Tiddley Om Pom, Pom...

Back to the Prom in Bristol again the other week, which has had a few improvements since last we played there - the stage has magically expanded (unless we've all shrunk, which is a worrying possibility), and the PA's been overhauled; we were under strict instructions not to break it...
Sound was as good as ever, but unfortunately we outnumbered the audience for much of the evening, which is a good thing if it all descends into an anarchic punch-up, but since it didn't we were a bit lonely up there...
Anyway, many thanks to those hardy souls who did make it - next time tell your friends!

Stepping Stones, Poole

All the way down to the South coast on the Friday night of a Bank Holiday weekend... what could have been traffic hell actually wasn't too bad, and we even found the place easily too.
The Stepping Stones is a huge great sprawling pub with acres of space to play with, which I was particularly chuffed by as it gave me a chance to wander around unencumbered by trailing leads, thanks to my new wireless rig. The rest of the band glowered jealously as I skipped merrily around the back of the room, wishing I had a trio of husky roadies & a surfboard... they'll all be getting one, now.
The downside of this ability to mix with the audience is that, well, you have to mix with the audience. As we tried to soundcheck, I was subpoenaed as an expert witness by a ruddy-faced all-day drinker who'd bought what he thought was a little guitar for his son, only to be told by his slurring companion it was a ukelele. One look at his popping eyes, dodgy tatts & general air of a man who could explode into violence made me very glad that it was, in fact, a tiny guitar...
Not a bad gig all in all - good sound, lots of room, and a very friendly ex-punk landlord, but a bit dispiriting going all that way to play for a couple of dozen people, so I doubt it'll become a regular fixture.

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

Spring Garden Tavern

Oh dear, oh dear... where do you start? It wasn't looking promising when the promoter (Harley Quinn - not his real name, I suspect) first contacted us about this one, as he didn't want to pay us anything apart from "a couple of drinks"... we were underwhelmed by this offer, & eventually he agreed to cough up some cash so off we went.
We played this place about 15 years ago when it was called Dirty Nellies, an ill-advised foray into Oirish theme-pubbery, but it's recently been done up as a music venue, and very nice too - good stage, nice acoustics, decent PA and a genial landlord who doubles up as sound engineer.
The enthusiastically burbling young Harley then told us that the 2 bands who were supposed to be supporting us had like, er, pulled out at the last minute, but it was alright 'cos a couple of his mates were like, literally on the way here on the bus, and they could play an acoustic set...
"Are you going to kill him, or shall I..?" growled the landlord as we set the gear up.
Harley's mates showed up after a while, and he took the opportunity to disappear, presumably to rethink his career path... we played the gig, and it turned out to be great fun, we all really enjoyed it - thanks to Emily & Ally for turning up so we had someone to play to! A good little venue, and I hope it does well.
Harley needless to say never reappeared, but to his credit (and much to our surprise) he had left some dosh for us, so all's well that ends well...

The George, and The Men They Couldn't Hang

A busy couple of weeks, starting with a gig in The George at Bradford on Avon last Saturday - always a pleasure to play here, especially now that our favourite landlord, the Porcupine tree-loving Darren, has got Bath Ales Dark Hare on! Such a pleasure in fact that we stayed there sampling it till the wee small hours - cheers Darren!
On St Patricks Day we were in Swindon, at the 12Bar supporting The Men They Couldn't Hang, and a cracking night it was too - great PA, a very good young sound engineer name of Kieran, and a proper sticky floor to boot. We seemed to go down well, and there was a fair bit of dancing going on by the end of our set, which ain't bad when you're the support band.
I didn't see much of TMTCH as I had to drive home, but thanks to them for the cheerful loan of their drumkit & slightly less cheerful loan of their bass amp (think I'll bring my own next time), and hopefully we'll be back in this venue again...

Raglan Arms, Weston Super Mare

A new venue for us this, and very nice too: smallish pub in the back streets of Weston with a great atmosphere, a policy of putting on original music and real ale at two quid a pint - you can't go wrong, really!
The only fly in the ointment was the lack of punters, but apparently they don't usually do music on Saturdays, so this was a bit of an experiment. Hopefully there'll be a few more next time, but it was good to catch up with some familiar faces we haven't seen for years, when we used to regularly play the late lamented O'Malleys Bar, good stuff...
Cheers to Dave the landlord for the video clip above, too.