An Interview with Jockey Chang part 2
Tonight’s gig was at King Tut’s in Glasgow.
King Tut's throughout its twelve-year history has been host
to bands including Radiohead, Blur, Travis, Pulp and The Verve before they
reached the heights of music superstardom. It also hosted the first Scottish
gigs for Beck, Crowded House and The Strokes, and created a piece of rock and
roll history as the venue where Oasis were first spotted and signed in 1993! Pulp, Suede, Gomez, Barenaked Ladies,
Catatonia, Beck, Ash, Supergrass, the Charlatans, Deacon Blue, Rae &
Christian and Mercury Rev have also rocked King Tut’s stage, it’s a legendary
place to play in Scotland!
“Let’s Go”. We said for the umteinth time
We left for King Tut’s ahead of schedule as I wanted to go
busking for beer money and Moony wanted to go for a brief walk in the
highlands, we did neither!
What we did find along the way was Hadrian’s Wall,
a wonderful piece of history built by the Roman Empire
dating back to 122AD during the reign of the Roman Emperor Hadrian. They used stone and earth to build this
amazing divide between England
and Scotland. It
stretched across the entire width of Northern England.
The wall was 117 kilometres long and took 6 years to build! Unfortunately now there is little left of
what was once a monumental wall, though you can still see the remains as you
drive across northern England
on certain routes.
Check out the Hadrian’s Wall heritage
sights online for more information.
“Wow look at that” someone chirped with glee.
“That is so beautiful” Someone chirped back.
“We gotta stop there” we all chirped in agreement.
10 seconds later just over the bridge… “Yeah man, look
there’s a coffee shop”
“Wicked I need some more warm food to get rid of this
hangover” I pointed out.
“I’ve made us sandwiches and we’ve got crisps” Moons said in
a pleased manner.
“Wicked, I gotta get something warm too”.
We had just crossed over a single track bridge going over a
breathtaking scene. A beautiful river
ran below the bridge with natural carved hinges in the river bed. There were small tussles of water fighting
over narrowing edges creating calm mini rapids.
The river probably touched on 90ft wide.
On one side was a belt of well aged trees in full splendour. On the other were green lands, the type you’d
find cattle roaming. We parked up in a coffee
shop and nipped in.
“2 egg rolls and tea please” asked Rich.
The shop was quaint, so was the waitress frying our
eggs.
We left the car at the coffee shop and walked back over the
bridge to get to the field side of the river.
‘Private Property’ signs met us just at the top of a rambling
track.
I climbed over the fence heading towards the river with a
little hesitation feeling I could be walking into a bull’s back garden and he
could have been waiting for years for me to cross that fence. Dismissal of signs often occurs when such
beauty is so close to touch; is ignorance acceptable when it means touching Mother
Nature’s fruits, I don’t know and to be honest, we didn’t care.
I was ahead of the boys by twenty or so strides, I was first
over the fence and got a third of the way to the river when I heard it…
“MMMOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!”
My heart froze. Do I
run forward and jump in the river to avoid the Bull that’s close behind me, I
dared not to turn and face my enemy. As
I jumped in the air with surprise I made sure it was in the direction of the
river and as my foot hit the ground I sprinted forward, my heart was going ten
to the dozen, I had instant sweat beads, how could I get out of this? As I
leapt forward I turned my head, eyes wide with anticipation…..
“YOU TWATS!” I shouted
Jimmy D and Benny T were laughing hard.
Jimmy D was the bull.
“That’s not funny dude I nearly jumped in the river”
They laughed harder.
After several minutes my heart rate dropped to normal and we were sat
down dipping our feet and eating snacks.
Half an hour and an expired camera later and we were off back to the
car. Its Glasgow
all the way now, King Tut’s here we come!
You never know what you’re going to find at legendary venues. By this I mean you hear of the most famous
places where all the greats have played through the years of popular music and you
build mental images of the largest most spectacular stage in the world, it’s
not like that in this game.
My first ever London
gig was with my first band called The Weakend.
From months and months of building contact lists of venues, promoters
and record company contacts we finally got a date to play at a venue in
Islington, The Hope & Anchor, through Bugbear Promotions (Tel: 0207
7000550). This was such a big moment for
The Weakend as we were leaving the comforts of rehearsing in our living rooms
and kitchens cheering “thank you Wembley” to each other as we finished each
song, to now taking our music to the world, to London, and to the city you need
to play if you’re gonna make it in music. We thought that then, some will tell
you it’s true now.
I’d read that the Hope & Anchor was very famous in the
mid seventies as one of the must punk/rock venues to play, a few of the bands
you’ll probably recognise that played the stage are The Police, Elvis Costello,
The Stranglers, Madness, U2, The Cure, Joy Division and Ash. The Weakend arrived all nervous but very
excited and from what I remember Damo (our guitarist) had man flu. We parked outside on the loading bay and went
into the pub.
It was a small pub on the corner of the high street, it
looked smaller than expected but ce la vie.
We were soon informed that the venue was downstairs, that’s more like
it, the famous amazing venue was just down these twenty something stairs.
It couldn’t have been further from what I thought a legendary
venue would be.
The room was about twenty feet wide on entrance and maybe
triple the length. It was dark lit with
an equipment room’s walls laden with graffiti.
In the small main room was the world’s smallest stage in the corner which
I doubted if even my drum kit would fit, and the place absolutely stunk of
stale beer… I loved it. It’s hard to note why this place felt a bit
spesh but I felt a little magic down there in this hole of a venue. Maybe it was knowing it’s a reputable place
to play, a place where A n R would go and sit and drink listening to bands they
were tipped as potentials for a cash boost to get them on the ‘full time rock
tour’, or maybe it’s knowing great musicians and co have walked on the same
floors and racked up on the same bit of side wall. I could speculate till the cows come home, it
was what it was, and it still is what it is. If you want to play The Hope &
Anchor ring Bugbear (Tel: 0207 7000550), Marrianna is very helpful.
King Tut’s were very welcoming.
A table was arranged with fresh bread and menus for us.
Upstairs was the backstage room with a fridge full of beers, water, juice,
ginger beer and pepsi, there was also a shower, t.v. coffee machine, sofas and
a table.
Hamfatter were engulfed in poker. I was engulfed in pockets full of beer, soon
to be engulfed in a soup starter followed by a vegetarian pasta dish which, for
five minutes of my life, rocked my world.
Then we played – the gig sounded good.
I was outside rolling up and a woman came and stood next to
me and asked me for a light.
“Got a light?” she asked me.
“Yeah” I answered.
I gave her one.
She hung in the spot for a few moments I could sense she was
looking for some conversation from me. I
didn’t have any, I just wanted my roll up.
Then my lips farted.
“Do you come here often”.
It’s a bit of a shitter but I didn’t care I had no interest
in flirting for a dip in her knickers.
Once the conversation started between us she kept looking at me like I
was answering in a different language. I
stopped speaking, I couldn’t be arsed to feel like a twat for having crap convo. Half an hour later and I’ve grabbed the last
beer from tall fridge in the band room and sat down. Outside the venue was a big sign mounted on
the front wall with King Tut’s wah wah proudly protruding. Opaque were all out front, we had a couple of
band photo’s taken compliments of Rich Hill.
Some time later Mark steamed out front looking pissed off.
“You alright dude?” I asked.
He kinda shook his head in an, I’m not that fussed about
speaking right now, kinda way.
“What’s the matter mate”
“I’m pissed off”
I could tell.
“Why what happened”
“I’ll be alright”
He was soon on the phone to someone, I smoked my fag. Our paths crossed ten minutes later, Mark was
smiling, good.
After the shows we hung around for a while then packed the
van for our next dwelling for the eve. We
were staying in Edingburgh tonight at Jimbo and his partner Abbeys house about
an hour away. Jimbo is a Scottish dude, he does well to live in Edingburgh and
play with the boys based in Cambridge. I like his style.
Due to space restrictions back at their house the group was
split into two, half of the group went to Jimbo’s and Me, Arms, Rainbow, Jimmy
D, Benny T and Rich Hill went to a spare flat which was being viewed at 10 or
11 the next morning so we were politely asked not to fuck it up! ASIF we’d do anything like that. The first floor flat was quite spacious, It
looked quite new and still had a t.v. and video unit in it as well as some
shopping in a bag in the kitchen and a set of golf clubs next to the window in
the living room. From the window were
views of Street lamps, a road and some other flat blocks. It felt good here. Moony, Rich Hill and Arms shot-gunned the
bedroom and we were rulers of the kingdom of the living room. I was agitated and in serious need of some
physical and mental stimulation, I paced wondering what there was I could do,
fighting the boys wasn’t an option as one of us normally ends up with a body
part not working quite as well as it did before, and we need our limbs for the
next few days at least, so what could appease my edge. Within minutes I was playing ‘try to get the
toilet roll onto the office chair with a nine iron’ game. Rich Hill joined in with his Handicap of 11. We couldn’t do it, mainly due to the fact
that there was 6 feet between us and the office chair, and the jejectory required
was hard to obtain from the force required for distance. Hitting a toilet roll
off the ground with a 9 iron to make it sit just 6 feet away on a chair is a
mean feat. I took a few tips on my
Driver swing, it wasn’t long before the boys convinced me that swinging a huge
golf club at 80 miles an hour in a flat was a bad idea. After a moments thought I couldn’t disagree. Me and T-bag nipped out for a swift smoke
before getting our heads down.
There is a phase between sleep and awake, sometimes it is
very hard to differentiate between dream and reality. I was in this half way house when I heard it;
‘wwwhhhhhhhgooooooooooom,
bbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr’
“What the fuck is that?” I said out loud
The room was very dark.
I could barely see my hands in front of my face. Rainbow Jo was also
woken.
“I don’t know it just started it might be the‘Tele’ or
something”
The t.v. was off but underneath it was what appeared to be a
digital recorder type devise.
“Is it that thing” Jo inquisantly caughed.
“yeah probably” I inquisantly answered
We pushed lots of buttons in a typical male fix it fashion
but the sound kept whirling.
“The plug” I said
“I’ll get it” Said Jo
“Can you see it”
“Uurrgh, yeah got it”
pop.
[SILENCE]
“aaarrggh, good shot” I commended his fumbling skills.
“Night man”
“Night”
We slept.
The morning sun shone through the window, we had half an
hour to restore the flat and get the fuck out.
I could imagine it, an estate agent man in a suit with a clip board
coming to show a new couple to one of their ‘prestige flats in a wonderful
location in the city’, as the door opens they see a floor full of beer cans,
and stinking guys in a fart cloud stretched all over the floor making grunting
sounds whilst wheezing in their sleep. SOLD!
Jimbo came round and took us back to his home to wake up
with the other half of our party. The
place was really nice. Abbey and Jimbo
made Vegetarian Sausage Baps, Eggs, Toast and Tea for the clan, it was proper
lush, it was a welcomed surprise to have had good warm breakfasts each day so
far, we were living like kings and I felt it.
There was none of the ‘eat breakfast while you shop’ antics that I’ve so
often had to embrace.
The sun was shining we had been blessed with yet another
gorgeous day to fulfil. I noticed above
the sink there was a china plaque 12” x 12” approx. It was a ‘my first prints’ of their little
son’s hands and feet, he is just over a year old.
We all ate and talked, drunk tea and scratched our heads.
Jack entered the living room with;
“Has anyone got a needle and thread?”
I had a look in my bag, I’d bought some specifically to sew my
button back on my shorts, since then the needles had vanished.
“What’s it for?” I asked.
Jack turned around and bent over, slightly cocking his left
leg.
“ooow” i laughed.
He had a massive whole in his ass. The seam on Jacks Jeans it seems couldn’t
hack the pace, the jean company obviously hadn’t catered for the power of
Jack’s trumpet.
“I have a couple of spare pairs if there any good to you”. I
said.
Like a Debenham’s show boy I displayed Jacks options from my
holdall.
“There’s these, or a pair of shorts I’ve already worn, or
these jeans?”
The jeans were very new.
“Are you sure that it’s ok to borrow a pair?”
“Of coarse dude your jeans are fucked, any of them is fine I
have a few pairs”
“I’d probably say the jeans if that’s ok” favoured Jack
“Here, no worries”
“Thanks, I’ll sort you them out on Saturday” he smiled
(Saturday is the last date of the tour)
“Cool”.
Jack is about a foot shorter than me, the jeans just about
fit with a belt and the legs rolled up.
I went and smoked a fag on the top of the concrete stairs
outside the front door, the stairs led down to a little alley where about twenty
other houses stairs met. Just 10 feet
from the alley was the side road. I
finished my burn and went back inside and hung out in the kitchen, Eoin had
just woken. He was well pissed last night. I drove back in the van with the Hamfatter
crew, one minute Eoin was sat next to me in the front, the next thing I saw was
his knees fly by me as he dove in the back of the van crowd surfing the knees
of the front row rear passengers. I
didn’t know what was going on I was swaying more than the van but it sounded
fun.
Eoin woke up with smiles despite being a one man brewery the
night before. I made him an egg roll,
without butter, and a cup of black coffee to kick start his day. He was quite quiet through a lot of our week
together. I take him as a thinker,
always thinking about what’s going on and the next thing he’ll be doing.
Just after breakfast at Jimbo’s something bad happened;
I’m minding my own business staring in the kettle/frying pan
direction when
[SSSSSSSSMMMMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]
My shoulders raised, your body goes into that strange
position sometimes with a loud noise, your shoulders head up towards your ears and
your arms come up into the Michael Jackson ‘Thriller’ position. Speaking of Arms he was also in the room near
the door and Joe had his hands in the sink washing a few plates. I spun on the spot and looked down. The horror hit me, it was the ‘my first
prints’ plaque. My hands cupped my mouth
and my eyes stretched just like in the films as I let out an “oooooooh
ssshhhhhiiiiitt” in a whisper.
Joe turned around he thought a plate had fallen off of the
side board. Arms new what it was.
“oh my god, oh fuck” I whispered
I was gutted but poor Arms stomach must have been in the
flat below and his heart in the flat above.
The plaque that had smashed once sat upon two nails loosely hammered
into the wooden architrave beside the kitchen window. Arms noticed the angle of the nails was only
slightly above the 45 degree angle required to hold a plaque against a
wall. He pushed the nail in a bit more
with his fingers for a better angle and tighter fixing. As he turned and walked away the nail dropped
below 45 degrees, and plaque had a swift introduction to floor. It smashed into pieces. If you’ve ever had kids you’ll know that
things like kids first prints are priceless, even if you haven’t had kids
you’re probably aware of the sentimental value something like that holds as
they are true ‘one-offs’ and are made from the stuff most and closest in ones
heart. Not that this was a time to lay
guilt on poor Arms, to be honest it was probably due to fall sometime soon
anyway. I was amazed it had stayed up
there for that long, any way, what how when where and why were not the issues
before us, the issue was how the fuck do we tell Abbey and Jimbo we’d smashed
their priceless plaque?
I thought Jimbo would be gutted, but I thought it was going
to really upset Abbey, I was sad even thinking about her seeing it. Arms took the notion to go and call Jimbo
into the kitchen with the classic…
“urgh Jimbo, can I have a word?”
“yeh sure”
Jimbo looked a bit curious, his eyes told the story.
I was waiting for a few of us to be swiftly evicted through
the kitchen window, thankfully Jimbo kept his cool.
“I think we can stick it together” said Arms
Fortunately each foot and hand had smashed into its own
section, not in their entirety but it was possibly the best smash that could
have happened. Jimbo went and got Abbey,
the mum of the young artist.
I needn’t tell you she was gutted, Arms explained why and
how it happened and also that is was salvageable due to the good nature of the
smash. Joe stood there quietly at the
sink, sensibly.
This took me back to a similar thing that happened years
ago. As teenagers a group of us were
round my friend Damon’s house in Orton Malborne in Peterborough. Damon used to do freestyle karate and had the
pads so we used to spar, it was all good fun.
One day we were in his living room, it was me verses Hick, we could only
find one pair of boxing mitts so I took the left hand and he took the
right.
Jab, jab, dodge…………SMASH!
”Of fuck in hell dude look what you did” someone shouted at Hick
“It wasn’t me” Hick said
“It wasn’t me” I said
“You knocked it with your shoulder” I said to Hick
“You hit me towards it” He said back
On the floor lay what once was an ornamental plate that
faced the room from the shelf.
“Where can we get one of these from Damon?” I was hoping he
could say “ah we’ve got three, the others are just in that drawer” but of
coarse there were no spares.
“Dunno, maybe a magazine, I’m not sure” replied Damon.
We picked up the pieces.
Damon’s dad was a cool cat, Over the years he’s been nicknamed different
things but my favourite was Dave ‘The Pen’ Macdonald, he likes to write. Under the advice of Damon we thought it best
to not say anything and see if ‘The Pen’ noticed.
He noticed.
“Where’s that ornamental plate Damon?” asked Dave.
“What plate” said Damon
“The one on that shelf” served Dave
”I don’t know what your talking about dad”
“Well it can’t just disappear”
I was a sucker for the truth as a child, a few times things
had been broken round at Damon’s and I would buckle in no time and part with
the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, well, something like
that.
Once upon a time we fought over who was going to use the
downstairs toilet first, instead of offering it each other we ended up in a
full scale wrestling match in this down scale ring. Damon had secured him self with his arse on
the sink, one foot on my back and the other doing twirls, I was facing the door
pushing back with every last bit of might I had to try to secure my place on
the toilet.
“wwhhhump”
“Wait Gav”
“WHOOOOMMP”
“SHIT”
Water started gushing out from behind the sink.
“What shall we do?” we both stared clueless.
“Ask the neighbours, they’ll know”
We were two schoolboys with an elemental knowledge of
domestic plumbing and in a new situation such as this, we were fit for nothing
but bad language and knocking for help.
It was a good five minutes before the main inlet tap was turned off by
which time the downstairs hallway was flooded as was the kitchen slightly,
thankfully they had kitchen tiles. We
borrowed a VAX machine from the neighbour, we planned to soak up the water from
the floors and carpet, put the carpet outside to dry and put it back to rights
before Barbara came home. Barbara,
Damon’s mum, was such a beautiful woman, so lovely, but if she caught wind of
this we thought we’d get a proper bollocking.
We couldn’t dry the carpet in time but we drained the excess water out
of it and laid it back in the hallway, and we couldn’t fix the sink either so
we had only one option. Fib.
Before Barbara could ask we came out with it.
“I was just washing my hands and the sink fell off the wall”
Damon presented with sincerity.
I still laugh now when I think about it.
“Fell off the wall?”
“Yeh I’d just been to the toilet and as I was washing my
hands I turned the tap on and the sink fell off the wall and water started
spraying everywhere” said Damon
“Gavin what happened”
“mm what he said, yeh”
“Ok we’ll ring the council and ask if they’ll come and fix
it”
They came the same day as the house was without water, Damon
and I were stood in the doorway watching the man fix the sink thinking ‘fuck we
got out of this one by the skin of our teeth’.
“Blimey, you must have been jumping on this to pull this off
the wall like this” said the intrigued plumber.
We both looked at each other with half smiles.
“Nah, it just fell off we just washed our hands”
Thinking back the guy must have known we’d been pratting
about, but he mended it all the same.
Accidents happen.
Arms and I poodled down to the local supermarket where we
found Super glue. We got back to the
house and Arms begun the task of sticking the ‘my first plaque’ together. We (Opaque) said our good byes and headed for Edinburgh
centre for a quick look around and a photo with the bagpipe man [pictured]. As
the other boys busked I found a beautiful harpist. The harp is so beautiful, admittedly so are
normally the ladies playing them, but what it comes down to is a magical tone
from the strings, they make you laugh, and by spectrum they’ll make you cry. I got ten minutes shut eye string drunk then
headed back over to the boys who’d found a nice arch under which they busked on
the main street drag in Edinburgh centre.
We sunk a beer in the nearest bar on another sunny day, sat
on a table outside next to the footpath. My chair was just into the lines of
the streaming people walking by. I had
the hot seat. If you imagine being a
turtle floating in the clear blue oceans in the midst of shoals of fish
swimming past, in the opposite direction, I was that turtle on Edinburgh high
street. After fishing for half an hour
we left the café-bar, jumped in the car and headed back into England
for our next show at Fibbers in York.
We got there late and the management were flapping about us
having to go on first because we had missed soundcheck.
No we are not driving around the country to play to one deaf
guy at the bar!
“We’re billed on for 9 15 mate its only 8 we’ll line check
and play at our billed time”
“The local support have gone off now though, cause you
wasn’t here we told em they can have your slot”
BOLLOCKS! We
disapproved and recommended they try to contact the band to get there asses
back to the venue and get on stage in 15 minutes but they we not obtainable.
We were left with a choice to do nothing but play at 8 15 to
the deaf guy. Oh well shit happens
sometimes! He clapped all the same. As
we played it slowly filled.
The local guys that swooped our spot (and we think all the
beers too) had a pretty full room to play to.
What was there name again?? They were nice guys backstage, filling Benny
T and I with generous quantities of Jack Daniels straight from the bottle neck.
For three minutes of their gig they gave
the crowd drums, bass and guitars with the repeated vocal – “know what I’m sayin”,
“you know what I’m saying”. We laughed
hard, not because it was shit, it was just funny, and I was mesmerised by the
size of the drummer. I hadn’t seen them
before they got on stage, I came in when they were a song into their show, I
kept pointing out to Benny and Rich how huge the drummer was. I’d never seen such a big musician, every
time he hit the cymbals the room shook, I mean this guy was a hard hitter, no
retreat, no surrender and definitely no prisoners. He was hitting like it was the new and last
source of renewable energy. I laughed
with amazement at the power and size of this guy. The Drum kit appeared like a child’s toy
version from toys R us. I repeatedly
commented on how enormous this guy looked.
The band finished and when they came back stage I realised what a big
bastard I am, I was taller than this giant, sometimes you forget.
Hamfatter rocked again, Its Labrador
shit man.
Moony had other commitments tonight involving driving back
to Peterborough with Jimmy D. Benny
and I were far from ready to head back to the Boro, with one more night out on
the road and the mini tour finale tomorrow in Cambridge’s Soul Tree. We cleared the decks after the show and
jumped in the van with the Hamf Crew heading for Wakefield,
tonight we were heading to Bill, Michelle’s and Nanny Jimbo’s.
Nanny Jimbo lived in a beautiful flat on the ground floor of
their splendour of a home. Bill and I
drunk beer, well I drunk beer, lots and lots of beer, and we talked about music
and the fish that swam in circles at the top of the stairs next to the guitar
amps and effects pedals, Bill’s a cool guy, a guitarist/bass player too. I started to flag and I could see the wrong
side of my eyes as they rolled, as much as I didn’t want to be rude by leaving
any hospitable beers left, I could drink no more.
They had a tiny child size piano built by Bills granddad in
the upstairs hallway. Despite begging
for a restoration it still sang a little tune, Benny was enthralled and enjoyed
a wee tinkle before we were shown to our sleeping quarters. Half of us were shown to beds upstairs and
the rest of us were shown downstairs to Nanny’s flat, we tip toed around like
teenagers trying to sneak in at night, we were directed to the last room in the
hallway. It had original dated oil paintings on the walls, an adult size piano,
a few trinkets, two blow up beds and a setee.
Rainbow Jo and I claimed the blow ups as Benny snuggled into the
sofa. Just before we slept T-bag and I found
our way back into the courtyard for one last puff. We slept.
We met Nanny in the hall the following morning;
“You’re the quitest rock band I’ve ever met” she remarked.
I laughed but almost felt failed as a wanna be rock star.
Where was the enormous pile of cocaine?
Where were the numerous ladies flashing?
Where were the arrests?
Where was the violent vomiting and waking up in bushes in
the completely wrong towns??
It’s happened before, and I’m sure it is only round the
corner but for this venture, we were good grandchildren.
Benny, Rainbow Jo and I walked our feast of vegetarian and
sausage sandwiches off with a gentle stroll to find a nearby mill which was
“just down the road there”. After half an
hours walk we come to the conclusion it was “just down the other road”.
What we did find was
a sheared rock face overlooking miles and miles of farmland with the clash of industrial
units which from afar looked a little like a train docking station. With a little squint, a mile high signal
receiver stretched high into the clouds on a far away field. Behind us sat the rock face with a decades
worth of spray paint blanketing its jagged edges. At the very top of the rock face HOLLYWOOD
was cast in bright letters. We climbed
to the top. We climbed back down.
Our good byes came soon after our return to Bill and
Michelle’s and Nanny Jimbo’s and a brief gathering for some group photo’s
together left us with one voyage left to end this week. In two and a half hours time we will be in Cambridge’s
Soul Tree sound checking for the homecoming.
There were roomers of Soul Tree being sold out for Hamfatter’s big
return to their home town after their two week tour and we had some friends
coming up which was excitable, but the looming end to this week was quite
sad. I love being on the road, I hate
four walls surrounding me and during the drive back to Cambridgeshire I
couldn’t help but feel and know that soon our adventure was soon to end. Sad feelings were quickly put in the side
pocket, there is no room for negative to seep in yet, we still had one last
show of the week and we were going to make sure that we rocked it to the hilt! We arrived in good time. Free beers and a bar top of varying snacks
greeted us at the 2nd floor venue.
Our friends Fre3 piece, a top hip hop/mellow groove band, arrived from London
ready for their show tonight, they seemed in good spirits. Check out www.myspace.com/fre3peace for some
of their funkygrooveliscious music.
We all rocked it tonight, the crowd loved it, energy breeds energy
and as a finale goes, it was a brilliant end to a most enjoyable week on the
road. Jamie Turner did a wonderful job
arranging this tour and in getting Hamfatter to where they were now with doors
opening for a prospective future for them in music. Arms was a natural tour manager, at only
twenty two years old I hope to see this guy filling this role again, superglue included.
To Rainbow Jo, smoke on man!
After sharing a week with these guys I was very hopeful they
would be successful in their plight, good guys, good music, good laughs and good
memories, Hasta Luego Compañeros.
Jamie, I need my pillow m8.
Eoin, my tuner dude.
and Jack if your reading this, I need my jeans man.
Till Then....X
chops '08