anyway. I blithely jump out of the cab and watch as John hauls on his rubber gauntlets and whacks the pump nozzle in the Bogey’s tank. We’re chatting about this and that when I suddenly realise a fair amount of time has elapsed , and still the Bogey is slurping away. I risk a glance at the pump…..and nearly pass out. Over six hundred pounds’ worth of diesel has gone into the Bogey’s tanks, and she’s STILL not finished ! The pump finally clicks off.....Satan’s Trousers, it’s £ 702 !!! Passing a trembling hand over my suddenly feverish brow I walk unsteadily to the cashier to pay for it, half expecting my card to burst into flames or something at any minute. That’s four hundred and seventy-three litres of fuel, fact fans, and at the Bogey’s cruising rate of 10 mpg this isn’t going to be the last card-curdling fill-up of the tour. I get back aboard and decide I need a little lie down to recover…that was, frankly, terrifying. I fall into an uneasst slumber where I dream I’m being pursued by the Bogey who is yelling “ I’m thirsty ! I’m thirsty ! “ while a demonic David Cameron is standing at a fuel pump sayig “ Come and buy ! Come and buy ! All major credit cards, your soul and your firstborn children accepted !! “ It’s a relief when we get to the gig and I can start to think of something other than the robber barons…….The Artrix at Bromsgrove is one of the country’s new breed of theatre, and that’s a good thing, because it means decent access and facilities. We played here on the mini-tour in August two years ago and it was fine, so we’re not expecting any landmines today, So it turns out…the gear is up and line-checked by 3.10pm so there’s time for some work or play depending on your fancy, and then soundcheck is completed quickly and efficiently too. We can’t get used to this unexpected free time….we keep thinking we’ve forgotten something, but no, all is covered and ready to go. Why are the days so much easier, then ? Answers on a post card to the usual address, please ! At this point I’d like to deviate a little from the regular narrative to point out that during this free time today I tried to get onto the Bootleg Sixties Facebook page to update it and add some pictures. However, I realised I have no bloody idea what the user name or password are from when I first set it up, so I REALLY have no clue whatsoever as to how to get onto it. At some point I WILL do something about this, but right now I just want to say to everyone who has commented on the FB page, “ Thanks very much…normal service will be resumed as soon as possible !!” It’s another noisy crowd tonight….the advance sales had been a bit limp but it appears we’ve had a walk-up tonight as it looks pretty decent out there. Pug makes the observation that they look like the oldest crowd we’ve had on this tour, but there’s no indication of this as the lights go down and the show kicks off to loud cheers and whistles. They may be an old crowd, but they certainly know what to do !! There’s a couple on one of the side balconies who are on their feet from the first note, and stay standing for the whole show. Now THAT’S dedication !! We find out later that a fair proportion of the people here tonight saw us last time, which is an added bonus. We’re still down on audience numbers from last time, though, and that’s a problem. We’re once again back to the dilemma of what to do. We know that the economy’s been in the dumper for thee past two years, and that business across the theatre world is down, but where does that leave us ? Do we just drop the show and give up altogether ? Do we persevere even though we’re making nothing out of it ? If we DO persevere, how many years do we give it ? Five ? Ten ? Fifteen ? The problem is that we’re just SO close to the show, the people, the content and the concept that to give it up seems unthinkable. We’ll carry on as we are for now and see how things look for the winter tour this year ( dates for that tour will soon be appearing on the website, by the way……). The problem with establishing any new perennial touring show is that it DOES take a while to get into the public consciousness. Three years is the absolute minimum for this to happen, but five is more the norm. As long as the show’s good enough and popular enough, you really should be OK from then on. We see the main competition as things like That’ll Be The Day and Rockin’ On Heaven’s Door which now tour annually and sell out everywhere, but That’ll Be The day is in something like it’s twenty – sixth year, with Rockin’ On Heaven’s Door it’s twelfth or thirteenth. We’re very much the new kids on the block, and we’re not alone in the genre, either…Flying Music’s annual Solid Silver Sixties and the Sixties Gold tours peddle the original artists, whilst odd new shows like Mods Vs Rockers keep cropping up, the posters for the latter displaying an alarming similarity to ours, right down to a quote from Elton John. We just have to make sure ours is the brightest and the best, and we’re also trying to do that without any cash backing from an outside investor or theatrical impresario. There’s no doubt we’re having to do this the hard way…..we just have to hope our work and the many sacrifices we’ve made pays off in the end.When we see a reaction like tonight’s…..a stamping, cheering crowd, a standing ovation and a theatre management who are fulsome in their praise, it just makes us want to fight harder to get to the breakthrough point. We KNOW this is a great show, and that’s not false modesty, it’s a fact. What we need is for one of us to win the Lottery or Roman Abramovich to tire of football and decide he wants to invest his money in theatre instead . I mean, it’s BOUND to happen….!!!

Market Drayton Festival Centre Friday April 6th

As with the “let’s leave in the morning “ plan after Buxton, the “ let’s follow the bus down to Market Drayton “ scheme after South Shields also turned out to be something of a poisoned chalice. On paper it made loads of sense…avoid traffic, save a hotel room cost, keep us all together….but unfortunately we didn’t drive on paper, we drove on tarmac, some of which, especially the Trans-Pennine Way part of the M62, was in the form of long, steep hills. Whilst Nick’s van can negotiate these with barely an increase in revs, the other van is constantly having to be prevented from just lying down and dying by the roadside. It takes a looooooooooong time to nail this bit of the journey, so we ended up arriving at about 5.15am; the only saving grace being that the bus pulled up about ten minutes later, so we jumped aboard. By now I was so tired that I’m totally convinced my left leg hadn’t even left the floor as I was climbing into my bunk before I’d fallen asleep. I’d been out for what seemed like about five minutes when I was awoken by the bus engine roaring into sudden and unexpected life. This was a mystery, as we were already parked outside the venue and John was connected to the power line the venue had left out for us, so there was no need to run her up. Awake far earlier than I wanted or needed to be, I dressed and stumbled down to the galley. Rodders, Tomps and Nick were already there, so I asked them what in the name of Tinky-Winky had been going on. Turns out that in our knackered state last night we’d forgotten the one vital component in the whole “ connect the bus to a power line “ process…..we hadn’t switched the bloody thing on, so the batteries had run almost flat. John had woken up and realised what had happened when he saw how dim the lights were, and had switched the juice on just in time. The engine starting was just to check that all was OK. Thus hoiked from our pits, we decided that we may as well start the load-in early. We take our time over this, with some of the lads breaking away for showers or to grab a cuppa in the venue’s café, but it still goes in and up without any problems. It also gives me a chance to have a chat to Jeff Vernon, the chap who is largely responsible for the venue even being here. He’s an absolutely top bloke, and the Festival Centre is a cracking little place. It’s totally self-funded and run by volunteers, and the way they’ve turned it into the centre of the town’s community life is fantastic. This is our third time here and our third sell – out, and I have to say that there are plenty of so – called professional venues which could learn a lot from the part-time folks here. Their hospitality and friendliness is second to none, as well…they are the only venue on the whole tour to actually feed us, and Jeff unhesitatingly agrees to let the bus and vans stay the extra night to make sure we’ve got access to showers and toilets tomorrow before we set off for Bromsgrove. There is, you may recall from previous tours, another lure for me, and that is Sheila’s cakes. Now, believe it or not, I’m actually doing a semi – diet thing at the moment; it’s less a calorie-counting thing, more a “ not stuffing my face with pies and kebabs at two o’clock in the morning “ thing, and I’ve actually shed about half a stone so far. The cakes, however, are not to be denied, and thus I content myself with a single bowl of cereal until dinnertime.At soundcheck there a couple of little glitsches as Junior and Pug get to grips with the set-up by themselves for the first time, but it’s still all done in no time. Rodders, Nick and I use the free time to do some running repairs on flight cases ( especially the monitor desk case, which for some inexplicable reason had had some of the handles put on upside down. It’s been nipping knuckles and flattening fingers to the accompaniment of much cursing for about eight years, and has been one of those “ when I get round to it “ jobs we all know and love ! ). A couple of the lads go back to their bunks, others nip off for a beer, but having this little bit of time between soundcheck and showtime is a godsend. Note to self : DO THIS EVERY DAY !!! One of the odd things about the audience here is that there are a lot of really quite old people who come along…just this morning in the café I was accosted by a lady who was in her eighties at least, and she told me how much she was looking forward to coming. Fearing for her hearing ( if not her life itself ! ) I nervously pointed out that it could get “ quite loud “ to which her reply was “ Oh, I don’t mind that dear…I come to all the floor shows now and I love the loud ones !” I see her in the front row as the stage lights come up at the start of the show, and sure enough she’s bellowing along to “ I Feel Fine “ and bobbing up and down in her seat, about five feet away from the stage left PA stack. Takes all sorts, I suppose…..! This is DEFINITELY our noisiest crowd of the tour ( the lone YEEEEEEEAAAAAAHHHHH merchant in South Shields aside ) and they know just what to expect. The band have got the measure of the place by now as well….it’s a very small stage in a small theatre, so onstage volume has to be controlled more than normal. They’re totally on the case tonight, and I have to say it sounds bloody amazing when they’re rampaging away just a couple of feet away. We COULD have done two or three encores tonight, but not only do we like to stick to the old “ keep them wanting more” premise, we feel that one encore is all the show really needs. We COULD milk it for ages but this is the better way. After the show the lads are virtually mobbed in the reception area, and it’s clear to see how loved we are around here. Now, if we could just have the venue and audience wrapped and brought with us in the vans.... It’s been another total triumph, though, and yet another vindication for what we’re trying to do with the show. You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned the cakes again…..I WAS going to let it slide but I’ve been shamed into coming clean. I did have a piece ( oh, alright, four pieces ) but they WERE quite small, though as delicious as ever ( thanks, Sheila !! ). I’ll just get back on the diet tomorrow, honest…….