Plug Studios Norwich Try Out Session with Mick

I met up with Mick and Nige at Plug and we got set up in a largish practice room equipped with a Mackie PA and a Peavey bass amp for Nige – I was using my Mesa and had brought along my PRS 12 string in addition to my Godin. Nige and I elected to use our Audix mics which sounded OK through the PA. We opened up by asking Mick to 'dep' with us for a normal Foot Tappers start. All went very well, after “Foot Tapper“ Mick sang lead on “Just One Look”, the harmonies and the band sounded good and together. We played through a variety of things e.g. “Beautiful Body, Cathys Clown, Ipanema, Phoenix, Lady Is a Tramp, Blue Suede Shoes, All Shook Up, Beatles, Searchers, Eagles etc” Mick fitted in pretty good with it all and did a lot of the singing. We had a break then we tried out a bit of practice on Ace's “How Long” and a vocal arrangement of “Stand By Me”. Considering we hadn't had time to do real homework, this showed that we can work constructively together. We finished off with “All Right Now” to try out rockier stuff and then packed up and opened up a discussion. It was obvious there was a good musical fit so we had a long talk about how we might take it forward. There is a shared vision of a harmony showband that can earn in the £500 per night bracket. Mick is keen to get things going quickly and is prepared to work hard to make things happen. We agreed the bones of a project to create a new band, complete with 2 x one hour shows, with scripted comedy/entertainment routines, changes of outfit, dressing up and artiste tribute sections. The project would also put in place all the marketing collateral (photos, web site etc) and admin to allow bookings for next year to be negotiated. We explained our short term limitations, i.e. we are committed to deps up to Xmas, and then, apart from a couple of weeks in early Feb, I'm away until end February. We saw no reason why we couldn't get on with building the new band up to Xmas, but there was little scope for working together until the New Year. One possibility in the immediate New Year was Nige and Mick working as a duo. So, at approaching 1 am, we left it that we are agreed there is a good fit, we would sleep on it and then all discuss how we can take it forward whilst addressing the key issues of keeping Mick working through the Winter and getting the project underway as soon as possible. The next day Nigel and I 'chewed the cud' a bit and agreed that it was hard to see £500 gigs coming our way on the club and holiday park circuit unless we were a semi -name band. Weddings and Corporates which would pay well needed a re-engineering of the band to include female singer/s and hard dance sets. Over the next couple of weeks we agonised independently about what was best for the future and in the end we had a band meeting at my house where we had a good open and honest exchange with Mick about taking what bookings we could for 2010 whilst we looked to develop a higher paid long term future. Armed with that understanding we could look to immediately progressing things such as the name, photo's, repertoire etc and get promoting the band for jobs in 2010