We’ve been travelling even further than normal recently with a triumphant return to Malaysia’s capital city, Kuala Lumpur.  Last year we visited KL to help promote Scottish culture and tourism with the Scottish Executive, and whilst there we met up with a few members of the Selangor St Andrews Society, including Chieftain Paul Henderson.  The society is based in Kuala Lumpur and the guys went out of their way to show us some great hospitality as well as the sights of this marvellous city.  Little did we know that they had an ulterior motive in trying to entice us back there this year – and it worked!

 

We were returning to perform at the Society’s annual dinner/concert event, something they’ve been gaining quite a reputation for in recent years and, as the Chieftain himself commented, this promised to be the loudest to date!

 

Before reaching Kuala Lumpur though, the guys had also put us in touch with their sister St Andrews Society in Singapore, so it was here we travelled to first to begin our Southern Asian adventure.  Much like footballers travelling to hotter countries, we felt the need for a bit of acclimatisation so when we arrived on the Wednesday, we performed a smaller, more intimate performance at a Scottish themed bar and restaurant.  The temperature certainly took its toll on us but luckily there was lots of cold Scottish beer afterwards to refresh us and make us feel at home!  There was a great turn out and we thank everyone involved, we certainly felt welcome on our first visit to the city.

 

The Thursday was the main event for us in Singapore for the St Andrews Society and they had organised a great nightclub venue for us in the city called Howl at The Moon.   It was a multi national audience with Singapore locals, Australians, Americans, a good dose of Scots and everything else in between.  As the place filled up, the temperature rose, and then kept rising to boiling point as we rocked their Singaporean socks off!  There were enough Saltires flying to almost make us think we were in Scotland (were it not for the temperature!) and the crowd reaction and dancing told us that everyone had a great time.

 

We’d like to thank the manager and all the staff at Howl at the Moon for looking after us and showing us some great hospitality after the gig and also thank Scott, Andy and George for making it happen for us, and also for ensuring we made it to Kuala Lumpur safely!

 

The following morning we made the journey up to KL by bus, which gave us the opportunity to take in the sights of the countryside and, more importantly, catch up on some much needed sleep.  With all the travelling and gigging, we’d never quite allowed our bodies the chance to get used to the time difference!  We were met by the guys from the St Andrews Society who took us to our hotel for a short rest before taking us out again to enjoy the nightlife of KL.  This began with the magnificent views of the city from the Trader’s Hotel’s open air “Sky Bar”, where we met up with a few more of the members of the Selangor St. Andrews Society, before we stopped in for food at the 60^th birthday party of Roger, another of the Society’s members, at the very grand and ancient Royal Selangor Club. Afterwards we moved onto the Hard Rock Café and the rest of the night…

 

The next day we made the very short journey from our hotel rooms to the venue, which was handily enough in the function room of the same hotel and so just involved a journey in a lift downstairs!

 

The society had ensured a fantastic venue for the occasion, with a huge stage for us to jump around on, and ticket sales had gone so well that the whole room was crammed with tables for the dinner. Apparently they had so much interest for the event that they had to turn people away.  After a fantastic meal where we were each at different tables mixing with a huge variety of guests, our intro music kicked in an we rose from our individual positions to make our way through the tables to the stage, drawing in their attention as we did so.  We had been told beforehand that generally when the band starts to play, most of the guests make their way out to the bar and congregate there but on this occasion, hardly a single person left the function room till we had finished our third encore!

 

It was a fantastic night and we thank everyone at the society and everyone that came along to make it so memorable.  A special mention of thanks must go to Carol, who produced the fantastic souvenir programmes for the night, some great work there!

 

On The Sunday, we had some free time before leaving and Paul, Myra and Hector were again kind enough to take us out for some sightseeing and shopping including the Batu Caves, the KL Tower, Chinatown and also the local music store for some extra percussion items!

 

We really thank the society so much for organising this, and also their sponsors for making it possible, to Chieftain Paul and his girlfriend Myra, Hector, Alastair, Carol, Sue and everyone else we met along the way, thankyou and if we all keep our fingers crossed, we’ll see you all again!

 

Back home, after the long, long journey, we had a few days to rest and recuperate, which was certainly needed, then a few wee gigs before flying out again, but this time a much shorter flight, across to the Isle of Man to play for the bike fans of the TT.

 

We had an idea beforehand that a crowd of bikers would be up for a good show, and we certainly weren’t disappointed!  The Isle of Man TT attracts people from all over and as they crammed into the grounds of the Villa Marina we knew we were in for a good time.  The crowd gave as good as they got and I think we had as good a time as they did, if not better!  Thanks to Dawn and Seamus and all his team at the Villa Marina, yet another place that we’d love to return to!

 

We’ve plenty coming up to keep us busy, including a concert at Alness Academy this weekend and Dundee’s Whitehall theatre on the 4^th of July and then more European travels in July.  As always, keep your eye on the website for details of when you can see us live or just generally keep up to date with the all the goings on here in Chilliland, and we’ll see you here again soon!

 

Chillipiper

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