Practice: Pre-Gig

Present: Ad, Fea, Gi, Tom

With a gig looming this practice was a necessary run through the old favourites and covers. The lack of lyrical cues caused a few issues but the chance to sing lead for Ad, Fea and Tom was taken with glee in spite of not knowing any of the words required to make a complete performance.

Valley Studios' very own Ben brought news of his proposal of marriage to a disbelieving Jeanie. All happy there.

Post Practice Pint Topic of Conversation: Lead Balloon, Gavin and Stacey, the actual population of Austria and how come the wife didn't know?

Practise 22nd April - sax workout

Present: Ed,Eg,Felix,Susie,Tom
Venue: Ilsleys Primary School
Songs: Somersaults, Hearts Pumping, Meet Me On The Corner, Sparkle & Shine, Wild End

With more recording imminent it was time to workshop the brass section in the shape of Ed and his saxophone. With wife Susie giving encouragement from the sidelines (well ... a comfy chair at the back of the staffroom) Ed initially struggled with, but manfully overcame, some tricky fingering to pull off Tom's slightly dodgy brass lines on Somersaults, though was happily unphased by Meet Me On The Corner and Hearts Pumping. After recording a piano version of the Somersaults brass line on Eg's phone, Ed promised to do a bit of practising before the next recording session (after Eg's worked out how to get stuff off his phone and onto a CD).

Down the pub ...
Topics of conversation included:

• Horse riding (and post-op challenges for Eg)
• Ed and Susie's horse (called Flub) who isn't ridden anymore but was once well-trained. Doesn't like men though.
• Upcoming gigs: possible David Soul feature
• Future projects including: A34 tour, M4 tour, schools tour, foreign gig / tour

Practice 3rd April 2008

Eg took control and led from the front. The next four songs to be recorded were practiced - 21, Heart's Pumping, Secrets and Lies plus Wild End. Fea couldn't remember the chords to 24 hrs but did better with Change. Adam spent most of the night playing the bass whilst crouching to the ground - an interesting rock stance.

Topics of discussion down the pub - different diary formats, Tom's Germany trip, Fea's new job, possible title for new album Second Hand Groove Machine, how easy it is to add entry to the blog!

Adam and Eg give me marks out of ten please.

Thursdays coming

Four songs:
Secrets & Lies, Heart's pumping, Wild end & 21

Plus:
Gallary of you, Hold on, Sparkle & shine
Change (fea, remember chords), 24Hours (ditto), April30


Adam - put it in the car now!!!

Eg

Practice

Present: Ad, Eg, Fea, Gi, Tom
Venue: Valley Studios, Winchester.

Ad's back still playing up. Tom is off with the fairies. Ad gives Eg the task of extracting from the band the four tracks that should be practised for recording purposes. He sort of succeeds. Though this band's blogger can't remember them if he had been told.

Post-practice pint prattle included: Eg's got a hard drive with loads of gig details from the band's early years. The Loopy Gig Google Map. And 'why don't we make the next album cover out of wood'.

Stupid, stupid boys.