A blurry Ray testing the kit.
With the gear still set up there, I could leave quite late, so I only got on the road at 6pm. I arrived at the gig just after 7pm to find Nige and Ray parked up and loaded in. I had looked at the repertoire in the afternoon and made a note of some numbers to resurrect to deliver a different show on this second night. It’s usually quieter on the Sunday, but the gig had filled up nicely by the time we took to the stage at 8pm to open with “Flingel Bunt”. We followed this with me doing “Good Luck Charm” which went down surprisingly well – with a bit of investment in arrangement and practice this could become a good ‘quiet’ show number again. I lined Nige up for “Beautiful Body” next and we continued on with a selection of songs covering the usual pop, rock’n’roll and country bases. Nige gave “True Love” an airing as a change waltz I read it ‘cos it is quite complicated chord wise.. Next we managed to fit a reprise of “Living Doll” in a country medley based on “Cheating Heart”; it produced a strange feel but we got through it and, more importantly, it didn’t put the barn dancers off their step. We carried on with the Everlys’ “Dream” in which I made a bit of an error with the words and key change - that will shake me up into getting it right next time! Finally, we completed the set with the Beatles medley that we had promised them the night before. Nige claims he made a blooper in the solo to “All My Lovin” but the audience didn’t blink! All had gone well and we had received a lot of appreciative attention. After the break we resumed for the second set with the Hollies Medley. This went quite well considering a) it hadn’t been aired for ages, b) we were down to 2 vocals, and, of course, c) it was completely new to Ray. But it was very well received. A couple of numbers in we did a special request for “Wonderful Tonight” for a couple from the committee and we did a verse of the “Anniversary Waltz” for another couple enjoying a 40th anniversary. We carried on with the intention of not repeating many of the previous nights songs. Although we repeated the Searchers and Sweet Caroline as special requests, we included plenty of change numbers e.g. “Yellow River, Bad Moon Risin”. We had expected the audience to drift away in the final break, but a lot stayed and we had good dancing and applause right through the third set as well. Towards the end of this set we got a bit more adventurous and I tried out “Money for Nothing” which kept the floor filled even though I forgot the arrangement and had to improvise my way to the end under Mr Nigel’s guidance! I also tried out “Shine Your Light” a country Christian piece by Charlie Landsborough. Can’t say the band enjoyed it much – but it brought shrieks of appreciation from the crowd! We wrapped up with a good “Unchained” and reprise of “Johnny B Goode” when Darren came up and asked us to do one more. I called for “Price of Love” which went the best we had done it so far. A good driving rhythm with Nige and I getting the ‘blue grassy’ harmonies about right. All in all another great night for the band. The Chairman came up at the end and complimented us on getting the volume right, playing a versatile repertoire of songs they knew and enetertaining them with added banter! He said he had had a lot of good comments about the band and would be definitely looking to book us again. So a great outcome. Finally got packed up and away about midnight and was home for 1 am. A good and enjoyable weekends work!
