We had agreed to meet at the 'Macebearer' car park at 4:40pm with Chris
the drum tasked to lead us to this charity dance at Lawshall Village Hall. It was a nice warm day and we met up on
time. Chris the drum was accompanied by
an injured Trudy. She had had a fall in
the week and exacerbated a knee injury so she was toting crutches! We headed south towards Sudbury and then west
into the country. It seemed to take ages
to find Lawshall itself, but we were
heartened by signs up in the village promoting the dance and eventually rolled
up to a deserted village hall a couple of minutes late. We were just setting up a call to see when we
would be let in when a car arrived with the daughter and granddaughter of
Jeanette (the promoter) and they soon had the doors open for an easy load in to
the adjacent stage. Its a fairly high
stage and, once cleared of kids
playthings, there was plenty of room for the band to set up. I could see the stage area would act as a box
with curtains absorbing sound at the edge;
which usually makes for a loud sound on stage but weak out front. But I decided to put the Bose at the back
anyway and see how it went. We soon had
the gear set up and running. I left the mix pretty much as per the previous
gig. On my side I actually had a good
bit of room to perform in but our set up had crowded Chris the bass's side of
the stage a little. However, we did manage to fit Abbie's mic in amongst
all the lights on Chris's side - so we were all set for a sound check. Just
then Jacqui arrived with Bridget and Abbie (and Abbie's brother Lewis) - so now
we could get on with the sound check proper;
which went surprisingly well. The
box effects weren't too bad and despite the limited line of sight from the Bose
on Chris's side the sound out front was reported as good. I put the background
musak on about 15 minutes ahead of schedule and looked round. Wow - the hall was filling up already! Time for me to get the beers in for charity? We had a room to the back of the kitchen to
get changed. With it being warm we
dropped the ties and got ready to open in our usual white shirts and
waistcoats. At 8:30 we took to the stage to open with our usual sequence.
All sounded fine and we were getting a good response from the off. We even had some dancing going as we got into rock'n'roll mid way through the set.
We finished with a really good audience response to the two Tom Jones numbers: "Delilah and Green Grass", so we were happy and relaxed for once as we left the stage to replenish our glasses. Fifteen minutes off then we changed to the red shirts for the second set and opened with a request for "Apache", I couldn't get off the stage to do the 'walk' but the chap who asked for it (and his mates) was most appreciative anyway. We carried on with "Eight Days a Week and Walk In the Room" which went really well.
I was very happy with my guitar sound and quite happy with my vocal sound so all was building well. I called for "Mr Tambourine Man" as another 60's number to do before we brought Abbie on. Unfortunately, Chris the bass lost his way in his music book and I had to start without him. He eventually gave up looking and tried to play from memory with mixed success - oh dear! But the audience didn't seem to mind: they got up and danced and gave it a good round of applause (I just love country village dances!) I looked round to see Abbie was ready. She had alternative stage wear on tonight: a black dress with a denimy embroidered jacket - looking good! We had agreed to play Abbie on with "Wildwood Flower". Starting it fast playing through a few bars and then slowing down as she came to the mic. Then I go straight into the opening riff of "Good Girls Gonna Go Bad" On the night it worked really well and we were soon rattling through Abbie's mini set of 5 numbers. She got a great reception and I got in a good banter line about the audience must be very familiar with country roads so we would finish with "Country Roads" dedicated to tractors and single track roads everywhere - or something like that! We played Abbie off with "Wildwood Flower" as well; although Chris the bass had to remind me! Then us boys in ReTrio carried on with our second set getting a good response and increasing dancing for pretty much everything we did. As we were close to time for the raffle I chose to finish with "Do You Wanna Dance" on this occasion. After the raffle we only had about half an hour to play. During the break Chris the bass had asked if Abbie's brother Lewis could come up and sing "Achey Breakey Heart". "Yes" I said "we will open with it!" I got it started on guitar and Chris bass was busy prompting Lewis so it took a while to get the rest of the band going. Although he didn't know too many verses, Lewis did a good job singin it. I was able to work in some good harmonies with the harmoniser; and it went down great with the crowd who were amazed to see live karaoke on display. I just picked and mixed the next few numbers; the crowd were dancing and singing along and even we in the band were having a great time. I called "Hi Ho" as our last number and we had a lot of shouts for more, so we were set to finish with "Johnny B Goode" This night I asked Abbie to come up and sing it with us. I did the first verse then she took over and it went really well. She can sing quite low for a girl and the key of A was just fine. Our solos and outroductions are still a bit ragged but we are getting better. We finished on a high on this night - a good job well done chaps! Pack up took a while as we dealt with a few enquiries (hopefully these will turn into bookings); but we were on the way home by midnight getting in about halfpast feeling well satisfied with the best performance so far with this band.
All sounded fine and we were getting a good response from the off. We even had some dancing going as we got into rock'n'roll mid way through the set.
We finished with a really good audience response to the two Tom Jones numbers: "Delilah and Green Grass", so we were happy and relaxed for once as we left the stage to replenish our glasses. Fifteen minutes off then we changed to the red shirts for the second set and opened with a request for "Apache", I couldn't get off the stage to do the 'walk' but the chap who asked for it (and his mates) was most appreciative anyway. We carried on with "Eight Days a Week and Walk In the Room" which went really well.
I was very happy with my guitar sound and quite happy with my vocal sound so all was building well. I called for "Mr Tambourine Man" as another 60's number to do before we brought Abbie on. Unfortunately, Chris the bass lost his way in his music book and I had to start without him. He eventually gave up looking and tried to play from memory with mixed success - oh dear! But the audience didn't seem to mind: they got up and danced and gave it a good round of applause (I just love country village dances!) I looked round to see Abbie was ready. She had alternative stage wear on tonight: a black dress with a denimy embroidered jacket - looking good! We had agreed to play Abbie on with "Wildwood Flower". Starting it fast playing through a few bars and then slowing down as she came to the mic. Then I go straight into the opening riff of "Good Girls Gonna Go Bad" On the night it worked really well and we were soon rattling through Abbie's mini set of 5 numbers. She got a great reception and I got in a good banter line about the audience must be very familiar with country roads so we would finish with "Country Roads" dedicated to tractors and single track roads everywhere - or something like that! We played Abbie off with "Wildwood Flower" as well; although Chris the bass had to remind me! Then us boys in ReTrio carried on with our second set getting a good response and increasing dancing for pretty much everything we did. As we were close to time for the raffle I chose to finish with "Do You Wanna Dance" on this occasion. After the raffle we only had about half an hour to play. During the break Chris the bass had asked if Abbie's brother Lewis could come up and sing "Achey Breakey Heart". "Yes" I said "we will open with it!" I got it started on guitar and Chris bass was busy prompting Lewis so it took a while to get the rest of the band going. Although he didn't know too many verses, Lewis did a good job singin it. I was able to work in some good harmonies with the harmoniser; and it went down great with the crowd who were amazed to see live karaoke on display. I just picked and mixed the next few numbers; the crowd were dancing and singing along and even we in the band were having a great time. I called "Hi Ho" as our last number and we had a lot of shouts for more, so we were set to finish with "Johnny B Goode" This night I asked Abbie to come up and sing it with us. I did the first verse then she took over and it went really well. She can sing quite low for a girl and the key of A was just fine. Our solos and outroductions are still a bit ragged but we are getting better. We finished on a high on this night - a good job well done chaps! Pack up took a while as we dealt with a few enquiries (hopefully these will turn into bookings); but we were on the way home by midnight getting in about halfpast feeling well satisfied with the best performance so far with this band.
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