TLOGS - trend setters

Nice to see Muse shoe-horning 'House of the Rising Sun' into their biblical set at Glastonbury the other day. Very unimaginitive doing it in 6/8 time, though.

TLOGS - where we go.....

Caption competition.

What on earth has Dave just said/done to provoke such mirth/astonishment?

Last Night's Gig

It was off to the mighty Rose Bowl to help Romsey Young Farmers celebrate their 75th Anniversary. Incredible venue, incredible sunset, miserable staff. We resisted the temptation to upset them further by heading out onto the square for a quick game while we waited for our much-delayed start.


The International Space Station made an appearance just as we finished packing away into Shed 3b, at 02:10, so I was happy.

Picture below shows the Old Gits rigorously sticking to the dress code, which for that evening appears to be Hawaiian Lumberjack Gangsters.

Another booking?

So I'm having my hair cut today, and instead of asking "Something for the weekend, Sir?", my excellent barber asks "I've been hearing all about your band; might you be available for a Wedding Anniversary party on 20th November?" I told him I'd put the word out.

(This potential booking brought to us by Jonathan 'Motor Mouth' Flindt Promotions Ltd.)

Tomorrow's Gig

I'm rather hoping that the group fag break takes place from 22:59 until 23:05 on Saturday. That's when the International Space Station will be passing over the Botley area, with a magnitude of minus 3.6.

I must get out more.

[That's 'fag' as in cigarettes, by the way]

Last night's gig.

Don't be fooled by the shorts and the sunshine....

I wonder if Dr David Viner is a music fan. "Who he?" you ask. Well, he was a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, which as any fule kno is the highest cathedral of the religion of Man-Made Global Warming. He was quoted in the Independent on Sunday on 20th March 2000:

According to Dr. Viner, within a few years, winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". He said that "Children just aren't going to know what snow is."

Almost as accurate as my Eurovision predictions.

Anyway, I wish Dr Viner had been at Midsummer Madness last night. The blistering cold North wind played havoc with guitar strings, snapping some and sending others out of tune. Nearby RAF Odiham reached 6.5C during the night - before windchill. I was lucky; I had a lamp nearby to warm my hands between songs.

Special mention to Matt, Jesse and Dave, who had played at the Alresford Music Festival earlier in the day, then joined Mark for a 45-minute No Through Road set before the Old Gits came on. A long day.

Still, we had a good time, and plenty of the good folk of West Meon turned up to show their immaculate line-dancing skills and cheer us on.

Extra special mention goes to a Mr and Mrs P, of Borden, who also came down to cheer us on, but went to last week's venue. It would be unfair to mention any names, but here's a picture of Matt.

Hobbits to Isengard

The demand for this techno remix of 'They're taking the hobbits to Isengard' has been overwhelming, so copy this into your browser:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE-1RPDqJAY

Saturday's Gig

Ah, the archetypal English Summer evening: the East Meon Sixes drawing to a noisy close, the beer tent beginning to do lively business, the tent with the big TV all primed for the big game..... and in the music tent, two bands are simultaneously trying to set up for the evening show. You never saw such an outbreak of politeness as Old Gits and Unusual Suspects tip-toed round each other, sharing amps and borrowing cables. The Old Gits drew the line at cordless microphones and in-ear monitors, though. New-fangled nonsense.

We finally got going fairly late, just in time for the association football to start (I'm told England valiantly managed a draw with the mighty USA). Our audience was....sparse, you could say. Sparse but enthusiastic. We had a lovely time, though. A huge thanks to the Gorgeous Groupies who made just enough noise for us to do our encore. We'd have looked a bit silly saying "What's that? You want more?" to a wall of silence.

We won't know ourselves if we ever end up playing to a heaving mass of several hundred people!

Here's a lovely picture of a balloon.

Monday's rehearsal

Another quiet rehearsal. No really, it was. Matt was away, John was in Yorkshire, Dan arrived late, left shortly after that, and then arrived again. Don't ask why.

Heavy rain on the shed roof (good title for an album?) was greeted with cheers by the assorted agriculture-based band members.

We tweaked a few numbers in preparation for the June mini-tour.

The Inaugural Thomas Lord Old Gits Dinner

It was a very serious and historic occasion. The complete band and a smattering of other halves gathered in our 'home' pub for the first ever TLOG Dinner. Actually, it wasn't at all serious. It was very silly and very good fun. Some of us are still bearing the bruises from being comprehensively beaten up for the trifling crime of drawing a smiley face in the mashed potato.

Talking of food, the TLord did us proud, and well done the Pink Fairey on her magnificent birthday cake for John. I've never heard 'Happy Birthday' sung with so many varied harmonies - some of them even in key.

.

Pics from the party 1

Last time I saw this lot, I'm sure they were offering cheap Tarmac from a white van.

Curly Fingers

How the lovely Mrs Pratt would be proud of me. All those long lessons she'd be imploring me to use curly fingers. "Oh, Flindt, you'll never reach that top G spot without curling your fingers!" she'd cry.

Saturday's Gig

Another jolly evening on Saturday. The rain mostly stayed away and it wasn't too cold; you'd think you could book an outdoor party for the end of May without freezing to death, but, hey, that's Global Warming for you. Only three weeks 'till the days get shorter.

Luckily, no-one noticed that we weren't doing Country & Western numbers to match the party's theme, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

Looking forward to the TLOGID on Saturday.