Deepest, darkest Devizes again...

Back to the Bear Hotel's cellar bar on Saturday, on a nice balmy spring night, only to be told we can't go in because all the electricity has gone off.
Only one thing to do - repair to the nearest hostelry to fortify ourselves while we wait for the all-clear from the Sparks. Down the road we trot, and into a decaying pub where the gurning landlord rests his gut ornamentally on the bar while his elderly wife does her best to coax some beer out of the pumps for us. A couple of superannuated rockers who remind me of the Chuckle Brothers are setting up a karaoke which occupies half the pub, and for a while we are haunted by the prospect of having to sit around and listen to whatever bangin' choons they've brought with them... happily the power is back on at the Bear, and we drink up hurriedly & leave.
Rather a rapid setup thanks to the late start, but the gig goes well, as they tend to here, and the stunned punters stumble drunkenly out into the night, ears ringing... job done.

Glastonbury Assembly Rooms with Pressgang

To Glastonbury on Friday, playing support for loud folksters Pressgang, who we last played with at Pontardawe Festival a couple of years back - a lovely bunch of chaps who are currently promoting their latest album "Outlandish" - see the link at the bottom.

The Assembly Rooms is tucked down a little passage off Glastonbury's High Street, and once we've humped the gear up the many, many steps it opens out into a surprisingly large venue with a decent stage & huge LED lighting rig. Most venues smell of stale beer, fags & sweat, but being Glastonbury this one smells of incense with a hint of apple crumble, and there are smiley ladies placing tea-lights on every flat surface.
Nice little bar/cafe attached too, with local real ales, so I'm happy...
Pressgang have set this gig up themselves, and no-one's sure how many people will turn up, but arrive they do, and by the time we go on the hall's filling up nicely. With that big lighting rig it's a bit tricky to tell how many people we're playing to, but judging from the noise there's a fair few of them & they like it a lot!
We thoroughly enjoy our little selves too, and after a couple of encores we hand over the nicely warmed up crowd to Pressgang, who are excellent, & get on with the business of drinking & sweating a lot. Now I come to think of it, perhaps it's not the venues we normally play that smell like that... perhaps it's us..?

http://www.myspace.com/pressganguk