Once again a previous sin lets the Angels out, and the Demons in

Friday 21 September – sad face, Hazzard County aren’t playing at the Old White Swan – happy face, but The Stanleys are! I know this because it was written on the toilet wall (not my toilet, obviously.) Now I’ve seen The Stanleys before, in fact I’ve paid real pounds and pennies to watch them, so a freebie night sounds brilliant.

We arrive at the usual time, but it’s already really busy. I man, it’s packed to the door and there is a good deal of squeezing and “excuse me”-ing to get anywhere near my usual perch. There’s a lad playing on (plugged in) acoustic guitar. He’s doing a reasonable job, with a voice not unlike Kelly Jones (Stereophonics). I even recognize one of the tunes; Robin Hood, originally by Ocean Colour Scene (B-sides Seasides & Freerides.) His guitar sounded a bit out of tune but he had a good voice, although I never heard his name, so no five minutes of fame for him on this blog! (Unless you know who he was.)

Meanwhile, back at the bar, the John Smiths had been identified a variety that was brewed in Liverpool and not fit for Yorkshire consumption. The word is that many of the pubs in Yorkshire are simply sending it back. I’ll have a pint of Bass, thank you.

I think The Stanleys had brought all their mates along. This is a very crowded public house. As far as I know, The Stanleys have not played in York since January 2007. The first half of the set is OK. They sing and play well. They have a new drummer in the shape of “the quiet one” from Hazzard County (by which I mean Not Tom.) and the tunes are pretty good. The second half is much livelier but they seemed to run out of material as I’m sure I’ve heard at least one tune about twenty minute ago, and the encore is definitely a repeat. Stands to reason I guess, they don’t normally play such a long set. Very enjoyable though.

I notice that the Jed Thomas Band is playing on Sunday. I won’t be able to make that gig. I love this band; they just don’t know how to finish a song so they extend the ending for about ten minutes. Brilliant.

Ooo, Odin Dragonfly got 8/10 in this month’s Classic Rock… in the prog section. I’m not sure about the classification, but the score and the accompanying write up seemed fair to me.

Mine's a pint, Aye

Friday night and a change from the usual. The gang had decided that we should check out The Stanleys at Certificate 18. Roy was already there when I arrived and Andy came in close on my heels. The first support band, Casual something, were already played and pretty good they were as well. In the audience I spotted Richard and the second drummer from Hazzard County, the reason for their presence was shortly to be revealed!

The second band was Naked Flame, fronted by a small girl in cargo hot pants (I’m sure there’s a proper word for them) who was a bit too screechy for my ears. The big surprise was that Richard was playing lead guitar and he really let rip. Fantastic.

The headline act was The Stanleys, a bunch of scouse cheeky chappies. Oh, and Hazzards other drummer was drumming for them! Anyway, not so bothered myself, for me the first band was the best. I had decided on wearing an old 3 Colours Red t-shirt for the evening and, in a bizarre coincidence, 3CR tracks were played in the intervals between each band. I was able to give a rousing rendition of “Beautiful Day” to Roy and Andy, but I’m not sure that they heard it very well! The grump of the evening, well it was smoky of course, which I always hate (can’t wait for 1 July.) But the thing that made me tut (it doesn’t take much) was the number of people in the audience who thought they looked amusing in the ultra-violet light exposing their yellow-looking teeth and green-looking lager in faux-Dracula poses.

It was still reasonably early when we staggered out into the rain, so we made our way down to The Old White Swan to catch the last 5-6 songs by Hazzard County, who were missing front-man, Chris Johnson. They were excellent as usual and at one stage had five, yes count them, that’s five, crazy dancing chicks. I don’t like to talk about crazy dancing blokes because it’s just a bit disturbing.