Blog: Hello Norbiton

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After work on Friday i RENDEZVOUSED with The Freeze Frame On My DVD at Waterloo, and together we headed for NORBITON and thence to Kingsmeadow, to the home of Wimbledon AFC, Kingstonian, and the Give & Go GIG night. As soon as we walked in it was pretty obvious that this was a GOOD PLACE, and we lurked about having a chat with Kevin The Organiser who was EXCITED about that FACT that he'd got Boo Hewerdine headlining. He was a BIG FAN, as would become apparent later...

After a quick soundcheck and a BEER I was delighted to see not one but TWO people enter the room wearing Hey Hey 16K t-shirts - Mr Stephen Walker and Mr Matthew Breach, BOTH of whom had bought them at the Water Rats gig. Thanks chaps! Mr Breach had suggested the gig in the first place, and he came over and SAT WITH, he was a Nice Chap. People who WEREN'T wearing Hey Hey 16K t-shirts came in, and at 8.20pm i went up and played them THIS:

The Peterborough All Saints Wide Game Team (group B)

Red And White Sockets

Good Luck In Your New Job

Never Going Back To Aldi's

I Come From The Fens

The Fight For History

Billy Jones Is Dead

The Perfect Love Song

Fucking Hippy

Clubbing In The Week

The Lesson Of The Smiths

Easily Impressed

Boom Shake The Room

It was a LONG set - I'd been asked to do 40 minutes so i did, but it FELT like quite a long time too. Partly this was due to HEAVY COLD still being in effect, and partly it was because everyone was so very FAR AWAY, my dears i felt quite DETACHED from the audience. People DID seem to enjoy it tho, i certainly got some GRINS from various people later in the evening, but for me the best bit of the evening was yet to come.

Now, I'd HEARD of Boo Hewerdine before, and I knew he'd written some songs with other people and been in The Bible, but I wasn't entirely sure WHO he'd written with or WHAT The Bible had played. To be honest I was expecting something Worthy But Not Particularly Interesting, and when he came on looking quite nervous and started strumming i sat back to Appreciate but not enjoy, and then make and excuse to get away early.

Imagine my surprise then when he turned out to be ABSOLUTELY BLOODY FANTASTIC! I couldn't quite believe what i was hearing, or indeed FEELING, as he opened up a whole new LAND OF TUNE - all these gorgeous melodies came out of him that I'd never even THOUGHT of before, and the way he sang them made me get all MOVED. A couple of songs had me WELLING UP - "Ontario" was one of them, and when he did "The Patience Of Angels", my dears i was quite BESIDE myself with Emotion. I hadn't expected ANYTHING like this, and thus was quite AGOG. In a way it was like the first time I'd seen Belle & Sebastian - it was the first time I'd seen somebody play this kind of music and do it RIGHT, for me, so that it reached out and TOUCHED me. He may well have been an Excellent Musician and Craftsman, but the songs were beaming DIRECTLY INTO MY VERY SOUL. It was RIGHT, and it was BEAUTIFUL.

One of the best bits was when he got Kevin The Organiser on stage to sing a song with him. I expected this to be a bit Charming and Loveable, but actually he was REALLY GOOD - it was lovely to see someone so HAPPY to be there, and also putting his ALL into the song he was singing, it cast a warm glow around the whole room. Mr Hewerdine finished off with "Gracelands", which was the second song of the night that made me go "Oh! Did he write that then?" after which we dashed off into the night, to spend a long train journey home full of me going "WOW! That was BRILLIANT!"

Today's mission: H for Hewerdine in Virgin!

posted 10/10/2005 by MJ Hibbett

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