Thursday 28 February 2013

I'm dizzy from the minty tingles!

That’s three grand nights in the Pilgrim that we’ve notched up now. We seem to be doing rather well at this caper. Z.E.B.R.A was great, sweaty and really very groovy. And I’m fairly certain he managed to hit himself in the face because he was getting so far into the groove. I too have hit myself in the face, many a time. I have also broken a deckchair because I was air-drumming so hard. I think the seeds of an excellent performance art project are right there.

Gorp were also amazing. I spent my formative years surrounded by people who liked prog-rock. I confess it was never my favourite thing in the world but Gorp’s sound had a sufficiently edgy enough to please me. And no one was wearing a cape, which was a relief. I’m the cape wearer in these parts. That night I had decided to wear a fairly preposterous garment – a jacket with tails and great big silver button things. I think I looked like sex on a stick, a pretty big stick at that. A Gallop poll found that 87% of women over 35 agreed.



The specific stick.
March is looking like it is going to be an interesting month for us. We will be doing a session for Dave Monk’s show on Radio Merseyside, which will involve acoustic guitars. I’ve got new strings on mine and everything. I even gave it a polish with a bit of Pledge. Smells like spring cleaning. Polish technology has come a long way since I was a lad. According to the label this polish can be used on wood, plastic, glass, human flesh, space, time, facts, lies, racism, cancer, birds, racist birds, porridge, electoral fraud, delusions, illusions, confusions, scandals, handles, sandals, moths, cloths, lofts, ditches, bitches, witches, snitches, hovercraft, Lovecraft, dove crap, spider-monkeys, monkey spiders, dog spiders, spiders with human heads, spiders with human hands and human heads, human heads with spider eyes, bees with lips, ducks with dicks, cows with wheels, swine in heels, lords on fire, the snooker player Stephen Maguire, knuckle dusters, scrotal fusters (look it up), snowballing, kerb crawling, grass cuttings, face fuddings (don’t look it up), anal warts and existential angst. Remember to use a clean, soft cloth.


Greater Spotted Northern Canadian Lesser Lipped Bee
We will also be playing the Threshold Festival on the 9th of March, specifically in the Roost section at about half seven in the evening, which is a definite improvement from last year when we took to the stage at roughly one in the morning, after having sound checked at about noon. It was a long and unpleasant day. Hopefully this year will be much more fun.

But wait, there’s more. This Saturday we will be playing an animal right’s benefit gig in our old haunt Next to Nowhere. It’s been a while since we were down there so that’s going to be a hoot. And the mighty Z.E.B.R.A. will be joining us!

Rounding the month off will be our 4th Pilgrim gig on the 30th. These have really gone extremely well and I’m really very proud of us for having managed to do it. Yay, go us. Mike has an informative film about glue sniffing lined up for us, which I think we would all do well to watch. Whilst I have managed to get my solvent abuse down to manageable levels recently I know some of you haven’t and it is really in your best interests to do so. It wasn’t so long ago that I was huffing a 15kg Calor Gas Butane cylinder every week, as well as the Perma Gard Expoxy Resin, Loctite Hybrid All Purpose Power Glue, Unibond Repair All Purpose 1min Power Epoxy, Evo Stik Serious Stuff Ultimate Strength Grab Adhesive and my personal favourite Mapei Ultimate Ready Mixed Supergrab Adhesive. Now I’m down to one Tipp-Ex Shake ‘n Squeeze a day. My life is my own again. If I can do it, so can you. Andy can’t, he’s got no willpower at all, but the rest of you can.

Seriously though, solvent abuse is brilliant.

Only joking.

I’m not joking.