Gig No. 4, Proud Gallery, Camden, 25 March 2010

Tonight I started to write a new song for the first time in ages. Although it’s far from finished and I’m a bit stuck as to where it will go, it has reminded me that I should really have written a review of the last gig a few weeks back. Life has a habit of taking over and all too easily the things we do to support what we love soon become the things that demand all our attention and we forget what we loved in the first place. In short, I have a job.

After a successful pre-Christmas gig I was offered a slot in trendy Camden of all places. More than that, it was at the Camden Stables Market, perhaps the centre of all things painfully cool and hip. I am neither cool nor hip. I have never even tried on a pair of skinny jeans. So I thought that Camden would be a bit of challenge for me. As it happened, the Haiti earthquake wreaked its havoc and the good people of Camden decided to host a fundraiser on the night my promoter was due to stage the band night. I was more than happy to postpone my gig for a good cause and because it would buy me some time. It also reminded me to dig into my pockets for the appeal.

As tends to happen when I’m not entirely enthusiastic about something, I chose to simply ignore the fact that the next gig was booked and didn’t really promote it with anything other than word of mouth, which went some thing like,

Loyal fan/weary friend: “So Phil, any news on the next gig?”

Phil: “Oh, I’ve got a something coming up at the end of March. Nothing big. Don’t worry about coming along, it’s a bit out of the way…”

Friend: “No, let me know when it is and I’ll be there”

Phil: “Well, ok, it’s… but really don’t worry. They’ll be plenty more gigs in the future”

My reluctance to promote the gig could be traced back to the same old problem of worrying about getting a band together, choosing the right style and getting a good setlist. I’m sure that if I knew all these things were organised for me I would be much happier to just turn up and play. But that’s not the point. These things are supposed to be a challenge.

As time ticks on and we are left with but distant memories of the gig I will try to pick out the main points. Tek wasn’t available this time, but the absence of a lead guitar allowed us to explore other options. We changed the set up of the band to me on guitar and vocals, Rich on keyboard and vocals, and Stu on cajon (a cajon is a percussion box that you sit on and hit. Like many instruments, it’s easy to play but hard to master). The room of the venue was a gallery space and bar, with a small stage set up at one side. The space wasn’t huge but sounded vacuous. Pieces of foam had to stuffed into the windows to keep the sound in.

It was about this point that we realised we were missing a vital component of the keyboard, namely the power lead. Very very luckily a band called Lucid Jake were on the bill to play and they kindly lent us their keyboard (complete with ironing board stand) for out set. I’m not just saying this but Lucid Jake put on a fantastic show later on in the evening.

I began the set with a song I had only just shared with the band two hours earlier, and they were also the first people besides me to hear it. It was called “Losing my faith” and was an attempt at a political song as we were approaching a general election. Who says it should all be about love and heartbreak? The rest of the set had a lot of the usual songs but with a different approach given the line up change. I was told afterwards that it was the best gig yet. I should certainly give my compliments to the sound man for balancing everything and again to Lucid Jake for the keyboard. Friends were also very kindly in abundance and made the whole thing very enjoyable! I hope they were entertained as well.

I am determined to write these reviews much sooner after the gig in future as I recollect far more interesting anecdotes and witty observations! Still, Gig No. 4 is done! I learned a lot about adapting to a new sound and venue, and most importantly I did not get ejected from Camden for being too uncool.

Gig No. 3, Punk, Soho Square, 12 December 2009

I plunged right into this Christmas gig, thinking it would be bigger and better without ever thinking why. When it came to it I really didn’t want to get up that day. But by the end of the night it was the best gig so far, but for all the different reasons than I imagined…

The feedback from the October gig was great. Everyone seemed to love it and generally have a good time. But I knew I could do better. For one thing the sound could have been better – my voice couldn’t always be heard over the instruments. And the effort that the band had to go to in getting there and back far outweighed any real benefit to them. But I immediately accepted the next gig that was offered to me.

This one was to be at Punk, Soho Square, right in the heart of London’s decadent party district. I had heard good things about this place and had seen in the papers several celebrities stumbling out of its doors early in the morning. I knew it was another winner in terms of venue and location. And what would be the selling point of this one? Well, it was the “Christmas gig”!

Now, I’ve never been particularly proactive in anything but my inactivity. I had over 6 weeks to prepare for this gig, but the most I managed to do was create an event on Facebook and invite a bunch of my friends who had been to the last couple of gigs. Worse than that, I tentatively asked the band if they would be able to do the gig and then left it for a while. Doing nothing when you know you should be doing something has a wonderful way of getting you stressed.

As it turned out, Richard the bass player and Stuart the drummer were able to do the gig. Tek the guitarist was not able to do it. This was a problem. He knew the songs from last time and was really brilliant, and now I had to start all over again to find another guitarist. If one memory sums up this gig in years gone by it will be my stress at trying to find someone, anyone, who could play lead guitar for me. I looked around for people who played in other bands. I had someone confirmed but he soon realised he had double-booked himself. I was all ready to go on stage with just acoustic guitar, bass, and drums. As they say, “the show must go on” and I would do it however I could. In one last effort, Rich checked with Tek the week before the gig and he was able to do it! I never knew what palpable relief was before, but I felt it for sure that day.

Owing to my uncertainty about having a full band, I held back on promoting the gig to the point of trying to discourage people. I don’t really need to say this, but it’s a bad idea to discourage people from your gigs when you’re trying to play in the front of the president. I thought I would let the fates (and my friends) take care of themselves. Whoever turned up would be welcomed with open arms. I had to concentrate on practising now.

Personally, I managed to lapse somewhat with my practising in the weeks leading up to the gig. I will blame it on a house move and a holiday to the States, but there is a general theme of laziness developing every time I write this blog. My fingers had lost their calluses and my voice was wobbly. I had one Christmas song that I wanted to do, Fairytale of New York. But I couldn’t play it just how it was done on the record. I decided to keep it in 4/4 time throughout the song, which basically took away the Irish folk lilt as I just wanted to give it a different spin. And I practised another new song written by somebody else, Blues For Elise. This was an interesting take on Fur Elise by Beethoven mixed with a bluesy song called “Elise” written by a guy called Jim Reynolds who I met on MySpace.

The benefit of having a Saturday gig was the extra time it gave everyone to get to rehearsal and soundcheck. After the fiasco of the studios we practised in last time, I decided to hold our only rehearsal (on the day of the gig) at a decent place, The Joint in King’s Cross. The band turned up and were their usual brilliant selves in picking the songs up right away and playing like professionals. From the studios we loaded things into our cars and headed off to Soho, where we managed to park right outside the stage door of the venue with plenty of time for our soundcheck. The soundcheck went very well, and I we finally felt confident that things would sound good. The venue itself was smaller than Sound, but had more of an atmosphere. It was a brilliant little place tucked away through a small door off a side street. One corner of the bar even had a tiny little annex called the “Pussy Parlour” – I didn’t want to dwell upon the kinds of things that happened in there.

We had lots of time before we were on and were quite hungry, so where else to head but Chinatown?! Having quickly established that we really didn’t know which restaurant we wanted to go to (all-you-can-eat-buffet or real food?) we finally jumped into a non-descript restaurant that Rich had been to before, but only while he was drunk. The food was good and I learned a lot about nutrition from Tek, who is a personal trainer. After talking to Tek, from now on I try to only eat meat that looks like it used to be alive at some point! Paying was quite fun, as we were almost certainly overcharged, but of course the bill was all in Chinese. So, we had to get someone over to add everyone up again and go through a list of what we all ate. We finally agreed on a price and headed back to the bar, fighting our way through a street filled with Santa Claus’ (what’s the plural of Claus?!)

The time came for the gig and we even had a little backstage area (granted it was the kitchen but I’ll take whatever I can get). A good number of my friends had turned up by the time I went on and the set went quite well. The Christmas number went down well but I was a little disappointed that no one sang along. I think the key to audience participation is either alcohol or number of people. It’s probably easier to get people drunk at this stage, and maybe that’s a plan for the future…

Throughout my set I could see a girl hovering around the front of the stage taking photos on a rather professional looking camera. After the gig I managed to track her down, and it turned out she was there to photograph the band that played after me. But during my set she was “testing the light”. She managed to get a few good shots that she very kindly emailed a week later. Photographic evidence is very important if I’m to give the impression that I am a proper musician, so I put those photos up on Facebook and elsewhere!

The rest of the night was good fun. The guys in the band had to leave straight away, which was a shame, as I would definitely have bought them a few drinks for playing so well. After the band night had ended, the bar slowly turned into a cheesy nightclub. By the time I left early into the morning, the place was full of people dancing to the likes of Whitney Houston and even Will Smith. I hate to admit that it was a nice way to end the night. All my friends who stayed seemed to have a good time, with some even losing all memory and wandering off into the cold night air. And at £8 for a vodka and coke how can you blame them?! But it’s London, baby!

Overall verdict: put in the work, trust, and things will turn out great. The band will always be brilliant. Friends will always be supportive.

Biggest challenge for the gigs ahead? Keep it fresh and interesting, but never ever do any dancing until I’m off the stage and in a dark room full of people who can’t see me.