Omaha Caravan Club Rally at Narborough Community Centre.

I still have a cough and feeling a bit weak but Carl elected to come with me to help with the gear. We set off in cold, gloomy, overcast conditions at 5pm and made good time to Swaffham where we joined the A47 for the next few miles North West to Narborough. The Community Centre is well signposted and we arrived just before 6pm and asked a lady behind the bar to show us the way into the hall. Here I met up with Val, the organiser. We got the door opened and had just started to get the gear in when Nige arrived. Nige brought news that there had been a murder in North Walsham and a man in his thirties was being held?? We agreed to give it a while before we contacted Greg to make sure it wasn’t him! (I found out later that the victim was Dave’s old card playing mate George, killed by his nephew apparently!!) The stage here is big but tatty. It’s a big, reverberant room and we set up Greg’s bass drum through my Bose to give a bit more depth to our sound. We soon got set up and tested out and with so much room I set up my PRS 12 string as well. The 4 of us then enjoyed a sit down cold meal: pate starter, ham salad and jelly and ice cream to follow – I did pass on the latter as my belly is getting big! We selected the away team dressing room to get changed in and, as it was a chilly day, we had the luxury of putting the heating on in there. After the Chairman’s speech we took to the stage in our black’n’white shirts looking like a team of waiters. Greg has a black tie and waistcoat now! We started up with “Foot Tapper” the sound was OK but I sensed we might be a bit loud, However, we got a fair response, so I introduced the band and we continued with “Just One Look”. The on-stage sound wasn’t that good and somehow I managed to mess this up by going to the end early – sorry Nige. I dropped the guitar volume a bit for “Heartbeat” and that improved the sound a little. We settled into a typical set 1 adding “Around the World” as a waltz and bit of country in the form of “Crystal Chandeliers” complete with Nigels false beginning with his ‘horsey’ Irish contender for the Eurovision song contest. The audience was a bit hard to read: we’d fill the floor occasionally then lose them with a similar song. But, by and large, they were appreciative and responded in the right places. We brought the set to an end with the “Beatles and Ferry”. In the break I was introduced to Pat who really liked the band and discussed the possibility of us doing a charity gig in aid of MS for a reduced fee sometime. I started set 2 on the PRS 12 string and we opened up with “Under the Sun”. Quite a nice jangly sound I thought so I called for “Take it Easy”. It’s quite a handful on the 12 string but we got through in good order. We got going on the “Searchers” next and by the end we had the dance floor reasonably filled, so Nige took us on through “Do It Again”. As I changed guitar the audience faded away and we ended up playing a goodish attempt at “Love Potion No 9” to just a handful of dancers. As it was quiet on the dance floor we set about a request for Apache by getting Hannah and Lisa to come to the front to do the Shadows walk. They were quite shy but their 5 minutes of ‘fame’ did them good I think. It got a great reception anyway! It took me a couple of minutes to get back on stage and ready to go with “All Shook Up” which went very well; but the dancers looked tired so I took us into the “Halfway - Wonder of You” sequence which had them all slow dancing and singing along. I followed up with “Hi Ho” to keep them singing; then, as we were close to time, we wrapped up with “Words” which was also very well received. After a 10 minute break we resumed with “Do You Wanna Dance”, then took them through “Amarillo – Hey Baby – Hippy Hippy Shake – Pretty Woman” to keep a party atmos going. We did “Unchained” as a mid-set slowey request and then set about our closing sequence with: ”Lets Dance – Mony Mony” and “Johnny B Goode”. This elicited shouts for ‘more’ so I asked if they wanted a slow or a fast one? ‘Both’ they said. But we were close to music license stop time at 11:45pm so we signed off with Greg’s choice of “Born to be Wild”. Pack and load wasn’t too bad with Carl’s help. Good job too because it was raining. Greg and Nige followed me in convoy as I searched out the A47 and we all went our separate ways as we approached Swaffham. Got home just after 1am, pretty tired and still coughing. The next day was Ms J and my Ruby Anniversary. We hadn’t arranged anything, but Carl and Claire surprised us by taking us out to lunch in Bury.

Seacroft - East Runton

Another very pleasant day as I set off for the journey over via Swaffham. I had a good run, arriving at 6:35 a bit ahead of schedule. I got the barrier key fob and had just parked up when Nige arrived so i let him in and we started to unload. Nige was feeling a bit rough with a tight chest and I was fighting the cold that had taken hold on the Friday, so we were pacing ourselves. When Greg arrived (having been to West Runton first?) I helped in with his ‘body bag’ and a wag from audience commented that he knew what was in there - ‘the lead singer’ I quipped! I started to set up on the right and was quite surprised by the amount of room there despite the disco – Greg is a compact drummer to work with. Fortified with a beer we soon got set up and went off to get changed into the black’n’white. Nige fixed the lighting by wedging a mic on to a switch. There were only about 20 in the room as we opened up with the usual sequence, but we got a good response from those that were there, so we dropped in to an easy listen, bantering mode which went down very well with this small audience. The early set slowey was “Phoenix” which successfully set the mood low volume and jazzy, adding a hint of sophisticated variety to our show. We got a couple of ladies up and dancing to “Peaceful Easy Feelin” and I soon found an excuse to do “Apache”. As I thought – one of the ladies came up to do the walk. Mind you she had her own ideas on how to do it; dancing very close to me and knocking me off the notes. But it was all in good fun and we got quite a reaction as we finished. “Blue Suede, Great Balls and All Shook Up” did the rock’n’roll business as usual. We did an entertaining Beatles and finished the set with “Ferry” for a change. The voices were holding up well considering, but another beer was most welcome at this point. We did quite a bit of glad handing in the break but our audience had dwindled a little as we resumed for set 2. We opened with “Under the Sun” and then on into the “Searchers” and “Take it Easy”. These all got a good reception, particularly from a couple on my right who seemed very enthusiastic about the band taking on the more complex pieces. We brought the set to a close with “Sweet Caroline” and we got a very good reception from the half a dozen or so left. It was just after 10pm as I jokingly announced we would be playing on to 3 in the morning on our return. But our remaining audience all came up to say variations on the theme ‘they had to be off for an early night’! It looked unlikely we would have anyone to play to in Set 3. In fact I had an interesting discussion with the couple on my right. He turned out to be a bass player in a band based in Burton on Trent. He was most appreciative of what we had been doing, saying we had a great sound, excellent musicianship and a really good, friendly on-stage attitude – all of which he had enjoyed. He was particularly impressed by the ‘crisp, clear sound’ we got from the Bose pa. By now it was 10:20 pm and Nige spotted Sarah so he went over to see how long she wanted us to continue. Sarah said she thought we had completed our show for the night anyway (it turns out we were due to finish no later than 10:30pm). So, Sarah was happy and there was no need to play anymore. Nige and I were relieved because we both felt under the weather and my voice in particular had started to croak up quite badly. We got packed up and had just started loading when Michele arrived on her way back from dropping Harriet off on the ‘night club train’ to Norwich. I think she was surprised we had finished already but we were able to exchange news as we loaded up. It turns out Dan was doing two gigs this weekend but he would be back from the US in early October for a few weeks – so I agreed to meet up on my return from Spain in mid-October. I set off home via Norwich and made good time getting in before 1 am.

Norwich British Legion

Another lovely day weatherwise. Ms J accompanied me on this one so she could meet up with Jenny who is still finding it hard going without Dave. We made good time to arrive at the gig about 6:40pm. Nige were there already and we soon had the gear in and set up. Nigel and I continue to swap sides and this was my first appearance on the right hand side of this stage. Greg arrived and started setting up. It is a big stage and Greg must set up quite compactly because Nige and I had loads more room than with other drummers (mentioning no names Dave!). So much so I set up my Fender 12 string as well. Jenny arrived as we completed set up. Nige and I managed a beer then rounded up Greg and we went to get changed into the black’n’black with white ties. We returned to the stage for an on time start with “Flingel Bunt” which sounded good and went well. Greg might benefit from listening to the record to get an idea of the fill ins, but we don’t play it that often so no big deal! As I introduced the band I explained that we had swapped sides so Nige could experience and conduct the ‘glee club’ on his left. It got a laugh! We followed up with “Just One Look” to get the vocals settled. I could hear Nige a bit better than the previous night but certainly not as loud as normal – maybe it’s my left ear? We were waved down volume wise anyway so I left it and adjusted my own sound to suit. Despite the sniffles the voice was performing OK and I led the boys into “Good Luck Charm” as a change song. This filled the floor and we kept it going through “Cathy’s Clown, Bye Bye Love, Beautiful Body”. I called for “True” Love” as the waltz at this point and, after a bit of fumbling for his music, Nige duly obliged. Next up was “Lady is a Tramp to continue the strictly dancing theme; and then we did “Rock Around the Clock” as the change rock’n’roller over the previous night. Inevitably we came to “Crystal Chandeliers” as the barn dance. Nige teased the audience about the start by saying we could only remember that the song started with ‘oooh’ and then false started ‘Lily the Pink’ and then “Sunarise” before a lady came up and demanded “Crystal Chandeliers”. We played through that and “Rambling Rose” and ended it with “Cheating Heart”. I got the boys to do the Hollies medley as the change over the Beatles and that went quite well considering it doesn’t get aired that much, we even got some dancing going - I think because Greg picks a steady dancey beat and sticks to it. Then we wrapped up with “Words” before we took a long break for the bingo! We opened set 2 on the 12 string with “Under the Sun” and the “Searchers” but then we continued a policy of change numbers where we could. I took the vocal on “Moon of Love” and we gave Lying Eyes” a go to reprise the barn dancing (a few got up to dance it). I had to reprise “Sweet Caroline” to get Darren doing his ‘answer backs’; he was outside at the time but got his cue perfectly as he opened the door, did his bit and then stepped out again. Actually, the audience stayed with us quite well, it thinned a bit as we took our last break but I thought there were more than normal as we started a shortish set 3. Nige called for “Achey Breakey Heart” as a line dance request at one point and, despite a change of key over what I’m used to, we got through it in reasonable order. We finished with “Johnny B Goode” and that got a great response; so Darren asked to encore with “Everybody Hurts” which I bravely announced as a Norwich City football song. Nige did a fine job and we got a great response. Overall another good night at the Legion. We packed and loaded quickly on a quiet warm evening and said our good byes (Jenny had surprised us by staying all evening). Ms J and I set off in good heart and made good time home. I thought I had shrugged off the cold the next day but it came back with a vengeance later in the week after a day yachting on a works outing on the Friday.

Norwich British Legion

Darren had rang up in the week to let us know that we were to play in the bar because the concert hall was being let out for a private party. Actually I thought that would be a good change for us. Set off about 5:25pm and had a quiet run over getting to the gig at 6:40pm to find Nigel there already, It was a lovely warm sunny day and the sliding windows into the bar were open so we just took the gear through them and straight onto the small stage. Greg rolled up and for this gig he was using his blue glitter DW kit. The stage is deep but not that wide so Greg set up at the back. Because there is a bit of brick work each side of the ‘drum alcove’ we had to set the Bose a bit in front of him. This would normally mean most of the sound would radiate to the front and the drummer would be hard pressed to hear what was going on, but, as it happened, Greg reported he could hear it pretty well as we tested the set up. On the other hand, Nige reported blocked ears and I had a tickly throat so the older boys weren’t in best shape. Interestingly, I could hear Nige’s mic really well at set up but not so well later when we were playing – could this be an artefact of his blocked ears I was to ask myself? Nige did some liaison with the committee man in charge and it turned out there would be no bingo and we were to play 4 sets between 8pm and 11:45pm = quite a long night we would have to pace carefully. We had a welcome couple of beers and got changed into the black shirts with white ties and black waistcoats so we were ready to go on time. Despite the absence of bingo, quite a few of our regular ‘fans’ had come along and the bar was about 80% full as we took to the stage a couple of minutes past 8. Greg was holding back on the volume a bit and I thought we had a good instrumental mix and a nice rhythm as we opened up with “Foot Tapper”. We got a good round of applause and, after introductions of the band we continued with “Just One Look, Heartbeat and the Everlys Walk Right Back”. For me we had a bit of a rare sound problem. I can normally hear Nige’s mic quite well, but for some reason it was well down in my mix. The audience seemed happy though? In the end I did ask him to bring his mic up, but he has blocked ears so it took a while to get through! Bur as we did “Peaceful Easy Feelin” he seemed to have got the message and the mix improved. From then on we were set for a good night. We played a good mix of material, there was a lot of singing along (thanks to the glee club attending) and good applause but not much dancing. Not even any waltzers for “Around the World” and no rock’n’roll dancing? I gave “Daydream Believer” an airing to keep the sing-a-long atmos going. But, after “Ferry”, we did the Beatles and that brought up an attractive young lady to do some 60’s dancing. Greg has the changes sorted in this now and Nige and I know what we are singing on “Nowhere Man” which I think works well with Nige singing the bass line, me on the lead line and the harmoniser just doing one voice above me - it makes for a good 3 part harmony in the accapella bit. Overall this medley is much better than a few weeks ago and it got a good reception. We wrapped up with “Words” which perversely did bring some dancers up. We took a bit of a break; Julie, the young lady who danced, came over to introduce herself and her mum. She’d seen Nige depping with “Midnight” at Arkwrights where she works the bar. She said we were great and would go down good at Arkwrights. We opened up Set 2 in good heart with “Under the Sun, “Tambourine Man and the Searchers”. These got a good response and some dancers so we switched to rock’n’roll with “Move It” and that filled the floor neatly. Nige carried it on with “Lets Have a Party” in which I finally got the chord sequence right; and I continued with “All Shook Up” to keep a good rocking atmosphere going. I slowed it down to do “Halfway” with Greg leading us through the intro’ accents correctly. The ‘glee club’ was in good form singing along and continued as an angelic choir as we followed up with “Wonder of You”. Spotting Darren in the crowd, I called for “Sweet Caroline” to finish and Darren obliged with his ‘bitchy’ answer backs – hilarious! We took another break. A drummer mate of Greg’s (from a heavy rock band) had arrived and said what a great sound we had and what a pleasure it was to see an audience out enjoying themselves rather than starting fights! We opened Set 3 with Julie’s request for “Take It Easy”. Despite my sore throat I thought we got it going the best yet following our re-arrangement with me on lead vocal and added hi harmoniser line. Interestingly, it got a good crowd of dancers up so Greg must have had the rhythm spot on. I think it just needs a bit of attention to the intro which the drummer should play accented tacet? We continued with more rock’n’roll and I gave “Rip It Up” its debut: I thought it went well for a first time. Greg caught the right tempo and swing and, with a very good turn out on the dance floor, I extended it a verse or two. Nige did “Everybpdy Hurts” as a request to close the set and this went down exceedingly well with a massive round of applause at the end. Darren came up in the interval and said he was very impressed with our rendition of the REM song. He didn’t know we could play more modern stuff and, the way he saw the club developing, it would definitely work in the bar – we shouldn’t feel inhibited! We only had about 40 minutes to do for the final set. We opened up with “Do You Wanna Dance” and filled the floor; we kept it going with “Amarillo – Hey Baby, Hi Ho”; but, as the dancers tired, we announced a request for “Apache” and I went out front with my Hank glasses on to do the walk. Although I made a few tiny errors, it must say it certainly sounded good out front and as we ended we earned another massive round of applause – very satisfying. After a few more numbers we ran into our close sequence with “Unchained” and encored with Johnny B Good finishing about 11:55, a few minutes over time. Overall a great evening. The only snag was we now had to pack up the gear. It was still warm and still outside as we loaded up - lovely. I made my way home in good heart despite the sniffley sore throat. I got in about 1:30am.

Broad Farm Flegborough

Weather has been cool and cloudy and set to continue over the bank holiday. But this evening it was still, sunny and a bit muggy as I set off with time to spare to deal with bank holiday traffic. Actually the roads were fairly clear, so I made good time to Acle and arrived at the gig about 6:25pm. The club was open and as I walked in I took a look at the entertainments board - only to see we weren’t on it? Panik were scheduled for this evening? Nige arrived about then so we went to find Linda the booker. She said, “sorry”, but she had cancelled the band with Mark (the agent) some time ago because they wanted a more modern image at the club. I got on the phone to Mark who confirmed it had been cancelled by letter and email - neither of which had arrived with me? Anyway, I agreed to check it all out after the weekend and Nige and I put in a call to young Greg to head him off. In the end Greg said, “lets meet anyway”, so we met up and made our way to the Hemsby California Tavern to have a beer and watch the Glamtastics for a while. They are a tight two guitar, bass, drums and lead vocal outfit playing up-beat stuff from the 70’s. A bit loud for my tastes but clearly popular. It remained a mild, still night so, on the way back, Nige and I called in a Broad Farm for a brief listen outside to ‘PaNick’ – a dad and daughter duo singing over backing tracks. Not that impressive really but this is the age of X Factor and I suppose we are now ‘old fashioned’. A bit like the jazzy dance bands of the 1950’s who were displaced by unskilled youths in beat groups in the 1960’s! Made my way home and had another beer as I slouched in front of the tele feeling a bit down about it all.

Bury St Eds Sugar Sports and Social

I could leave as late as 6:15pm and still be at the gig for 6:25pm. So this is what I did. I had just parked when Nige rolled up. We went round the front and into the club to meet up with Heather, the guvnor, who showed us the load in entrance and suggested we set up on the floor rather than the stage to create a more intimate setting. We were just loading in when Martin (our dep drummer for the night) arrived. It’s a fairly big room, so as we got set up I found plenty of room to set up and tune my PRS 12 string as well. We did have a bit of trouble with lighting. Although the house lights did illuminate the band, seeing music and set lists on the music stands was tricky – especially for the older member of the band! I tried out my LED PAR light but couldn’t get it placed to do the job, so I tried a clip on music stand light. This did do the job but mains cables were well stretched and creating a heath and safety risk. So, rather than get some more extensions out the car, I decided to abandon the idea of music stand lighting and adopt the ‘peering at it’ method of music reading instead. With all set up and working, I set off home to pick up Ms J for her grand entrance well in time for our 8:30 showtime. Heather gave me a last minute briefing that there were several in from a rock’n’roll dance club and could we do a bit of rock’n’roll? “Yes Please” I said. We got dressed in the back shirts and waistcoats and Nige and I wore white ties. We made a start with “Foot Tapper and Just One Look” All went well and we got a good response from a reasonably full hall. So I did a bit of banter about Sunday night TV preparatory to starting “Heartbeat”. Only trouble was I was moving my pedals round with my feet as I was doing this and must have kicked the volume knob down. We opened up and no guitar sound! It took me a good couple of minutes to get to the bottom of it and Nige had to fill in with his repertoire of ‘ghosty’ jokes. We finally got going again, the dance floor filled and we settled into an enjoyable set with a good sound and great audience response. After the Everly’s, Martin sang “Peaceful Easy Feelin” and Nige and I dropped in to close and hi harmony roles which went very well. I called early on for some rock’n’roll, opening up with “Blue Suede Shoes/ Whole Lotta Shakin” and up came the dancers in force. As we went on Martin fitted in some great harmonies from time to time, so I found I was only using the harmoniser sparingly. Nige did a good “Ferry” as the mid set slowey and we continued to keep the dance floor filled as we also did “Raining in My Heart”. After this it was time to do our Beatles medley.

We bantered away a bit aimlessly but with some good audience interaction then we all got wigged up successfully and ‘powered’ on into it. Surprisingly we got a good crowd of dancers from the off and despite the changing rhythms the dancers kept with it pretty well. We lost a few as we switched to “Nowhere Man”, but the harmonies worked well (with harmoniser adding one above only) and we soon had some more dancers joining in and even more for “She Loves You”. We were delighted with a very good audience reception for this set piece. Time was up so we decided to close with Martin singing “Words” and that filled the dance floor with slow dancers again – a great ending to a great set. We got some good comments in the break and were confident as we returned to open up with a birthday. We started the set proper with “Under the Sun” and on into the “Searchers” with me on the 12 string. I found it quite a challenge to play the 12 string in public again after so many gigs without using it. So I chickened out after the Searchers and changed back to the 6 string to pick up the “Move it – All Shook Up” sequence which just packed the floor. Then Nige pitched in with “Rock Around the Clock” to keep it going (and we all finished together!) Next up we got Martin to sing “Take It Easy”. I took the hi line giving us a good vocal mix which was well appreciated. We followed up with “Love Potion No 9” in which I was so pleased to get the timing right in the middle 8 that I relaxed and lost it after the solo! But the crowd danced through it all without falling over so we must have covered it up OK. After a powerful “Lets Dance – Mony Mony” complete with organ synth, we eased the dancers up for the “Halfway – Wonder – Sweet Caroline” ending sequence with Martin doing the vocal honours on the last two. There was still a few minutes left so we finished the set with “My Girl” with Martin on lead vocal – only slightly let down by my poor timing in the solo. After the raffle we came back on to do another hour starting with more birthdays and then “Do You Wanna Dance” which packed the floor again. We ripped on thru the old “Party Dance” sequence to “Hi Ho” and then “Alright Now” complete with extended drum solo to finish. I called for “Pretty Woman” and we did a goodish version and followed up with a rocking “Hippy Hippy Shake”. We fitted in a slightly ragged “Walk of Life” and a lively “Summer of 69” before easing off for a great rendition of “Unchained” by Martin. Then it was an extended “Johnny B Goode” to finish. Although it went down really well I must have failed to cue the audience that it was the last number, so we had to impose “Walk Alone” on them as an encore. This went well and had the crowd singing along. There were now some shouts for ‘more’, but we were now 5 minutes over time so we gently called it a night. We got a lot of compliments on the band as we packed up and Heather was keen to rebook. So, basking in the warm afterglow of going down good at a well attended gig (becoming a rarity nowadays) we completed pack’n’load and set off home. I had contemplated going home via Thetford to get the fulll experience but in the end, I did enjoy the luxury of a 5 minute drive home. Ms J and I were still wide awake so we has another drink and watched TV for a bit. Summing it all up - a great gig that makes it all worthwhile!

Band Practice at Plug Norwich

I’d been feeling a bit rough and got away a bit late, so I had to hurry to get there for 4:45 as I planned. Met up with the boys and got set up in room 5 which is a bit smaller than the room we had played in before but fine for our purpose. The guitar amp was an Ibanez solid state but it was well voiced to cut through and gave a great sound with the Roland pedal set to Fender Twin. (I was using my more expensive original Godin on the ‘dark’ output which may have contributed to the sound). After warming up with “Hotel California” we sorted out some timing issues with “Love Potion”. Then we tried Greg out on hi harmony vocal on some Eagles pieces. He would need to be more familiar with the harmony lines but his voice certainly does have the potential for hi lines. Greg then had a go at lead vocal on “Under the Moon of Love” and “Walk of Life” and we agreed he should take those on and work on them for the next gig. Next we tried playing along to backing tracks for “Dance the Night Away, Wonderful Tonight and Walk of Life”. This worked better than I expected and we discussed how we might augment the band’s sound for selected numbers using this approach. The debate is really about the practicability of using recorded MP3 files with a click / cue track on a separate monitor channel or setting it all up in midi with a decent midi synth. We finished off running through “How Long” by the Eagles to test if I can swap to the lead line and fill out the hi line with the harmoniser. This went OK but I’d need to do it regularly for a while to get used to not singing the harmony! Got away about 8:20 on a warm evening and was home for 9:30 ish. Ms J is away on a quilting fair so all was quiet and I had a beer or two to while away the rest of the evening.