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Forthcoming Gigs.

1st August - Eastleigh Festival
For further info go to www.eastleighfestival.co.uk

9th August - Eden Festival
For Further info go to www.edenfestival.org


Welcome to the new look "wise words". The entries have been less frequent because my digi camera was busted and I haven't been able to capture any stills so there will be no pics in future editions and any new pics will be in the gallery section. There should be some nice stills from the recent gig at The Flying Picket. With this new web log format I will be updating more frequetly and will try to make it more like a diary rather than the mammoth newsletter you have been getting every month. This is the last mammoth edition so I suppose we better get on with it.
The new band have been out and made there first mark on a stage with the recent gigs we did. Two nights before the gig in Liverpool we did a little warm up at the boys local on the night of the UEFA Cup Final which unfortunately Celtic lost. We played very well and were primed for the gig in the 'pool. The worst thing about the Liverpool gig was that I had to drive there, do the gig and drive back again all in the same day. I thought we played very well at the gig and the lights and sound were excellent. The only disappointing thing was the low turn-out. Thank you to all the people who did turn up: Lex & Po, Tez & Reidy, Irv & Mark, Mark & Lou, Ian & Pete, Paul & Paul. It was nice to see you all and I hope you enjoyed watching as much as I did playing. There was one important visitor to the gig in the 'pool and this was a lady who does a lot of bookings for festivals including Glastonbury and I am currently waiting a phone call that will most probably not happen. She has managed to wangle us a reserve slot for this year and if someone pulls out then Dan, Niol and myself will be tearing down to Somerset to join Noel who is already there. It would be beyond belief and totally ream if the phone does ring but as you can imagine I have resigned myself to the fact that it won't ring so I do not disappoint myself too much. All that said: you just never know. So althoug Glastonbury is a distant dream there is one festival that is booked which is stark reality. The same lady has booked us to play the Eden Festival in Arrowe Park on the Wirral on the 9th August so if you fancy some fun in the sun then shoot on up to Merseyside. On the subject of Merseyside it was the boys first visit to the 'pool and as the venue is so close to the Anglican Cathedral we managed to pop in there for ten minutes and have a quick look around. You may know that I have sung the praises of this magnificent building in these pages before and it is truly an awesome sight. It was a little unfortunate that we arrived about five minutes too late to go up to the top of the tower which would have been a treat because it was such a lovely day. I also spun them up to Toxteth which was a surprise for them because they were expecting it to be like Dodge City but because of the amount of regeneration that has gone on in the area it all looks quite posh. The only give away is the dodgy little kids running around on BMX bikes. Lastly on the subject of Merseyside, it was good to see Liverpool win the bid for the European Capital of Culture. It will mean a lot of much needed investment in the city and there will be a lot of good to come out of it. Maybe David Moyes can apply for some European funding to help him develop his shite football team.
Now for the obituary column. We have lost a couple of crackers over the last month. First, radio commentator Peter Bromley. He was the horse racing correspondent for Radio Five and following his death they broadcast a tribute programme to him and aired some of his more famous pieces of radio commentary. There is one that always has me welling up and it was when Red Rum won the Grand National for the third time. A great piece of audio but not a good as what I deem to be his best ever which was his commentary on Bob Champion winning the National on Aldiniti. Bob came back from cancer to win the greatest race of all and it was such a fairy tale they made a movie of it with John Hurt playing the role of Bob Champion called imaginatively "Champions". Although I am not a racing fan it is sad to lose such great professionals, especially when they have been at the top of their game for so long.
The other great loss was Mickie Most. If you are my age then you will know more about Mickie Most from his days as a panelist on the show "New Faces". He was the one who the audiences loved to hate because he would always slag the bands off, kinda like Simon Cowell but not such a fucking wanker or such a totally annoying twat (I would love to pull his pants over his head). I used to think he was a bit harsh but he was probably right. They would have these half decent cabaret bands on in powder blue tuxedos and he would say something like "the performance was average, they don't have their own songs and the suits are disgusting" and all the audience would boo but he was absolutely spot on. I had the good fortune to meet him once when Grant and myself went to see him to play him some Dr Jolly's stuff. He was a total cool cat and listened to five songs, really loud and then said "Well, you've got three of the four singles you are gonna need, I really like the direction with the Beach Boys harmonies but what do you think I can do". the answer was not much but he then went on to slag off the music industry in a way that I could never hope to reproduce in this edition and even if I could it would not do it any justice. Mickie produced some great records in his time from "Mellow Yellow" and "House Of The Rising Sun" to "Tiger Feet" and "Every One's A Winner". Maybe we will see him pooping up on satellite tv when they show the re-runs of "New Faces". Nice one Mickie, rest in peace.
News from Big Top: Apart from the rehearsing that me and the boys have been doing I have had some visitors in the shape of The Popes. The Popes were so pleased with their first visit to Big Top they have decided to come back and to some more recording again. Nice bunch of chaps with some nice tunes. I managed to persuade the banjo player Tom to come and play on some of my new tunes in the future which should be a vibe.
Cinema reviews: I ain't been out to the flicks for a while so I had a bit of a cultural burst and went to see "Secretary" which is a bit of a dark "relationship" movie which was not bad. It stars James Spader doing his best "James Spader playing the bad, mad guy". I dragged Irish Ed down to Camden Town to see a Japanese horror/thriller called "Dark Water" which is about a woman and daughter living in a very foreboding tower block that is haunted by the ghost of a young girl. It certainly had the hairs standing up on my on a few occasions and was well worth a visit. Last week I went with Noel to see the new Matrix movie which was quite good. I get the vibe that the people who made it were not too bothered about the story being too strong as long as there were plenty of bombs going off and lots of fight scenes. The CGI is incredible and well worth seeing. I got a leaflet from Ket yesterday that showed the screen times to see The Matrix Reloaded at the IMAX cinema in Waterloo. This is a cinema with a huge screen that is as tall as four double-decker buses and it is a different format from 70mm so I reckon I will go and check that out when it starts in August. Hope you like the new look and hopefully there will be more stuff to read in the coming days. I am at my son's school fayre tomorrow and I might set up a stall doing Beatles songs on my little acoustic for a pound each, what do you reckon, good value????