Gigs – Page 9 – Ferocious Blog

That difficult second festival… day two!

Friday night was so memorable, so it was with that ambivalent mixture of excitement and tired reluctance we hauled ourselves out of the hotel come Saturday to taxi our way back to the Robin 2. As such, we owe apologies to Stevie Simpson for missing his set in its entirely and to Emma & The Professor who were half way into theirs by the time we made it – but well, non-stop music for twelve hours, it wouldn’t be the only stuff we missed – and I must confess to sitting and feeling daunted about trying to write it all down!

Heading back into the gloomy venue worked a lot like the casinos in Vegas – it made it seem perpetually evening. Emma & The Professor were on the second stage, and just striking up Bostin’ track Men An Tol – thankfully plenty of folk were more disciplined at getting up than we were, there was a good crowd in already! This was followed up with Battle of the Marches and The Old Black Crow. They have such a unique sound, and a new album in the offing which I’m excited about!

The two stages were alternating – Stevie Simpson compering the main stage, handing over to (or being handed over from) Brian Stone on the second stage. If you take a moment to think about the logistics, soundchecking through the sound-desk only, the first chance to artists get to hear their monitor mix was starting the set – the sound guys and stage management deserves some serious kudos for even considering this way of working, to have pulled it off – just wow!

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Freeborn Al / 19th October 2016 / Gigs, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

That difficult second festival… night one!

I’m sure you know the story behind Bostin’ Days – in a nutshell, an accident happens at Beautiful Days… it’s sorted out thanks to the local air ambulance. Addie Burns has a crazy idea. It’s the kind of idea that people probably have all the time – but in this case, he made it happen – get a fabulous array of musicians to record a cover of a Levellers song and release it as a compilation, then have an associated event by the said same artists.

That album is still a regular feature on my playlists – and last year’s event was superb. How do you follow up something like that? Well, they bloody well did it – I’ve just got back from a fabulous weekend, and after sorting out assorted domestic stuff now I have the unenviable task of trying to put it in to words! Unlike last year I was able to make the Friday night too, so arrived at the hotel in Wolverhampton early afternoon in time for a bit of a chill out.

Ella and her Mum would be arriving later – so after a pleasant afternoon with a book (rock and roll, huh?) – I hopped in a taxi to The Robin 2 in Bilston with Mark and Amanda. I’d booked it using an app, and pre-paid for it – which confused my journey companions when I thanked the driver and got out without paying, as they thought! Haha! The venue wasn’t open yet, but the attached bar was so we headed in there and got ourselves some beers.

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Freeborn Al / 16th October 2016 / Band, Gigs, Hell Hounds, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

An electric atmosphere..

Rockstock and Barrel is fast becoming one of my favourite festivals – to take what is, frankly, a somewhat tired old social club attached to an abandoned power station and sprinkle it with imagination, art and music is a real testament to Debbo, Phily and their ever-expanding team of helpers. This year the them of the festival was Tim Burton films – the decor and fancy dress were the magic dust on top of a solid foundation of facilities and great acts.

I’d dumped Ludo on the site on Thursday night, but alas work commitments meant I couldn’t stay – arriving back on site on Friday afternoon – complete with some shopping for Tim and, perhaps most randomly, a watering can for Lynne and Ian (which looked alarming like some kind of thing you’d find in Ann Summers!). First order of business was to get the van sorted out – and then get my mits on the first of many Pineapple ciders.

As well as organising superb venues, decor and entertainment the stand out feature of Debbo and Phily’s events are their wonderous array of ciders and wines – and of course the Cheezy Vinyl Bar, which even had the option of pre-booking a baked camembert too. The main stage was in the social club, the cider bar hosted the second stage and a third was nestled in the attached Cheezy Vinyl Bar.

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Freeborn Al / 5th October 2016 / Band, Gigs, Hell Hounds, Lee Bonsall, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

All’s well at Whitwell..

We had a really busy weekend just gone – with events on Friday and Sunday we wouldn’t have missed for the world, combined with the possibility of me finally getting completed on a new house we thought Whitwell might’ve been a step too far. Luckily the house move was delayed by a week – some hasty arrangements involving somewhere for us to park Ludo meant that we could at least make the Saturday. And it was sure worth it!

The festival nestles in the Whitwell Community Centre – what I’m presuming is a former school building eerily reminiscent of my old Primary school (which has long since been torn down and replaced by an old folks home!) – with a stage and stalls outside, and a couple more inside functioning as the second stage and an open mic performance area. Stalls ranged from food, clothing and of course a bar.

Upon advice of people who’d been there on the Friday I was pointed towards the cider bar to sample the Mango cider – it had sold out the night before, hasty new provisions had been sourced – and I took heed and made sure I got a few pints in before it had gone. My gosh, what a delicious drink… keep an eye out for Lilley’s Mango Cider – it really is a thing of beauty (not quite up there with Rockstock Pineapple cider for my money, but bloody nice!).

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Freeborn Al / 14th September 2016 / Gigs, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

Freaky fingers in Doncaster..

A welcome return to live music came courtesy of Darren Eastell and the Freaky Fingers EP launch in The Leopard, Doncaster this weekend just gone. Darren was a last minute replacement at Wistful Festival, and they made a great impression – certainly on Ella who treated us to the tickets! Gritty bluesy rock was my vague memory from Wistful, a bearded frontman in a truckers cap – what could possibly go wrong? We had the bonus of two support acts too – Laura Kelly and Framing Witches.

Becky and Pete were hosting the evening (and us, having fed us before driving into Donny!), and we met Herb at the venue too. It was certainly more packed than last time we ventured to The Leopard, soon enough we were amongst a very healthy crowd – including assorted members of Darren’s family. As well as entry to the gig the ticket also provided access to a free EP and a sticker too – stickers adorned most of the people in the room, often with a fair bit of encouragement from family members in attendance!

We sat and drank cider in the green room for a while whilst sound-checking was underway, before heading downstairs to the bar for general nattering and merriment. It was probably the freaky fingers element of the performance I was most excited about watching – as a fledgling cajon player listening to Liam’s soundcheck (which you’d think was a full drum kit if you weren’t able to see him) was at once inspiring and incredibly daunting!

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Freeborn Al / 5th September 2016 / Gigs, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

Wellington Roots..

Having wisely taken Tuesday off work to further acclimatise from field-life, perhaps heading up to Eastwood for an open mic night was a bit foolish with work in the morning. Especially as I’d still got two blog posts to write about Farmer Phil’s to go as well, but well, I can’t say that I regret taking the opportunity to eke out my time off work a little bit further and enjoy yet more quality music in the confines of The Wellington Inn up in Eastwood.

A quick blast up the M1 saw me arrive at the pub in pretty good time – resisting the lure of popping in to Ikea for meatballs or Dime bars (alright, Daim if you insist, strange Swedish furniture peddlers!). Sam Jones was the host, and he’d got Mark Jones (aka Sam’s Dad), Spud and Nick Parker to play sets before he took to the stage himself. It was just too tempting a proposition to pass up!

Settled in with a very rock and roll lime and soda, it was great to sit and have a natter with Nick whilst Chris of Roots Acoustic fame got his PA set up. They were waiting on Mark to finish up a guitar lesson to arrive and open up the set – in the meantime we were accosted by football themed scratchcards, I think somebody called Kev won – in the absence of a team I liked I went for Leicester since I live in Leicestershire!

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Freeborn Al / 17th August 2016 / Gigs, Hell Hounds, Music, Other Bands, Photos

Geddin’ on Farmer Phil’s land.. part three..

Sunday morning arrived with that feeling of simutaneous amazement at how quickly the time had gone whilst feeling like we’d been on that happy campsite for much longer than just under a week. We started the day cooking bacon (we had a lot of bacon to cook) and celebrating Sally’s birthday with.. well, bacon. And cake, too, as all birthdays should be celebrated.

I think we were supposed to dress up in olympic get-up on Saturday, as we hadn’t done that Tim, Dave, Andy and I donned our Cool Runnings inspired lycra suits perhaps a day late (there was at least one other Jamaican bob-sled team on site though, so maybe it didn’t matter!). It was universally decided that in the interests of decency that shorts or kilts should be worn over aforementioned suits. I’m not sure it was any more flattering!

We’d got Sunday dinner booked at Nana’s Kitchen for noon (didn’t stop a sneaky bacon cob though), which clashed with Headsticks opening up the music. The lovely Drew was happy to serve our food into takeaway boxes – and lucky for us a few technical wibbles meant that there was enough time for us to sit by the main stage and get our dinner eaten before the first act started on the stage. It turns out Headsticks is a great way to work off a Sunday roast!

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Freeborn Al / 17th August 2016 / Band, Gigs, Hell Hounds, Lee Bonsall, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

Geddin’ on Farmer Phil’s land.. part two..

I’m dead when Ella sees this!

Saturday morning came and despite the strange cold-like thing I’d had the night before I felt fine aside from a bit snotty, which is a bonus! Speaking of Snotty, she had an appointment with an open-mic night where Morganella were scheduled to perform – so our first order of business was to head over a couple of fields where clan Parry were camped for an opportunity to rehearse a bit, grabbing a coffee en route.

By the time we’d finished and headed up to the arena it was lunchtime, nachos were my weapon of choice, we munched food whilst Emma and the Professor were getting started, it provided a most excellent soundtrack for a nice lunch – I only caught Kisses Sweeter Than Wine amongst the set before we decided to check out the shops. I had designs on a poncho – as The Mighty Boosh rightly states, it’s impossible to feel sad in a poncho!

Whilst shopping though I was drawn down the bank to the second stage where Guitar Cubed were playing Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd – one of my favourite songs, and done justice here. They moved on to Hey Jude before I headed back off up the hill to find Ella mooching around the shops some more. It was a shame not to have had the chance to catch more of their set though, the little bit I caught sounded great (I managed to miss getting a photo too).

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Freeborn Al / 17th August 2016 / Gigs, Hell Hounds, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

Geddin’ on Farmer Phil’s land.. part one..

How to go about summing up the best part of a week in a field in Shropshire at Farmer Phil’s? Herb did a great job in poetic form already – I doubt I’ll be as succinct! It was a windy field I arrived at on Tuesday evening, soon enough I’d got myself sorted nearly in the same spot as the year before, a fun night was spent eating fish curry (thanks Spike!), being cheated out of winning a rock, paper, scissors game, campfire singing and watching the stars.

Wednesday arrived and so did more people – Dave and Caroline got stuck in the mud, needing to be towed out by festival ‘Mr Fix It’ Craig, having spent our time in the campsite Tim, Jo and I opted to head up to the arena to case things out – and see Debbo and Phily in the Cheezy Vinyl Bar. Back in the campsite there was more fireside singing, more star gazing and lots of dogs to make friends with. Lurgan was a gorgeous young lurcher camped nearby – sadly Murphy didn’t get on with him!

Thursday started with bacon, a shopping trip with Tim and Jo to pick up supplies (for me that was a gas bottle and more bacon, ha!) whilst Caroline whipped up an awesome chilli. Ella arrived having been delivered by the lovely Parry clan – eventually finding me having been for a wander around the campsite. We took Kezzi up to the arena where she put on a dazzling performance in the kids open mic, before Emma and the Professor put on an early performance whilst we socialised.

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Freeborn Al / 16th August 2016 / Band, Gigs, Hell Hounds, Lee Bonsall, Music, Other Bands, Photos / 0 Comments

Sunday.. that’s my fun day..

Departing in the morning from Thorne – fuelled by bacon and tea (thanks Becky and Pete!) we had a pretty packed agenda – all before getting Ella back down south for a reasonable hour given that we both had work in the morning. A top way of ekeing out a weekend! So we jumped into Ludo and hotfooted it to Shirebrook FC’s ground where a charity match for the Lee Bonsall Memorial Fund was taking place.

We bought some raffle tickets and watched the match, featuring Lee’s old team (including frequent sub appearances from Ken). It was good to catch up with everyone, and the match was pretty entertaining – the first live footy I’ve watched in ages! I think the score was 3-2 to Lee’s team when we left during the second half – Ken had had an eventful game, missing a penalty at the end of the first half, and scoring one in the second (sorry Ken, I was too slow with the camera for the second one!!)

There was an afternoon fun day planned at Fatboy Ink Tattoo Studio after the game – but unfortunately it was one of those days where too much was going on so we had to miss that. We hotfooted it to the Yew Tree Inn in Ednaston, both ready for lunch – and what a lunch it was, I went for a beef roast and Ella an awesome looking lamb shank, which we duly devoured whilst nattering with Jonny and Katie. The Yew Tree is a bloody lovely pub!

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Freeborn Al / 8th August 2016 / Gigs, Hell Hounds, Lee Bonsall, Music, Other Bands, Photos, Videos / 0 Comments