Andrea Is a fat slut

This started when Mully sent me a message asking if I would like to play bass for Eastfield for them on their three date Northern Irish tour, of course I said no to him. I thought there would be no way I could learn or play all the required Eastfield songs, instead I suggested Waspboy. About twenty seconds after sending Mully that message I got a message from Jessi Eastfield saying how great it was I that I had agreed to play bass for them and he would be emailing me the chords for the songs. Oh well, you can’t really say no Jessi, he’s too damn nice.

True to his word Jessi emailed me the chords and I have to say the somgs are not that difficult to learn, I just don’t have that much faith or confidence in my bass playing abilities. Over the following two weeks I learnt all the songs of the CD and played along on a regular basis so I was sure what I would be doing. I was aware that the only practice that I would be having would be the time spent on stage with the rest of the band come the first gig.

The first show was to be opening for The Queers in The Front Page, with Eastfield going on just before The Queers. The Line up for that night was to be:

The Queers

Eastfield

The Evangelists

Mellow Dramatic

Scrotum Poles

But another band ended up getting added on the bill and that band was DEAD BY GUN who come from Finland, they are a true punk rock band, meaning that they are all about tattoos, hair cuts, clothing and paying ungodly sums of money to get on tours. In fact they paid around 1,800 Euros to get on The Queers tour. I don’t know what exactly happened, but as far as rumour and story go they paid this money to the UK promoter, but alas he never actually told any of the individual gig promoters. So Dead By Gun where turning up at all these gigs and nobody had any idea they were playing. So they were having to go on first as the doors were opening so as not to muck the carefully prepared running orders, this meant that they where playing in front of nobody and not getting the opportunity to sell any of their carefully manufactured merchandise. Not that anybody missed anything, they were as bland as Ready Salted Crisps and looked like they spent all their time and money trying to look and sound like Rancid. Anyway, Mully took pity on them and let they play third on the bill, meaning that I missed The Scrotum Poles who went on really early. Dammit.

Eastfield did get a practice, of sorts, while Dead By Gun were doing their soundcheck, Jessi, Ben and myself retreated down the back stairs of The Front Page to run through a few songs with our unplugged guitars and Ben drumming on his knees. It seemed to go rather well. Oh yea, this was after I had performed four trips from India Street to The Front Page ferrying all the equipment, Dead By Gun (not very talkative), the whiniest American ever (which puts her in the running for most whiny person in the world ever) and various other bits and pieces.

After that there was not much to do but watch some bands, enjoy some gig atmosphere and have a few drinks. By the time it came for Eastfield to play I had consumed a few pints and a few vodka and cokes so any nerves I had had been replaced with an excitement about playing. I think we played well, I certainly had a hell of a lot of fun. I wore my amazing Tesco T shirt that has the slogan ‘Save money on your shopping …ask me how?’ written on the front and ‘Join Club card’ on the back. It made the song ‘Bevland’ seem a little more appropriate.

The Queers played next and I know there is a lot of argument and discussion about what happened between Joe Queer and Andrew Griswold, who was drumming for the Queers. It can be read in great detail on The Stardumb Records message board. Anybody who says Andrew was sacked because he was a crybaby and a crap drummer is a dirty liar. Andys drumming was fucking ace that night. If there is one thing I know it’s Queers songs and I know he played them amazingly and I also know that it takes a lot of Andy to moan on tour, he has done tours so harsh and stressful that the French Foreign Legion couldn’t finish them. I love The Queers, but I don’t like Joe Queers ‘business’ attitude.

Tomorrow, all about DownPatrick and Londonderry/Derry/Doire.