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!
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!
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.
Here David is imploring me to play the next song in "his key!" - whatever that is...
Oh yes... and I've bought those shoes!
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.
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. 
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!
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!
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.
It was in this area that we set up the stage to allow a viewpoint from as much of the room as possible.
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.
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!
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... 
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!
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...
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...
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. 
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.
