More Gig Reports

Catching up on the latest gig reports, this entry covers two gigs, both for private parties at cricket clubs.

This was a couple of weeks ago on 14 April, a 50th birthday party in the function room at Blackpool Cricket Club.

Unfortunately there was another very loud band playing downstairs - their bass was shaking the floor upstairs and at first I thought that our gear was malfunctioning. One wonders whether the upstairs room should have been let out under such circumstances!

No such problems at Darwen Cricket Club last Friday night where we played for a retirement do. This was actually for an ex-colleague of both David and myself - the band (4 of us then) formed originally in 2000 at Myerscough College. So we got to see lots of familiar faces at this one!

Gig Report Catch-Up!

My respected colleague and sometime crooner has pointed out I have glossed over a couple of gigs without a mention. So duly admonished I now add a few photos for your delectation and approval...

Both of them were at one of our favourite venues: Coast Riders Diner and Bar at South Shore in Blackpool. Therefore the backdrop to the photos of us on stage may be somewhat similar to others already on these pages.

This was New Year's Eve, 31 December 2014. We had been asked to play out the old year and there were many familiar faces in the audience! You can tell from the next photo that we enjoyed ourselves. I have to say that 2015 was well under way by the time we left the premises!

The second event was Miss Franny's special birthday in March. She can be seen below talking to her brother, Bob. Surely, she should be listening to us???

Charity Gig For British Heart Foundation

Last Saturday, the 18th, we performed for the second of our own charity gigs of the year. Usually we do these every two years, but the response after the April one was such that we set about organising this one almost immediately.

It's for an invited audience, but we always have a few new faces at these events, brought by friends or family. Miss Franny and Miss Jeannie were kept busy on tombola and raffle with help from daughter Gillian and a few friends. We already had lots of raffle prizes but special thanks must go to all those who turned up with more, including an expensive pair of hiking boots which made their winner very happy!

David sang to a hairbrush for some reason during "Wooden Heart" - he claimed someone called Elvis did the same thing in a film... I don't know...

A special mention must go to Peter and Janet at Coast Riders Diner, who not only provided us with a free venue and food but also added a very generous sum to the pot and we ended up (so far) with a collection of £710 for the British Heart Foundation. Someone from the Coast Riders people asked us to play Johnny Preston's Running Bear, a song we've never done before, but hey - if we know the song we love a challenge and they were incredulous that we'd never played it before! I was a bit incredulous at the key David chose to launch into, to be honest, but that's a different matter. I'm now designated to come up with a polished version for the next gig...

We now take a short break from gigs as Miss Franny starts radiotherapy. Little did we know in April when we did the gig for Cancer Research that we would be in need of the results of that research within 6 months. But things are progressing well. As for the Heart Foundation, well I'm already a heart attack survivor and David carries a second one in the shape of a pacemaker in his shoulder. He claims this makes him a Time Lord, but the dalek he tried to intimidate was having none of it...

Party Antics

Saturday night saw us once more at the fabulous Coast Riders Diner Bar, playing for Pete's 65th birthday. Themed as Luau-cum-holiday night, the room was filled with rather loud shirts and one or two snorkels...

An interesting night - I was playing against a persistent tinnitus background hiss and was a bit paranoid that I might not be able to hit the right notes. I mean singing rather than the odd guitar/keyboard whoopsie! Anyway a few new tunes got unveiled. Apart from Pete's birthday it was the anniversary of Elvis's passing so In The Ghetto got a first play, as did a 3-song medley of Teddy Bear, Don't Be Cruel and Hound Dog. The last time we were at Coast Riders I made a rash promise that we would come up with a version of Roy Orbison's Penny Arcade and also The Beatles' P.S. I Love You came out.

And I have an awful feeling we may have... no surely not... but yes... I definitely remember playing Dancing Queen...

Creeping Bentgrass at the Fylde Car Club Meeting

Saturday night saw us once again at the Coast Riders Diner venue, playing for the Fylde Car Club as they met prior to the next day's display at Cleveleys.

They brought a great line-up of classic cars with them - I always thought that a car became vintage when it reached 25 years old. But thanks to an anonymous comment which I checked on the Oxford Dictionaries site, I now know they are 1919-30. Given that cars become and will always become rare once they reach a certain age, I quite liked my "wrong" version... Anyway, I'm thankful for learning something new!

This is the first incarnation of the Ford Capri. A two-door version of the Consul Classic with a streamlined rear window - the Classic had a window that sloped inwards like the 1960s Anglia. The bright red really pops and red is an infamous colour for fading over time.

Another 1960s car, the Triumph Herald. As a teenager a couple of my friends had these in the seventies in various states of disrepair. I remember one which had a huge hole in the floor and you had to rest your feet on the bulkhead in front of you whilst watching the road fly past beneath your legs... It was a bad idea to go out in this car on wet days because spray from the wheels shot into the car interior, particularly when the wheels turned to go round a corner! This example was in much better condition!

We were there to play a bit of music though and enjoyed ourselves playing to an audience that sang along, clapped and shouted for more.

When we play Status Quo's Rockin' All Over The World audiences always do the "Quo Dance", testing out their hips and waists with gusto! We were unable to see the cars at Cleveleys the following day due to our playing at Myerscough College's Open Day - a report of that to follow later. But we'll catch up with the classic cars later in the year at Fairhaven Lake near Lytham.

Car Club Gig in Blackpool

On Saturday 22 June 2013 we were out at the Coast Riders Cafe on Marton Moss, Blackpool playing for a car club.

We got there a bit early as the cars were being judged and I wanted a few photos. This MG ended up with the top trophy for the night.

A Jowett Javelin sports car - no, I don't remember them either...

I do remember the Consul Classic though! This Ford was the first British car with twin headlamps that I remember. I nearly bought one for £65 when I was 17 but in the end bought a chunky Hillman Minx for £40 instead - cheapskate!

And had I taken the blue guitar that night, this rather scrummy Jag E-Type would have just matched it!!!

But I had the red one with me instead...

And one to match the scratch plate!

Oh yes... and we played a bit of music as well...!

Creeping Bentgrass at Blackpool's Elgin Hotel

On Friday we played at the Elgin Hotel, Blackpool for a luncheon gathering of ex British Gas staff.

This was the third time we have played for this group and they make a great audience and - so they tell us - we have increased the numbers of people attending since we started playing the after lunch spot.

Glad to be of service...

Large version of photo: available at my Flickr account

Surprise 60th Party

Friday 5 April 2013. We were booked to play at a surprise birthday party.

Surprise birthday parties can be a risky thing to accept bookings for as the last one we were booked to perform at was called off after the birthday boy - who knew nothing about it - booked a holiday instead! But here everything went according to plan.

We were at the Raikes Hotel in the centre of Blackpool - a nice change for us as although we live there, most of our gigs tend to be out of town! The birthday boy was a biker and there was a fine collection of tattoos in the room!

A great night all round!

If you would like live music at your party or event, please find our contact details in the left hand panel and give us a call!

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!

Club Night in Blackpool

It's not actually all that often that we play in our home town of Blackpool. But last night was one of the exceptions.

We were at the Highfield Road Club for a social evening for ex-servicemen and their wives. So did they want nice easy relaxed music? No...

"Status Quo!" came a shout from the audience as we threatened them with Cliffy... So Status Quo they got!

We had a great night, singing, playing and joking our way through an hour and a half of good old-fashioned fun! Fran and Jeannie seemed to mop up in the raffle too... We came away with a bottle of brandy and one of Martini... Honestly... you can't take them anywhere!

Billy Fury Weekend

We weren't able to be at the whole event of course, due to the Saturday night gig out at Windermere, but the Billy Fury In Thoughts of You fan club held one of their Billy weekends at the Metropole Hotel in Blackpool over this weekend.

We met up David and Jeannie no more than 10 hours after dropping them off last night and went down this morning to meet up with the fabulous Rob Dee and the headlining act from the weekend, Colin Paul, with whom we will be sharing the bill at the Sunnyside weekend over 19-20 March in Northampton in just 5 weeks time.

It was also a chance to meet and chat to Billy's mum, Mrs Jean Wycherley who, at the age of 88, gave us a quite brilliant rendition of Billy's hit In Thoughts of You.

She is seen here on stage with Colin Paul and of course her perhformance earned her a huge round of applause and a standing ovation from the crowd who had obviously had a great time over the weekend.

It was great to see Rob and Chris, Pat and Mags as well. We are so looking forward to Sunnyside, where we are headlining the Friday evening of the event and we'll be just one of many acts supporting Colin Paul and the Persuaders on the Saturday night.

John and David Clubbing

Last night we played the Highfield Road Servicemens' Association club in Blackpool.

Poor David has been suffering since the Saturday gig with flu and looked as though he should have been still in bed really but we gave them a good night and a chance to exercise their vocal chords singing along to country, folk and sixties songs, finishing up with Quo's Rocking All Over The World.

David explained he looked a bit rough due to being on heavy drugs (Lemsip) and the audience gave us a rousing burst of applause at every song ending and afterwards as Fran was standing by the pile of equipment we were ferrying to the car across the road many of them could be heard saying how much they had enjoyed the night.

So did we...Even David was back to his usual self after a few songs and the adrenalin had shaken off the flu for a while!

School Prom

Monday night saw David and John playing at a junior school prom.

I think that an apt description of the audience would be "wildly enthusiastic"! In fact so loud we could hardly hear the music ourselves. We'd had to turn the speakers away to avoid feedback, it was cranked up louder than we'd ever had it before just to cut above the noise from the kids.

They weren't particularly running wild or anything, they were singing along, cheering, in fact giving us an amazing reception. Thank you to the kids and teachers at Blackpool's St John Vianney. We finished off an exuberant night with the Blackpool Football Team's anthem - the old Dave Clark Five hit, Glad All Over and I think everyone was!

As David said afterwards, "I can cope with 11,000 coming through the gate at Liverpool but that was scary!!!" An excellent night!