How do I get to Carnegie Hall? How do I get to Carnegie Hall?

Thanks again to all those at Thursday’s gig at the 229, both those who came along to see us, and those who came early for the other bands and cheered us on while waiting for them. A receptive and responsive audience is the number one spur that prods bands into giving it all they’ve got. New songs “When I Woke Up” and “The Other Ronald True” saw their debut at a public gig and both went down extremely well. Two more keepers! A tip of the plectrum also to the promoter, venue and sound guy, without whom &c &c.

Some of the audience feedback deserves to be set down for posterity. As we came offstage, the burly figure of the singer from post-punk maniacs We Buy Gold loomed up. “Great songs! So f***ing cynical!” he boomed. “That’s the way we write them,” was Klepsie’s reply (thankfully I just managed to avoid saying “That’s the way we roll in the Donutsh,” which would have sounded like a bad joke).

Meantime another audience member was remarking to Camrath’s girlfriend “They sound like Johnny Cash biting off Johnny Rotten’s head”, a quote which she gleefully relayed to us after our set and which it was instantly agreed by all of us summed us up to perfection. Shazomei was despatched upstairs to the land of mobile phone reception and ordered to put it on Twitter without delay, and it’s going on this website too next time we revise it. (Unless, dear reader, you can think of a better and pithier quote?)

Small wonder, then, that we wended our way home in the best of moods — in my case, with the sublime Sparks album LI’L BEETHOVEN blaring in the car. Next gig, please!

Practice, man, practice! Practice, man, practice! … I practiced! I practiced!

Having survived jury service, a most unpleasant ordeal I hope never to have to undergo again, time at last to catch up with things musical.

The Romford gig went well despite Daddy Amp (largest of the family Daddy Amp, Mummy Amp and Baby Amp) developing a fit of the sulks at soundcheck, leaving us having to borrow another from Last of the Waiting (thanks again, guys). The Bitter End is a cracking little venue and the guv’nor there very easy to deal with. We’ll be back, I hope.

Next up comes our West End debut on 6th April. We’re first up in a lineup of four followed by Model Railway Exhibition, De Shamonix, and Elize Kellman. It’s another bring-a-flyer-for-a-quid-off do, so cast your eyes up the page a little way and you’ll find a link to download ours from. The promoter sez that if we bring enough people we’ll get rebooked, so if you’ve been meaning to check us out and not got round to it, make this gig the one you get to, eh?

A few plugs to close with. At Romford we also shared the bill with Chelmsford’s The Library Suits, and I think it’s fair to say that if you like our stuff you’ll also like theirs. They’ve just finished recording a new album which should be well worth grabbing once it’s released. Their video for “You Don’t Have To Be A Wizard” is a hoot.

Terrorvision‘s new album “Super Delux” is their first in ten years, with a new drummer, but you’d hardly think they’d been away; it’s a triumphant return to their high points of the mid-90s such as “Regular Urban Survivors” and “How To Make Friends And Influence People”, and they score extra brownie points for making the first two lines of the first song a huge great salute to the late, great Kirsty MacColl. Too often bands which reform are a pale, washed-out shadow of their former selves. Buy this album and send Terrorvision the message that they, at least, are welcome to regroup any time they can bring something this good to the party.

Other good bands seen live recently include Run Don’t Walk and Hercules Rockafella both of whom were high points of the first Most Rated night at the Rhythm Factory last night in Whitechapel. Herc Rock are another band with a video to check out.