Alsager ON FIRE!

Alsager Music Festival 17th July 2022

*Updated 22/07/22

At risk of using not one but two overused words in this opening sentence, Alsager this year saw the start of a period of unprecedented levels of smothering heat opressing our usually fresh sumer weather, though I guess we will have to try to get used to this more and more as it becomes the "new normal". My train to the event was change to a rail-replacement bus due to a trackside fire (having gone through such a fire only on Friday on my train to rehearsals) Thank goodness for a strong breeze though to make things much more pleasant though.

Thank goodness too for the as-aways brilliant organisation, great sound which once again came from Mikey of Soundbites Creative on the desk but most of all to all of you who came along and sang along. You were just great, and gave us a fab time - thank you! x 

*Also - there was a frantic ant nest right beneath /around my pedalboard. 

*The Buggs joined us for "No Tobacco" after opening the day brilliantly earlier. 

Photos by Tim Lee

We’re Back!

I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I was going to be and after pondering on the fact that, thanks to the pandemic, we hadn’t performed in public since Christmas 2019 I started getting nervous about the fact that I wasn’t feeling nervous enough!

Anyway, it all went swimmingly at Alsager Music Festival and we dedicated the set to the wonderful and much missed Stath who has been such an important part of the festival since it’s inception.

Many thanks to Stephanie Burgess for the band photos.

Broken, but a blast!

The Blue Yellows at the Alsager Music Festival.

Having had a weird virus giving me the strangest bunch of uncomfortable and exhausting   symptoms since May the 3rd on and off, it was nice, at last, to play a gig while feeling well (though the virus had ‘gone under’ for a couple of days at a time in the past before returning with renewed vigour so... touch wood!).

In an ideal world, bands would get an hour or so to sound check, and I’ve even worked with pro bands who have taken up to two and a half hours to perfect their sound to the venue and iron out any problems, so these festivals we often play where you get a really quick turnaround, it’s a big challenge to try and get it right for all involved, and our sound engineer Matt, stage manager and whole team did a great job!

However, I did manage to snap a string in the first few seconds of the opening song (first time in quite a while as I’ve been using these NY Elixir strings which have an extra carbon component, and so are extra strong ((and expensive!)) ). So while I ran off stage, grabbed the spare guitar and tuned it, Em played the intro to the next tune over and over for a bit, until I was ready.. such pros, this lot on The BYs. 

We also got a brand new song into the set, ‘Who put Bella in the Witch Elm?’ and the gang played it so well, sounded pretty raucous from where I was anyway, in fact the whole set did.

It was great to catch good friends in The Dying Lights who sounded more laid back and melodic than usual, but in a good and groovy way. Good friends were all around the seating areas in fact, so nice to see you all and have at least a tinsy catch-upette. 

The Dying Lights on flowering form.

It was a blast!

Spot the new song?

Alsager Music Festival 2018

The really rather wonderful Alsager Music Festival once again in high summer and another gig in this extraordinary heatwave of Summer 2018.
It was great fun doing it last year with the full band, always more fun with your 'gang' of course, but this time, although solo for much of the set, I enlisted the help of some very talented youngsters on guitar and backing vocals for 'No Tobacco', a couple of very talented students of mine, namely the Bugg brothers, Owain and Dylan Bugg.
They have so much raw talent and charisma... Watch out world!

Many thanks to the multi-talented music-man Marc Gallagher for doing such professional and efficient work on the live sound (and photos, including the ones of me here and the close-up of my acoustic which I can't seem to caption right now, do check out what Marc's up to though, via his social media pages, especially his own gigs).
Special thanks to, to the old friends and new, who turned up to my set.

Big crowds in the sun.

The crowd  in between sets at The Sunken Garden Stage.

Many thanks to Marc Gallagher for this photo.

Soul and his good friend Joe came along 😀

The Bugg Brothers stole the show.
L - Owain, R - Dylan

All for Alsager!

July 16th 2017.

Packed out in front of the stage.
Thanks to Stath Kyrantonis, one of the hard-working Alsager Music Fest organisers,  for this photo.

P

Many thanks to Martin Butterworth for this photo.

art of my preparations for this gig was, I explained in this instagram post, was to stop my continual problem at gigs of the unscheduled 'moving of the dials' of my delay pedal, which is otherwise a beautiful sounding bit of kit. and it worked, no unexpected psychedelic moments!

I think I'm right in saying that I've been lucky enough to perform at every single Alsager Music Festival since it began a few years ago, but this was the best one yet personally as I got the excitement of playing with my mighty bandee-pals The Blue Yellows!

Introducing a song, or summit.
Many thanks to Ceri Bugg for the photo.

This is now one of the best music festivals you will find anywhere. Any fellow musos reading will know what an enormous physical, psychological and emotional burden is behind all the work that goes into every gig, especially at the gig itself, but events like this make it all worthwhile, the organisers work on this all the year round and it show, hats off to them! The crowds who came along to support us... many familiar faces and many new ones, you were incredible, thank you so much from all of us at BYs central.
We hope to see you again soon!

I'm always in a constant battle with my nerves before a show something I wrote of, recently; sometimes winning (successfully turning the nerves into a quietly focused excitement) sometimes not so much... it's especially hard sometimes when so many good friends turn up to see you and support you and you know you really ought to acknowledge them and chat with them and thank them for coming, but you also want to be locked away somewhere to work on blocking everything out and getting into the zone, and warming up on the guitar. So, I'm really delighted to see them, but end up feeling incredibly guilty that I hardly spoke to them! So, thank you, you know who you are, and sorry!

Something that did help me relax was finally getting to see the wonderfully talented Gary Wilcox and various different combinations of bands he is in. As a talented songsmith, radio show host and musician, Gary is one of those people who seem to be at the fulcrum of something of a scene; for one thing his radio show really helps a lot of under the radar talent out there and he also either fronts or is in the bands Wilcox-Hulse, Don't Call Me Ishmael some of whom stayed on with the rest of The Taskers who were also ace! All fabulous bands that all have something of a folk-rock element and great vocal harmonies or backing vocal combinations. I especially enjoyed DCMI who were sometimes lilting, sometimes stonking, but always drawing you into emotional musical stories. Great stuff!

Our own set was inspired and pushed on by the amazing crowds. Thank you Alsager Music Fest, thank you to your amazing team of organisers putting on this brilliant, brilliant event, to the lovely Lodge pub, thanks to those who came along, strangers and friends!
YOU make it all worthwhile!

Em from the BYs enjoys  Gary Wilcox with young Casper.

HUGE Thanks to David Barrs for all his hard work videoing and uploading!!

Alsager 2016.

July 9th, 2016

The Alsager Music Festival seems to get better year by year, this year I thought would be a major blip in that trend due to some torrential rain earlier on and on-and-off-rain through the day. But, no. The crowds flocked, set up their own seating, tents and awnings to make a full and indeed great weekend of it.

I sadly missed Kit and the Icefish, (do click on the artist names in this post to find out more about them) but heard lots about how good their set was. I enjoyed Katy Galloway's uplifting set before it was my turn, and afterwards Dayve Dean who did a sterling job headlining the the acoustic stage in the mini-amphitheater of the Sunken Garden in the park where it all took place. Thanks to the professionalism of the sound guy Marc from MG Audio Solutions for a great sound as well as all the lovely people who came to stand, or sit on the hay-bales or their own impromptu seating to watch.

Thanks Jane from Kit & the Icefish for this pic.

It was great to bump into lots of familiar faces including Simon from the band. We had some time to enjoy a couple of bands with Dayve and an old friend, Caroline.

Alsager 2015

12/07/2015

Thanks to Redshift Radio for this photo.

Updated 20/07/2015
After last year's performance in the park, this year's was a little more intimate in the extended pub garden of probably the best pub in the area (described as 'a gem' of a place in one review), The Lodge.

It was a lovely experience as so many friends turned up in the crowds, I was only sorry I didn't get to chat to them all. Some good friends also performed & I was able to see the always superb Tim Lee and Dayve Dean, as well as the lovely sounds from the jazzy to prog-rock (and everything else in between)- influenced Rain before some familiar and not-so-familiar bands entertained us before it was time for the train home.

Hats off and big thanks once again to all the organisers, sound people, techies and everyone who made this all possible again, and of course to all of you who turned up.

A fair contingent of Redshift Radio people seemed to be there and I'll be guest of theirs when I perform at The Nantwich Show and The South Cheshire Big Day Out, coming up soon. 

Redshift's Matt Jackson has also blogged about/reviewed the festival HERE.

Update (20/07/2015); Here's a video of the 'special' moment I was joined by fellow musos Tim, Dayve & Abby. Dayve got his own back later, forcing me up to do backing vocals on 'The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight', I've never been sure of the backing vocals on that song!

The Alsager Music Festival, now a biggie!

July 12th-2014

I've been fortunate enough to play the Alsager Music Festival for the past few years and it's grown every year, this year seeing it really step up to a whole new level in every respect, great to see! 

One of the best aspects about all this is that for original acts like myself and many others playing the event, the audience here were a really enthusiastic and attentive, friendly bunch. A lovely experience. I can't help feeling that so many venues which stick to the old ways of putting on cover-only acts (many of which play the same hits as each-other) are missing out on this increasing mood for original sounds and new music. There seems to be an appetite for it everywhere. I was joined once again by the talented purcussion maestro Daniel J. Logan.

The talent in terms of the other acts I got to see was outstanding, please check out my recommendations below the photos! 

The big crowd enjoyed great weather and great music!

Dan (left) played with 2 other acts as well as me on the acoustic stage. He even dodged a football at one stage, without missing a beat! Thanks to Dave Myatt for the photo.

The inimitable Hayley Strangelove joined us for the final song with her daughter Cherry, surely the youngest performer at the festival! Thanks to Dave Myatt for the photo.

Recommended artists I managed to see, check these out;

Hayley Stangelove; She and Paul Senior's (together they are Baxter) crowd-pleasing brilliance seemed to almost start a new religion.

Sam Hollyman - of The Voice fame, but here doing some really quite rootsie, country-ish stuff with Dan and Narn. Brilliant!

Dirty Money No 5 - Kind of Funky, scratchy, groovy ska with ace musicianship and vocals. You can't not like it!

Sea based Turtles - We're deep in the funk here, you like funk? You'll love these!

Dayve Dean - Dayve has made a welcome return, bringing his heartfelt, melodic and tuneful brilliance back to the live circuit!

July 13th - The Alsager Music Festival 2013.

Thanks to Abby Wallis for use of the photo.

Now in it's 4th year (I think), this festival just gets better and better, more scorching weather probably helped with the numbers of course. 
A lovely thing about being back at a fairly "local" festival to me is catching up with a lot of musical friends who either attended or played. This included Dayve Dean, Dan Logan, Dave Dove, Darren Poyzer and Lizzie from Bitter and Twisted (who all played at the event) plus musicians Mat and Abby (Abby also took some great photos-see below) from Human Condition, Martin Edwards from Rivers and Kelly, special thanks also to Simon, Alison and family, Dave and Vicky Myatt with family, Louise, Lynne and many others who came to soak up the music, sun... and beer! - A beer festival is also now a regular feature of this event, what is there not to love?

The sunken garden was the venue for the acoustic stage.

Lovely set also from Darren Poyzer

Great set from Dayve Dean & Dan Logan - Photo by Abby Wallis

The que for this ice-cream van was predictably long.

Photo by Abby Wallis