The Dawn Chorus / The Retrospective Soundtrack Players - Blogging all over the World

Build a Mighty Alliance @ Portsmouth Wedgewood Rooms
Friday July 14th 2006

The Strange Death of Liberal England
Golden Section
The Dawn Chorus
Red Campion

Our first wedge show was always going to be a memorable day for us regardless of how it turned out, so we're very glad that it went so well. Some of the shows i've seen at the Wedge have been a massive influence on me ever wanting to start a band, and i'm ecstatic that our first gig there wasn't a battle of the bands or something similar.

The evening started with me nudging/smashing (keith's interpretation of events/mine) my car into my dad's van when pulling off my drive. Then it was panic stations when i thought i'd forgotten our ultra-pompous intro music, but it turned out that Simps had it all along. Then i went and got a refund for my Regina Spektor tickets that i can't use any more, and then we kicked a football around the empty wedge which was pretty cool, and then we soundchecked with our special guest Mr Pauly B on trumpet.

After soundcheck me, simps and paul had a hilarious interview with dvd pete and his colleague (sorry i forgot your name). Sample question:

Interviewer: 'I notice a strong Celtic influence in your music'
Simps: '........'
Kyle: '...........'

Our constant hassling of our friends & acquantances paid off and we sold all our tickets, which was a nice relief. Hopefully they all enjoyed themselves. The night went so fast with the constant running around trying to say hi to everyone that we were onstage in no time, although i did enjoy what i saw of Red Campion. It bordered a little on Corrs territory at times, but mostly i did like it.

Our set felt absolutely awesome, and although i'm aware some of the songs were a little fast, i reckon we nailed it. Although our pretentios stage entrance was nearly fucked when i realised 20 seconds before the tape finished that my guitar had come unplugged at both ends. Almost extremely embarrasing. But it was good sweaty fun, and Paul B stole the show with his cameo on 'Everest', seemingly getting a bigger cheer than us lot!

I enjoyed TSDOLE's set on the whole, and while it was clear that their were some sound and tuning problems, it was the first time i'd seen them live and i think it's great that the area has a band thinking well outside of 'the box', whatever that might be. All us other bands went onstage to sing and manically hit tambourines on 'Motor' and 'Days', although no-one else - including the rest of my band - seemed to have learnt 'Days'. But what the hell, it was great fun, and DJ DVD hands down pants 1,2,3,4,5,6 etc succesfully managed to scare any stragglers out of the venue.

Thanks a heap to TSDOLE for having us, we all hope that the BAMA nights can build up a great reputation, they certainly deserve it for the effort they put in.
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