Royal Tavern November 2nd 2006

Our man of the night this week was Michael Parris.

Michael is originally from Ireland but now lives permanently in the Blyth area. He works in the nursing profession and unfortunately, isn't at the Buskers as often as he would like and he can often be found tramping around the country giving lectures.

On the night we heard a few of his own compositions along with his acoustic version of David Bowies 'Heroes'. ( I liked this as it gave me a rare opportunity to do a bit of backing with my e-bow ).

On the nights Michael can be there, we usually hear different tunes each time other than the same old stuff week in week out. 

Tonight was no different. Songs such as 'Bare Neccesities' from The Jungle Book, Queens 'We will rock you' were mixed with Bowies 'Ziggy Stardust' and Bob Marley's 'Three Little Birds'

Mike has a brilliant guitar technique using a chopping action with a palm mute which gives a good guitar sound with good rhythm which is especially good on 'We will rock you'.

Michael gets accosted by some dodgy bloke.............

  Thursday November 9th 2006

Dave, Kev and Derek were the first spotlight act we had on the Thursday a few months ago and tonight, they did us proud again - but tonight we had the recently enrolled new member of the band,  backing singer/guitarist Emma.

Main vocals are by Dave Oram, with bass guitar being covered by his brother Derek. Lead and sometimes, acoustic guitar is looked after quite nicely thank you, by Kev Wells.  

The addition of Emma to the band was certainly a good move, as these 3 blokes are as ugly as you get, so she makes it far easier on the eyes.

The ears however, have no such problems. The band sound good, no, they sound great, with a nice full sound helped by the additional vocals and guitar.

We heard a few new songs from the lads tonight in a set list that included Deep Purples 'Soldier of fortune' and 'Child in time' melded with 'Blind man'.

These were mixed in with 60's hits 'You really got me' & 'Gime, gimme some lovin'. I loved this last track, and so did the audience - it really worked well even as an "unplugged" version. Of course, a night with this lot is not complete without 'Smokin in the boys room'.  Unfortunately, Derek couldn't stay all night but the remaining members did cover 'If I close my eyes forever', the classic Ozzy Osbourne & Lita ford number.

Above we have a few of the regulars enjoying the atmosphere and we also had a visit by the couple who are to be the spotlight artists in a couple of weeks time - Simon Day and Faye Douglass (seen above on the right).

November 16th 2006 - Craig Fairbairn

And lo…it came to pass that on Thursday 17th October, Craig did descend upon the Royal Tavern to grace us with his ‘Spotlight’ set (written by Mark Cocking).

This is where it’s happening and if you’re looking for great live music and good company then get yer arse down to the Royal Tavern. Bring your guitar, sitar, or whatever you want to play. Or… just bring your voice and con some of the unsuspecting but brilliant musicians to accompany you whilst you do your thing. This is the buskers’ night and the floor is open to all.

The open floor is preceded by a 30-40 minute guest spotlight set each week where an artist has the floor to entertain the gathering. This could be you. Just let us know if you would like to indulge us and I’m sure it can be arranged.

This weeks’ spotlight artist was Craig Fairbairn. Craig sings with the band “Black Mother Cap” and punks it up regularly. This set, though, was his chance to show everyone what a multitalented performer he really is. His set included covers of The Stereophonics, Steven Lynch, Damien Rice and SemiSonic, as well as a few of his own songs. His ability to command attention is admirable and my own favourite moment was when he burst into a song called “Craig Christ” purportedly about the often overlooked brother of the ‘man’ himself. This was his story….and I could have sprayed my beer everywhere. A brilliant song…not for the fainthearted…hilarious…beautifully blasphemous and performed brilliantly.

We were then treated to “Fairytale in New York” and “Arthur McBride” by Craigs’ old man Pete. Traditional folk at its best.

And the sessions went on. Each taking the floor to entertain in their own delightful way.

 I promise I’ll get to know a few more next time and give them a mention, but for now I’d particularly like to mention Derek (Guitar) and Dave (Vocal) Oram, brothers in arms.(See last weeks photos) Derek plays the guitar with a sensitivity and expression rarely seen and Dave…..well… suffice to say that he is one of the reasons I started attending these buskers nights regularly and I was pleased to see him back this week. This fella wraps his vocal chords around many songs ranging from Rod Stewart, to Dr Hook (as he did last Thursday) to Marc Bolan to Led Zeppelin. Each and every one is real performance and an absolute pleasure to hear.

Drag your friend along to the next one. This really is the place to be on a Thursday night.

Then the ladies took to the floor. I think I’ll save my comments on them for the next instalment because there’s some real talent and I think I’d like to do them justice by at least mentioning their names next time.

This truly is a great night with a variety of musical entertainment. It wouldn’t happen, though, without the hard work and efforts of Keith Bradley who will occasionally take to the floor himself and impress the minions with his outstanding vocal range. Keith, though I have focussed primarily on the buskers, I’d like to thank you on behalf of everyone at the buskers’ night for making this all happen. It’s often too easy to overlook the main man, so cheers Keith. Long may we busk!

  Buskers Night at the Royal Tavern, Blyth, 23 Nov 2006

by Mark Cocking

Tonight’s gathering began with some deep philosophy from the Bradley team. First of all Keith pondered the wonders of a TV set that seemed to have no volume button and no apparent way of turning it off (see pic). This was closely followed by Chris who pondered the inner meaning of the word “Mate”, declaring that it means someone with whom one has sex and insisting that he didn’t indulge accordingly with his mates. Once these formalities were completed and Chris was content that everyone believed him (honestly), the sessions began.

The spotlight set tonight was local band “SWELL” (minus their drummer). This line up consists of the gorgeous Faye Douglas (Lead Vocal), her fella Simon Day (Guitar & Vox) and Jamie Parker (Bass & Vox).

Their set was varied and consisted of a mix of covers (Nina Simone “Feeling Good”/ Jack Johnson “Bubble Toes” / Nelly Furtado “I’m Like a Bird”) and some of their own songs, like “Delores”, “Rainbow”, “Blue Melodies” & “May Day”.
Particularly good among these, in my humble opinion, were “Rainbow” with a hooky chorus line and a beautiful sustained note from Faye which showed her natural vibrato off to the full.

They did other songs too, like the “Ooh! Ooh! song from “Kill Bill” (whatever it’s called) together with a wonderful rendition of the classic song from “Friends”… “SMELLY CAT”. What a delight that one was! Additional lyrics added by Faye finished it off wonderfully.

Altogether “SWELL” are a tight outfit with an acoustic sound and, when they all sing together in harmony, a very full sound with voices which serve to compliment each other. In fact, at one point, I thought I was listening to Nico with the Velvet Underground. That shows how old I am…but…more to the point…shows that there is an originality present in SWELL which is hard to find, particularly as they had never heard of Nico or the Velvet Undergound. (Hey Guys…suggestion…Check out the VU song “Sunday Morning” and do it as one of your covers. That’d be well cool)

If you want to see SWELL live then you can find them at the Tynemouth Surfing Competition, soon arriving at Long Sands Beach, Tynemouth. Or come along to the buskers’ night and check them out again here (cos I’m sure they’ll be back)……………………………………………..

The night continued with various contributions from Den, Geordie, Johny, Peter, Chris (will you be my mate) Bradley and Keith, some of whom are pictured here.

REMEMBER THAT NEXT WEEKS BUSKERS NIGHT IS ON WEDENESDAY…FOR THIS WEEK ONLY!! COME DOWN AND JOIN IN!

  Wednesday 29th Nov 2006

Well, as Marc mentioned last week, Thursday was on a Wednesday this week, but we still had 20 or so folk in to play and listen to the music. we didn't bother with a spotlight artist this week because of the gig being on a different night, so we ran a nice, simple, easy going buskers night where everyone was able to get up and play a couple of times each. It worked quite nicely too.  One or two things happened which I have waited for for some time - we got to hear Derek sing and for the first time got to see Steve Hill sing as well as play Zac's 3 grand Gibson!

The first 2 pictures above are from last weeks night. Dennis, on the left, is to be our featured artist next week (first week of December). Bill French gave us a couple of songs and Zak just can't keep those hands still for a moment!

 Black Magic Wo-men! Steve picks up the guitar to do a bit of lead with Derek & Dave for Black Magic Woman - could have done with a bit of harp playing there.....................................