Sunny, hot and humid - just how I like it! Jacqui decided to give it a miss so at 5:50pm
I set off on my own for the 10 minute drive into town. The chaps were already unloading as I arrived
and parked up. I walked in with a guitar
and they were inspecting the stage to see how to enlarge it to get mic stands
on. It is a kind of boxy stage wider
than some (think Caister Social) but not quite enough room to get the stands on
at the front. We played around with
ideas as we brought the gear in and eventually Chris the bass moved a piece of
stage extension over to accommodate his stand.
It was on wheels so he'd have to take care. On my side I put the stand on the floor and
extended it so it would reach. It was a
bit shakey on full extension but it was workable. We decided to site Bose on Chris's side
'inside' the bass amp to give it a
clearer sound flow down the middle of the hall - it would also have the
advantage of giving both the Chris's stronger monitoring. The rest of set up was uneventful but I did leave the Bose on 40%+ analogue
input volume.
A chap came up in the break and asked for a 'Wet Wet Wet' song - he was going to see them next week. I could have busked "Love is All Around" but the boys weren't too confident, so I had to decline. I was quite hot and downed a pint of water. Then the requester fellow came back over and asked if we could do "Summer Holiday" - he was on hols next week! Yes I said - we'll busk it but you'll have to sing - a - long! I don't actually know it but felt confident I could busk it and I briefed the chaps to expect it in C. We opened set 2 with it and the requestor's family came on to the dance floor and sang and danced lustily. They probably didn't notice fluffed chords etc and it was a clear success! We carried on with "Apache" - no walk tonight the stage didn't really support it. That went well and we followed up with "Do You Wanna Dance" and 'lo and behold' several came up for a dance - unexpected but appreciated! I skipped the Monkees to "Happy Together" and a few stayed on the dance floor. Chris the drum started the vocal at the right place and it fared well up to the second verse where he was distracted by my pre-echo's (I do it like the record), from then on we were all a bit distracted - I made a mental note that we need to run it thru a few times next practice. I called for "Daydream Believer" and we got quite a bit of sing-a-long going, just a warm up for "Delilah" really 'cos that was very popular as usual. Still Chris and I are confusing the chords right at the end - it's hold the G out the chorus then B7 'just couldn't take ..' Em Am Em Am Em B7/Em. "Bad Moon Risin" came next and got some dancing going and then we carried on with some rock n roll to keep them going for a bit. Chris the drum still doesn't seem to know the drum responses in "Jailhouse Rock" so that's another thing to sort out next practice. As we finished that someone came up and asked for some sloweys. I asked Chris to oblige with "Help Me Make it Thru Night" and that did the trick. At least 4 couples came up for a dance. I thought we'd better do some more, so I called for "Green Grass of Home" and that went pretty well. Then it was back to usual running order with "Proud Mary" (there was someone called Mary in the room we could rib), "Don't Stop" (I forgot some words and the stop - doh!) and "Hot Love" which went very well. Chris had called time but I urged them on to finish with "Wonder of You" and it went down very well - a great set closer! I was pleased with my vocal on this night but I was also pleased we were taking a break.
During the week, to right
the wrongs of the previous gig, I had taped
certain knobs on the harmoniser and vocal FX into a fixed position and I also restored
the mixer to its original state when I last set it up back in May. With all this change, it took me a few minutes to get the mics and
FX levels sounding OK. Oddly enough
Chris the bass's cheap SM58 copy sounded good from the off; it was mine and Chris the drum's mics that I
had trouble balancing a good sound against toppy feedback. On my Audix the problem was also getting more
low end into the sound and I had to mess with "deep tweak" on the mixer's
complex EQ which has 2 shelving and 3 parametric adjustments = easy to make it
worse. In the end I settled for bit more
push in the lo-mid frequency. It was the
boxy nature of the stage that was restricting volume with toppy feedback. You could hear the feedback suppressors
kicking in to kill it but, as it wasn't
too noticeable out front, I settled for
a workable level. The club was
relatively quiet so I asked the boys up for a sound check with "Sugar and
Spice" It took a couple of goes to
get the harmoniser balance about right and then we ran through it. It worked pretty well so I said it would be
in the show later to kick off the Searcher's medley. As we got off stage it was still 28C and we
disappeared a couple of beers in double quick time. I put our muzak on the
create some atmos. By 8pm we had a good
turn out from the Chris's family and friends and with more 'local's arriving
all the seats were taken as we set off to get changed in the little kitchen at
the back. We put on our 'club' outfit of
black shirts, white ties, black trousers with white belts and strode
out to do our bit.
The start of set one was fairly standard and we got good applause and
banter response from the first number "FBI". After "Groovy Kind of Love", I introduced Chris the bass and asked the
audience if they wanted to hear him sing - "Yeess" they roared and
off we went into "Act Naturally".
He hadn't sang in bands 'til I got him started a few months ago and he
is still finding his voice; but on this
night, I thought he sang it best he has done so far and he got a lot of
appreciation from friends and family. As
did Chris the drum when we followed with "Ring of Fire". Blame it on
the heat, but I lost my way with this
towards the end as I led the chaps into doing three choruses to the finish
rather than the usual two! Audience
didn't notice and he got a good response.
Chris then introduced me as a former member of the "Checkmates". I said 'they're too young to remember - let
me try them out on a the first line' and we did the 'do wappy' intro. Normally I get little response to this bit of
banter but on this night several sang back 'what do you wanna make those
eyes...' So we did the song and it went
quite well. The audience is a dance
floor away from the band but I could definitely hear some sing-a-long! We wigged up for the couple of Beatles songs
and that went down well. The Searchers
medley with "Sugar and Spice" added at the front worked very well and
w got a good round of applause for it. We
continued through the usual set and Chris called time as we were about to do
"All Shook Up", so we made
that our last number. Chris the drum is
starting to get the 'whats wrong with me' type harmony on this now - he just
needs to learn the words for the other verses!
The audience were tapping and singing along but, oddly enough,
when I stopped for the 'all shook up' line they were missing - I need a
fall back for that: maybe repeat the cue
'I'm in love, I'm ---'?
A chap came up in the break and asked for a 'Wet Wet Wet' song - he was going to see them next week. I could have busked "Love is All Around" but the boys weren't too confident, so I had to decline. I was quite hot and downed a pint of water. Then the requester fellow came back over and asked if we could do "Summer Holiday" - he was on hols next week! Yes I said - we'll busk it but you'll have to sing - a - long! I don't actually know it but felt confident I could busk it and I briefed the chaps to expect it in C. We opened set 2 with it and the requestor's family came on to the dance floor and sang and danced lustily. They probably didn't notice fluffed chords etc and it was a clear success! We carried on with "Apache" - no walk tonight the stage didn't really support it. That went well and we followed up with "Do You Wanna Dance" and 'lo and behold' several came up for a dance - unexpected but appreciated! I skipped the Monkees to "Happy Together" and a few stayed on the dance floor. Chris the drum started the vocal at the right place and it fared well up to the second verse where he was distracted by my pre-echo's (I do it like the record), from then on we were all a bit distracted - I made a mental note that we need to run it thru a few times next practice. I called for "Daydream Believer" and we got quite a bit of sing-a-long going, just a warm up for "Delilah" really 'cos that was very popular as usual. Still Chris and I are confusing the chords right at the end - it's hold the G out the chorus then B7 'just couldn't take ..' Em Am Em Am Em B7/Em. "Bad Moon Risin" came next and got some dancing going and then we carried on with some rock n roll to keep them going for a bit. Chris the drum still doesn't seem to know the drum responses in "Jailhouse Rock" so that's another thing to sort out next practice. As we finished that someone came up and asked for some sloweys. I asked Chris to oblige with "Help Me Make it Thru Night" and that did the trick. At least 4 couples came up for a dance. I thought we'd better do some more, so I called for "Green Grass of Home" and that went pretty well. Then it was back to usual running order with "Proud Mary" (there was someone called Mary in the room we could rib), "Don't Stop" (I forgot some words and the stop - doh!) and "Hot Love" which went very well. Chris had called time but I urged them on to finish with "Wonder of You" and it went down very well - a great set closer! I was pleased with my vocal on this night but I was also pleased we were taking a break.
We only had about 20 minutes to play 'til 11pm when the club would play
their unlock the treasure game. I
suggested we start with "Dance the Night Away" to give it an airing
and after a promising start it was me that cocked the horn solo in the middle -
I rather lost the way and we had to have several bars of E to B to get back in
synch. Mind you we had a couple of
dancers up and they didn't miss a step!
Next we had a request for another slowey. We did a good job of
"Wonderful Tonight" but the crowd enjoyed it so much they wanted
another. I called for "Raining in
my Heart" which we had played together about 18 months ago. Chris the bass couldn't remember any of it
but said he would give it a go. I remembered it very well but I could hear
Chris struggling on bass. I was able to
remind him to keep playing the G in the verse under the guitar chord changes
and I think he saw enough of my chords to get most of the middle 8. Surprisingly it went down well as well. I could see the game organiser heading off to
the gents so I called for one more number chaps - "Great Balls of
Fire". That went well and even had
a few rock n roll dancers up and, more
importantly, it was short enough not to delay the game. I was preparing for a long spell off as they
did the game, but the first chap up won
the £220 jackpot so that was it! We went
back on and opened with "Pretty Woman,
Saturday Night, Sweet Caroline"
sequence. We were rewarded with lots of
sing-a-long and some dancing - a good set up for "American Trilogy". I took my time with this, we did a good job and got a roof raising
reception at the end. I could sense that
had taken a big chunk of my stamina out but we ploughed on with the "Hey
Baby, Hi Ho, All Right Now"
sequence. Then it was 'all the ladies
sing' as I introduced Chris the bass again to sing on the chorus of "Mustang
Sally". My intention is for Chris
to sing the verses when he's ready for it - but for me its not too demanding at
present. I couldn't spot a slowey in the
list (Albatross came to me after the gig though - it would have been ideal!) so
we did "Hippy Hippy Shake". By
then the hall had thinned out as we approached midnight, so I calculated an extended "Johnny B
Goode" would be enough. We took our
time over the outroductions but we could have been more together on that. However, the remaining dancers whooped it up
right to the end and that was that - gig over!
I was very tired at the end and had to have a couple of quiet minutes
before getting changed. I think it was
the start of a 48 hour virus 'cos I felt rough the next day (didn't feel up to
visiting me old mum even) and on Monday my sciatica got a lot worse. Sufficient to make an appointment at the
chiropractor - hope that fixes it. We have
a couple of weeks off now - but grandson is imminent, no rest for the wicked.
No comments:
Post a Comment