Well, I think Airstrip One's more or less officially dead, although no-one can discount the odd sentimental revival in the future. Time to go our separate ways, really.
I'd like to say thanks to the rest of the guys for some fine times, and will probably catch you around in various projects. In the last words of James T. Kirk (although omitting the rather badly acted "oh my..." bit), well, "it was fun."
We're not playing together much! (September 1999)
Basically we're having to give it a bit of a breather because we're all at different ends of the country at colleges and universities. Specifically:
- Denyer, Pete & PK are at Aberytswyth
- Al is at Sussex
- Darryl is at Bangor
- Glyn is at Stourbridge College
- Gaz is at Dudley college (I think)
- Vicky is at Plymouth
So that's that (until Christmas, at least.) We will presumably play together in some shape or form in future, but it'll be a very different Airstrip One when and if we do. Our individual tastes are probably going to have altered a little over three months in the proverbial wilderness, so what direction the band will take we'll have to see.
The US has its own Airstrip One! (mid August 1999)
Your webmaster got a mail out of the blue a short while ago, alerting him to the fact that you can find these band pages by entering "Airstrip One" into any good search-engine (and one or two bad ones). Because someone had actually been motivated not only to find this site, but get in touch with us... however, it turns out he had a vested interest in those two words which form our band name...
That mail was from Struan Oglanby, one of the members of airstripOne, a New York based band who have their own web-site (which looks rather more spanky and professional than this one) at http://www.airstripone.com. Despite looking around around for a few minutes, I haven't actually worked out exactly what type of music it is they play (but then again, the same could be said for my own band.)
If you're going over to America in the near future, give us a shout if you happen to catch airstripOne. Apparently they'll be coming down to London towards the end of the year (and jokingly have suggested that we have an all Airstrip One gig.) If we didn't have university looming, I'd seriously consider nipping down to catch them...
Airstrip One guitarists record for Merry Hill (early August 1999)
I'm a bit fuzzy on the details, but through the contacts of a friend of the band (and official groupie, hi Ruth!), our guest vocalist Vicky, plus Al and Darryl, will be recording their interpretations of some soft rock covers (for use in-mall) and also putting on some live gigs in the centre's ampitheatre, in September. I think that they'd welcome anyone who made performance date inquiries and expressed an interest in attending.
Despite initial fears that the secrecy surrounding the organisation of this project could result in overall band disharmony, this site can calmly and officially state that the uninvolved members of the band really couldn't give a badger's w#nk, because none of them have any interest in the type of music they'd be forced to play. We'd like to take this opportunity to wish the-schism-with-the-odd-greek-name all the best for these venues, and hope you find it more enjoyable than we would.
(That's not meant to sound as sarcastic as it does.) More info here...
Two amateur guitarists discuss future world-stardom (circa 1994)
Al and Darryl had plans since first they met to start a band (or at least since sometime in secondary school.) This BonJovi inspired troupe would also include the song-writing and double-bass talents of Eleanor Smith (a friend sadly long since past the realms of contact—if you're reading this, Ellie, any chance you could e-mail me, please? I'd like to know how you're getting on.) and keyboard abilities of Paul Kettle.
Needless to say, this idea didn't actually go anywhere, it got put on hold because of GCSEs and the fact that El moved to Burton-on-Trent. Not to be discouraged, the surviving dreamers carried their vision to college...
A melodic legend in the making... (late 1997)
Having arrived at King Edward VI college, Al set about the takeover of their music department facilities, importing Darryl on a regular basis from Halesowen and forcing PK into the role of drummer. It was at around about this stage that I volunteered to try my paw at singing. Darryl was not keen on the idea, having already decided that Al would be the sole vocalist. I'll freely admit that the only thing I had going for my was my equipment—and by that I mean that I already had a mike.
Shortly after, Pete volunteered to drum for us, freeing up PK to play keyboard (which he never actually seemed to do.) This actually involved him buying a full kit and taking lessons, which was one heck of a commitment... Somewhat later his brother Glyn decided to take up the Bass. The rest, as they say, was history. Except for one tiny thing, not much of a problem, but always present... we were crap.
A real, live, kicking and screaming rock band... (early 1999)
We got better slowly. Two years of practise were required to make us function as a cohesive unit (who am I trying to kid? We've never been a cohesive unit. I don't even think we can all spell co-heasiv... sh#t.) We chucked out the Oasis covers and widened our musical boundaries. More to the point, three members of the band (myself included) had to learn how to play the instruments they'd rashly taken up.
Well, we've played a few gigs. We aim to chock out sets with about half our own material and half covers on a fairly routine basis. Weekly practises kept us (theoretically) in harmony. It's been fairly up and down, and there have been too many moments when I've thought that one argument or another would tear us apart for good. The volatile mix of abrasive, aberrant personalities has been beneficial in that it keeps us balanced, so there's something in our performances for everyone.