Boxing Day Show at Mundlesey Manor

We agreed to meet at the gig at 6:15pm and I allowed and hour and 45 mins for the journey. It was chilly as I set off but I was pleased that the sniffly cold I had been fighting was in retreat. The roads were very quiet and apart from an accident on the Norwich ring road I was hardly held up. So I rolled up at the Manor bang on time to see Dave’s van parked up and Nigel getting his last few bits in. The Manor is a big rambling hotel probably dating from Victorian times? I parked behind Dave and got my stuff into the foyer then we shifted our vehicles into the car park proper. As we moved the gear into the dining / concert room I realised that Dave had had a cold over Xmas giving him a decidedly nasal vocal quality. It is a fair sized room (by hotel standards) with room for several dining tables and a medium sized dance floor. The carpeted stage meant there was hardly any boxy echo but, thinking we had the potential to be a bit loud, we set up with the Bose well back and Dave well forward. There was a funny smell in the stage area, but I put it down to Dave’s bad stomach! However, all the gear worked well and, as there was no one there, we did a bit of “Just One Look “ as a sound check. “Much too loud” reported Nigel who had wandered out front. So we dropped the Bose master volumes a notch and Dave switched to brushes and we tried again. It was still a bit loud, but we figured with a few people in we would be OK. And so it was. As it was a bit of a hotel function do, we got changed into white shirts, black ties and black waistcoats – looking quite smart (but easily confused for restaurant waiters). When we came out to play there were only 3 or 4 people sat ready for the show; but the management had specifically asked for an 8pm start, so we got on stage and opened up with a very quiet “Foot Tapper” with Dave playing brushes instead of sticks. There were still only a few people sat there as we ended it so I took the boys into a quiet jazzy 12 bar to limber up. Quiet but played at a fair pace, we certainly got Nigel’s fingers busy in the bass solo! Following on Nige took the opportunity to take us through a quiet “Beautiful Body” and Dave turned out a couple of Jim Reeves waltz’s. During this quiet spell the audience started to arrive and we had about 20 in. We opened up a bit of banter with the audience and they were very responsive, even asking for 60’s stuff we knew (e.g. Needles and Pins), so we promised their requests would get played and got on with the normal set 1 with Dave back on sticks. We ran through nicely from “Just one Look” to “The Young Ones” doing some good bantering and getting a bit louder along the way. I had been distracted by how loud I was having to set the guitar on the Bose until I realised that the volume pedal on the Roland GT-10 was half way back, but that was quickly fixed. The audience had grown to about 30 at this point, mainly sat in rows (theatre style) facing the band across the dance floor. We slipped in a better paced “Rockin Around the Xmas Tree” and then “Three Times a Lady”. The ‘crowd” were still very responsive, so we did a good bit of audience involvement with the Shadows walk getting 2 chaps and a lady up to play the rubber guitars – this time I got the guitar sound right on the GT-10 and as I went out front I could hear that the band sounded pretty good; the whole thing going down really well! After a well appreciated “Seasons of Gold”, we followed up with a ‘bum clutcher’ (“Only You”) and got several couples up and dancing. Bottom grabbing sloweys had turned out to be the staple repertoire for getting this audience dancing. Then, as I switched guitar, Dave and Nige assembled a tambourine troupe to assist us on “Mr Tambourine Man”. We followed this with the Hollies medley and that got a great response as did the following ‘Mop Top’ Beatles sequence. After “Rock Around the Clock” I could see we had been playing for about 90 minutes so we brought the set to a close with “I Believe”. We retreated to the bar to top up on water and lime and then got changed into the red shirts. These looked very smart with the black ties and waistcoats and we were well received as we came back to play set 2. We opened with the usual sequence of the Searchers, Eagles and Beach Boys then threw in a slowey with “Raining in My Heart” and followed up with a great audience sing-a-along with “White Xmas”. Somewhere along the way we also did "Shine" and a couple of instrumentals with “Walk Don’t Wipe Out” and Flingel Bunt” - I stepped out front to do the Shadows walk again. We did a good banter sequence to introduce “Alice”; getting the logic right that Nige announces it and it is only as he explains the answer back expletive with an “Ffff” that Dave interjects with “You can’t do that here Nige!”. Anyway it all went down very well as did the Elvis routine a bit further on. After “Sweet Caroline” we wound up with “Love is All Around” and we got a great reception with some shouts for ‘more’ (it was getting late and it may have been that some thought we were finishing for the night). We had a short break and came back on for the final set opening up with “500 Miles” and running through to “Hi Ho” getting a great reception from our small but enthusiastic audience. We carried on with “Unchained” and “American Trilogy” and then a rare performance of “Dance the Night Away”. We were just thinking what to do next when someone shouted out for the Kinks and we impressively swang straight into “You Really Got Me”! By then it was fast approaching midnight so we continued into the ending sequence with “Pretty Woman” and a special request for “Wonderful Tonight”. We got a great reception for that so we encored with “Great Balls” to finish about 5 past midnight. A surprisingly good night considering the small audience! As we packed up the bad smell returned and the boys told me the stage was built over a sewer that occasionally leaked bad odours; but looking at Dave clutching his belly I think they were having me on! It was as we were packing up that Dave noticed he had used his Shure Sm58A mic rather than the Audix - which he had left lying at the front of his kit!! Got loaded up and Dave had some good feedback from the guvnor who was most impressed with the bands versatility and ability to hold the attention of a small audience. It was about 1 am as I set off in sub-zero temperatures. The roads were icy but quiet and I made steady progress home getting in about 2:45am but feeling surprisingly good!