Fantastic gig at the Gypsy Hotel!

The run-up was not promising.

Half the band got stuck in traffic grid-lock on Kingsland High Street. I had to rush home between sound-check and performance, and somehow between tuning and the first number, one of my bass strings went seriously out of tune.

Our set list was not going to work as our time on stage was shorter than expected.

But it was still a triumph.

The short set-list meant that we chose our best numbers. The errant string was quickly tuned after the first number.

And the sound engineer was really good, and had quality kit to work with. Not only did we have great sound on stage, but some intelligent mixing went on during the set. Neither of these is guaranteed.

But best of all it was a great audience. They liked the old ska chestnuts, and our “unexpected covers” Tainted Love and Enola Gay – even if had to drop our mystery new song.

I don’t think that we have had a mass sing-along before, but the instrumental verse of My Boy Lollipop certainly saw some collective karaoke.

Just three weeks til our next gig . Feb 27th at the Last Days of Decadence.