Maybe there's a law or mathematical ratio which states that the least willing you feel about going out on a particular evening the better a time you're going to have. If there were such a law, this night at The Kings Head in Holmbury would have gone some way in supporting it's validity. About an hour and a half drive from West London and somewhere on a lattitude between Dorking and Guildford, The Kings Head is, as Mike the Landlord aptly puts it "In the middle of nowhere and take a left" Mike and his wife Jane are lovely. They bring to mind Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn in 'The African Queen'. Jane makes a great stew! On arrival Mike shows me around. There is no PA. It is is a shock. I had not been briefed. I instantly see what I have to do, which is to engage the whole pub in listening to the music instead of talking and, when the moment comes, this is what happens. I start singing at nine, in the usual stage area. I talk a lot about the songs, and anything else that comes to mind, in between the songs and keep asking if they can hear it, to keep their attention. Being in the stage area though, creates too much separation between us, so after a break, around ten, I decide to simply sit at the bar. At no time do I ask for quiet and there is talking in between songs but as I start another introduction on the guitar, the talking dies down and they are attentive again. This creates a pleasant and relaxed rhythm to the evening. I start to loosen up and the jokes start flying. Performing unamplified is about as raw as it gets. I perceive a special quality in the atmosphere. I can feel everything very close. Lots of these songs were written in emotional states, sometimes tears, and some of them, when fresh, I couldn't get through without breaking up. After a time, though, the songs become set and I perform them with little emotion. Here though in this atmosphere the emotion appears again but I have control. There is something like a tap and, in this moment, I can add as much or as little as required. It is an extraordinary experience. During the songs I enjoy experimenting in this way. I am also aware that all this is getting through to the audience. After on particular song I say "Singing without a microphone is like having sex without a condom". They laugh so I say next "I feel okay about saying that to you because you know it" Suddenly I realize I have come to the end of all the songs written on the sheet of paper. This is somewhere I rarely get to. It's also nearly midnight. I get up to take my leave but they call for more. After a quick smoke outside I come back and do 'Summerbreeze'. It's been a wonderful night and everybody there comes and says so. Definitely one of my favourite gigs and a good one to end the tour on.
Ps. there was to be another show, it is, however, rescheduled and I also happened strangely to have a streaming cold that night.
A Note of thanks to Rob Mc Gee who put this tour together and has been overseeing it every step of the way. Interestingly, Rob and I have never met in person or spoken on the phone, everything being communicated via email, fb message or text. I must confess I do quite like the 'Charlie's Angels' vibe, though we will be meeting soon to discuss the next tour.
Leaving East Woodlands near Frome in a drizzly afternoon after last night's revelry in Bath.
A tiredness that sleep cannot slake.
Lydia likes the phrase "where did it come from" she asks
"From being on the road for nearly a Month"
I take Lydia in to town to pick up 'Gavin', whom she adores and has been riding for longer than she has known me. I am not even slightly jealous but Gavin is lime green. I continue deep into the heart of the English countryside alone, accompanied by the rain and Jim Reynolds CD which he gave me the night before. His album, 'One Day' is lovely, especially the first few tracks. I mentally thank him for joining me, in this way, for the journey.
Ordinarily I would love to be driving through these parts but for some reason, the weather perhaps, or my tiredness, I cannot find that sense of enjoyment and am a little anxious to arrive..... where? Even when I pass through Winchester and catch a glimpse of the Cathedral I don't stop. I tell myself that I will on another day, that I don't want to be driving in the dark, that trying to park would be a hassle and so I leave Winchester with a nagging feeling of an opportunity, perhaps of badly needed revivification, missed. The road pulls me, and I remember Joni's song 'prisoner of the white lines on the freeway'. I arrive in Brighton and am warmly greeted at The Fiddlers Elbow by Rosie, who, though young, is in capable command of this busy, hard drinking, old, Irish Pub. It will be an hour or two until the music starts and there are other acts performing here tonight. I take the time to find some dinner - Vietnamese around the corner. Out of the blue I get a text message from Sharon Lewis whom I haven't heard from for six years. We played on the same bill once or twice in Oxford and Brighton and had a brief romance in London. She is one half of a duo called 'Pooka' who were famous in the nineties. Lydia's brother Ben also shows up. He is also one half of a current and well known and successful duo called 'Bitter Ruin' It's nice to share a table with friends. Also here tonight is a music writer/journalist called Paul, who comes to ask me some questions after I play. The music tonight is overseen by Brian who asks me to play a set in the first half and another in the second but after the act after me in the first he decides to end the night there because the Pub is so quiet and indeed, as Carly of Pipe and Tabor, one of the acts here tonight, correctly remarks "It's shitting quiet at The Elbow tonight". Sharon invites me to stay at her place which I gratefully accept and the next morning I have a chance to wander around Hove and Brighton. My Grandmother brought my brother and I here when we were children and came to live here in her final years. My daughter also spent her later childhood here with her mother and so this place has some pleasant memories.
There are two bands on here tonight, One in the main bar, a seven piece, and us in another room at the back of the Pub. The main bar is quite busy and warm. The back room is empty and cold There are no posters or any mention that there will be a band playing at the back. I resign myself to playing to a cold, empty room.
Yet this room has some charm. An upright piano, which I find Jim playing and later Lydia. Old leather sofas lined up for comfortable gig listening, and the lighting is nice. The sound engineer rigs up a couple of mics and then disappears to the front bar to sort out the other band. I take the opportunity to get something to eat, a very good lamb tagine, in the front bar with Lydia. Then, returning to our room, we start to run through a few songs.. a kind of soundcheck / nothing else to do type of thing, even though the sound man is still not back from the other band and my guitar is not wired in. As we play, people start to wander in and even faces that I recognise; Jim Reynolds, who heard us at The Old Bookshop the Saturday before has come to hear us again. He has come with Bjorn, a Norwegian graphic artist. There are also a group of friends from around Frome and Loredana from Sicily who heard us in Nunney and she has come with Haley, who together run 'Soundbites' where we will be playing in April, served alongside home cooked, Sicilianfood.
At the back I see the silhouettes of a couple dancing, a slim, elegant African girl, a really good mover. no one in the band seems to know what is really going on.. are we doing the set without guitar? is this a soundcheck? as I play, there are attempts to get the guitar plugged in. Finally the sound engineer returns and the sound is established. By now the room is well populated and we progress through the set, stop for a break after bout forty minutes and then continue until closing time.
At the end are meetings with new people who like the sound and with those already familiar. Jim Reynolds gives me his CD, which I will come to listen to on the way to Brighton, the next day.
"In the middle of nowhere and take a left"
