The weekend.
Sep. 21st, 2009 11:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johnny9fingersNow, unusually, The Wife has never seen me play guitar live with a band. She's seen me in the studio, but.....
Anyway on Saturday afternoon I packed my tux and guitars and amps and kit, and she packed a LBD and we headed off to the Hunt Ball in Gloucestershire some ninety miles away. The fact that the first twenty or so miles were crossing London from East to West added about an hour to the journey. The function band had been recommended for the gig through Jezza Clarkson's Personal Assistant. Soundcheck was at 5.30pm. We rolled up (thanks to traffic) at about 5.45pm, but I was not the last to set up, which was a relief.
The venue was a big top in the middle of a field strewn with various kinds of animal manure, but that's horsey folk for you. As an aside, I never really took to riding. The Kid Bro rides a bit, but I just don't seem to have the temperament for it. I rode a bit as a youth, but preferred motorbikes which, like horses, can kill you; but at least don't seem to have a mind of their own.
Once soundchecked (big tops are bloody hard to get a decent sound in) the band went to get changed. We had a smaller tent as changing room. Frankie (the male lead singer) opined that The Wife looked a bit hot in the LBD, and thought she might be a trifle distracting to the chaps onstage, but I told him to get over it. We had our own table closest to the stage (thanks to the organisers - kudos to them) and were generally treated more like guests than 'staff', which is not always the case at these events.
Before supper, Martin, our leader, put the 'James Bond' album on over the PA. Brilliant. Almost immediately two hundred chaps in dinner jackets started adjusting their cuffs, standing up a little straighter, evidently lost in some child-like fantasy of....gawd-knows-what, really. I mean, honestly: why does it have that effect on chaps?
After the speeches, there was an auction, and I bid for a week in a holiday villa in Malta at the height of the holiday season next year; but due to my own ineptitude was pipped at the post. As it happens it went for 2K. Still, if I ever get a chance to see Valetta, and go to the island that was home to the Hospitallers, and won a George Cross during WWII, I'll jump at the chance.
Because of delays we didn't go onstage for the first set until just after 11pm. A ninety minute set followed which seemed to get everyone onto the dance floor. The Wife was, by this time, unescorted; as the band was onstage. When she got up to shake her stuff she was the subject of attention from a couple of chaps in their twenties, which must have been fun.
Coming offstage after the first set I complimented her on 'pulling'. She replied that the minute she'd mentioned that she was married to the guitarist in the band, they'd scuttled off, tout suite, as I believe the phrase to be. Where are these young chaps' manners these days? I am not likely to call 'em out (in the sense of pistols for two followed by coffee for one) for being charming to the Missus (disrespectful would be another matter, of course) and I wouldn't dream of spoiling her fun, but there you go.
After a twenty minute break we commenced the second set which went well. Well, that is apart from the solo to 'Beat It'. Of the eight measures of the EVH solo I screwed the first part of the sixth, which is one of the easier ones. But even that one mistake didn't spoil what was overall probably the best performances the band had given this year.
Offstage at 1.30am sharp (disappointing the crowd) thanks to the noise abatement people and the organisers. Packed and on the road by 2.15am. Back home in sunny Dulwich by 4.30am. Whereupon I spent another hour sitting on the loo while the food-poisoning I'd contracted from either something I'd eaten, or the amount of animal shit in the atmosphere, coursed through my gut.
I wonder if anyone else suffered similarly? Will take a straw-poll of the band and see if there were other sufferers.
We will have to host a function band Christmas Lunch this year. We haven't quite enough room for a sit-down if everyone brings spouses/partners, but we could do the old 'eat-on-your-lap' routine quite happily.
Sunday was spent recovering and watching telly.
The wife was v. impressed by the band. But I fear she is somewhat biased. Still, she'd seen Coldplay the night before at Wembley on a work shindig, so favourable comparisons weren't unwelcome, though they were unexpected. (Also, in general, dance bands play favourites from five decades or more, rather than trying to promote a new self-penned album....and Coldplay don't cover James Brown, Chic, et al....or for that matter end with slightly raucous versions of 'The Boys are Back in Town', 'Lady Marmalade', or 'Sweet Home Alabama'.)
Anyway on Saturday afternoon I packed my tux and guitars and amps and kit, and she packed a LBD and we headed off to the Hunt Ball in Gloucestershire some ninety miles away. The fact that the first twenty or so miles were crossing London from East to West added about an hour to the journey. The function band had been recommended for the gig through Jezza Clarkson's Personal Assistant. Soundcheck was at 5.30pm. We rolled up (thanks to traffic) at about 5.45pm, but I was not the last to set up, which was a relief.
The venue was a big top in the middle of a field strewn with various kinds of animal manure, but that's horsey folk for you. As an aside, I never really took to riding. The Kid Bro rides a bit, but I just don't seem to have the temperament for it. I rode a bit as a youth, but preferred motorbikes which, like horses, can kill you; but at least don't seem to have a mind of their own.
Once soundchecked (big tops are bloody hard to get a decent sound in) the band went to get changed. We had a smaller tent as changing room. Frankie (the male lead singer) opined that The Wife looked a bit hot in the LBD, and thought she might be a trifle distracting to the chaps onstage, but I told him to get over it. We had our own table closest to the stage (thanks to the organisers - kudos to them) and were generally treated more like guests than 'staff', which is not always the case at these events.
Before supper, Martin, our leader, put the 'James Bond' album on over the PA. Brilliant. Almost immediately two hundred chaps in dinner jackets started adjusting their cuffs, standing up a little straighter, evidently lost in some child-like fantasy of....gawd-knows-what, really. I mean, honestly: why does it have that effect on chaps?
After the speeches, there was an auction, and I bid for a week in a holiday villa in Malta at the height of the holiday season next year; but due to my own ineptitude was pipped at the post. As it happens it went for 2K. Still, if I ever get a chance to see Valetta, and go to the island that was home to the Hospitallers, and won a George Cross during WWII, I'll jump at the chance.
Because of delays we didn't go onstage for the first set until just after 11pm. A ninety minute set followed which seemed to get everyone onto the dance floor. The Wife was, by this time, unescorted; as the band was onstage. When she got up to shake her stuff she was the subject of attention from a couple of chaps in their twenties, which must have been fun.
Coming offstage after the first set I complimented her on 'pulling'. She replied that the minute she'd mentioned that she was married to the guitarist in the band, they'd scuttled off, tout suite, as I believe the phrase to be. Where are these young chaps' manners these days? I am not likely to call 'em out (in the sense of pistols for two followed by coffee for one) for being charming to the Missus (disrespectful would be another matter, of course) and I wouldn't dream of spoiling her fun, but there you go.
After a twenty minute break we commenced the second set which went well. Well, that is apart from the solo to 'Beat It'. Of the eight measures of the EVH solo I screwed the first part of the sixth, which is one of the easier ones. But even that one mistake didn't spoil what was overall probably the best performances the band had given this year.
Offstage at 1.30am sharp (disappointing the crowd) thanks to the noise abatement people and the organisers. Packed and on the road by 2.15am. Back home in sunny Dulwich by 4.30am. Whereupon I spent another hour sitting on the loo while the food-poisoning I'd contracted from either something I'd eaten, or the amount of animal shit in the atmosphere, coursed through my gut.
I wonder if anyone else suffered similarly? Will take a straw-poll of the band and see if there were other sufferers.
We will have to host a function band Christmas Lunch this year. We haven't quite enough room for a sit-down if everyone brings spouses/partners, but we could do the old 'eat-on-your-lap' routine quite happily.
Sunday was spent recovering and watching telly.
The wife was v. impressed by the band. But I fear she is somewhat biased. Still, she'd seen Coldplay the night before at Wembley on a work shindig, so favourable comparisons weren't unwelcome, though they were unexpected. (Also, in general, dance bands play favourites from five decades or more, rather than trying to promote a new self-penned album....and Coldplay don't cover James Brown, Chic, et al....or for that matter end with slightly raucous versions of 'The Boys are Back in Town', 'Lady Marmalade', or 'Sweet Home Alabama'.)
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Nice.
Date: 2009-09-21 12:04 pm (UTC);)
Re: Nice.
Date: 2009-09-21 12:11 pm (UTC)