Our last gig to date, and also probably our best.
We had some slight equipment problems when we turned up (Darryl having misheard the chap behind the bar's "we haven't got a PA and we never have had" as "yeah, we can sort something for you mate"); twenty minutes later and two close friends down, we opened a furiously kick-ass set which included virtually every song we've ever played. Glyn was caning it from on top of his amp to great effect, me and Pete had to lose our tops or drown in sweat, and Al thoughtfully interspersed the tracklist with subtle commentary like "F#CK INDUSTRY!!". It felt great.
After which, the evening was only marred by two things: 1) Boyd chucking up because the beer was off, and 2) the management cutting us off before we could start the last song because they feared that the volume and levels of crowd disruption might draw attention to their Friday night lock-in.
Summary? The Maverick cannot handle a proper rock band. They also serve crap beer.
Rock Cafe 2000, late August 1999
An evening we shared with another local band, Molochai, who went on after us. We played relatively well—our only complaint is that we'd have done more songs if they'd told us that they didn't have enough material to fill their slot.
All in all, not a bad evening, and we got to watch another band who were reasonably good after we finished. (Always a perk of being a support band!)
The Lamp Tavern, late August 1999
A variable evening with a glut of acoustic material but some intense highlights.
Guesting were Vicky and Gaz in separate slots (Al playing guitars with every group which performed.) A rather tame set was eventually brought to life with crazed moshing and guest guitars on Kung Fu and the demented crescendo of Tourette's.
The Mitre, early August 1999
Um, if we'd told people about it, maybe they'd have turned up.
A very well equipped pub in Birmingham. This wasn't really a gig as such, it was Andy Nicholls' engagement party. Thanks, Andy! It's the first time we've ever been plugged through a mixing desk and soundchecked properly. Glyn just wants to get back to school and point out that he's played on the same stage as Oasis.
The evening kicked off with some acoustic numbers by people whose names I don't know, but were really fun. Our cut-down set included (as far as I can remember): Sunsets, Brat, Where The Sky Is Darkest, Fallen Victim, Little Baby Nothing, Tonight Don't Last, Faithless, Only Seem To Bleed, Kung Fu, The Grouch and Local Boy in the Photograph. (We even got a—really bad—recording of it.) After which Jim's band went on, at which point we said quiet prayers of thanks that we'd gone on second, because there's no way we could've followed a packed set of excellent, original metal. Check 'em out if you get a chance!
The Mitre, Friday March 26th 1999
Another end-of-term gig. This time around we had two support bands: The first up were Andy's Blue Topaz with a solid rock bill that included Nirvana's "Territorial Pissings". They were followed by Katy's slightly less frenetic Elysium with upbeat tracks like Suede's "Animal Nitrate".
After which excellent build-up, we did:
Nuclear Holiday : 3 Colours Red Sunsets : Airstrip One (Kirkup) A Life Less Ordinary : Ash Little Baby Nothing : Manic Street Preachers Where The Sky Is Darkest : Airstrip One (Kirkup/Denyer) Local Boy In The Photograph : Stereophonics Sonnet : The Verve Only Seem To Bleed : Airstrip One (Williams) Where You Are : Airstrip One (Macleod) Oh Yeah : Ash The Grouch : Green Day Tonight Don't Last : Airstrip One (Macleod) Brain Stew : Green Day Blood On Blood : Bon Jovi Faithless : Airstrip One (Macleod) Fallen Victim : Airstrip One (Denyer) Kung Fu : Ash Traffic : Stereophonics Brat : Green DayThanks to everyone who turned out to support us—you're the first audience of more than twenty people we've had (we counted over an hundred heads), and we hope we enjoyed yourselves! If you didn't, you can probably blame me, 'cause I'm always the one who forgets the smeggin' words. I can't help it. I just tend to drift away during "Brain Stew". And that room was damned hot.
The Mitre, Friday December 11th 1998
More like it! Our first real performance. Not the best turn-out ever, but it was a cozy little circle of friends (our thanks to everyone who came!) and it was nice to see a couple of unknown faces in the crowd. The set list, as finally played, was:
Local Boy In The Photograph : Stereophonics Brain Stew : Green Day Sunsets : Airstrip One (Kirkup) A Life Less Ordinary : Ash Where The Sky Is Darkest : Airstrip One (Kirkup/Denyer) Chemical World : Blur Only Seem To Bleed : Airstrip One (Williams) Brat : Green Day Oh Yeah : Ash Stand By Me : Oasis Where You Are : Airstrip One (Macleod) Blood on Blood : Bon Jovi Tonight Don't Last : Airstrip One (Macleod) Sonnet : The Verve Cast No Shadow : Oasis Waiting to Die : Airstrip One (Kirkup) Faithless : Airstrip One (Macleod) 29x the Pain : The WiLDHEARTS The Drugs Don't Work : The Verve Kung Fu : Ash Some Might Say : Oasis Traffic : Stereophonics By request we did an encore of "Local Boy In The Photograph"
Kingswinford Youth Hall, November 29th 1998
A somewhat inauspicious first date. We sounded okay, given that our only previous experience was a few songs at The Rock Station jamming evenings. The only thing really missing was an audience. We abandoned the set list pretty much when we realised that none of the kids were listening, and the whole thing was a big nightmare really. Still, it got better after we started treating it as a good, loud jam in a big hall with decent equipment. But I don't think we'll be going back.