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MAY 2002

Wednesday 15th: The Palomino - Newmarket
I have pretty much the same principle as Greg McDonald when it comes to "debut gigs", but we were all feeling a little nervous for this one. Although the audience was made up of our friends, and the other bands, it didn’t feel like a debut gig! We played a song that we had written the day before (Secrets) and a badly chosen Mansun cover of 'Being a Girl' Highlights included an attempt to dance with myself - the dance floor was empty, apart from the ever faithful Holl(i)y, and a constant battle against falling over in a crumpled heap. We crashed our way through our extremely short 5 song set, all very aware that there were people watching us, and listening for mistakes... Tom's guitar levels weren't quite right, but thankfully we didn't fuck up too much. After Sarcoma Credo (which was aptly dedicated to God, who promptly responded by creating a mass of feedback through the ever suffering PA system). I barged my way outside. Lets get wasted.

Saturday 18th: The NCC - Bury St Edmunds
Extremely scared, tired and hung-over, we turn up late for the sound check which was fortunately running late anyway. After our sound check we wonder about for a bit and are very impressed by the fact that there is a back stage…and we can "go backstage" whenever we want! Sitting on the floor watching Opposite the Hotel I suddenly realise that I needed a wee so badly that I was going to cry! The next thing I hear is Tom's voice coming through the PA, saying "we can’t find our singer but we’re going to play anyway" and the band had started to play Morphinated… I get to the stage in time to say 'Hello' to all the beautiful people and we kick into Tomorrow's Nation. We are all feeling slightly more pissed than we thought we were, due to speedy and dedicated alcohol consumption before our set. The set is the same as Wednesday night but we are pumped, and put far more energy and effort into the songs. The combination of alcohol, additional confidence, and an enthusiastic crowd who are dancing, and even moshing to our music, encourages us greatly. We made more mistakes and my microphone stopped working, but it felt a hell of a lot better than our first gig. Sarcoma Credo comes around too quickly and it feels like it's over too soon. In a fury of drunkenness I manage to get caught up in my microphone lead and stand and as the song finishes I jump out, throwing the heap of equipment on the floor. At this point I decided to retreat outside to play on the swings and of course to carry on the band's reputation as the most drunken rock n roll experience ever! After several hours of heavy drinking, Tom falls into his car, and embarasses himself in front of his delighted mother, whilst me and Jooles walk home in the cold (I found a nice road maintenance sign for my room). We ate strawberry mousse when we get back to my house. We live for this and nothing will ever be the same.

JULY 2002

Saturday 13th: Frogstock - Norfolk
We don't talk about this one!

Wednesday 24th: The Palamino - Newmarket
Waiting around for hours, with nothing to do but wait and grow old, or at least that’s how it felt! Got to the Palamino early and watched the other bands do their sound checks. Nerves finally kicked in and I was allowed no alcohol to calm them before we played…due to the incidents at Frogstock! Remembering my lyrics seemed much easier when I had consumed alcohol before hand, and dancing was proving more demanding than usual too! Tom jumped around and looked generally very punk indeed, Nick posed and threw shapes while Jooles threw angst-ridden glances at the audience. Edd is the most amazing drummer I’ve ever heard and I don’t know what we would have done without him! As for me, well I made more mistakes than ever, rambled random nonsense to the crowd and sustained multiple microphone injuries! The end of our set came around more quickly than I ever could have imagined and before long I was running down the road past the shops and gaining myself a free bicycle…this is rock n roll!

AUGUST 2002

Thursday 15th: The Portland Arms - Cambridge
Sweating our arses off in the cramped back room of the Portland Arms we played the best gig we’ve done so far! We had a good crowd and there wasn’t that big awkward space in front of the stage because people were dancing! And I was shocked when people recognised Secrets and cheered when it was announced. I don't think we'll ever play Sarcoma Credo again...we all hate it! As the set was finishing I ended up in the car park of all places drinking sex on the beach and strawberry daiquiris. Recording the demo the next day with an incredible hangover and extremely sore throat...oh dear! To say that I want nothing more would be false because like everyone in the world I cant help but strive for more, but I think if this was all I got I would be quite content in my own little world!

SEPTEMBER 2002

Friday 8th: The Drum and Monkey - Ipswich
Guitar breakage during our sound check, no replacement guitar, borrowing a weird guitar from the other band that gave tom a rash, broken strings, no replacement strings, no replacement left handed guitars, tuner failure, playing everything as if we were on speed, terrible levels, terrible sound, playing a new song which was impossible to finish, alcohol, forgotten lyrics and bass lines made this gig a complete shambles. On the plus side Tommy Cutler had a fantastic time, the banter between myself, Tom and Julia was very impressive (considering what my early attempts at on stage banter were like) and we got paid £25 for our appalling attempt at rock n roll…I’m surprised no one died!

Thursday 12th: The Priors Inn - Bury St Edmunds
Over dressed, over anxious, over you and over tired; I really didn’t think I was ready for a gig tonight. As always, listening to the other bands sound checks had made me nervous and I felt ill…one way to cure such things and that is to drink as much as you can! (Note to self: must drink less.) Much to my surprise nothing went wrong, no one died and we sounded pretty damn good! We were less energetic than usual though, I felt uncomfortable on the small stage and found it near to impossible to dance or move much at all really. Our crowd was lovely. It was a fine night. And in the morning it comes as a surprise that I write better songs when I’m hung over! (Note to self: must drink more.)

Saturday 28th: The NCC - Bury St Edmunds
I can't sleep after a gig like this, so here I am! But what can I say? I think we went down well, and we even had a mosh pit and some crowd surfers! My banter was terrible cos Tom and Jooles didn’t have mics to help me and I just felt really nervous...the word "twat" comes to mind when I couldn’t even read the set list and got the songs in the wrong order! But apart from the odd mistakes (mainly mine) it was a great gig, everyone enjoyed it and we played our little hearts out! Best quote from the evening, "If I didn’t know you guys and I didn’t like your music you know I'd still like you cos you’re just so fucking cool!" Well that says it all doesn’t it ;-D

OCTOBER 2002

Saturday 12th: Newmarket Band Competiton - The King Edward Royal Memorial Hall
Probably one of the best gigs we've played, its just a shame no one could hear it! It was described by the judges as a "battle of the sounds" rather than a battle of the bands. I don't mind not winning and I wasn't expecting to, but I do feel we were cheated and let down by the pittiful sound. And how can judges give marks to a band that they can't hear? In the words of Nickolass Trash, "oh well, at least we got to roll about with our guitars but then again without any sound it's basicaly gymnastics!"

Thursday 24th: The Priors Inn - Bury St Edmunds
I was determined to write a really good gig history that didn’t put us down or make us sound like twats but it was another one of those gigs where afterwards I wish that the ground was Roberts Smiths lipstick stained mouth and that he would just open up and swallow me like a sleeping pill...but unfortunately I’m not an easy pill to swallow so he would have just spat me out onto the cold hard floor of reality. Didn’t feel like we played well at all and due to technical difficulties we sounded worse than we deserved to. Paggey from El Spoonio made a guest apperance on bass guitar during Sarcoma Credo (and yes I know we dropped it from our set months ago but it never really left) and played it like he had someone with a gun behind his back but it was rectified by pure rock n roll posing! Forgotten lyrics and poor vocals meant that I only had one option left…. to roll about on the floor as much as possible to take the emphasis off my general rubbishness! Me and Nick had a fight during Brain Sells and before I knew it me and Jooles were driving back to my house for cups of tea and chocolate doughnuts! Never got to the moon but got paid which was a nice consolation.

NOVEMBER 2002

Friday 15th: BurySOUND Heat 3 - Corn Exchange
I seemed to have suffered from an almost complete loss of memory (not, as some would have you believe, from alcohol consumption but more likely to be caused from a mixture of nerves and adrenaline) starting from when we opened the door to walk on stage and ending with me running out of the corn exchange and down towards the off licence. I have, however, been assured of a few facts these are that: a) we played the best gig we have ever played b) we looked and sounded great c) we had “the best” (not entirely sure what this means but I have been told it by a number of people) crowd of the evening and d) we have split up…though as far as I’m aware we haven’t, but then again what would I know? Due to my memory shortage and taking into consideration the praise we have had and the general good feeling the band have had after a gig like this I feel compelled to say it was fucking fantastic! I know I usually have a lot of critical comments to make but I really have none…I hope we live forever until we die so please don’t bother me now, I’m living happily ever after.