A Night in Liverpool

Last night we played at Croxteth Hall in Liverpool for a Silver Wedding and Revewal of Vows party. To all extents and purposes it was a wedding party.

It's a while since we've been to Croxteth and with new developments we took a wrong turning somewhere, but got there in good time without too much panic!

David knew the lucky man and he had arranged for a DJ to take over later in the night so that we could join the party as guests. There were a few people there that I knew as well so it was a very pleasant evening for us!

Can You Hear the Drums?

So we were just having a rare rehearsal to remind ourselves of a few new songs we had stuffed into the repertoire...

Not the most polished sound - no microphones, no sound system, the keyboard is coming from its own speakers which of course point straight up and the guitar was plugged through the computer into the hi-fi. Recorded on a Flip camera - no expense spared...

Can you hear the drums?

Staining Charity Gig 2011

Last night saw Creeping Bentgrass on stage at Staining Village Hall.

This was a night we had arranged ourselves and we had invited family, friends and people we have worked with year after year until they too can be classed as friends.

We do one of these every two years or so and they are informal, punctuated by guest appearances and a chance for us to try out new stuff to people we can trust to tell us if they don't work.

After years of having "Abba!" thrown at us we have capitulated and now "Fernando" and "Waterloo" (seen above being road-tested with The Creepettes - or is that the Bentettes?) are added to the repertoire.

We road tested a few last night in fact. The Single Girl, I Can Hear Music, You've Lost That Loving Feeling - the latter after we busked it in response to a request in Chapeltown a few weeks ago!

Then again, Jack who books us every year for his steam fair at Heskin Hall at the beginning of June has been asking for House of the Rising Sun for years. It is a bit of a voice-breaker but we have now come up with a bluesy version which went down a storm last night!

And talking of going down a storm - here was a bit of fun!

I walked off stage to leave David singing a West-End musical song - Love Changes Everything. It raised a few eyebrows but then I walked back on to join him in harmony from the second verse on and if we surprised the audience with a new style of song, then in turn we were blown away by the reception the song got at the end.

Thanks have to go to Miss Franny and Miss Jeannie for arranging raffles, hot pots and to willing helpers, Gill, Chrissie, David and Elaine, Claire, Shelagh, Janet and Doreen who dished out grub, sold raffle tickets, managed to separate people from money for the charities, to Marcus and his friend for arranging and manning the bar, to Shelagh and Peter Cooney for the guest spot, to the Bentettes: Louise, Marion, Janet and Shelagh, and to all of you who came from far and wide. A special mention to Harry and Maureen Whitehouse who had come over from Scarborough for the night. Harry is the head of the Peaksoft recording label and was responsible for convincing us to contribute to a CD of Protest Songs (see here) and he donated a copy for the raffle. Harry is also the man behind billyfury.com and so absolutely a VIP member of the audience!

A quick aside to Billy Fury New Zealand Fan Club Manager Moya Gleave here - Harry did stop a little short of giving me a "big sloppy kiss on the top of my head" but thanks for the thought...!

A huge thank you to all who came to see us - we didn't have much time to talk to anyone but it was great to see you there and we appreciate it so much!

After paying the expenses for the hall, bar and food we made £200 profit which will go to the two charities - a Cat Rescue Centre and Diabetic UK

Clubs and Pubs Weekend

Creeping Bentgrass were out and about this weekend.

We started on Friday night at the Longshaw Sports & Social Club in Blackburn. This was a charity night in aid of the Mayor's charities.

An upstairs function room, a stage and some rather hot stage lights! The crowd set the standard for the weekend, crowding onto the dance floor early on in the proceedings!

Then on Saturday night we played for a 70th birthday party (that's two of those in a week!) out at the Chetham Arms, Chapeltown. Again the guests made a beeline for the dance floor early in the night and a good time was had by all.

Our appreciation and thanks to those who booked us, particularly for the very kind compliments and feedback and today has been a nice, relaxing day which didn't start until long after normal get-up time...!

A Fabulous Time at the Party

What a wonderful fabulous time we had last night!

We were out at Garstang Golf Club for a 70th birthday party, playing a country and western set before the guests had a meal and then playing for dancing later on.

The lady wife of the birthday boy had done a lot of preparation for the event - there were games, competitions and a lot of fun and once the meal was over the dance floor filled up and we had a ball.

It's always very nice when bar staff tell us we are the best band they've ever heard and I have to say, the bar staff last night showed some excellent taste...

Huge thank yous to all concerned!

Check out the Creeping Bentgrass YouTube channel for samples of our work!

Rain Stops Play in Garstang

Such a shame. We had played around an hour or an hour and a half and then the heavens opened at Garstang's Music and Arts Festival yesterday.

Unlike Saturday when we covered up for a bit and then played again, Monday turned into a steady non-stop downpour and we had to move the equipment to a dry place and then try to dry it all off. Definitely not the place to be using electricity out in the open!

Thanks to the people who came to see us - especially those who had come some way especially. A couple came and he introduced himself as Hughie - they had seen us on the Internet and come all the way from Manchester. Another family had come from Blackburn after seeing us at other events and some had come down from Lancaster.

It was lovely to meet and talk with you all and we were as disappointed as anyone at not being able to carry on. We hope to see you at future events. Our dates can be found in the left hand column of the blog.

Dodging the Weather at Garstang

We wondered how we would get on yesterday, but apart from one very short period where we had to cover up, the rain skirted round us and the sun tried its best to make an appearance!

Even the wooden kingfisher had its warm clothing on!

Anyway, although quieter than the previous Saturday there were a number of people out and about and we had a sizeable crowd during the last hour of our set.

Creeping Bentgrass will be back in Garstang on Bank Holiday Monday for the third of our three appearances at Garstang Music and Arts Festival.

Playing Like High-Speed Gas!

Yesterday we played for the British Gas Pensioners following an excellent meal at the Elgin Hotel, Blackpool.

Both David and Jeannie used to work for British Gas so we were invited to dine with them and the Elgin put on a superb meal. I have to praise their staff and manager too, who were so pleasant and accomodating it was a pleasure to be there.

We played two sets and David had devised a little extra involvement for the audience. As we played our country and folk set, he had distributed a list of all the pop and rock songs we do from the late 50s upwards and audience members were able to vote for their favourites for us to play in the second set.

It worked very well and some brave souls ventured out of the 60s voting enough to include both Westlife and Take That songs that we included.

All in all we enjoyed ourselves every bit as much as the audience and the Committee were full of praise for us afterwards which was very nice too!

Garstang Music & Arts Festival 2011

Yesterday we played the Garstang Music and Arts Festival for the first of three appearances this year.

We will be back in the same place - our usual spot by the Information Centre next Saturday and Bank Holiday Monday.

From yesterday's spot, here's a taster!

Songs to Change the World

Let no one say we don't mix in the right circles! This new release, Songs to Change the World has just been released by the Peaksoft label. It is an album of protest songs from the beginnings of recorded sound through to songs that were Internet download hits without troubling the official Charts.

We are featured on the opening track, having been asked by the man behind Peaksoft, Mr Harry Whitehouse, if we could record a song made famous in the early 1960s on the many CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) marches.

"The words of H Bomb's Thunder" (writes Harry in the sleeve notes) "were written by the best-selling novelist John Brunner and set to the traditional tune Miner's Lifeguard in 1958. Its haunting melody has helped it to live on in the memories of those who marched 50 years ago."

It was recorded by a youth choir on an early LP record, long since deleted and unavailable and Harry asked us if we could contribute an arrangement for this album.

This is not the first Peaksoft compilation we have contributed to, but never before have we found ourselves in such exalted company as Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong, Paul Robeson, Billie Holliday, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Ewan MacColl and others. But nice to be in the company of our fellow artiste from Harry's Billy Fury website; the Gentleman from the Isle of Wight, Johnny Storme!

The CD is available through the merchandise page of the Billy Fury website, from the Peaksoft website, or from Amazon and some independant retailers.

New Card

I've just had 500 business cards printed off from this new design by graphic designer Katherine Metcalfe. Katherine designed our banner (below) that we use at events using some of the same motifs and I asked her if she could come up with a new business card for us.

Seeing as she's my cousin and therefore quite biassed in favour of the band, she agreed with no more than a few gentle turns of the thumbscrews!

Thank you Cuzzy!

Ruby Wedding Gig

Last night we played at a private house party to celebrate a 40th Wedding Anniversary.

To have a live band playing in your home - even as small in member numbers as we are - requires a fair amount of room! Last night we even had space for a dance floor and we had a great night with loads of great comments at the end.

Fylde Vintage Weekend

I've been reminded I missed a gig report! A few weeks ago was the Fylde Vintage Weekend, a chance for classic cars, tractors, traction engine and farming equipment to come together for a weekend of displays, some with real live sheep and some without...

David caused a bit of controversy shortly after we arrived. To our surprise we saw him crouched down with his camera lens poking through a tent flap.

"What are you doing?!?" we asked. "I was photographing birds!" he replied... What? By poking your lens into their tent?!? Is that not an arrestable offence?!?

Luckily not...!

We played in the beer tent marquee on Saturday night and had a cracking night.

I was starting to think we wouldn't get away - I don't think we have ever been shouted back for so many encores. It was a good night and a great audience!

A special mention has to go to Rosie the dog who barked her appreciation at the end of every song! I suspect it may have been the clapping that set her off, as she even joined in at the appropriate places in The Wild Rover! Or perhaps that's her boyfriend...

Creeping Bentgrass at Larbreck Hall

Last night we played Larbreck Hall Caravan Park. The residents had created a stage area for us and there was a brilliant crowd sitting to clap and hand jive, singing, or up on their feet to dance.

Someone had spent a lot of time constructing the stage and there were rope lights, fairy lights and mirror balls all over the place!

Thanks to the Larbreck residents, summer visitors and holiday makers for making our night such a pleasure - hopefully we did the same for you!

Wedding Gig at Garstang

Last night Creeping Bentgrass played at a wedding at Garstang Golf Club.

We set up our gear and then managed to have a sit down for a while as the meal was finishing and the speeches and then some family entertainment was still to come.

We played for the early part of the night before resident DJ Ricky took over. Generally the early spot is before people feel ready to dance, but in our case it went up to 11:00pm so we had a few people on the dance floor before we were done. If nothing else the dreaded Amarillo can always be relied upon to get a few people on their feet!

Here David is imploring me to play the next song in "his key!" - whatever that is...

Oh yes... and I've bought those shoes!

Weekend Gig Reports

It was a busy weekend for us.

On Saturday night we were at Heskin Hall for the annual steam fair and played in a packed marquee. Always a good audience, they were in a terrific mood this time and lifted us so that we were on the top of our game as well.

One of those gigs where we could do nothing wrong and we ended with no less than four encores!

It was 2:00am when we got home to bed and then we were on site for our next gig at 9:00am Sunday morning...

After several days of warm sunny weather it dropped a good 10-12 degrees of warmth on Sunday for an outdoor gig at Myerscough College's Open Day.

This is where we all got together as a band so it's always a pleasure to go back to Myerscough. I'm told there are few letters received after an open day that don't mention us specifically. We had a great, if cold, day and started playing around 10:30am going all the way through to 4:30 with just a short break for some lunch. Must be a record for us... my fingers certainly knew about it by the end of the day!

Loads of interest shown, lots of friends to see and lots of folk commenting favourably. Thanks go to the enthusiastic dancing girls who kept coming round from whatever they were doing and adding to the fun!

Back in Witton Park

Today we were back in the courtyard at Witton Park Blackburn for the Family Fun Day.

Whilst we had an audience throughout the afternoon the weather had not been so good. We clocked just 9 degrees temperature as we drove to the park. It was fine but dull and cloudy so no big crowds today. Frustratingly the sun came out half an hour before we finished - just that bit too late to tempt people out!

A huge thank you to those who came to see us. We will next be at Heskin Hall in Chorley in the marquee following the Annual Steam Fair on Saturday 4 June and the following day at Myerscough College's Open Day.

Witton Park

Last Sunday saw us in our usual spot at Blackburn's Witton Park. That spot, more specifically is in the old courtyard near to the cafe in the doorway of one of the stables.

We've been honoured to be asked to play at Witton Park for several events during the year over the past five or six years and when the weather is good to us we always get a large audience. In fact even when it's tippling down and we are dry in our stable, people are often willing to sit or stand in the rain to listen! Hardy folk in Blackburn!

On Sunday it did rain a couple of times but not for long and there was a really good atmosphere in the courtyard.

There was a fairground farther down from us, displays of birds of prey and small animals, tractor rides and Myerscough College had lots of displays on too.

We tried out a few new songs for the first time - if young girls start to film us doing a Take That song we couldn't have been too bad... unless it's now on YouTube labelled "Two old wrinklies try to do..."

We'll be back at Witton on Spring Bank Holiday Monday.

Sunnyside 2011 - Saturday 19 March

The second half of my report of our annual Billy Fury tribute at the club which saw his final public performance.

Saturday dawned and we sat down to an excellent cooked breakfast before heading into Northampton for a look round. In past years we've gone into Wellingborough so it was a morning of discovery, which I'll show a little of in another entry. I know they are a bit few on the ground recently, I've been rather busy!

Then we headed for Sunnyside to suss out the new layout. The old club layout has now totally gone and the place is a pub restaurant. The new layout works very well for that, with new wall partitions with gaps or "windows" cut through to allow views into different parts of what once was the concert room.

The old stage area at the bottom end of the large room is therefore cut off from the rest of the space. It was reached down a ramp from a slightly higher floor at the back of the room where there was a bar. The balcony created by the higher floor extended down one side of the ramp to overlook the stage area on the left, whilst on the right, tables gave a same-level view of the stage area with access on that side into the main pub.

It was in this area that we set up the stage to allow a viewpoint from as much of the room as possible.

It did mean that the artists were singing to a line of people getting progressively taller on the ramp, but it worked fairly well!

We had been asked to bring our own kit this year as, rather than a band, the main professional act was Johnny Red, a well-known local act with a great Billy tribute set. Taking all our own gear meant that we needed a full half hour to set up. We decided to leave this until later as once Johnny Red had set up his very comprehensive stage gear, a crowd of singers gathered to test their tonsils around the mic and we walked back to the hotel to get showered and changed.

Then I got the PA, speakers and keyboard set up and we blasted through our version of Bad Moon Rising to test the sound, Jeannie and Miss Franny running round the different areas of the place to listen for any imperfections in the sound - hiccups, burps, slurred words, bum notes, swear words, that sort of thing...

We'd had to crank it up a bit because of the size of the room and standing just in front of the speakers, I have to say we enjoyed ourselves immensely on that test; it was obvious that a ripple of excitement had gone round the room and it was a struggle to force ourselves off, but we did!

More new faces turned up - I'd never met Russ Dee or Roger Sea before, despite having "known them" from the billyfury.com forums for years and it was great to shake their hands and catch up.

And then, such was the number of artists attending, the music started at 4:30pm. Dave Jay, thwarted from walking into the audience by the new layout, still delivered some cracking numbers and then switched on his polished MC mode, introducing each act. There are very few seats now with a view of the stage. People were standing and crowding around the gaps and doorways through the new walls and partitions.

It did make it a bit frustrating but the sound carried and there was plenty of applause and cheering and a really brilliant atmosphere and there were some absolutely superb acts.

Jane Hubert made her Sunnyside debut with some fabulous vocals. She sang a fast Helen Shapiro song and then started "Funny... but it's true..." and I went cold and all the small hairs on the palms of my hands - er... I mean back of my neck - stood up. Wonderful!

Roger Sea had a brilliant mirrored jacket - I want it when he's done with it ha ha! We followed Michelle Gibson onto the stage. David had blabbed it was my birthday and Dave Jay got the audience to sing Happy Birthday to me. As he said, "suitably embarrassed"!

Harry, the organiser (who has obviously got to know us by now), came to whisper in my ear to make sure we finished our set on time! We started with an Elvis number, Suspicion (the video of this is at YouTube) and then went through our set, ditching a planned number in order to get in a request from the audience dedicated to the perfect woman - When You Say Nothing At All...

We had to ditch another song in order to finish on time (a Cliffy too - Moya would have loved that one...) as both having to bring instruments forward from the back of the stage and the Happy Birthday bit had eaten into our time, but when I checked my watch we had finished on the dot of our allotted time - by heck, and I still had a joke or two in hand...

Laura and Emily followed us after the raffle. A brilliant set and two great girls - we were chatting with them later (closely watched by Miss Franny and Jeannie of course...)

Johnny Red delivered a great tribute act to Billy and then we all came on for the traditional rendition of Halfway to Paradise to finish the night.

A brilliant night! Everyone calling for a repeat next year. Everyone happy. Everyone quite willing to have stayed another few hours and sung some more. Harry, we salute you. Sunnyside 2012 will be on 16-17 March. Can't wait!

Sunnyside 2011 - Friday 18 March

Phew - it's been one of those weeks out on the road eating up miles and not getting much chance to sort out photos or thoughts! So let's go back just over a week to last Friday and we piled everything in the trusty MPV and breathed a sigh of relief as we considered that, had it had rafters, it would be full to them! We were taking our full set of gear down this time so with PA and speakers, keyboard and guitar, gig bag, stands and luggage and four people, we zoomed off down the motorway, stopping at every second services - drat these pills... The hotel we've used the last two years is now a Travelodge and a communal breakfast-free area so we were staying at the Sunley Conference Centre of Northampton University, who were providing a large room for the Friday night jam session. Lots of familiar faces there from years past and also some new ones. Some that I knew from the Billy Fury forum but had never met. In fact the first thing we saw was the Danmobile! Daniel Heeney, is a long-standing member of the billyfury.com forums but it was our first meeting. "Long-standing" suits him - he's a tall fella! And I loved his act on Friday night! Cathy and Jean were on hand to give me my first cuddles, Katie, Marie and Jan hadn't been able to make it alas! Likewise a few others but there was a good crowd of us. The Furygirls' favourite, Johnny Storm was there to wow them with his voice. Miss Franny came over all accusingly at me because he did one of her favourite Michael Bolton songs - er... yes, it's a while since we've done that one I know... MC, the fabulous Rob Dee called us up. Creeping Bentgrass took to the stage area and we set off with a Billy song - Like I've Never Been Gone, one of my favourites! We had a bit of help with Johnny B Goode (below) - he can be a bit of a handful that one! And at the end of the night we were surprised but very honoured to be asked back to play a live backing for all the performers from the night to sing Billy's best known hit, Halfway to Paradise. All the photos from Friday night are in a set at my Flickr account and the video of Like I've Never Been Gone is at the band's YouTube channel. Saturday night report to come...

Suspicion at Sunnyside

Am soooooo much in need of sleep after wonderfully welcoming weekend (a bit of alliteration for you there!) at Sunnyside, Northampton for the Billy Fury weekend.

A more detailed entry to come but for now before I climb or crawl up the stairs to dreamland... the opening number from our set last night: Elvis's Suspicion. G'night all...

CBG in Catforth

Last Saturday night Creeping Bentgrass played a social "Dance Nite" at Catforth Village Hall. My SatNav tried to take us down a dead end again. Luckily we recognised it as one that we tried before, having to turn back when it became a rut and yawning chasm-filled dirt track. Instead we did a somewhat circuitous route to get there... The journey back was much quicker as we decided to ignore the SatNav!

We set off with the usual country and folk sets to an enthusiastic audience. As the hall warmed up (literally), a couple of balloons exploded quite spectacularly close by my head - talk about playing under fire...!

We had a break whilst a hotpot supper was served and then came back complete with sparkly ties to play through the late 50s and 60s sets and a selection of smoochy ballads for dances "in hold" as David described it...

A great night with plenty of folk on the dance floor and lots of happy faces singing along at the tables.

We usually play for around 3 and a half to four hours on such nights and lots of friends ask how we can play so long.

Well if you play guitar regularly you just build up corn on the ends of your fingers and although some of it wears off after a full night's playing, as witness that night's photo of my fingers, it doesn't hurt any more than feeling a little tender and the following morning my fingers were back to normal again.

The next gig is the annual Billy Fury bash in Northampton in a fortnight. Looking forward to that!!!

Tickets for Catforth 5 March

I'm told there are still a few tickets left for our show at Catforth Village Hall on Saturday 5 March 2011.

Starting at 7:30pm through until 11:30pm the night is advertised as a "dance nite" and the admission fee of £10 includes a hot pot supper.

More details about the event available by following the link, including contact details of the organisers for tickets etc.

You can find a map here.

On The Wireless...

This morning we were the studio band for Preston FM's Saturday Brunch, a light-hearted music and chat magazine-style radio programme.

We had an absolute ball, the programme had some great guests including Neil Thomson from Blackpool's Grand Theatre and Henry Metcalfe, currently playing Jacob in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Preston's Charter Theatre.

We got to play seven songs with a range of different styles from Gypsy Woman (Country) through Irish (Fields of Athenry) to 60s folk (The Boxer), through the 1950s and 60s with Billy Fury, Buddy Holly and Creedence Clearwater Revival and we finished the show with a rock and roll self-indulgence - Johnny B Goode!

A little added pressure was provided with the presence of the organisers of a local Battle of the Bands! Here were two guys well into their music. Luckily they seemed satisfied with what they saw and heard! Well at least they didn't laugh!

Our thanks to the show's presenter, Mark Howard (runs a marathon during the show to take the mic to different people around the tables) and the really laid-back "techie" Richard, patiently keeping his hand in the air counting down the time until Mark looked up to see it!

We loved it! I keep trying to scrape the smile off my face, but it's stuck...

Garstang Festival Booking 2011

This year we have been booked for 3 days at the Garstang Arts & Music Festival.

You'll be able to see us on Saturday 20 August, Saturday 27 August and Bank Holiday Monday 29 August. For a preview of what you can expect here's a video of two old geezers playing Concrete and Clay at the 2010 festival!

Join us for Saturday Brunch!

Ooh, here's a bit of excitement!

Creeping Bentgrass will be the live studio band on the radio programme Saturday Brunch broadcast between 10:00am and 12:00am on Saturday 19 February on Preston FM.

Broadcast in the Preston Lancashire region on 103.2 FM or online at http://www.preston.fm

Radio, so no need to wear masks... If any listeners would like to know what we look like, we are in our early 30s, tall and slim, straight hair and curly teeth... We each have our own full set of cutlery.

Christmas and New Year Gigs

A couple of gig reports. Fran hadn't picked her camera up for the first one but yesterday David gave me a disk of photos taken by Jeannie so I can now include a report here!

23 December 2010 saw us at the Wyrebank Banqueting Suite in Garstang, battling snow and ice to get there to play for a rather unusual event.

This was a pig club - a group that had reared a pig and was celebrating this night with the fruits of their endeavour. A meal of pork sausages and mash with plenty of sausages was followed by a sale of yet more sausages and a raffle - no they had other prizes for that!!!

Generously they invited us to sit with them for the meal and whilst David and I hardly ever eat much before a gig, (belching down microphones is never good...) it was an excellent meal.

Then we played for the rest of the night before slipping and sliding back on the ice to load the car in rather cold temperatures! Oh - and we were given a big bag of sausages as a bonus! They are rather yummy...

Last night we played the New Year in at Lancaster Golf Club. As I tuned the guitar just before starting I hit the end of a string with the tip of my thumb, feeling the string go right down into my thumb.

Muttering a surprised "Good Gracious!", I had to stick a plaster on the end of my thumb to avoid getting blood all down the neck of the guitar which would have gone sticky and perhaps not looked as aesthetically pleasing as I'd have liked.

Unfortunately the only plaster they could find was designed to cover the whole of the upper torso... Still, after a couple of songs I was able to take it off and apart from a mild soreness the thumb performed it's usual task of keeping the neck of the guitar pressed against my fingers with no problem!

And what a night! The dance floor filled as soon as we started to play and as we counted down to midnight there were balloons, confetti, cheers, hugs and kisses all round. No sausages though...