My Exciting Life In ROCK (part 1): 19/2/2000 - The Boardwalk, Sheffield

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I wouldn't like to give the impression that all my gigs have been drunken disasters. This one, for instance, was a drunken TRIUMPH!

The Pop-A-Go-Go All-Dayer (for such it was) was the first time I ever played in Sheffield, all thanks to a rag tag band of survivors who I always thought of as The Velodrome Lot on account for most of them being in the band Velodrome 2000. When I first met them I was thoroughly DOWN about all aspects of gigs, as nothing much was happening for me in Leicester and I was FED UP of hanging round with the same old people, and so they were a GLEAMING BEACON OF HOPE - funny, enthusiastic, down to earth, and generally GRATE at GIGS. THUS I'd been looking forward to this for a LONG time, not just for the gig itself, but because I knew they'd all be there.

I had to arrive early as Penny, who ran these all-dayers, had asked me to COMPERE . For some reason ALL promoters, even otherwise LOVELY and BRAINY ones, believe that if you're able to stand on a stage on your own and play a guitar then you must ALSO be able to stand on stage and seamlessly bind an entire evening's entertainment together, taking the audience by the hand from one act to the next, dazzling them with witty remarks and building the whole loose collection of artistes into a festival, a happening, an EVENT. In this belief they are incorrect, at least as far as I'm concerned. Every time I've done it I've discovered that the HILARIOUS REMARKS I had planned can be described as STUPID at best, ACTUALLY OFFENSIVE at worst. It's fine when I'm talking about ME, as if it all gets too much I can at least launch into a song to cover it up, but when it's OTHER people I'm supposed to be talking about... well, lets be honest, if I was THAT interested in talking about other people I would never have joined a band!

Some NAUGHTY promoters do it because it's a REALLY easy way of fobbing off the solo artiste. Instead of saying "Yeah, we care so little for you that if you absolutely HAVE to sing a song we'd like you to do it while other people who are MUCH more valuable to us than YOU take down or set up their gear behind you and the entire audience has gone for a WEE" they say "Hey! We'd love you to do a few songs BETWEEN acts, you can be the compere!" It's just more polite, I guess. Doing songs as well makes it an even MORE thankless task, as even if you do REALLY WELL and everyone starts singing along and DANCING then you have to get off the stage and let someone else come on and take advantage of THE GOOD TIMES. Handily this hardly EVER happens and usually you play to the backs of everybody dashing to the bar/toilet, accompanied by the doleful sound of a snare drum, being checked.

HAPPILY this was a GLARING exception to the norm - probably because it was Sheffield, where all is JOY. I started the day by doing a whole proper SET, which garnered the BEST kind of reaction: Reaction From GURLS! One young lady came over and said the song "The Peterborough All-Saints Wide Game Team (group B)" had reminded her of someone she knew from Peterborough, who was unable to operate a clutch. All right then. Not QUITE the sort of thing I was after, but she WAS still a LADY, and at that point in my life talking to such exotic creatures was a RARE TREAT. Shortly afterwards ANOTHER came towards me. "THIS could be IT!" I thought, in the way that the Long-Term Celibate often will. "You were very brave," she said, "it must be scary up there - you looked absolutely terrified!" Perhaps "terrified" was Sheffield street slang for "really sexy"?

Shortly after THAT a bloke came over and asked me for my web address! In these days of blue-tooth enable toothbrushes that may seem entirely unremarkable, but back in the year 2000 it was the first time this had EVER happened, and we BOTH jiggled excitedly at the sheer MODERNITY of our interaction. My webpage address, like so MANY at the time, included a TILDE (this thing ~), it was something I very much enjoyed saying. In the rush to the future, I fear we have abandoned the humble tilde, and I for one mourn its loss. TILDE!

The day progressed DELIGHTFULLY, with me popping up between the acts to sing COVERS like "Back For Good" and "Ooh Stick You" and GRASPING the chance to sing some of my own songs where relevant. At that time there was a band called Vyvyan who were one of those bands ARCHLY "manufactured" by middle-aged men who really SHOULD have better things to occupy their time - LONDON, and by extension the music press, was RIDDLED with them, and they were all AWFUL. They might well have been TERRIBLY AMUSING when thought up in a Soho Cellar, but brought into the light of Actually Happening they were always RUBBISH. Another example was GABBA - Abba songs, sung by The Ramones!! AAHAHA! Julian, that's BRILLIANT! COCAINE FOR ALL! I went to see them and yes, it was VAGUELY JOLLY for the first couple of songs, but INTENSELY TIRESOME half an hour later when they did the extended version of "Knowing me, knowing you - OI!"

Anyway, the GAG about Vyvyan was that they were GIRLS! YOUNG GIRLS! DOING PUNK! Oh Tristan, please, I'm laughing so hard my SNOOD has fallen off! They themselves may well have been perfectly nice, but the MENAGERIE of SNIGGERING GITS around them were intensely annoying. Like all the SMUG WAZZOCKS that this sort of thing attracts they were HUMMING with the sure knowledge that they were about to BLOW THE TINY MINDS of the YOKELS with their LONDON IRONY. As usual, the band went on and were met with stony faced indifference, gradually changing to vague resentment and, it being Sheffield, CUDDLY FORGIVENESS. I went on straight afterwards and did "Bands From London (Are Shit)" and got the BIGGEST APPLAUSE OF THE DAY.

After that things went a bit blurry - I have a clear memory of a sing-along in the backstage room (which was bigger than most venues I play) with a PHALANX of WOMEN playing BONGOES. It's the sort of thing that sticks in the mind. There was BEER and DANCING and SHOUTING and every so often I'd stagger out to the front and say the name of a band. After a while I was gently asked if I'd mind not playing any more songs, as they were running short of time. I think perhaps they were being polite, as I'd long since lost control of my Chord Fingers, and anyway, it was soon time for me to stagger off to the tram and make my weary way home.

Since then Penny's asked me back to play at every all-dayer she's organised - I can only guess that she offended a local COVEN who CURSED her with my presence for evermore, and am extremely grateful to them for doing so, as they've always been TREMENDOUS fun although none, as yet, have featured any more MASSED BONGO WOMEN.

Sheffield: that's a HINT.

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