Yesterday we were asked to play at the 120th birthday party of Grangewood Park in Croydon. So we did, for our second post lockdown gig.
We hope to get some better photos rather than these snatched phone snaps.
The weather held up. The generator worked – except when it cut out for about a minute during Latin Goes Ska. But of course we kept playing and it came on just as we hit a new section, so the PA, bass, guitar and keys all came in together as if on cue.
We got to play an hour long set and eat too much cake.
As Desmond Dekker lived his final years in Thornton Heath, we dug out a couple of his songs that we have not played for a while as a tribute.
We were delighted to be asked to play at Dan and Dinah’s Christmas plus birthday party at the back room at the Hideaway in Streatham yesterday.
It’s not a venue that we have played before but it’s a great room with a good stage and fantastic sound system. It is recommended if you are looking for a function room in South London.
We played two hour long sets – which is the longest we have played for quite some time – so we were able to pull out a few that we have not played for a while. We ran out of time so were not able to do our Christmas number – probably a good thing.
This is what we played.
Chinatown
Guns Of Navarone
Latin Goes Ska
Tide Is High
Mood For Love
My Baby Just Cares for Me
Work Song
Mambo Number 5
Enola Gay
Mad World
London Calling
Monkey Man
Red Red Wine
Tequila
One Step Beyond
Come Dancing
Simmer Down
10 Out Of 10
99 Red Balloons
Tainted Love
Rudy A Message To You
Enjoy Yourself
Baggy Trousers
My Boy Lollipop
Night Boat To Cairo
Gangsters
Our next gig is also in South London where we play the New Cross Inn on February 7th
We have played a couple of gigs in Brixton on the last two Sunday evenings.
First we played Upstairs at the Ritzy – always a favourite for us as the sound there is so good. It’s a lovely small venue. And as we were the only band we got to play two full sets.
We had a blast and we think the audience did too. The set list we played is below.
Here’s Annie at the Ritzy.
And last night we got to play a very different gig just down the road at the Hootananny – somewhere we haven’t played for a few years. If the Ritzy is small and intimate, the Hootananny is the opposite – big and loud. We played one long set starting at a quarter past midnight to a big and appreciative crowd, who sang along with many of the songs. It was a long evening given that we had soundchecked at just after six, but worth it as we got a great reception.
Thanks to Cecil Reuben, who has been promoting reggae at the Hootananny for years, for putting us on again.
And it was good to see a poster from when we supported Neville Staple – nearly ten years ago – still on the band room wall.
We’ve had a very nice email from our recent clients:
“Thank you so much for last night, you were fantastic! We had so many comments about what a great band you are too. Andy’s mum was up and dancing and Andy’s mum never gets up and dances these days!
“Thank you also for playing Can’t Take My Eyes Off You, that was a real treat for us both.
“Thank you again for making our evening special and giving so many people a great time.”
Yesterday evening we travelled to Brighton to play for a party celebrating a wedding that had taken place a few days before.
While loading into a venue on a pedestrian precinct in the middle of a fearsome one way system was not exactly easy, once we were all set up and enjoyed a fine burger it was a blast.
As a special request for the happy couple we played “Can’t take my eyes off you” with a ska flavour, which seemed to go down very well on what had become a packed dance floor in the monster second set.
We don’t have any photos or video but this is what we played:
It was great to see a such a good and enthusiastic turn out for our gig Upstairs at the Ritzy last night. There was lots of singing along, and some enthusiastic and authentic skanking.
We managed to take a few snaps at the soundcheck – and it’s always good to see our name in big letters.
We have never played a Christmas Eve gig before, so we were delighted to be asked by Croydon’s Oval Tavern to play there this year as it is one of our favourite venues.
We decided it should be called Ska Humbug! and it gave us the chance to play a lot of cheesy Christmas covers.
Many old Christmas songs are basically jazz swing tunes, and they always work well as ska – so it was not hard to adapt Rockaing Around the Christmas Tree, Frosty the Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (which we have done before) for our line up.
We have done Slade’s Merry Christmas Everybody before, so we dusted that one down. And in what we thought was a stroke of great originality we adapted the Snowman song “Walking in the Air” as a reggae instrumental. However we soon found that we were by no means the first band to do this, but no matter it still went down well.
We had lots of fun playing one of our favourite venues, the Earl Haig Hall, in Crouch End last night.
It’s an old British Legion Hall, brought back to life as a great pub/venue – though we like to think of Earl Haig as a lesser known counterpart to Duke Ellington and Count Basie.
It was a lovely appreciative audience, and it is always a real pleasure to play when the sound is good. Thanks Matt!
We only managed a few photos as it was pretty dark with the lights in the wrong place to get decent shots. But if anyone in the audience wants to share pictures or videos, please add them to out Facebook page.
This is what we played – a slightly shorter set than we had planned as we hadn’t factored in the 10pm curfew to keep the neighbours happy.
