Blog: Brighton

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Travelling into London Town on a Saturday may be a bit odd, but doing it on a SUNDAY at the moment is a clear mark of INSANITY. As detailed before, right now North East London (or "my manor", to use the correct local terminology) is TOTALLY unserved by rail tranport on Sundays, with the Central, Victoria AND Overground being switched off. This means you have to either a) get a Rail Replacement Bus that take FORTY FIVE MINUTES to do a train journey that normally takes FIVE b) wait for a local bus which does it more quickly but goes no more often than on a normal Sunday and will be PACKED due to lack of other options or c) try and WALK to the transport infrastructure.

I chose Option C and got within ten minutes of TRAINS before a bus eventually came. It was nice to find it so do-able and ALSO meant I had BURNT CALORIES which could later be recharged with BEER.

A tube, a train and a delightful STROLL towards the seaside saw me at Brighton Seafront Travelodge and in a room with an Actual Genuine view of the SEA. I was there to support The Fighting Cocks, who themselves were meant to be supporting the chap who was also meant to be promoting the evening. I say "meant to" because when I got to the venue I saw absolutely NO sign whatsoever that the gig was actually occuring - never mind flyers or posters, we weren't even on the MASSIVE gig list that took up most of an entire wall of the downstairs bar!

Upstairs I met Charlie and his fellow Fighting Cocks, who were Trying Not To Be Cynical - the promoter had texted that morning to say he wouldn't be playing, as he'd been called away on an Emergency, and that we'd need to take charge if we still wanted to do the gig. Not Being Cynical was made a LITTLE difficult by the aforementioned total absence of any sign that ANYBODY would know about the gig, but we tried our very best.

After popping out for PROPER CHIPS (surprisingly difficult to find - Brighton seems to be FULL of Kebab Shops but precious few Proper Chippies. At the SEASIDE?!?) I returned to find we had an AUDIENCE, in the ever charming shape of Mr Jimmy From The Bobby McGees. When it came to SHOWTIME he, Leon The Soundman and The Fighting Cocks formed a seated circle while I did THIS:

I Did A Gig In New York

My Theory Of A Dinosaur Planet

Here Come The Dinosaurs

My Grandad Is Nuts

My Theory Of A Dinosaur Planet (REPRISE)

(theme from) Dinosaur Planet

Boom Shake The Room

I started off with I Did A Gig In New York because it had THEMATIC RESONANCE with the evening in progress i.e. there may not have been a Proper Audience but there were still GOOD TIMES to be had, and with that in mind I ended up thoroughly enjoying myself. I decided to have a go at a chunk of Dinosaur Planet, with a couple of songs making DEBUTS, and I'm starting to discover that there are JOKES to be had. I think it may actually work!

Once I was done Jimmy, Leon and I were treated to a PRIVATE SHOW by The Fighting Cocks, and it was MAGNIFICENT. This was the final date on a week long National Tour, and it SHOWED - they're always a FANTASTIC live proposition, but this time they made it all look EASY. It was especially GRATE to see DJ ASSASSIN on the WHEELS OF STEEL at the back, and also DANCING AROUND. I felt privileged to be watching one of the GRATEST Live Acts currently available, especially sat alongside one of the OTHER ones. The Fighting Cocks: GO see them!

With the business of the evening concluded we said our farewells and Jimmy escorted me up the road to The Evening Star, a completely BRILLIANT pub that I've walked within METRES of on many occasions without realising it was there. We had DELICIOUS BEER, topping off what was actually a pretty GROOVY evening out in Brighton town. Going to do Gigs is GRATE!

posted 30/3/2009 by MJ Hibbett

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