Band Stuff

Good idea Tone, and it doesn't have to be totally impromptu as we can have a go at it on Tuesday. If done well it will show we are 'in tune' ha ha with our audience...if done badly we never need to see them again, apart, of course from you two!

I would like a cd so my answer is yes also, thanks Joolz (and for the nice comments re singing). And yes I think it is Shelley who sounds so good on run, I am pants on that but hey it's the taking part! ha ha

weather looking gorgeous for weds...yippeee
and yes think for £20 we should get a recording.

Thanks for CD Shelley. It does sound pretty good, all things considered. I'm feeling pretty up about the gig next week, especially since I know the audience already, as does Corinne, and they will be lovely and very appreciative. But I dare say we will all do our best, as usual, and much fun will be had by all. I think the idea of getting a recording done for that price is great value Jules, my vote is Yey.
One thing I think we should watch for is the possibility of people getting up to dance, on Perfect or Mavericks track for inst. It would be a shame to curtail that and then send them all on a downer with Run, so how do people feel about being prepared for extra choruses, if necessary, which can be cued.



Tony.

thx emmy..the list may not be complete but at least it will give joe (the pa man) some sort of an idea - and anything better than nothing..

just been listening to the cd.. it has a sort of confident/relaxed feel and there's not that many gaffs if you dont count my own! haha. shame

like the sound too..quite fortunate my bass is turned right down, and the vocals, sax and guitar are all sounding good.. great lead vox by emmy throughout, and especially nice backing vox from shelley (i think?) on run.. and tony's voice seems to suit run too..but i think i need to get moira to teach you some scottish accent for 'havering' as it doesnt sound quite right on 500 miles
just heard a trailer for 'moll flanders' on the telly.. shirley doing a version of our song "hey pigs blender"! how dare she?

and if I missed you off sorry but I often sing with my eyes closed......so gawd only knows what's going on around me...

Song Lead Backing

1 Delilah Emmy Tony

2 64 Tony Emmy

3 Songs of Love Steve Emmy

4 Ring of Fire Tony Emmy

5 Perfect Emmy Shelley Corinne

6 Just wanna Tony Emmy

7 Run Tony Shelley Emmy

8 River Deep Emmy

9 Will You? Emmy

10 Sweet Dreams Emmy Shelley Corinne Tony

11 Spender Emmy

12 500 Miles Tony Emmy Shelley Corinne

Please all check and apologies if wrong. Steve, Corinne, I think I have the numbers you sing on - apart from you Steve I am not so sure .... do you sing on 500 miles? I know you do a bit of a whoop on Sweet dreams but that may just be a rehearsal whoop? help?!

...and Joolz I think you said you just mime to all tracks - but not in a Marcel Marceau fashion, more of a Madonna/Britney type of mime...Although as we all agreed one evening I can see that stripey Tee Shirt/white face thing working for you. A bit 'Kiss' you know that Gene Simmons bloke now that could work.

Sorry to be a bit woolley Joolz but I think the above is correct

with how we all sounded... onward and upward, I have only just been able to listen to it Shell it wouldn't work on my cd player but did on the telly, however, there is quite some competition for use of that facility it's Slightly Shirley or CBeebies, and CBeebies seems to win out most of the time, but it did work on my computer so listened tonight at bath time - good and thanks Shell for recording it I will try and send everyone the bit of film Steve did of River Deep, Delilah and 64, if I can work out how to do that - if my computer will actually play a film?

Joolz I will set to and do the list tonight, now Hattie's in bed I have a bit of free time, Steve is gardening with George in the back pack so I can do something for me! Hoorah.

sorry no chance to properly listen to cd yet.. hopefully later this evening!!
yep.. pa man is booked and we shouldn't need your little pa.. he has front of house and monitors so disasters not withstanding, we'll be fine.
i do need to let him know the set list and details of who is doing what, so if emmy has had time yet to do that list with vocalists it would be good.
we also need to make a decision about whether we want him to record it.. he records it 'raw' tracks and then takes them back to base to remix and supplies us with a mixed cd.. charges £20 for the whole recording bit! almost sounds too cheap to ignore.
please give me a steer as to whether we go for this????
bfn
jjjjjjjjjjooolzzzzzzzz

on a quick lunch break...Tony, honest.
I've listened to the CD twice, and you're right Shelley it is really good, I am really surprised by how good. We rock, yeah!
yes there are gaffs but we worked on them Tues so knew, i think, what we needed to do, which is also really good.

Thankyou for remembering to record it and thanks for the copy.

Hows the PA thing going, did you book him Jules and will we need the Stage Pass PA at all? If we dont i might use it for the jazz band, or might not, let me know?

..................................................... its very quiet out there............................................. thought they may have been an avalanche of feedback by now from CD.........................or maybe not! Too Stunned?.................

and she's only 3 and a half! ... so i won't make 7pm in the pub so see you at studio. a bit of feedback i forgot to mention was:

it would have been nice to see Steve when he was singing , that I am rubbish at singing and playing the tambourine at the same time (true) but on a more positive note; it was a shame that we didn't do a longer performance as the crowd were enjoying it so much.

Like the banner btw.

Sorry Shelley, I see what happened with the banner, it got chopped off. I put us all up in the header, is that ok?

See you all tomorrow night 7pm in the pub.

Yes Big thanks to you both for use of premises, not only garden but changing rooms too...an thanks Bully for sorting PA, and also advice on my guitar re pedal & eq.
Well who'd a thunk it? I guess we did a good job. Banner pic looks good Shelley, but where are you ? Don't you go hiding yourself off in one corner. Can we have another one please with all of us on?
I felt overall it was a good and useful experience. We do work well as a band, and over time I believe we could become quite a saleable item. Setlist does need looking at, but there are a few gems in there. I thought we all turned out nice, and I felt I almost managed to carry the hat off! If pressed to say, I don't think I'd change outfits at all, think we all looked splendid.
Looking forward to the party gig now, should be fun. I shall try and contact my friend of a friend who may be able to help us out with P.A. I'll do it tomorrow, didn't have a spare minute to breathe today.

Today Corinne's Garden...tomorrow the world !!!

Big big big thank you to Cor and Bully for the whole set up yesterday. Felt really bad driving away last night cos there was all the tables and stuff to clear and gazebo to take down and PA to return etc. etc. etc. but had to get Evie home as school next day and no clean school uniform (bad mother talking...take note Emmy and you too could aspire to the same dizzy heights of mothering! So long as you have a big glass of wine in your hand at the same time, its just dandy!!!).

And just a thought girlies, and getting a little ahead of myself here, but maybe we could have a chat with the ebay lady and organise the purchase of 3 matching dresses through her rather than bidding......... I have to admit in the photos the two purple dresses really look good either side of the gold! Cor, what about leggings under like Emmy? (Sorry boys if I'm boring you but you guys looked very dapper anyway...........its a girl thang! And I dont even do the whole "clothes" thing!)

Have done the CDs, will bring tomorrow, I would personally like to work on the whole 64 coming in after the chorus thing as I struggle with the whole no gap concept . Bye for now.

Well it's reassuring to hear the good news about how things came together yesterday. well done everyone. i think it does need to be said that a very large many thank yous need to be directed toward a certain and somewhat incapacitated mr bully for a splendiferous job done making us sound so good. not that i've heard it properly yet, but it certainly seemed pretty good from where i was standing and that was definitely NOT the best place to be hearing us from.. especially with the farts emanating from my bass cab on a fairly regular basis!
Your comments re. "the wife" are very kind Emmy..oh dear, she'll never let me hear the last of that when she reads that! And Shelley.. you might think you made the most mistakes, but most of mine were SOOOO LLOOWW notes you probably cant hear them to count 'em!! And yes, I'd love a disc with the tracks on please and if Emmy's tracks can be copied/distributed then it would be great to have them too.. I really must get a zoom of my own and not have to rely on you all, strange given my collection of gadgets!!
anyhow, jusqu'à demain.
au revoir
cher joolz

Steve (my Steve) that is, he only 'managed' to record our run through of River Deep and then got Delilah and 64 !!!! how disappointed was I when I found out! still he did have Hattie to contend with, and apologies to your neighbours Corrine as I believe various stuffed toys and some grass and flower heads were posted through their letter boxes during the course of the evening. Anyway back to us ...and in my humble we sounded really very good on the 3 tracks Steve captured and equally as important, we looked good too. Well done to all. It really was great fun. Thanks for your hospitality Corrine and to Moira too Joolz for watching over George. What a nice wife you have by the way (well done!)...Btw I think I had a compliment Hattie's grandad said I could have been a great red coat at Butlins, is that a compliment? hmmmmmm

Listened to the recording last night and you know what, its ok, it really is. Yes there were a couple of very minor farts but there was some really good stuff in there as well. Yes, really! Considering it was our first "gig" in front of actual real live people, and we have only been together for approx 3 months, I think its sounding pretty good, and that comes from me who made most of the mistakes, and I counted them Joolz!

Unfortunately Phil missed Delilah, but have the recording from 64 onwards to end. That took approx 45 mins continously, including a bit of faffing over mikes and other such stuff. Because it is probably too big to send via email, I will do you all a recording onto disc and bring them along on Tuesday if you like? Havnt seen my daughters photos yes but she took loads apparently, so will sift through later and have a look.

Well done guys, see you all tomorrow.

Thanks Cor, we need that ping for Spender. See you all later.

hello slightly insane people,
address is 1 barton cottages, off wrefords link, by cowley bridge roundabout
postcode EX4 5BU(sat nav prob takes you to pub, well cheap sat nav does!)
If in doubt call 412426
if they're driving then best to leave car on wrefords lane as we aint all gonna fit in our lane
emmy - i got a triangle today for big spender for you, whoop whoop.

would be great if you could all be here for just after 4
guests from 5pm and we start set at 6pm ...all sound OK?
tonys coming round at 3.30 and him and steve are coming with me to get PA.
i am hoping to get loads of ice for a huge ice bucket for chilled drinks etc...i will put out bread and cheese and pickle but cant provide any other food.
oh and most importantly, if people wanna sit down, either bring blankets or chairs, i havent enough...

yours quite excitedly
Corinne
xxxxxx

Hi all, can I just confirm your address Corinne for some of my folks. Also please confirm what time we should arrive and what time the guests should arrive. Ta.

Hi folks. I have to say we have really started getting it together in the past few weeks. Lots of refinements and polishing going on (which is always good). No signs of panic any more, but wait for the nerves and use them, they will make it a bit spesh on sunday and again on 24th. I know i'm starting to get a bit edgy now, and it's only friday night. Lots of good stuff going on here in forum.
I think you may be right about the end of 'will you' Jules, or it may just be a long Rall. on the Dm, but whichever if we just sit in the background towards the end whilst Corinne does her thang we should get away with either.
I am happy to resurrect 'Hit the road', not so sure about 'Aint what you...' I would have to convinced we were well into it percussion-wise.
I think we should have enough for Sunday with what we've got though.
See you all at Corinnes !!!

It's a bit lonely out here in Shirley land....
anyhow, just in case Tony or Shelley happen to read this before Sunday I have finally worked out what is going wrong with the last few bars of Will You?

I think the chords Tony and I are playing when Corinne does her final flourish are:
Dm F G Dm
/ / / / //// ////

But it should be:
Dm F G Dm A rall. Dm
/ / // // //// ////

the slashes are crotchet beats.
Hope we can just check that out on Sunday before we go on stage!!
Cheers
J

well, you're obviously all too busy this time on a friday to be passing comment here.. I'm taking some time out during lunch today to reply to my own posting! yep.. sad I know, but I get lonely when no one talks to me!! :-)
Just checking weather forecast again seems to confirm we should be OK on Sunday.. so perhaps my original fears were unfounded. Still its always worth having fallback plans - as last weeks University virus outbreak proved..
As I write this I have headphones on listening to Corinne's mp3s, and have to say im liking what I'm hearing.. nice warm sound, relaxed vibe and sounds pretty well rehearsed.. (which it is of course!!). well done folks!! something definitley wrong in 'will you' so I'll have a good hard listen tonight and try and work out what we're doing wrong...
bfn
j

Just looking at the met office five day forecast for exeter suggests that sunday should be a better day than saturday.. which is somewhat re-assuring. However, would it be worth having a fallback plan if it ends up pouring and we can't play in corinne's garden? not necessarily for sunday, but at least an opportunity to set-up as we would be 'on stage' and run through the set once or twice ?!! any ideas for location/venue???
BTW - I thought that this Tues rehearsal marked a big shift in our confidence levels, and somehow it felt (to me) we were all feeling far more relaxed with the songs.. i havent heard the mp3's yet but i hope they reflect how i heard it!!

just emailed last nights tracks... let me know if you didnt get them all

enjoy and see you sunday...gulp

the famous blind orchestra of the hebrides play the tune in horrid key for sax, having tried all afternoon, i would need music to read from, cant improvise over it, there are too many sharps. we can try our original key on tues and see if thats better for tenor?? sorry guys.

What a great album that is - I DO like the instrumental version of HtRJ very mellow and would be lovely with your sax playing Corrine. I can sing along to it .... sitting at my computer ...........but who knows what will happen on Tuesday !!!! I do like light my fire from that album too. Again lovely sax on it.

Shall we try it along with one more go at Jolene? And I need to refine Perfect - if I could just nail that damn opening note.

oohh had forgotten about jolene...love the sophie eb disco version ...handclapping and all.

and i've just listened to hit the road - Ray Charles version (instrumental magic) and if we cut that ending out, the rest of it could well be doo able in that sort of style... sax talking with vocals etc... can we try it in that key on tues and i'll try and work it out this weekend? dont know what the key is, i'm afraid, you'll have to play along with spotify...Emmy can you sing it in that key?

Shelley.. its not necessarily the number of emails but if you've got attachments to lots of them it might be worth deleting the attachments.. or saving them to your hard disk, but the important thing is getting them out of your inbox. hope that helps.

as for sitting in the garden topping up the tan, mmmm nice for some..
and setlist wise personally i would prefer jolene to aint what you do... but thats just me!
J

some ace versions of Jolene on Spotify in particular by Jill Johnson and Sophie Ellis Bextor both more upbeat than our slow version. But not as fast/loud etc as our quicker version. Have a listen. Nice harmonies too in Jill J version? Perhaps a go at that one on Tuesday may yield something positive? I think aint what you do could be put at end of encore just a chorus or two of it would be a good way to finish.

Do you think it may be because I have 539 emails in my inbox? Big glass of wine and an evening in front of laptop coming up I feel. Getting quite excited about dress rehearsal now!!!! Definately think we should work on Aint What You Do, its lighthearted and fun.....oh but where to insert it in the set list?

Am in garden practicing with the box and trying to remove sock like tan line from right leg. Just thought you might like to know

we could try Aint what you do again... have a listen on spotify cos its really percussive. I ll bring the balafon - and we'll see if that is pitched and has necessary notes???

and yes, if we can make hit the road rock then as padding will be useful i think, even if its a two minute version.

emmy.. thanks for the set list. just an observation but with those 10 numbers as the main set, we're going to have trouble stretching out to 40 mins unless we have some serious chatter between numbers.. would it be worth adding "hit the road jack" back into the list just to give it some additional swelling?

Set List

1. Delilah
2. 64
3. Love Songs
4. Ring of Fire
5. Perfect
6. Dance the Night Away
7. Run
8. River Deep
9. Will You
10. Sweet Dreams

Encore

1. Big Spender
2. 500 Miles

Tony, can you email me your holiday dates please?



(will you didnt record....so that why you didnt get it yesterday, i think thats the only one mssing from this recent flurry of mp3s...)

...could be caused by the mailbox being full... that's what you get with corinne's weekly shed loads of mp3s.. i've just spent half an hour removing the older versions from my 'puter!

have to say that despite feeling like warmed-up death i really enjoyed last night's rehearsal.. its amazing how things have improved and although i keep making mistakes, overall our effect is miles away from where we were just 6 weeks ago. well done to everyone for the concentrated effort. i'm now really looking forward to the gig.. and to make things even better my prisoner t-shirt and badges arrived today, alongside another package containing a new 5m guitar lead!
would appreciate if someone could put the new revised set list here so i can re-arrange my folder.
Be seeing you!
No. 6

hi Shelley, i ve sent out the zoom tapes from last nights rehearsal but they bounce back from your email...somethings wrong.

I know we're waiting to see how our first gig goes, but , if,.... we had offer of another gig in late Sept/early Oct...are there any Fridays or Saturdays that people CAN'T do?
i ll explain tomorrow...

if you did please as I didn't receive it.

Re rehearsal for vocals let me know when and where - Steve works every day except Sundays - so that would generally be a bit of free time for me - or an hour or 2 one evening could be doable? Sorry to hear about Bully and thanks again for the understanding about having to leave early, a crying baby for 2 hours is enough to drive even the most patient babysitter to dispair. Ironically enough though George had fallen asleep in the baby bjorn just seconds before I arrived home ah well....

I like the set list, did you decide to drop 'it aint what you do'? it could be good to slot that one - or bits of that one just a verse maybe to finish the encore i.e we could all sing

'doo be doo dooby dooby dooooooby
doo be doo dooby dooby dooooooby'

'It ain't what you do it's the way that you do it
It ain't what you do it's the way that you do it
It ain't what you do it's the way that you do it
And that's what gets results'

END

About how long is the set? just wondering how much talking /banter is needed between songs..... ha ha

evening,
i will send out mP3 s to emails, of tuesdays rehearsal, there are some really good ones, tho obviously missed you emmy, hope baby george ok...

sorry i was in fractious mood too, worried about bullly, no excuse tho...he s home from hospital now, been sawn across middle and had various organs removed and some put back a little higgledepiggledee...( he gets 6 weeks off work and no heavy lifting!). life returns to some version of reality - its been a horrid few weeks.

anyways Shirley, i would imagine having music probably neccessity for now, i wouldnt worry about learning stuff, the more we do, the more confident and tighter we'll get but it's early days and for this gig, emmys right, no one will notice or care...

the set list, which isnt set in stone, goes something like this

Jeremiah
When I'm 64
Songs of Love
Ring of Fire
Perfect
Dance the Night Away
River Deep Mountain High
Run
Will You
Sweet Dreams
***encore
Big Spender
500 Miles
(and we slot Valerie in if we can get it good nuff)
listening to recording think there shud be bass on perfect but wots other people think?, songs of love nearly there, just needs some glue but we' have come on really well, it s sounding great...

when he performs .....and Chris Martin writes it all on his hands/arms.... I think music stands are fine and the audience wouldn't even think about it...

I agree Emmy , we are sounding good. We obviously missed your presence but all in all set is coming together. Not to go over the top about it but it's good that everyone is still enthusiastic about it all, that goes a long way towards a polished final product.
On a slightly different note, I am having apprehensions about having to learn this all by rote and not having music stands in front of us. I'm not sure in the time left I will be able to learn all the chords and words by heart. Many other musicians, professional as well as amateur do use sheets. How do we feel about this?
Tony

I must say I thought we sounded our best yet not long to go now...... Thanks all, for being so understanding

we may have been depleted in numbers but we rocked you'll be glad to hear.... missed you both loads and it sounded a little wierd &*(%^£$£%!!! but it was productive in tidying up some musical bits and sharpening up beginnings and endings and middle bits...
unanimous to start with Jeremiah to far... the rest of set loosely put together but be great to have input from whole band for that.
other decisions were to leave chanson on subs bench and to put valerie back in main mix but do the Zutons type of thing with our very own arrangement. the chords for chanson quite complicated for both guitar and accordion and all felt to do it justice we'd have to be proficient singing and playing at same time and we didnt have enough rehearsal time to get it right...we'll come back to it.
we've reverted back to more of a conventional ending for Jeremiah - perhaps feeling the name change will be enough to cause upset amongst large cheering crowd! (Emmy spins delightedly on one foot!)

um...wot else? Tony, Shelley and Steve to carry on story so far....

did we agreet to meet 6.30pm then in't' pub? to discuss PA etc...? I can do that.... and, if anyone has any ideas for start of set list, might be quite good to start airing them here, so we can start to think about whether there are any musical or (not) links we can make between the songs.
i would like to start with jeremiah but have no other preferences for order yet, but do think Jeremaih sets the tone and nature of band in one quick fell swoop, plus its probably, musically, our strongest.

co-ordinating colours...think DRUM...gotta match the drum!!!! Dulux number ...

Wow, Tony, it sounds like you found the shirt I bought in Torquay yesterday, totally pscho hippy! Purple green and pink amongst lots of other colours. Really enjoyed Thursday, gonna listen to Cors MPs now before I go out to husbands gig in a minute.

Thanks for MP3 corinne. Yes, it is now sounding half way decent. I think we'll probably be ok ! Well done all. I know we missed Jules on Thurs and we are two down next week, but i think it will all come together. Next couple of rehearsals we should concentrate on being very clear about parts, intros and endings and get them pinned down so we can be really definite when we all get back together.
I saw an incredibly loud shirt today with pinky, purple flowers today, almost like a flock wallpaper shirt! Any thoughts on me wearing something like that? What colour would you say your dress was corinne, it would be really good if we could co-ordinate in some way?

It's great to have a listen back especially to the big laugh we have at the end of each song!!!!

No plan was made to meet in the pub beforehand Tony - I too have a new purchase - I bought a mic AND A CABLE.... no stand though...so can I have your seat? ha ha

HI all,

I am assuming that we are meeting at Depot X at 7:30pm tonight as no one mentioned going to Great Western first? I am happy to do either, but would be good to know for sure. Any plans been made to meet earlier?
Otherwise see you'all at 7:30 !!
Yeh! I bought a music stand and a guitar strap !! So now I am a standing member !!

Tony