Hi all,
Well here we go again, will I have time to complete this time? First off here is what you need to know
Saturday 27th February
The Pilgrim Pub
Pilgrim Street
Liverpool
8:00 pm
It is our first time at this venue and actually the first time the band have played anywhere near Liverpool city centre. Personally I don’t think Liverpool is really a rock town and hasn’t been for a long time if it ever was? Most of the known bands that emerged from the city have been more “indie” in nature : Echo and the Bunnymen, The Coral, Cast/the La’s, Frankie goes to Hollywood, The Farm, the Wombats and probably a whole raft of others I am unaware of or have chosen to forget. The Last original rock bands I know that came out of Liverpool were Export, Rage/Nutz and not only was that a long time ago but neither were exactly household names.
For the Pilgrim gig we are pleased to say that Bourbon Toulouse are our special guests. They haven’t been together that long in their current form and need to play a few more gigs so we are happy to help them out.
New original music needs support.
The Pilgrim is a great pub in its own right, worth a visit if you have never been just for the beer and the atmosphere. Should be a good night.
Our last couple of gigs were both good fun. We played Alexanders in Chester for the HB Rock & Blues II along with the aforementioned Bourbon Toulouse and another Wirral rock band: Savage Outlaw. Good original sets from all bands, a couple of covers thrown in by Savage Outlaw and Toulouse but the majority of their sets was original material. To be honest it was not that well attended but I think there will be another event in June so word may get around. Again thanks to Alexanders for supporting live original music.
We followed our appearance there with a return to the Musketeer in Leigh. We generally have a good night there and this time was the busiest I have seen it. Very appreciative crowd and a great night was had by all.
Our one off tribute to Lemmy in the form of Silver Machine seems to have become part of our set now and it surprises me how well it seems to be received? Still there you go, you never can tell.
Other big news for us this week is the confirmation that we have been booked to play at Cambridge Rock Festival in August. We have played there previously, this year the headliners are Jim Cregan (Rod Stewart’s guitarist and Song writing partner), Carl Palmer (ELP) and Focus (as in Hocus Pocus and Sylvia). The line-up is quite prog (progressive) rock this time, it seemed to be quite bluesy last time, so hopefully our brand of Good time feel good rock will be a breath of fresh air.
We also have a prestige gig in April when we play with “The Darker My Horizon” (previously Sacred Heart) and “Jupiter Falls” at the Snooty Fox in Wakefield. Both of those bands have albums to promote and are being talked about on the grapevine. We are all slightly different in our approach to rock so it really should be a good night. There is the possibility that the gig may be streamed over the internet or filmed for a DVD. Guess we need to rehearse a bit for that one, especially some endings J. Hoping we can get in a couple of new tracks which will be on the next album. – see next paragraph.
As you can see a few good things happening. I posted the recently recorded track (Tear us Apart) up on the internet via sound cloud and it has had nothing but positive feedback so really pleased about that. It’s only the radio edit (Shortened version), the full length version will be on the new album which we are putting out this year. Finances mean it will have to be recorded in dribs and drabs which is not ideal but we will get there. The next track is being recorded in March at Parr Street studio. A bit of a rocker currently going under the working title of “Brother in Arms” which bears no resemblance whatsoever to the Dire straits track of the same name.
Now I know we are playing Cambridge Rock Festival the production of T –shirts and merchandise is crucial. If any of you knows anybody who can help out with the T-shirt, please let us know at clan-rock@virginmedia.com. This continues to be a major source of frustration to me.
Speaking of merchandise I have a few other ideas mulling about at the moment as well.
Rants
Well it has started hasn’t it? The should we stay or should we go question about Europe. Has the referendum date been announced or is everyone just assuming it is June? All I know is that for the next four months it is going to be very tedious if we let it. I did see some posts of clips form Yes (Prime) Minister on social media. Not actually watched them but I guess they must be along the same topic and knowing that program they are probably quite accurate.
Double yellow lines on roads. Yes I am happy if they stop people parking in dangerous or obstructive places but quite often they are just there and there seems to be no real logic why? Council jobsworths I suspect, use the paint up.
Come on E4, what has happened to the second half of the big bang theory. The latest series seemed to stop at episode 10i or 11 just before Christmas and it has never come back? I am sure there must be 20+ episodes as there usually are with the American TV networks.
Self-service tills/checkouts in supermarkets. They are not new anymore, they have been around for quite a while yet still a large percentage of people who don’t seem to have a clue. The queue for these is often longer than for the staffed checkouts due to the stupidity of these people.
It’s not that difficult is it, surely?
In fact given that they probably go once or more times a week the ability of many people to actually keep walking in a supermarket and not just stop in front of you seems to be becoming less frequent. It is almost as though they are in wonderland for the first time and dazzled by the bright shiny shelves.
To be avoided in peak times most definitely.
I was in staples stationery the other day as I needed about 5-10 A3 posters. Not our general one, I have those done in batches of 250/500, these were a venue specific one. Well there were about four staff who completely ignoring me despite the fact that a couple of them were actually wearing shirts emblazoned with “here to help “or something similar.
Basically when I did manage to extract a few grunts from one of them he effectively told me that the pre-paid printing cards could not be topped up (they actually have the word Reloadable printed on them) and I would need to buy a new one. Given that I already had some money on an existing card and I wanted to top it up as you are supposed I was not impressed. I voted with my feet and left. They were pathetic really, be interesting to see how long that branch (Chester) stays open as it wasn’t busy and I won’t be going in there again.
Music
The other week I went out to see Michael Schenker’s Temple of Rock at the O2 academy in Liverpool. Now for those of you who don’t know Michael Schenker fits perfectly into my definition of a guitar hero. Many of you will have your own definitions as to what that means and I am sure will be willing to tell me about them but at the end of the day I have mine and no matter what anyone says it is unlikely to change. Schenker is to my mind a bonafide guitar hero and he and his band delivered a crackin’ set. Doogie White (ex Rainbow) on Vocals), Herman Rarebell and Francis Bucholtz (ex Scorpions) were solid on drums and bass respectively plus someone unknown to me performing an excellent job on keyboards and second guitar. A mixed set of UFO, Scorpions, MSG and Temple of rock Tunes made for an excellent evening. Even the awful lager (no proper beer to be seen) in plastic glasses at £4.40 a pint didn’t ruin it.
Planet rock are plugging a band called Inglorious heavily at the moment and to be fair they are not bad at all. An ex vocalist from TV’s “The Voice”, who I think sang with Uli Jon Roth recently plus some decent tunes, one of the better Hyped bands I have heard for a while. Good enough to buy the album? Jury is out on that one.
Black Stone Cherry, I don’t mind in small doses although not still too sure about the Rival sons or the Temperance Movement. I’ve kind of lost track with the current bands which is probably not good.
A real shame to hear about the band Viola Beach who as you probably know were all killed in a car accident in Sweden recently. I didn’t know them (Indie band) before it was on the news but at the end of the day they were young lads out doing what they had dreamed of doing and I am sure they were all really excited and thinking they were starting to get somewhere. The tragedy is that they were so young, most of them only 19 or 20.
Unfortunately musicians and entertainers do spend an awful lot of their time travelling so it is statistically inevitable that such incidents will occur every now and again, not that it makes it any less tragic.
I have to laugh at all the whinging and whining about Ritchie Blackmore’s forthcoming rock gigs. Even ex Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner has spit his dummy out now, probably because he is not involved. I think people are forgetting a few things: It is Ritchie’s band and he can have who he wants in it. People are saying why use unknowns, well as far as I know most people he has had in the band were unknown before he employed them, Ronnie Jame Dio, Graham Bonnet, Joe Lyn Turner, Doogie White, all fine singers but had anyone heard of them before they joined Ritchie? So he is not exactly doing anything he hasn’t done before. To my recollection the only people he has ever had that were already well known “names” were Cozy Powell and Roger Glover and neither of them is available to do the job; Cozy is no longer with us of course and Roger is still in Deep Purple who would not take too kindly to him participating I suspect even if he was asked and wanted to.
Basically who cares who is in the band – they will be competent musicians and its Ritchie and his Stratocaster that people want to see, that is what is selling the tickets. It’s really quite simple, if you have a ticket and don’t fancy going because of the other guys in the band then sell it. There will be no shortage of takers.
After the Chester gig, one of the guys in Savage Outlaw told me that we sounded very much like Saxon? Never really thought that myself but I suppose coming from the same era it is a possibility. Anyway, I took it a compliment.
So for now I will sign off otherwise this is never going to be posted.
Until next time
Keep rockin’
Craig