From Dundee to Newport

Rather than clogging up the Dave Hughes Music (TM) website with a diary of every gig I do, I've decided to write them up in this blog. I'm taking inspiration from Chris T-T here, who has his main website news feed and also Blognostic (and now the awesome Songnostic) as more personal blogs. Hope you enjoy, I'll try and make it as interesting as possible.

Yesterday I went and took the massive 10 minute coach trip from Dundee to play in Newport. This was the first gig I've done in the East Coast of Scotland since I moved up here, and in front of a totally new audience. An old friend of mine, Dominic Venditozzi, puts on these completely unplugged gigs in a wee cafe in the town. I met up with him a couple months back to talk about places to play up in Dundee, and he invited me along to play a few songs.

Newport is a lovely wee town, the type of town you can walk from one end to the other in 10 minutes. It has quite a few hotels which double as the local pub, a really good smelling fish and chip shop and a co-op. Perfect for the settled the life. I found myself looking in the estate agent's window and saw a 3 bedroom cottage with "outer shed/workshop" for around £135,000. This is now my goal for the next year.

Anyways, I got to the cafe and found a large-ish crowd standing outside the locked doors, a few kids carrying guitar cases and adults with boxes of wine. This was very helpful in giving me an idea of what type of show this was going to be. Around half seven, Dom showed up and opened the doors, put down a masking tape sqaure to mark the stage and the gig got underway.

Around 4 acts played before me with everyone doing 2 songs each (except for the main headline act, Sarah Collosu who was booked for 30 minutes). Nervousness set in as most if not all the other acts played a softly softly style of acoustic music, much associated with the new-folk scene that's going around at the moment. I rattled through my mind trying to work out which songs of mine I could play that would fit the night.

Eventually I had the revelation of "fuck it", and just played songs that are representative of what I do, namely The sinner and the saints and "I want something". I don't know how well they went down, people clapped, and there was a softly softly sing a long at the end of I want something. Later on I was asked up again, and played "never took the time" by way of apology.

Time was getting on so, in the absence of having a car now, I had to go and find the bus stop for the coach back to Dundee. So I said my good byes, gave apologies to Sarah who's set I was going to miss and left. A 15 minute wait in the cool night air was only made longer by the Midges. I got back to my flat around quarter past midnight, had some leftover cake and went to bed pretty content.

Today I am getting the bus from Dundee to Glasgow, then the train to Ayr followed by a local bus service to Failford in the South Ayrshire valley for tonights gig. I can't wait.

Look what you started

Currently on the bus from Glasgow to Dundee after a fun excursion to see one of the best bands on the planet: The Gaslight Anthem. This was also the first trip I've made since getting rid of the car, which has it's good points and bad points. Good in that there was no stress of where to park, can i have a drink, or what will the traffic be like? Bad in that we had to get up super early in order to get our return coach so i can get to work, didn't have a useful car boot to leave bags in, and of course the stuffy environment of the mega bus.

We got to the gig just after the second support band, Twin Atlantic had started. I've been lucky that i've never had the chance to see them before, as they did absolutely nothing for me. The sound was generic Kerrang friendly unit shifter, had no personality at all, and then made bitchy comments to the audience. Very poor.

Didn't have to wait long for the Gaslight Anthem to come on stage. I saw them a couple years ago at the Garage and was really looking forward to this gig. This excitement was extinguished with the opening of American Slang due to the most horrific mix I have heard in a long time at a gig. The rack tom was far far to loud against the rest of the mix, there was a certain note that the bassist kept playing which lept out over absolutely everything, and there was no guitars. This continued through High Lonesom, which is one of my favourite songs from the last album.

Perhaps through a combination of moving to a more central position, or the soundman pulling back on the suck channel, things started to get better.  The band rattled through a selection of songs from the Newest album and the superior 59 sound. Only one track, Blue Jeans and White T-shirts, from pre-59 sound was played in the main set. Great Expectations was a highlight, as was Boxer which is, along with The Queen of Lower Chelsea perhaps the strongest tracks on the new one. Closing the main set with a cover of Baba O'Reilly, the band then retreated backstage for the typical gap before the now standard encore.

The encore was the best part of the show. Where other bands come out and play a popular album track and then close with their hit single, Gaslight took a curve ball and put together a six song punch of older material. For me this was like they were taking a leaf out of Springsteen's how-to-write-a-setlist book. We got Wooderson, the rarely played We're Getting a Divorce, You Keep the Diner, Here's looking at you, kid, and closing with The Backseat. This is how you raise a gig to an almighty finish.

At the end of the gig it was great to step out in to the Glasgow drizzle to cool down as we walked back to the train station.  The usual debates arose over what they should have played, or where things should have been, but the general consensus was that it was a very good gig. 

I'll be making a sign for Woody next time though.

Setlist Link: http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/the-gaslight-anthem/2010/o2-academy-glasgow-glasgow-scotland-5bd41334.html