Blog: The London Run

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Mr S Hewitt and I met once more on Saturday evening, at The Camden Head in Camden, London, Camdencestershire, to do the first of our two night LONDON run of Dinosaur Planet.

I was, to say the least, feeling a bit TREPIDATIOUS about it all. I knew we hadn't sold many advance tickets and wasn't sure if many people at ALL were coming. What if this turned out to be a Really Bad Idea which casted a PALL across the whole experience? Steve was, i think, feeling the same, so you can imagine our AMAZEMENT when we went upstairs to do the show to find that the room was PACKED!

PACKED, i tell you, PACKED! This led to a GRATE show where we larked around like NOBODY'S business having an ACE time. There was an air conditioning unit on VERY LOUDLY which meant we had to shout a bit to be sure everyone could hear us, and it was odd to be playing an L-Shaped room, but we ROMPED through it, and went home VERY pleased with it all. HOORAH!

So pleased was I, in fact, that the next morning I woke up with a HUGE and WHOLE NEW FANTASTIC IDEA for NEXT year's show ready formed in my brain. I had to RUN downstairs to write it all down, it sounds GRATE - for a little while now I've been concerned that the idea for doing a whole show about Terrence Lloyd-Johnson might not a) be enough for a fun hour b) have much scope for HILARITY and c) be entirely RESPECTFUL if we did. Nobody else, I thought, is doing gently humorous two man science fiction ROCK OPERAS, so perhaps it might be better if we carried on and did something ELSE in the same vein?

I arrived at The Hangover Lounge with all this ringing in my brain. I was spending the afternoon there to see TWO bands and also because Steve had suggested some flyering. Nervously I approached him with my THORTS and then explained the IDEA. I needn't have bothered going into so much depth, I think i HAD him with the words "MOON HORSE"! "MOON HORSE!" we would sing for the rest of the evening. "MOON HORSE!"

Honest, it's going to be GRATE!

Upstairs I watched the first of the two TURNS I had come to see, Jyoti from White Town. I've been loosely linked with him ever since we advertised our very first AAS single as "featuring members of number one hitmakers White Town" (which it did, Mr Frankie Machine and Ann from Sienna were both in his backing band EONS ago) but ridiculously have never ever heard him play. This is foolish as he was GRATE - playing Totally Acoustically i was first of all amazed at how LOVELY his singing was. Really, you so rarely hear Proper Excellent Singing in the live arena, it was beautiful, and the songs were brilliant. I was HUGELY impressed, and even more so when Elizabeth Allo Darlin' joined him for the final song which was, of course, "Your Woman". It was FAB!

As indeed was the next TURN, which was the aforesaid Elizabeth Allo Darlin', playing similarly Totally Acoustically. There was a new song, a couple of requests (someone - hem hem - BELLOWED for "Silver Dollars", almost as if the lyrics are Extraordinarily Relevant) but best of all "Tallulah", which is pretty much my FAVOURITE right now. I love the fact that a song which ASKS, among other things, whether you've heard all the songs that will ever mean anything to you goes on to say "No, because THIS song does". It's just a brilliant song, as they all are really.

It was a brilliant afternoon, not least because it was so nice to be back in INDIE WORLD, where people are dead nice and there are Pleasant Times to be hand. With all this buzzing through my head we then went for BURRITO before heading once more to The Camden Head for what was to be, pending further bookings, the FINAL SHOW for Dinosaur Planet. It's very unlikely that it WILL be the final show, not least because once again we had a WHALE of a time doing it. We were nowhere near packed this time, and so got the audience to sit in one LIMB of the L-Shaped room, but they were WELL up for it and there were LARFS APLENTY. I tell you what, it doesn't half make a difference doing the show in the evening, when people have had a BEER!

It was HECKLOADS of fun and, as I say, we are thus EAGER to do more. I'd been feeling a little bit DOWN about the whole thing with the Post-Edinburgh Blues but this "Victory Lap" reminded me how much GOOD TIMES there are to be had in doing this show and not only made me want to TOUR it, but also to do something similar next year. This, I believe, is known as The Healing Power Of ROCK!

posted 23/8/2010 by MJ Hibbett

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