Thursday, 12 August 2010

Appologies to our female fans...

Yes, the Shine can exclusively reveal, ladies that you have indeed missed the boat. Our pocket guitarist, Mr Andrew Keates, the young good looking one in amongst the old codgers, will, this Saturday coming, make an honest woman out of his fiancee, Gwen. Our old friends, Soul Inferno with our erstwhile bass dude, Mr Stuart Grant at the helm will be providing the music for said occasion, which means a bit of impromptu jamming will be in order at some point in the proceedings. I hope we don't scare the grannies too much.

Seriously though, the other 75% of the shine wish Andy and Gwen all that they wish themselves and respectfully request that Gwen lets Andy out to play with us on a regular basis- after her honeymoon of course.

Mines a pint of you're asking.

Normal service will be resumed in approximately 4 weeks...

Wednesday, 4 August 2010

The Lorne Hotel, Oban, 31/07/2010

While sorting out the gear to take to Oban, we received the alarming, but frankly hilarious news that Stevie had done a "Spinal Tap" and fallen down his stairs at home and seriously damaged his shoulder. As Stevie was meant to be driving, we got serious immediately unpacked the beers that we had decided to take and then enquired after his health. True to form, Stevie cried the show must go on and avowed that it would be "alright on the night" once the adrenalin and the painkillers kicked in.

Having redistributed the driving duties off we went to sunny Oban, our progress only hampered by the plethora of mobile tin cans, ie, caravans on the road to the north west with us. A couple of vaguely frustrating hours later we arrived at the Lorne, where it was steak pie o'clock, so much so that we took a brisk walk along the front to give the bar some time to clear before we returned for some much needed scran. Oban was heaving with the holiday crowd and we dared to hope that more than a few of these visitors would visit us in the Lorne later.

Refueling accomplished, we then had another short wait before the bar could be cleared enough to get set up, which was accomplished in record time.

Having had a few minor sound issues at the previous gig, we prepared to start the proceedings, aware also that Stevie was not overly confident of his shoulder lasting the night out.

From the first chord it was clear that whatever had happened previously, the sound was spot on this time. The crowd got right behind us and sang and danced the night away with us. High spots; Whiter shade of pale- the second outing for this old classic and now we know what is coming up, we're right into it; the revisiting of Cocaine for the first time in many, many gigs was long overdue also. It was hot and sweaty, but that's just how we like it and at the end of the night, having played a blinder, we left the stage after an encore with the sound of "One more song" being chanted enthusiastically by the now well oiled punters.

All in all, a great night, as it always is at the Lorne. The afterglow of the night even made Stevie's arm feel better. Nuff said!