ALL IN ALL - NOT A BAD DAY!!

OK - let's get it out of the way! Saturday's gig was made all the sweeter by the magnificent City win a couple of hours earlier - all the Blues were obviously on cloud nine, and I have to say that even the Reds in the room took the wearing of the City t-shirt and blue and white scarf in good heart (except for the guy who threatened to take the wheels off the dirty white tour van!)! So bring on the mighty Potters - fortunately we don't have a gig booked for 14 May, so Wembley here we come!! As for last Saturday's gig, once again it was a great night at the Cock & Pheasant - some familiar faces, and some new ones (even a coachload from Marple!), which was good because we played some familiar tunes, and some new ones! In fact, SIX new (or new-ish) songs received an airing - Gimme Shelter, Ballroom Blitz, Don't Fear the Reaper, 20th Century Boy, Hanging on the Telephone and Walk This Way! Audience feedback suggests that they all worked pretty well although, obviously some polishing is needed (will be especially good if Paul & Chrissie can learn all the words to Walk This Way!). Still, we have 3 more practices to do this (and maybe even learn one or two more) before the Macc Beer Festival on 6 & 7 May. Thanks to Charles & Ann for having us there, and we hope we didn't disturb the neighbours too much! On the subject of the Beer Festival, as we always say around this time, be sure to get your tickets early, because they really do fly out the door, and we already know that sales have been excellent. With the plethora of Bank Holidays that are just about to hit us, it would be easy to leave it too late, and find you have to sit on a freezing grassy knoll on Priory Lane (without beer!) listening to us, rather than being part of the action - so don't delay, get your tickets today. Details are on the attached poster (click to enlarge to a legible size!) We will be sharing the bill again with Monkey Harris and, as usual, we will be doing the late second slot on the Friday night (so we can have a couple of snifters ourselves on the Saturday!). Friday is always the more popular night so, even more reason to get your skates on!!

JUST NEED A LITTLE MORE LAPTOP IN THE DRUM MONITOR!!

Well howdy folks!

The silence on here has been due to the enforced absence of 3 band members over the last couple of weeks - all of whom were taking well deserved holidays! One was Dave (no surprise there!) who took on the European slopes with his usual aplomb, and did not break a single bone; however, he was complaining last week that he twisted his knee, hip and back, so it wasn't all plain sailing (in fact, it wasn't sailing at all, for a change!). Anyway, he seems to be OK and, no doubt, will be fully recovered in time for his next escapade at the beginning of May!

As previously reported, Chrissie and Paul (and respective partners, I hasten to add!) spent part of March lapping up the delights of the South by South West Music Festival in Austin, Texas before departing for different recovery clinics in the East and West USA! For those who haven't heard of SXSW (as it is known by those in the know!), it consists of wall to wall music from 10am to 2am for about 6 days; now, you can buy a pass for about $1000, and go to watch people boring each other about how good their music is, and watch the "showcase" concerts, or you can gird your loins and hit 6th Street (which is literally all bars!) and savour every conceivable genre of music continuously for the above noted 6 days for absolutely nothing (except the price of your drinks - ah, not very free then!). You may think I am exaggerating this, for effect, but let me assure you I'm not - we must have seen getting on for 100 acts in the time we were there, and we didn't even scratch the surface! The fare on offer ranged from the unknown (and pretty poor), who shall remain nameless to protect the guilty, to the unknown and bloody good (examples for me being the Gary Lee Cox Band, Shayne Zaid and the Catch, SoandSo, The Golden Dogs etc.) to the relatively well known and bloody good. We saw Eliza Doolittle, The Bangles and Ron Sexsmith (among others), but decided to give Bob Geldof and Yoko Ono a miss! We even heard the dulcet tones of Duran Duran wafting down from a rooftop bar at one stage, but couldn't get in! Of course, as all these bands/acts were in bars, we had to have beer, Bloody Marys, Margaritas, and lots of other liquid (well, it was 80deg+!). We were there on St. Patrick's Day as well, so you can imagine what that was like - the Yanks all seem to think they have Irish heritage, and that means they have to wear green and drink Guinness - 6th Street looked like Wembley's turf for the whole day!

You may be wondering what the title of this post is all about, well......it refers to something we heard from a combo we saw one day, that went by the name of Bonjay. There were 3 of them: a lady called Alanna on vocals (hip hop, urban, that sort of stuff!), some weird guy called Pho (yes, really!) on "beats and effects" (whatever they are!), and a newly recruited drummer (with real drums!). They had enormous trouble setting up - the conventional 5 piece band that had been on before, set up in about 10 minutes, but this lot were at it for about half an hour, and all they had to set up was a computer and a snare drum! The first problem was with dear old Alanna's loop pedal, which she gave up on in the end saying "you'll just have to imagine what it would sound like"! Then came the piece de resistance - after the first number was completed, the newby drummer was heard to say "You''ll have to give me more laptop in my drum monitor"! On the list of things you never expect to hear said at a gig, that must be pretty near the top - who says rock and roll is dead!

Anyway, back to normality; we are currently "rehearsing" new numbers for the Beer Festival - 3 pretty much boxed off last week, and we're hoping there will be at least 3 more before the event itself. Our first opportunity to trial these will be at The Cock & Pheasant in Bollington on Saturday 16 April, so come along, if you dare!

The tickets for the BF are now on sale (from the usual outlets), so get your order in quick, because we all know they go like hot cakes! Details are on the poster below (double click to see a bigger version).

EAST CHESHIRE HOSPICE MIDNIGHT WALK

The more observant of you may have noticed that we are giving our services to the East Cheshire Hospice on Saturday 25 June to get everyone revved up in advance of this year's Midnight Walk. As we've mentioned before, the Hospice does a fantastic job, and needs around £6000 per day just to stay in existence, most of which comes from voluntary donations.

So, if you fancy not only having a bop around to us, but also participating in the Walk itself, why not log on to the ECH Website, and register NOW?

THE BOYS (AND GIRL!) WERE BACK IN TOWN - IF ONLY BRIEFLY!!

Good heavens - it's over 4 weeks since a post hit these airwaves; better fix that!

A good reason for the absence (well I think so, anyway!) - antipodean visit to long lost travelling daughter meant Paul was away for most of February and, unfortunately, that's just the start of it, as Dave is off on his annual attempt to shatter his limbs in the snow this week, and then next week Paul AND Chrissie are off to the US to witness first hand the magic of the South by South West Music Festival in Austin Texas! Who knows, maybe they will pick up some tips - either way, you can be sure there will be a report on here sometime around the end of the month; with bands like "Trampled by Turtles", "Wordburglar", "Pulled Apart by Horses" and "Say No to Architecture" to enjoy, how could there not be?!

In the midst of all this holiday mayhem, however, we did find time to fit in a gig! Last Friday saw us back at Porter's in Macc and, as seems to be the norm these days, it was a wild night! The "stage" at Porter's is not what you would call the biggest and, in order to fit all 6 of us in, we had to put one of the speakers and the PA mixer IN THE FIREPLACE (see Pete Banks' picture below)!

However, once we'd set up, and all agreed to Andy's request not to "gyrate" too much, we kicked off in front of an absolutely stuffed pub and things just got hotter and hotter (in more ways than one!). Highspots were more furniture dancing, a not so tuneful vocal backing to "Sex on Fire" from Mad Dave (don't ask!) and Sue, the landlady withdrawing her 11:30 curfew and allowing us to play on till midnight, because the pub was still rammed and nobody wanted to go home!! The only thing missing was Alison Unwin and her tambourine doing her crowd surfing but, on reflection, it was probably for the best that she couldn't make it - things might have got broken (like arms and legs!).

Thanks to everyone who come along - we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!

Below is a a further selection of photos courtesy of Pete B.

I've also added a link to the "Dazed & Confused Massive" Facebook page where Roger Thawley has kindly posted some videos - if you listen closely to the "Sex on Fire" vid, you might just hear Mad Dave's dulcet tones in the background!!

Next gig is now not until 16 April at The Cock & Pheasant in Bollington, where we hope to be giving an airing to some new tunes, in advance of our annual appearance at Macc Beer Festival - put the date in your diary - we'll be raring to go after all this travelling!!

PEOPLE HAVING FUN!!

Many thanks to Pete Banks for posting some pics from The Windmill on our Dazed & Confused Massive Facebook page - posting them here as well just to prove that we weren't making up the bit about dancing on the tables etc.!


Shades of The Ship! Hope Alison didn't bang her head!


We lose most of our tambourines this way!


That's the tables take a bit of a hammering now!

3 previous band members in the background (Frank, Paul G and Paul H) wondering why this level of mayhem never used to happen!

Now that's better - much more sedate!

...and this is what caused it all!

Playing a wedding on Saturday, and then it goes quiet until Friday 4 March at Porter's in Macclesfield - we'll be ready for that, and hope you are too!

WHAT A WAY TO START THE YEAR!!!

The first gig of the year is supposed to be a nice gentle introduction to what might yet be to come - after all the festivities, it's always good to slide into January without too much noise and disturbance - little did we know!!!

Star Date, Friday 7 January 2011 8:00pm - the dirty white tour van pulls into the car park of the Windmill to find there are absolutely no parking spaces whatsoever - the whole place is jam-packed with cars!! What the hell is going on?? Maybe it's 200 ramblers that went out at lunchtime, got lost, and have not yet returned? Maybe it's the Annual General Meeting of the Adlington Dogging Society? Maybe it's something else??

But no, the pub was actually cram jam full of people eating, drinking and generally enjoying themselves ("we'll soon put a stop to that", we thought!), approximately 200 maybe, so no pressure then! Some of them were even shoe-horned into the space where we were supposed to set up, so you can imagine how happy they were when we asked them to move, and shifted their table outside!

Now, this number of people in a venue before we even start poses a number of challenges:

• Are they expecting a band, and will they mind their quiet evening meal being disturbed?
• How the hell do we get our stuff in, and do a sound check without tipping food and drink all over the place, while we try and erect speakers and string cables around the place?
• Will they all still be here when we start playing, or are they on an early shift, so they can get home and finish watching Christmas catch-up TV?

Whatever, we pressed on, set up the gear and, although it was a bit of tight squeeze (remember, there were 6 of us this time, and we weren't used to that!), we were just about ready to play by 9:15pm. We had realised by then that the size of the crowd was due in no small measure to the fact that Becca, the landlady, was having her "farewell do" (not her birthday, as originally thought), and loads of people had come to see her off in style. It was also the opening night of the Windmill's annual "Local Ale Sale" which had drawn many diehard fans of proper beer (especially Storm Brewing's best!) in.

Heartened by the fact that nobody had disappeared in the intervening period, we cracked on and, in addition to having people up and bopping during the first set, we were treated to an amazing display of dancing, singing and general mayhem during the second! Once again, there were people up on shoulders, tables, chairs and anything else that was vaguely fixed to the floor! We did have a bit of a turn when we were asked to go on for the second set at 10:30 and finish at 11:00(!), but we soon persuaded the new landlady, Abby, to let us play until 11:30 (we actually finished at 11:50!), so all was good! I'm hoping that someone has some pics they can send us to post on here, because it was yet another memorable night, and words alone can't do it justice; so, if you're reading this, and have some photos, e-mail them to the address on the right hand side of the blog, and we'll post them (or post them to the "Dazed and Confused Massive" Facebook page).

So, 2011 is well and truly under way, and we are out and about again this weekend, playing a private party in Marple tomorrow night, after which there is a band get-together at Paul's on Sunday - which I'm sure will be a quiet and subdued affair (just like the Band on a Boat event last summer)!!

New gigs are cropping up all the time, and are being posted on the right ------------->
next public gig looks like Friday 4 March at Porter's on Roe Street in Macclesfield - the delay being due to holidays (not Dave this time!), so put it in your diary, because we know you'll be having withdrawal symptoms by then!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR - THE SAILOR RETURNS, AND A MYSTERY SOLVED!!

So here we are again - we've stepped out of the old black tour bus that was 2010, and into the rock arena that calls itself 2011 - I think we are relatively un-scarred by the festivities just passed, and we hope you are too, and can I be the last (but probably not!) to wish you all a Very Happy New Year! We met some fabulous folks and played some great gigs in 2010 (about 25 I make it), and thanks to everyone who took the time to come and see us - a lot of you on many occasions! We know that, although we have a great time, without you, it wouldn't be half as much fun, and we're grateful for your continuing support! We're really looking forward to more of the same this year, and I'll spill the beans about where it all kicks off in a little while.

Before all that, just a quick word about our last gig of 2010 - at our happy hunting ground of The Ship! You may remember, that we played a wondrous gig there in early November and, while it was expecting a lot for the Christmas gig to match it, it did turn out to be a fantastic night! The snow held off (mostly), although Pete Munro did manage to measure his length outside the pub at the end of the night - it was nothing to do with the drink, he said, but it was fortunate that he had taken enough anaesthetic, and so was feeling no pain by the time he landed! Nothing broken, fortunately (which is more than can be said for others who did the same earlier in the month!), and Pete did say he had enjoyed the gig, in spite of that! The pub was packed again, and everyone seemed to have a great time - and it felt really Christmassy! Paul's throat just about managed to survive the evening (which was a major surprise in itself!), probably due, in no samll part, to the chemist's shop he had lined up alongside the beer (VocalZones, honey & hot lemon, inhalers - the works!). We even managed to deliver the THREE new songs we promised - "It's My Life" (twice!) by Bon By Jovi, T-Rex's "20th Century Boy" and "Getting Away With It" by James; they need a bit of polishing, obviously, but seemed to work well, and will undoubtedly see the light of day again!


We were a fivesome at the Ship for about the 6th time in a row, but Captain Birdseye (Dave) has returned from his Atlantic jaunt and will be with us for our next gig (unless he's decided to go on another voyage!) which is this coming Friday, 7 January. You will see it is billed as being a "Mystery" gig, but it's time to put you all out of your misery - cos we don't want to be playing to a completely empty pub do we?! The madness will be happening at The Windmill in Whitely Green (near Adlington), which has more or less become our traditional opening gig of the year, as we've played there the last 2 Januarys as well. The reason it wasn't billed up before is that it is a birthday bash for Becca, the landlady, and she said that she was worried because we attract so many punters when we play there, and she might end up having to work instead of enjoy herself!! So, we have kept it under out hats for a bit, but now is the time to put the word around; if you fancy a bite to eat, and some good beer (assuming you've got any money left after Christmas!), not to mention a chance to join in with all the old familiar tomfoolery, get yourself down to The Windmill, and savour the opportunity to see a "full strength" D&C!