I had to be on best behaviour because Jacqui was accompanying me. We set off under clear skies and a cool wind about 5:30pm and all went well until we got to Long Stratton. As is usual with this gig I missed the turn and had to navigate by the sun taking a circuitous route along farm tracks and country roads until eventually we found our way to Wreningham. Dave and Jen were already there and pleased to see Jacqui. I soon had the gear in and was just setting up when Nigel arrived - not too late considering he had advised me he might be delayed. Set up was largely uneventful, but I noted that the electricity has a bit of a hum on it, but not bad enough to affect the show. Although everything worked Nigel and I were to find out later that Dave had used the wrong mic setting up his Shure SM58 Beta rather than the Audix OM5. I gave Dave some updated sheets for the Beatle medley and they promptly got lost. We had just cobbled a hand annotated version together from the old ones when Jenny found the new sheets in the dressing room! I decided to try and video the band to see how it compared to the previous years gig at this venue. This time I set the vidcam up on a tripod by Jacqui on my side of the hall. We got changed into the red shirts’n’black waistcoats with white ties because Nige had lost his at the last gig? There must have been about 70 in the room as I ‘faffed’ around a bit getting the tuning right just before show time. Dave and I had a brief conversation about how we would go straight into “Just One Look” after “Foot Tapper” then the clock ticked over to 8:15pm and we counted in the start. Immediate shock/horror as Dave started with “Just One Look” while Nige and I opened up with “Foot Tapper”. Eventually we all got behind “Just One Look” but our performance of the song never really recovered from the bad start. So when we finished it we explained the mess up to the crowd and then played “Foot Tapper” as a restart! There was a lot of good dancing right from the off and it was a pleasure to play to a floor full of dancers nicely in step with the band. I thought Dave and Nige’s mics were a bit low in the mix but I put it down to an artefact of the hall and concentrated on doing my best with a brittle on stage guitar sound. The band was making good continuity between numbers and with sharper banter than usual we progressed rapidly through a normal set 1 show flow. We got good applause for everything we did but got a particularly good response for the Shadows Walk where I had a line of 7 dancers doing the walk in front of me. Like the previous week, while I was out front I could judge the sound and it was great! So, with lots of people dancing to the music and listening intently to the banter, all went well until the Beatle medley. Here we had a good response to the pre-song ‘mop top’ banter and the sequence started well enough and continued OK through to “All My Loving”. I thought this bit was a tad fast and I did fluff a chord in the middle 8 but the solo following it went well. Unfortunately, as we finished on an E chord for the start of “Nowhere Man” the band were ‘nowhere’ to be heard! After what seemed an age (about 10 seconds in reality) we finally got going with the acapella start, but with voices fading in and out? Somehow we got through the rest of the song to the solo (which went well) and then we transitioned smoothly into “I Feel Fine” where again I played a wrong chord in the middle 8. But again the solo went well and I stopped firmly on the Bm expecting a drum roll into “She Loves You”. After another age Dave got going and we swang through the song with backing vocals fading in and out and the odd timing hiccup but at least we reached the end together (sort of). We thought it was a bit of a shambles and we were surprised we got a good round of applause at the end: but it is work in progress, the gaps were only a few seconds in reality, and the crowd may have had some sympathy for us? Unperturbed we cracked out a good Hollies medley, filling the floor and earning some strong applause. The rock’n’roll selection of “Rock Around the Clock” and “Summertime Blues” went well (even had Jacqui and Jen up and dancing) and these songs concluded the hour, so we closed with “3 Times a Lady” which brought the waltzers out in force. We took a short break to don the Chinese Waiter uniforms. During the break we had a couple of requests, one being from a gentleman of oriental persuasion who translated the Chinese writing on the dragon shirts to something like ‘mercury in the heavens’ to which I quipped “you mean head chef”! Anyway we got back on for Set 2 starting with “Let There Be Drums” to introduce Dave and following up with Dave introducing me as an ex-Checkmateer to sing “Eyes at Me For”; both these performances were well received and drew enthusiastic support. Just need to work something up to introduce Nige next. During a typical set 2 we did brief performances of requests for “Under the Boardwalk” and “Love Potion Number 9” which Nige sang well despite my patchy chord comprehension! We also did a brief instrumental ‘Cha Cha Cha” in A for the dancers. Elvis made a double value appearance singing “The Wonder of You” and ”Falling In Love”. We extended the set to an hour by doing “Shine”, the “Bay Cities”, “Crazy Little Thing” and “Johnny B Goode” The playing was getting a bit ragged by this point so it was the right time to wrap the set up with “Love Is All Around”. During the break we had a birthday request so we opened up set 3 with that and then carried on through the party dance sequence to “HI Ho”. Then we did “Unchained” and, spotting the dance floor was full, we sashayed into the longer version of it. Next up was a good rocking performance of the Spencer Davis sequence only marred by a couple of guitar errors. We still had a bit of time to go so we did a sequence of band calls including: “Midnight Hour”, “Shaking All Over”, “Be Bop A Lula”, “Great Balls”, “Saw Her Standing There”, “Pretty Woman” and “Dance the Night Away”. We announced this and then as we got going I realised I couldn’t remember the first line, so I asked Dave to do the first verse. Then he forgot the last line, so I took over and we shuffled our way through it quite nicely from that point. I was pleased to get the guitar solo right for a change! Soon it was midnight and we wrapped up with “Wonderful Tonight” finishing to a good reception from about 30 or so with the stamina to stay right to the end. Christine (the organiser) seemed pleased despite competition from other events restricting the turn out. She mentioned that not many bands could play the 3 x one hour show she asked for. Also we received several compliments: Dave and I were singled out for doing the drum show and the Shadows numbers respectively; and I had to give a bit more detail on the Checkmates connection to a chap who had seen them live in 1961 at Nottingham University. I explained that he had seen my old gaffer drumming mate Raye Du-Val when he was a young man – he’s now in his late 70’s and still playing! Then it was pack up. As we packed up we spotted Dave had been using his Shure SM 58. The Bose is optimised for the Audix OM5 so using the wrong mic explained the problem with Dave’s vocal sound! Nevertheless, we celebrated a mainly successful night (albeit with some ragged edges) with some diet coke. As is usual at this gig I missed the turn for Long Stratton and ended up navigating across country to Diss. So it took over an hour to get home on a cold night. Poor Jacqui was exhausted, but the next day she gave me a report sheet to append as follows:
JACQUI’S HALF TERM REPORT:
Dress: A pleasure to see the boys smartly turned out for set 1. The red shirt and black waistcoat combination looks professional and is nicely complemented by the white ties. From set 2 the band looked a bit uncouth but I understand the reason that Dave needs to get into something cool and unrestricting. Why don’t you try just Dave making the change into the casual shirt with Nigel and Adrian staying smart, perhaps changing into white or black shirts with a change of tie to keep the image fresh. This would make the band look professional but promote the idea that the drummer has lots of hard physical work to do! Overall mark: B
Sound: Much better live than it sounds on the video. Hard to fault the sound, harmonies significantly improved since the last time I attended a gig. The band is much tighter than last year and tempos are less hurried making it easier to dance. Overall mark: B+
Presentation: Best I’ve seen the band do but would benefit from some more props e.g. Elvis Top, Sir Cliff Glasses / Wig etc. Overall mark: B+
In conclusion: Very well done overall B a good report well Deserved (note the D word Nigel!) looking forward to my next gig.
Mog concludes. I looked at the video of set 1 the next day and, apart from the cock ups, it was surprisingly good. The guitar bass and drum instrumental sound was great. The banter was clear, efficient and well timed. The main downsides were the vocals from Nige’s Bose which were low in the mix, particularly in backing situations. This could have been because the video was nearer my Bose, but I suspect it was due to a combination of Dave’s wrong mic and Nige needing to sing up a bit with the backing vocals. He sounded good and loud singing lead on “Beautiful Body” so I think the basic set up is fine.
