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Blog: Weekend: LARGE
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It started off fairly quietly with me standing outside a building in Bloomsbury... for FOUR HOURS. I'd (theoretically) POPPED into town for the afternoon to go to the Alan Moore signing at Gosh, and arrived at 2pm to find NO queue outside the shop. "Oh good!" I thought, "I'll be straight in and out!" But then I got closer and saw that, down the side of the shop, there was a MASSIVE queue coming out of a side door. I walked along it, turned the corner, and found it went all the way down the next street, AROUND the corner and then most of the way back almost to the front of the shop. YIKES! Happily i found Mr Dave Green and Mr Ben Moor, so stood chatting with them and ended up being there for the aforesaid FOUR HOURS! By the time we got in it had been agreed that things needed Speeding Up, so I only had a minute or so to tell The Great Man that it was ME who did Alan Moore Song last year. We shook hands like GENTLEMEN, I said "Thank you" properly, and pretty much FLED, GRATEFUL for not being there long enough to make a tit of myself. It was, i think, worth the wait, tho i did feel a bit sorry for Kevin O'Neill - he is UTTERLY GRATE but most of us were a bit too over-excited about seeing Alan Moore in the flesh to give him as much time.
On Sunday The Monday Of My Bank Holiday Weekend and I nipped into town again, this time to spent quality time in a PUB with The Hewitts, who were celebrating their tenth wedding anniversary. TEN years! How can people younger than ME have been MARRIED for a whole decade? They seemed very WELL on it I must say, and we had a lovely time before having to dash off to Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes, where I was due to play with The PopArt Allstars.
This was for the end of their THIRD Britpop Alldayer, and i have to admit I was feeling a little COCKY about it, as it had been SUCH fun the last time I played with them at Christmas. The closer I got to the venue, however, the more I remembered the time I DISGRACED myself doing "Country House" at a previous event and started to think MAYBE I should have learned my song a bit more. However, the fact that I was still in my SUIT from the Hewitts' Party seemed to work some VOODOO on me and, once on stage I think I managed to do "Do You Remember The First Time" some JUSTICE. My favourite bit was in the instrumental section, when Dom leaned over and said "Do a breakdown, like last time." So i DID, and it was FAB, even tho we were put in the shade by the MAJESTIC finale, when Dave Rees led the audience in a lenghty HILARIOUS call and response section of "Brimful Of Asha." "WHAT does everybody need as a pillow?"
Then on Monday I had to get up SUPER EARLY in order to catch the train to Sheffield, where I was playing at the Fuzz Club BBQ. The journey seemed to take a long time but was DELIGHTFUL and I was soon back back in the University Students Union enjoying a) The Barbecue and b) The Company. There was a whole HEAP of lovely people who turned up this year, tho an ALARMING number of them seemed to have BABIES. By this I mean SEVERAL - it was (OK only slightly) like taking to the stage in a CRECHE as I went up and did THIS:
The Peterborough All-Saints' Wide Game Team (Group B)
My Boss Was In An Indie Band Once
Clubbing In The Week
It Only Works Because You're Here
Being Happy Doesn't Make You Stupid
Do The Indie Kid
Easily Impressed
We're Old And We're Tired (and we want to go home)
The Lesson Of The Smiths
Boom Shake The Room
Just before I'd started the University ROCK SOC had been DJing - there was much discussion as to the FACT that, of all University Societies, the Rock Soc is EXACTLY THE SAME where'ere you may wander through space and indeed TIME. The small group of black-shirted boys who looked so PLEASED with themselves for almost entirely clearing the room had done so with exactly the same pointlessly beligerent crap music as their FATHERS probably did 20 years ago. It was horrible!
THUS it was nice when I started to see a RUSH (well, a speedy stroll) of people coming back in, including about eight teenage girls who were dressed as SHEEP. At first this seemed CHARMING, but this too very quickly became ANNOYING - they stood RIGHT at the front in a circle, SCREECHING, occasionally dancing and occasionally all falling to the floor. At first I thought "Be DELIGHTFUL Hibbett!" and pointed out JOVIALLY that _I_ was the main attention-seeker in the room and that people should look at ME. But then as they stood, RIGHT at the front with their backs to me, I got a bit more annoyed - i asked if they were a CUNNING SATIRE on contemporary students and they looked BLANKLY back at me, and I wondered if it'd be OK just to ask them to sod off BUT luckily the advent of It Only Works Because You're Here made them clear off, obviously quickly BORED. PHEW!
But then, just as I was taking back CONTROL of the situation: BABIES! BABIES being cute! BABIES wandering around near the front! BABIES! When faced with BABIES at a gig there really isn't anything you can do about it, so I accepted my fate, acknowledged their VICTORY, and continued to the end having, actually, a really nice time of it, so much so that i went rather OVER my timeslot.
After that it was time for CHAT, also BEER, which was GRATE although I was a bit alarmed by the STRENGTH of the beer. Apparently they'd just had a beer festival, where all the DRINKING BEER had been drunk, leaving only the LUDICROUSLY STRONG. The calmest thing I could find was a pint of Jaipur IPA t 5.9% FIVE POINT NINE PER CENT!
THUS it was a rather TIDDLY Hibbett who attained TRAIN later that afternoon, having said various farewells to the various lovely people of Sheffield, and who then had a HANGOVER at 8.30pm, just as he had to clamber onto the TUBE. Verily, I had been DONE IN by ROCK once again, but i LIKED it!
posted 5/5/2009 by MJ Hibbett
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Comments:
It was a great day all round, despite the rubbish weather. And like you said, good to see those indie sheep girls leaving once they'd realised that you were seriously rocking and they were being annoying.
Hope you got the email I sent - there's a video link in it :)
posted 7/5/2009 by Warren
An Artists Against Success Presentation