A funny thing happened on the way to the gig last night...
Odd things happen when you play in a gigging band. We thought it would be fun to record a few memories from our lives on the road...
Our Shortest Ever Gig:
We were booked to play at the Rocking Horse Bar in Clacton, Essex on 27 January 2007. This was always a good night for us, the venue was always... Ummm... “Lively and Interesting” to say the least. It was not unusual for a fight to develop, or people to get loaded way out of their tiny minds but most punters just had a good time. Anyway, we arrived, set up, soundchecked and at 10:30pm we started our first set to a half empty gig. Three numbers into the set and the crowd are starting to get into it, and the place is filling up when we were amused to see someone dressed in Police riot gear come running up to the stage, waving to get our attention. We remember thinking - “Oh right, it’s a stripper-gram for someone’s birthday! Cool, this should be a giggle...” But then we saw the 40 odd other people in Police riot gear come running in and realised it was a full-blown drugs raid. That was it - we were asked ever so nicely to turn everything off and spent the next three hours standing around waiting for the boys in blue to “search the premises and everyone therein.” Oh, that included us by the way! In total, we played 2.75 numbers - around 10 minutes - making this our shortest ever gig. Sadly, the venue never reopened so we also have the honour (?) of being the last band to play the Rocking Horse.
We were booked to play at the Rocking Horse Bar in Clacton, Essex on 27 January 2007. This was always a good night for us, the venue was always... Ummm... “Lively and Interesting” to say the least. It was not unusual for a fight to develop, or people to get loaded way out of their tiny minds but most punters just had a good time. Anyway, we arrived, set up, soundchecked and at 10:30pm we started our first set to a half empty gig. Three numbers into the set and the crowd are starting to get into it, and the place is filling up when we were amused to see someone dressed in Police riot gear come running up to the stage, waving to get our attention. We remember thinking -
The Flying Snog Gig:
We were having a great night at the White Hart in Saxmundham a couple of years ago. A good crowd was in and everyone was bouncing around, getting drunk and enjoying themselves. Halfway through the first set, a woman came up to the stage and started talking to Chris. Except that as we were in the middle of a song, Chris couldn’t hear a bloody word she was saying. Expecting this to be a request (along the lines of “Can you play Freebird for me please?”) Chris leaned forward to try to hear what she was saying. Instead the lady grabbed him around the neck, pulled him off stage and started trying to snog him. This kind of caught Chris off guard and his playing suffered for the next couple of numbers! Chris swears blind she looked like Cameron Diaz, the rest of the band just swear she was blind...
We were having a great night at the White Hart in Saxmundham a couple of years ago. A good crowd was in and everyone was bouncing around, getting drunk and enjoying themselves. Halfway through the first set, a woman came up to the stage and started talking to Chris. Except that as we were in the middle of a song, Chris couldn’t hear a bloody word she was saying. Expecting this to be a request (along the lines of “Can you play Freebird for me please?”) Chris leaned forward to try to hear what she was saying. Instead the lady grabbed him around the neck, pulled him off stage and started trying to snog him. This kind of caught Chris off guard and his playing suffered for the next couple of numbers! Chris swears blind she looked like Cameron Diaz, the rest of the band just swear she was blind...
The “Did You See Those Tits?” Gig:
Back in 2005 we were having a blinder of a night at the Grapes in Bury... Lots of people enjoying themselves and jumping around to the music when a young lady at the front of the stage decided to flash her boobs at the band. Needless to say, with suitable encouragement she did it again later. And then she dropped her jeans and mooned for us. At the end of the night we were having a laugh about it all when Paul the drums said, “Tits? What tits?!?!” Being at the back of the stage he’d missed it all. Sadly the girl had left by this point so we couldn’t ask for a private viewing just for Paul...
Back in 2005 we were having a blinder of a night at the Grapes in Bury... Lots of people enjoying themselves and jumping around to the music when a young lady at the front of the stage decided to flash her boobs at the band. Needless to say, with suitable encouragement she did it again later. And then she dropped her jeans and mooned for us. At the end of the night we were having a laugh about it all when Paul the drums said, “Tits? What tits?!?!” Being at the back of the stage he’d missed it all. Sadly the girl had left by this point so we couldn’t ask for a private viewing just for Paul...
