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

Friday 12th July 2013
Two Thousand Trees festival, Cheltenham (Camp Turner)

Ben Marwood
The Retrospective Soundtrack Players

Camp Turner was a little campsite ring set up by some VERY enthusiastic and lovely Frank Turner fans. I managed to find it after Frank's set, though I didn't have a guitar and once again I was 2.5, if not three sheets to the wind. After about half an hour of fannying about someone had found a guitar and I played 'In the Aeroplane over the Sea' by Neutral Milk hotel, the title track of the greatest album ever. After I'd finished someone whispered in my ear: "Ben Marwood is here but he's in a rush to leave." So I had the dubious pleasure of having to re-start my set after Ben had played his. It's a good job I love him so much and was a bit pissed.

When I got the guitar back I managed to knock out 'Why Bother?' by Weezer and a few DC and RSP requests before handing the guitar to Kelv when my stupid bastard hands finally gave way to the gin. Good fun all round.

After this my new best buddy 'John who looks like Seth Rogen' and I set off on an (admittedly unfilmed) bromance-comedy to find his sister and my bandmate. We gave up on this pretty quickly and decided to go to the secret stage, where some truly awful acoustic goings-on were taking place, then went to the main arena to dance to the silent disco without headphones. Apparently there is video evidence of this, though I really hope that's just a vicious rumour.

Another excellent Trees festival, and the moral of the story, as always, is: the dog won.

Friday 14th July 2013
Two Thousand Trees festival, Cheltenham (Main Stage)

Frank Turner and the Sleeping Souls
King Charles
Funeral for a Friend
Jim Lockey and the Solemn Sun
Nine Black Alps
Crowns
The Crimea
Park Bench Society
The Retrospective Soundtrack Players

There were some definite heavy heads on the morning of this when we emerged from our tents, but that blessed sun came out and we had a whale of a time. The last time we played the main stage must have been 2009, to about 50 people in the miserable rain, so it was great to see a great swarm of people around the main stage, especially as we were first main stage band of the whole weekend.



Here's how the rest of my day went:

• Spent about an hour after the set dying in a sweaty heap.
• Recovered and met my sister and nephew somewhere in the shade.
• Caught a little bit of the Crimea, including 'Lottery Winners on Acid', my jam from about 2002.
• Watched Oxygen Thief slay the Greenhouse, which was living up to its name in terms of immense heat.
• Stayed at the Greenhouse for a little schmooze with Chris T-T, Frank Turner and the Xtra Mile gang, before watching Crazy Arm's superb acoustic show.
• Wandered down to the main stage for home town heroes Jim Lockey & the Solemn Sun.
• Trekked back up for a bit of Ben Marwood, but it was so busy that I couldn't see him, and the crowd were singing every word so I couldn't hear him. These are both great things for Ben, and for the universe in general, but not so good for me, so I went back down and watched Funeral for a Friend, or at least the ones that are still going (singer and beardy for sure, the others... not sure.)
• Had a little sleep waiting for/during King Charles and did that jerky thing where you spasm as you're falling asleep. Some people laughed at me.
• Had a few more Badger's Bottoms and watched Frank Turner do his thing. Probably about the 15th Frank set I've seen. Or 20th? Who knows. Great as always.
• Then wandered up to try and find 'Camp Turner'.........

Thursday 11th July 2013
Two Thousand Trees festival, Cheltenham (Addistock Stage)

Fighting Fiction
The Retrospective Soundtrack Players
some others (I was a bit drunk)

I think most people know by now how much we love 2k trees, so I won't gush any more here. We did a set on the new secret stage, which was lovely and busy, in fact if I'd known how busy it was going to be I would probably have had one fewer Badger's Bottom (deadly cider) during the day.

We did about 5 or 6 RSP numbers and a truly atrocious drunken slaying of Ring of Fire, during which I had to yell so much that I lost my voice. I wanted to play for longer and fulfil a few requests for DC songs, but Paul dragged me off to rest the voice before tomorrow, which was fair enough, really.

Wednesday 10th July 2013
Camden Monarch, London

The Retrospective Soundtrack Players
John J Presley
Oxygen Thief

This was a warm-up gig for the Two Thousand Trees festival, though we had to do it as a stripped-back three-piece so it wasn't really useful as a warm-up. BUT it was great fun, most importantly. We're getting much better at these acoustic shows now, and we had to be on our game because the two supports were very good indeed.

Our good friend Fred from the USA was in London with his new friend Carolina, and he asked us to play an old DC song called 'Carolina' to help him, er, 'seal the deal'. Paul and I managed to blag our way through it, and it was actually quite fun, a good little pop song that I'd forgotten about. Did it work for Fred? A gentleman never tells....

Here is a link to a picture. Yes, that's right, I allowed Kelv to play in shorts. I must be going soft.

http://instagram.com/p/bmbFeCFMFr/

Sunday 26th May 2013
Castle Road, Southsea

The B of the Bang
The Retrospective Soundtrack Players

A lovely free day out for all the family. We were asked to play this street party by our good friends at Pie & Vinyl on Castle Road, for which the whole street was filled with vintage stalls, antique merchants, lots of booze and sunshine. Here's a link to some photos from the day:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/16695682@N05/sets/72157634586343917/

As you may notice if you look through those photos, there was one quite bizarre moment when what looked like a girl band came and did a photo shoot in front of us while we were playing. Which has to be some kind of first.

After the gig my wife and I and some friends went out for a drink, which became dinner, which became karaoke at an old man pub until kicking out time. I sang 'Jessamine' by the Casuals (the song my wife was named after) and also 'Love Shack' (just the guy part, my old DC buddy Matt kindly took the girl part.) My wife sang 'Never Ever' by All Saints, which I never knew was about 7 minutes long.

Here's Castle Road while we were soundchecking: