Last night I went to a couple of gigs, and halfway into town I had a moment of panic when I realised that I hadn't recorded this week's American radio show, (The Sound Of Nottingham UK, listen in the UK here). I usually record it on a Friday you see. For most of today, I have thought it was Saturday. I woke up about twelve, made breakfast and settled down to listen to Pick Of The Pops, which of course I was twenty four hours early for. Where things get even more confusing, is that tomorrow (Saturday) will feel like a Sunday because we've already had a day off today (Friday). Sunday will be Sunday, but Monday will feel like a Sunday, which means when we return to work on Tuesday it will feel like a Monday. This year, Easter has fallen at an even worse time, as the clocks go forward on Saturday night. So Sunday will be even more fucked up, because in addition to barely knowing what day it is, there's the bi-annual obligation to tell everyone "in real life, it is (whatever) o'clock every hour".
There were at least three places that I wanted to go to and see some live music, but things didn't work out that way and one of those venues had to be sacrificed. We met at Alley Cafe to start with because Chloe McShane was playing. She first got in touch with me a few months ago regarding her music and was bowled over by her voice. We played her on NottinghamLIVE a few weeks ago and the response from listeners wanting to know more about her was amazing. This was my first opportunity to see her performing live, and I'm so glad I did. She's got an amazing voice, which she took advantage of with loop-pedalling her own backing vocals. At first she appeared nervous, but soon settled in to her set with flourish. The really good news is that she is booked to perform in session on NottinghamLIVE next month, as I have a feeling that before long she'll be far too big for such things. She's appeared on BBC Introducing and NUSIC, so after that she deserves to come on Nottingham's finest.
Rather than race to the next venue, we stuck around to avoid missing Josh Kemp. I know I've mentioned this before, but he is a perfect antidote to the over-population of 'one man and his guitar' acts. He is another loop peddler, and the sounds he makes are awesome. Despite an appearance from the usual talking through gigs brigade, he managed to get the crowd on side with an energetic set that aside from original material also featured a cover of 'Mr Brightside' and 'I Wanna Be Like You (The Monkey Song)' from The Jungle Book, which everyone sang along to. Josh is a really hard working guy, who had done a session for us the day before the gig, and will be spending his Easter Saturday teaching music before playing at a festival. As with all the musicians I nail my colours to, there will come a time when he's a massive star and won't even remember my name and I'll be the old man in the corner of the pub telling anyone who'll listen how I knew him when he played clubs and bars and they won't believe me.
I confused all the times and billings for Jam Cafe, and had somehow got the impression that The Golden Troubadours were the headliners. This meant that they wouldn't hit the stage until just after eleven, so we had time to get there after Josh had finished at Alley Cafe. This wasn't the case however, and we turned up just in time for their last song. They must have started the night's entertainment early to be finished so early, but then again it was Thursday when the whole world thought it was Friday, and Friday and Saturday usually have later hours. Luckily, it turned out that The Most Ugly Child were headlining, when I thought that we had missed them. They are appearing on NottinghamLIVE in a few weeks, which was in my opinion a bit of a scoop for us. We couldn't really see them from our table, but they threw out an absolute belter of a set. In fact I don't know why more acts don't experiment with making and selling live albums, or even just live tracks on Soundcloud. If I was the type to dance at gigs, then I would have been up there like a shot.
Anyone who has been to a gig at Jam Cafe will never believe this, but despite the usual shoulder to shoulder sardine tin environment, we managed to find and sit at a table. There were six of us, (myself, Prefontaine, Tegan, and another guy) and we pulled off the much fabled 'finding a table to sit at' fantasy that people in Jam Cafe can only dream of. This may never happen again, but it happened and one day I'll be the old man in the pub telling anyone who'll listen how I once managed to sit down in comfort in the Jam Cafe during a gig on Good Thursday 2013, and they won't believe me.
===
My daily blog can be delivered straight to your Kindle for 99p a month (link)
