Blog: More Devon

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We woke up bright and early on Sunday morning - not because we wanted to, but because we had to get up for Breakfast. For the second, and not the last time that weekend, i had some beans on toast, which went some way towards curing the MYSTERY ILLNESS i seemed to be suffering from, and illness which was to fade away completely when I had my first taste of that DELICIOUS BEER that the south west is overrun with.

I got my LAUGHING GEAR wrapped round some of the aforesaid later that morning, after a stroll down to Lynmouth where we sat on the green looking at papers, eating potatoes (eventually - it took about an HOUR for the Veggie Curry to get ready, we had to have some CAKE while we waited), EYEING UP the Ukelele stall, meeting pals, and being upset to discover that the staff in the beer tent had worked out how to served halves. CURSES!

As we set off for the railway we walked past a SKIFFLE band playing outside The Rising Sun. I was just about to REMARK to The Tea Chest Off My Skiffle Bass how raggedy they sounded, when the singer spotted me and said "OI! Peterborough isn't it? Good set!" It was GRATE, and I blushed modestly... then he said "VERY BRAVE!" OH the emotional ups and downs of FAMOUSNESS!

We caught the railway back up to the top, got our bags and then went back to The Crown to meet The Wilsons. On the way a passing driver leaned out of her car and said "Are you MJ Hibbett?" "IS THERE NO ESCAPE!?!" I thought, but it turned out she was one of the organisers who then went on to offer me a lift to Woody Bay Station, which was very nice of her. It later transpired that she was my initial CONTACT for doing the festival in the first place, and ALSO that I'd seen her before when she was working at the Cinema. I forgot to mentioned this yesterday - in the afternoon I went to the local 60 seater Cinema to watch a "Naked" gig, which was weirdly similar to BOTH my Totally Acoustic escapades AND to the Banana Grove gig last week, in that the DJ was a chap playing two wind-up 78rpm record players, and the bands were all playing completely unamplified. I didn't see much of the music as I had to dash off to get ready for my own gig, but what I did hear sounded LOVELY. It's always amazing to hear Proper Old Instruments played as they were MEANT to be played, and to realise that, actually, if you do it that way everything IS at the right volume anyway, as that's the volume they were DESIGNED for.

Anyway, as I say we went down to The Crown to meet The Wilsons and they headed out to Woody Bay Station, which was GORGEOUS. It was originally part of the Lynton Barnstaple line, and rather than me get it WRONG i would recommend a quick read of the Wiki article which is DEAD interesting. Suffice to say it was a LOVELY spot, the sun was out, trains were chugging along and we all got sat around a table in the garden. We watched the band before me, who sounded nice but LUMME didn't half need to do a lot of tuning between songs, and then i went on and did THIS:

It Only Works Because You're Here

The Perfect Love Song

I Come From The Fens

The Peterborough All-Saints' Wide Game Team (Group B)

Never Going Back To Aldi's

My Boss Was In An Indie Band Once

Payday Is The Best Day

Do The Indie Kid

Easily Impressed

Leaning On A Lamppost

Boom Shake The Room

It was SMASHING - it was such a lovely day, and I was sitting down (they didn't have a DI box for me to plug in to, so I needed miking up) so I did a MUCH calmer set than usual, and towards the end went a bit wayward and changed things about to fit the GROOVE. There was also no SWEARING, as there were a LOT of small children there, especially a pair of little lads who came and sat down together right at the front, causing a STAMPEDE of CHARMED adults to take their picture - including, it must be said, The Lens On My Camera, I'll get the PICS online soon so ALL can go "Oh just BLESS!" They didn't sit through the whole set as their Dad had to come and fetch them away, which led to CERTAIN PEOPLE making remarks about it being "Like Altamont down here - here come the Hell's Angels" and so on. Well, I thought it was funny anyway...

Job done we said goodbye to our PALS who had come along once again and leapt into the Wilsonmobile for distant Dartmouth, stopping off on the way to look at the BRILLIANT new house they'd just bought: IT HAS A BASEMENT! It's going to be THE STUDIO!

We got to their house, had GIN AND TONICS out on their BALCONY, then FEASTED on Beans On Toast (the food of DEVON!). We were then granted a MINI-GIG by Phil on the Mandolin, and he did a Field Mice song, his own versions of "Heroes" and "Century Of Fakers", climaxing with "I Fall". It was GRATE! I got caught up in the excitement and we had a JAM... with me on BANJO. I rather cockily thought this would be fine, until I realised this one had a different tuning to mine, and THEN also saw that Mandolins have EXTREMELY different tunings, so couldn't look over at Phil to see what he was playing for CLUES. INDEED it hurt my BRANE as Mandolin chords are COMPLETELY different looking to what I'm used to, and every fibre of my being screamed "NO! It is WRONG CHORDS!"

But we had a SCOOT through a Krautrock song I can't remember the name of, and also a country number that I can't remember the name of either because i was THINKING HARD about what I was doing, tho I think it sounded OK. After that we went out onto the balcony again to have some more BEER and CHAT. The house has a view down the hill and across the valley, and all along the road most of the other houses had balconies too. It was such a nice night that everyone seemed to be out and there was a lovely sound of CHAT coming from all along the valley, it was a VERY nice way to end a VERY busy day!

posted 12/6/2007 by MJ Hibbett

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Comments:

the staff in the beer tent had worked out how to served halves. CURSES!

THAT'S BETTER ;)
posted 12/6/2007 by CarsmileSteve

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