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.
