Blog: Lee Rosy's Tea Room

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I set off once more for the East Midlands yesterday afternoon to FINALLY play my gig at Lee Rosy's in Nottingham - the first time it was attempted i had to cancel, the SECOND time the promoters cancelled it, but THIS was third time lucky as I arrived at the venue (via TRAM) to find the gig was GO. I arrived at 7.29pm, Sam Tasty appeared at precisely 7.30pm and, as no-one else was there, we popped into the pub over the road for a quick drink with Ian From Horowitz, who got the BLUNT END of me RANTING about My Theories: INDIE. OH what a lucky young man!

We returned to find the PA being set up and Tom arriving so we did our soundcheck and then strolled about 15 foot down the road to an RESTAURANT where we had our TEA. It was very nice indeed - i must get round to adding MEALS to the DATABASE OF ROCK one day, it would be FASCINATING to chart the different kinds of grub eaten by different combinations of Validators. I expect the Tim: Kebab Shop relationship to be HIGHLY SIGNIFICANT.

We strolled back to the venue and embarked on TEA - i had English Breakfast (nice), Green Tea Blue Sky (odd, like old fashioned sweets) and some ASSAM (DELICIOUS). It was EXTREMELY pleasant to have a CUPPA on the go while watching bands, especially when watching one as ACE and all round GOOD TIMES as Horowitz, who were on excellent form. It was all LOUD and DANCEY and a bit JANGLE, which was GRATE, tho i did worry about how Tom and I were going to sound, and thus THE USUAL THORT entered my mind: let's do it totally acoustical!

I suggested this to Tom expecting him to instantly say "JAWOHL!" but he was SUSPICIOUS, having only done this with me ONCE, in Leicester, when it didn't work out. However i PESTERED him and we agreed that he'd go through the amp (and, importantly, his PEDALS) a bit quietly. This done we set up and did THIS:

The Peterborough All-Saints' Wide Game Team (Group B)

I Did A Gig In New York

Breaks In The Journey

It Only Works Because You're Here

The Fight For History

Being Happy Doesn't Make You Stupid

Do The Indie Kid

The Lesson Of The Smiths

Easily Impressed

The Gay Train

Hey Hey 16K

Boom Shake The Room

It was GRATE! I did the first four songs on my own and was RELIEVED that a) the live debut of I Did A Gig In New York seemed to go OK and b) i remembered the words to Breaks In The Journey, having not played it in AGES. Tom joined me from The Fight For History onwards and we had a FINE old time. I have said it 100,000,000 times but it bears repeating: it's SO much more fun to do gigs this way, you can dance around as much as you like, get CLOSE to people, you get much more control over how it sounds, and the BARRIERS between PERFORMER and AUDIENCE pretty much GO - people do get a bit FREAKED OUT sometimes by being reminded that you are all VERY MUCH in the same room as each other, but it makes things feel much more friendly, also FUN.

And yes, that IS a three song encore at the end, TWO songs of which were asked for, honest! POLITE DANCING broke out for The Gay Train which, being UNTETHERED, i could freely join in with, although outright FRUGGING was out of the question as it would be too LOUD. Hey Hey 16K was requested after that and I was having SO much fun I thought we might as well do Boom Shake The Room. Which we did.

After that it was back over the road with pretty much everyone who'd been there for POST GIG CELEBRATIONS, also quite a lot of excitable chat and LOOKING FORWARD to Indie Tracks at the weekend. WHAT a lovely bunch of people that Nottingham lot are. Tom and I said our farewells and headed back to Leicester, where we listened to his putative arrangement of We Can Start Having Fun and then stayed up LATE discussing GRATE GIGS WE HAVE DONE: ALWAYS a conversational topic which can keep us both talking.

Thus it was a bit of a bleary eyed and WEARY Hibbett who tottered across what's left of Frog Island this morning (it's an area of Leicester, and they seem to be knocking all of it down) but a VERY happy one. GIGS! HOORAH!

posted 26/7/2007 by MJ Hibbett

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