We had a great time yesterday afternoon playing for an end of term party for staff of a west London school.
None of us have ever been asked to such an occasion before but it was a lot of fun, with much dancing and perhaps the best sing-alongs we have ever had.
And Ian, our guest tenor sax player, still had time to get to another two gigs that evening.
This is what we played.
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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.
This is what we played.
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Yesterday we got to play for the first time in 18 months at a delightful food and drink festival in Newhaven in Sussex. Here’s a couple of soundcheck photos.
Two years ago we played just up the road at a festival in Seaford. It was good to be back – and really good to be gigging again.
The weather forecast was dodgy, but we played in bright sunshine. We had to drive through a storm on the way but the site was rain free at least until we left. Given the amount of gin on sale and consumed it would perhaps be inaccurate to say that it was a dry day.
This is what we played. We had to cut the second set a bit short as there was a curfew on the gig.
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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.
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Our next gig is also in South London where we play the New Cross Inn on February 7th
The weather forecast was for thunder and lightning but the rain held off for the set we played yesterday at a community festival in north London.
Lissenden Gardens, next to Gospel Oak station, has a strong sense of community and a fascinating history – see its wikipedia page.
We had a single set, and this is what we played:
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Everyone knows that bank holidays are wet, windy and washed-out. But not so this year as the temperature has climbed to ‘phew, what a scorcher’ levels. It was therefore a good weekend for the Seahaven Beer and Music festival in Seaford, close to Newhaven, along the Sussex coast from Brighton.
We had great fun playing to a lively audience (the photo above was taken from the stage but well before we started playing).
This is what we played in a single set of just under an hour:
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We were told that the festival was meant to launch last year as an annual event, but was rained off. It got off to a flying, if delayed, start this year.
Our next gig will be in Seaford on August 24th for the Saturday Evening session of the 2019 Seahaven Beer and Music Festival.
The event arena will be open from 18:00 with our full selection of Food and Drink available.
The Music Lineup for the evening is as follows:
18:45-19:45 – https://www.facebook.com/WeAreThe808s/
20:15-21:15 – The Skamonics
https://www.facebook.com/TheSkamonics/
21:45-23:00 – LARGE 90s
https://www.facebook.com/large90s/
*All times are subject to change without prior notification*
For tickets and more information please visit: www.shbmf.co.uk/
Update: Here’s some lovely feedback from the client:
Thank you all so much for coming all this way. Everyone has been saying how brilliant you all were and loved the music.
Yesterday was the hottest day of the year. It was a perfect day to play a party in a garden deep in the country near Petworth in Sussex – easy to find on some sat navs, challenging for others.
The photo shows the set up – a dance floor on the grass and a platform for the drums and vocals.
It was still warm when we finished playing at 11pm after extending our second set to keep people dancing.
It was isolated enough not to worry about noise and neighbours, and our PA was just right for this kind of gig.
This is more or less what we played as we threw in a few encores to keep the second set going:
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It was a blast playing the Maidstone Ska Festival on Sunday.
We played a good long single set to a great crowd who sang along from the first song.
And it’s always a treat to play an event that was so well organised. We started at the right time and came off just a few minutes late after an extended encore. The sound people did a great and a relaxed job – not easy when you are having to get bands on and off a stage all day with no time for thorough sound checks.
There is another festival scheduled for September with a fabulous line up too.
This is what we played.
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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.
And here’s Frank onstage:
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