Tonight the river rats sail again. Here some memories from last year. 

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It all started on a rainy day in Feburary last year when I took a walk down to Nambucca - now sadly deceased. I walked up those familiar old dusty stairs passed the many little smokey rooms and corridors to Jay’s ‘ study’ on the top floor - awash with unwashed plates and scattered pieces of paper. I sat down on the old leather sofa, lit a cigarette and started to tell Jay about this idea I had. So, said Jay, ‘ we’re talking boats today’.

The idea would depend upon rounding up as many London bands as could possibly be persuaded to spend a week together in the cramped and clostrophobic cabins of boats they didn’t know how to sail in a bid to navigate our way down the Thames playing a host of shows in quick sucession - for free. It sounded pretty far out - pub talk - fantasy stuff. 

But Jay being Jay liked the idea from the off. His ears pricked up straight way but not, perhaps, as quickly as did Ally Wolf’s who happened to be sitting at a computer screen in the corner.  He turned around on his swivel chair - 

‘ We’ve got a barge. What you guys talking about exactly ?’. 

I’m not a superstitious man but it was one of those moments that smacked of destiny. Ally was managing a band called Six Nation State - five minutes later he was already on the phone to Keon - their tour manager who along with Philly - his fiance - had been gutting, stripping and renovating a 70ft barge in a warehouse somewhere out of town. We got to work straight away.

Finding The river rats.

The first thing was to find the bands - and to find the right bands. We had to assemble a pack of musicians ready to work hard, bear long hours, harsh weather conditions and a whole lot of hendonism - who would be ready to put all egos aside and to become, for at least one week, a crew.

After myself and Jay  the first band on board was Six Nation State - all five of the sweaty bastards and thier sweet melodic gypsy punk. Next in was Jack from Naked and the Boys - an old comrade from adventures past with whom I’d thrown the idea around a couple of times as we sat freezing on the embankment with cans of cheap flat beer. Next in - cue a chap named Josh Weller I’d met down at the Bronze club where the two of us had been hanging out for many drunken Friday nights over the winter months. He was followed closely by the hosts of Bronze Club themselves The Golden Silvers.  Due to spacial restrictions Gwil Golden stood in to play solo.

Next up was a man by the name of Derek Meins I’d met and played with in my Brighton days. He’d come down to Brighton after his band The Eastern Lains split and was now recording his first album and running a night in soho called The Soapbox. Jay went on to recrute Jay Jay Pistolet. Justin was game too. It was coming together piece by piece. 

It felt a little bit like rounding up The Magnificent Seven - or so at least it felt to me and Ally as we sat over a table of beers in Hoxton bars throwing names around, pouring over maps of Thames and despearatly going over equasions - calculating distances, speeds, numbers of locks - trying to work out long it was gonna take us to get from town to town- something totally fucking unknowable as it depended on so many variables - yet totally fucking crucial to the whole enterprize. 

We were feeling pretty good about the crew but needed one more act. I gave my friend Jamie a ring. He turned me on to a band called Mumford and Sons. I vaguely remembered having played with Marcus at The Bosuns a year or so back on one of those many cramped folk nights and knew Ben from communion nights  but hadnever seen the guys play as a band. I was blown away. We didn’t even meet with them about it. I think Ally gave someone a ring. They were in and we had found the River Rats. 

 

The Departure. 

The day finally rolled around. After a raucous gig at Dingwalls the six nation barge left Camden heading south. Early the next morning myself, isla macleoud, Derek Meins and Rob Mavers arrived at quiet little boat yard in Oxford and were shown aboard our 70ft narrow boat. Half an hour later Jack and the Mumford boys turned up and , much to the consternation of the yard owner, began loading in endless banjos, acordians, guitars, fancy dress outfits, bizzare hats and crates upon crates of booze. 

After reassuring the owner that we knew exactly what we were doing we proceeded to crash his boat straight into the opposite bank very very slowly - then after a greta efforst we managed to turn it and crasjh very very slowly into the next bank. We left him looking white as a ghost as we merrily waved from the decks. 

Cruising down the Oxford canal was beautiful - all dappled light making patterns in the shimmering water. We soon got the hang of the old locks and were working as a team - throwing ropes to each other - hoping from boat to shore like old hands, winding back the big gates to let the river in and out. Marcus mumford was quite a sight in his top hat and waistcoat - looking like he just stepped right out of a Dickens novel and onto the oxford canal - Derek Meins sitting back in his boating hat and deck chair and sipping cider.

By the time we pulled in at night fall we felt like an old gang and all very easy in each others company. Jack put a pot on the stove and started cooking up a big vegetable stew - Ben chopping vegetables, Isla running aorund with her camera snapping everything and filling everyones glasses with endless wine. Marcus and Derek sitting smoking on the cabin - Mavo and Ted twanging away on a twelve string and a banjo in the bedrooms. 

We all sat down to a meal together and toasted the trip ahead - feeling very warm and pleased with ourselves and thinking what a civiliszed little outing this was turning out to be. A few bottles later things were getting a little rowdier. Wraps were getting opened and the licqour we had been planning to save was already rolling. We poured out of the boat and decided to explore the woods around the shore. After awhile Derek and Mavo came back having found an abandoned barn somwhere down the river. So it was that we spent the rest of the night having our own barn dance - climbing rafters to the ceiling, throwing hay around and swaping instruments and smokes. Sure enough our plans to get to bed early, wake up early and stay sober - had evaporated with the coming dawn. We stumbled back to the boat barely still able to stand up right.

Dave - a friend of Keon’s from the other boat - had kindly offered to come along with us on the down river trip. As the only one with any real experience he had been manning the tiller all day and had wisely turned in early. We decided that we would ‘ surpirze’ him by heading off down the river before he woke up and showing him how much progress we had made. Well surprize him we did. Poor Dave woke up having been thrown violently out of his bunk by an almighty crash into the bank. The tiller broke straight off and without any steering and not really knowing how the fuck to stop the thing we were surfing up and down the banks - zig zgaging form left to right in a drunken down stream stagger. The only way we found that we could stop the thing from running aground and flooding was to have four or five of us up at the front with poles pushing away at the oncoming banks. Poor Dave ran out on deck in his boxers and shouted ‘ what the fuck do you think your doing ?’ Someone up front shouted back - ‘ we’re making time !’. 

So now a big fuck off storm break out and we’re stuck and broken down in the middle of nowhere. We’re missing the tools we need for Dave to fix the engine. Derek remembers that his friend and producer - Iain - live somewhere on the river and bikes off into the storm to find his house. We don’t hold up much hope but he re - emmerges wet to the bone half an hour later with a tool box and Dave struggling and cursing manages to get the thing back running and we’r e off again - all feeling a little shaky by now.

The water in the rive rising fast and we’re picking up a fair pace now. We pass through a lock and the lock keeper gives us a little card that politely informs us that our insurance is no longer valid and that there are ‘ lethal currents’ down stream. He asks us if our boat company had given us permission to continue and we tell him they have. David Bowie is blaring from the cabin and we are all wide eyed in ridiculous colored hats. He waves us on not having the faintest clue what to do with us. 

It’s at this point that Dave asks us for the maps. What maps ? It’s just ...well straight down river isn’t it ? You just go straight ? Apparently not. Dave is starting to get a little incredulous at all us wavering idiots who have still not slept - trying to man this boats through a storm. The only maps around are some kinda picturesque wall maps dated 1863. We all gather round trying to make out the tiny names on the chart but pathetically our vision is so blurred from excessive...everything...that we can’t read a word. In the end we al stand on deck and when islands suddenly emmerge out of the rain and Dave shouts ‘ left or right ?’ ….. ‘ letf or right you fuckers !’ - we make split moment decisions  - “ left !...no right ! ...right !’ and when big fallen trees appear in our path or we see ourselves suddenly heading fast for a dead end we run for barge poles and all heave and push to correct our trajectory. 

By the time mid day rolls around some of us are nervous wrecks. Me and Ben stand on deck and watch a weir approach out of the storm a big sign reads ‘ danger of death’ as the boat veers away from the weir and bangs hard against the edge. We all take it in turns to get some sleep but are routinely woken up by someone crashing or stalling. At one point Marcus take us headlong into a lock and we are all literally thrown from our bunks. I run up on deck in a panic thinking we might be about to sink. 

Later that evening thought, after I awake from an hour’s sleep, the sun is starting t creep through the clouds and there is an air or calm now on deck - people are sitting aorund smoking cigarettes and dipping their toe sin the water. Sure enough soon we are coming into the meeting point at Henley - in fact we are coming in a little bit too fast. I have to jump from the end of the boat to pull us in before we crash headlong into the six nation boat which has just pulled in from the other direction. I almost don’t suceed and the tour nearly ends with a  head on collision on day one.    

The shows - 

The first show we played everyone played a very neat 9 different sets with speedy change overs. By day two all sets had merged and nine bands had become one river rat band with everyone playing on each others songs. 

After playing to packed out sweaty bars and clubs in riverside towns we would roll back to the boats for big river side parties and jams that had the boast rocking back and forth dangerously low in the water with their over crowded loads. 

Days were spent wandering through posh towns like Henley and freaking out the local residents with our outlandish costumes ( straight out of Isla's wardrobe) and guitars slung over shoulders. One day in Henley David Cameron turned up to give a speech to his Tory heartland supporters and instead found twenty or so fuckheads in capes and top hats. Mr.Cameron couldnt take his eyes of Josh Weller's towering hairdo all the way through his speech on ' stealth tax'. Meanwhile secret service people surrounded us watchfully. 

We wander back to the boat. Gerry is frying up a barbeque. Josh and Jay are lying on the roofs of the boat debating about wether that was or wasnt a kestral that just flew overhead. The mumford boys are working out a new song on the river bank. Derek  is talking to some girls on the grass who stayed over after the show last night. Niel and Lexy are in hard hats seranading  bemused passers by with guitars. Isla is walking around in her fur coat snapping everything in site with her camera. A stray dog is helping it's self to our left overs while ducks and geese bob by on the river. 

The tour continues down river. In abbingdon we get beaten up by bouncers who accuse us of dealing drugs and launch themselves at us  on stage half way through a song - assaulting derek who is sitting behind the drums quietly. By Oxford half of us are ill and vomiting - Derek has been lying on his bunk for two days with a sauce pan balanced on his stomach. I have to ride down to the venue with my head out the window like a sick dog. Debauchery has taken its toll somewhat. However the final show proves the best of the whole  tour. 

At the end of the week we all leave the boats a little shell shocked - not quite believing that its all over. It had been quite a week - no arguments, no egos, no drownings, no electrocutions, only one fist fight, not too many crashes - just love, good times and good music.

 It can be done,

We leave again tommorow with a host of new bands - for more info go to myspace/riverrats or click the banner at the top of this page. 

much love

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