Recording: Rufus and his cello

Present: Ad, Fea, Tom

Special guest, and lovely man, Rufus was with the boys tonight [he from 'Friday in Firenze' fame]. He and his cello were added to four tracks this evening: Hearts Pumping, 21, The Smile and Love The Way with intentions to use him on a further track that the band needs to re-record from scratch [Wild End].

Mulled wine was raised to congratulate Ben on his Gretna Green marriage and Fea on his new Head Teacher post. Commiserations were forthcoming however to Tom who's Eg-given USB key from the previous week turned out not to be 360GB after all. The tech boys at his work put it through its paces to discover that it was in fact 2GB. And a rather slow 2GB at that.

The making of cheese is discussed. Tom's going to give Fea a book on it. It's all Rock n Roll down at Valley Studios this evening.

Practice: Monkees Song and USB Key

Present: Ad, Eg, Gi, Tom

Had recording planned for tonight but Ben couldn't oblige. So the cellist and violinist were cancelled.

Eg has recently returned from China and brought with him a USB key that claims to have 360GB of memory. No-one believes him. Tom gets the spoils to play with.

The Monkees songbook provided the lads with an opportunity to learn Daydream Believer. Passers by would have been forgiven for thinking that this opportunity had been spurned.

Eg drops guitar and loses jack socket. 'Want You Back' - well remembered. 'It's All About You' - not so. Was that 'Dream A Little Dream' we heard on the ukulele?

Upcoming gig dates were discussed including a Schools' Tour. Basically that just means the band plays in three schools - an assembly and a couple of music workshops. And a wedding - of two Loopy Groupies - approaching fast.

Post Practice Pint Topics of Conversation: Loopy download profits declared: $15. 'Then She Said' topping the Loopy charts along with 'Ben & Jason'? What is China's currency, actually? Shooting a video of the band doing a dance routine and put it on You Tube.

Birthday at Band Practice

Present: Ad, Fea, Tom

Along with Ben the boys celebrated Ad's birthday with four muffin cakes, some microwaved mulled wine, party hats and hooty blower things.

They all, uncertainly, guess his age to within a year or two and, as with every year, work out that he is, indeed, still the youngest member of the band.

Tracks Secrets & Lies and 21 were painstakingly mixed; Ben spent the first hour doing the basics while the three band members went into a side room to work on songs new and old.

Take On Me was rehearsed while potential new songs, Live This Life, Kingmaker and The Sky Above My House, were worked on.

Ben secretly recorded Take On Me with one of the microphones in the room that was patched through to his desk.

Recording

Present: Ad, Eg, Fea, Tom

Ben's moved his control room again. This time to a different building. Into some loftspace over an adjoining unit.

Cosy.

Ad brings notes on previous recordings, Fea brings wine, Eg brings Fea [and Ben's tobacco], Tom brings cold and his own peppermint teabags plus universally loved Big Red chewing gum.

The team work on Secrets and Lies [Vocals], Hearts Pumping [ukulele], Love the Way [Vocals], 21 [Vocals, Ben Cymbals] and discuss violin/cello/trumpet usage.

Also discussed was how to release the current batch of recordings. Two 6 track albums?

More discussion/bribing/negotiations required.

Loopy Christmas Do

Present: Ad, Eg, Fea, Gi, Tom

Venue: Bella Napoli, Abingdon

The annual Christmas backslap involving the entire band and some poor unsuspecting small restaurant near one of the band members' houses. This year it was Gi's turn to source, book and disown the subsequent food quality of the eaterie he had chosen.

It receives the thumbs up from all.

Teetotal Tom gets roped in as Taxi driver for Fea but can't quite make it to pick up Eg. Ad scrounges a sofa off Gi for the night.

The Christmas crackers, as supplied by Minty again, fail to top last year's football themed cracker snapping bonanza. This year, each cracker houses a santa sitting on different coloured sleighs that zoom along the table after a short pull-back. When all the other diners finally leave, the restaurant owner and his wife look on bemusedly as the Loopy boys set up the cardboard race track and jostle for the perceived best lane.

One race. Winner claims glory.

All sleighs crash into each other in the middle of the track apart from Eg's whose outside missile zooms past the finish line and into the wall to take the podium.

Great food. Great company. Appalling crackers.