Right Back at the Start

Best to strike while the iron's not long been unplugged with these posts...

Last night saw your intrepid garage rock preservationists that are The False Poets play back where it all began in Chester-le-Street. Last time we played there was over 19 years ago in the youthful noise merchants that were Psychlone.

I was reflecting on how times have changed, sat outside Clems with Dean chewing on some red hot chips. In 1994 The Street was heaving Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday pretty much every week of the year. I never really liked going out too much in those awkward days of late adolescence. Being hemmed in at the back of The Queens Head with a pint of Carling as Whigfield sang her heart out over the pub speakers wasn't my idea of fun, but bloody hell! where have all the people gone?! Either The Wicket Gate and Utopia were utterly rammed or there's a lot more supermarket booze being knocked back in front of the tele by the Cestrians these days...

It's such a state of affairs that has played a part in seeing a number of pubs in Chester-le-Street putting bands on. I'd like to think I would've dug that when I were a young un. The Britannia, The Black Horse, The Market Tavern, even The Butchers Arms has put a few turns on. The Lambton Arms has been putting bands on for about a year or so. Grateful to them for giving us a chance to strut our stuff in the land where we learnt our ABCs, amongst other things.

Really good to see some friendly faces in there. First Poets gig me mam's gone to, as well! Plenty friends and family there and the locals on the whole seemed to enjoy it and weren't so deterred by the largely unfamiliar-to-them material. 9 gigs in and we've not been paid off for the night yet! Thanks to Sarah and Deb for the pics and tweets!

Here's the two sets:

Set1:

You're Gonna Miss Me

Pretty Big Mouth

(I Ain't No) Miracle Worker

Why Do I Cry?

Tell Me When

Stick or Twist

Like A Rolling Stone

My Flash On You

Nobody But Me

Gonna Make You Mine

A Girl I Know

Stomper

Primitive

Slow Down (Click to play!)

All Day and All of the Night

All Night Long

Set 2:

Call the Doctor

I Can Only Give You Everything

Gloria

You Are The Way

I'm Not Like Everybody Else

The Mad Machine

Set It Free

My Little Black Egg

Codine

Did It Feel Real?

I Fought The Law (first outing)

Hey Joe

Going All The Way

Psychotic Reaction

Strychnine

Action Woman

The lads are chipping in with the backing vocals, filling out those songs that little bit extra. Pleased with the way some of the originals were going down especially A Girl I Know and Stomper always gets a good response. Appreciated the advice from Mick Dixon re sticking some more reverb on the vocals - will try that next time.

Next up is The Sun Inn at Swalwell, Friday 6th September. It's just had a brand new coat of paint and looks The Dogs!

Keep a-had!

The False Poets at The Cluny 2 March 6th

Few gigs to update on since last time. I'll do one at a time cos I tend to waffle on a bit.

Our second gig came at Newcastle's Cluny 2 after having kindly been asked by the wonderful St James Infirmary to open the night. Topping the bill were the smashing lads that are Illustrators.

The guys from SJI put this poster together for the night:

Ross Lewis was overlooking the sound on his stamping ground. Ross produced some demos of a band that Pete and me were in, Mandalas, back in 2005. I say over-looking cos he had some young sound-hands learning the ropes. We were last to soundcheck and they did a sterling job. The most professional set-up I've done with a band from the point of view of sound, stage and venue. Tristan couldn't get, so I handled the vocals.

The Cluny 2 will be hosting more nights for the price of a pint as Profit is Over-rated, so keep an eye out!

The set we played on the night:

You're Gonna Miss Me

I'm Gonna Make You Mine

(I Ain't No) Miracle Worker

Hey Joe

Call The Doctor

Set It Free

You Are the Way

All Day and All of the Night

Action Woman

My Little Black Egg

My Flash On You

Strychnine

That lot clocked in at under half an hour. 'Twas great fun - and well received. You Are The Way was ten days old at the time, but held together fine.

St James Infirmary were most entertaining and on fine form. As I type they are currently hosting an excellent radio show on Ashington's Koast Radio. Tuesdays 8pm til 10 for You Are Not Our Demographic - they soundcloud the programmes, should you miss 'em - well worth a listen.

False Poets set sail in The Old Ship, Newbiggin

Saturday February 16th saw The False Poets do their first gig.

Venue was The Old Ship, Newbiggin - it was a fine evening enjoyed by the 20 odd people there - mostly family and friends. It gave us a chance to check out our p.a. and Dean's drums he'd just acquired.

The sound was pretty good - drums weren't mic-ed up cos we haven't got drum mics yet. Also, playing without monitors, again for lack of them, but the mix out of the p.a. speakers was decent and the kit carried well enough without the mics. Could hear ok on the stage what we were playing - kinder on the ears than the rehearsal rooms in Heaton!

Looking at the photo, probably should have lifted the Northumberland flag to go over the blackboard, but I don't begrudge The Old Ship the promos! It's a fine place actually and well worth a visit. We'll be going back again in the summer. Probably stick the p.a. speakers in front of the stage so Pete doesn't have to be stuck in the corner at the back.

We did a couple of sets as follows:

You're Gonna Miss Me

1-2-5

I'm Gonna Make You Mine

Stick or Twist

(I Ain't No) Miracle Worker

Call The Doctor

Slow Down

All Night Long

Little Black Egg

Strychnine

Going All The Way

Action Woman

I felt personally that I played a little bit too stiffly during that first set but loosened up for set 2:

Gloria

Pretty Big Mouth

Tell Me When

Did It Feel Real?

I'm Not Like Everybody Else

My Flash On You

Why Do I Cry?

Stomper

Primitive

All Day and All of the Night

Hey Joe

I Can Only Give You Everything

It might look like a fair few songs, but each set took about half an hour. I particularly enjoyed the bluesy pairing of Stomper and Primitive, but it was all a lot of fun, really. No audio recordings were taken, but there may be a youtube clip to share at some point.

A few further gigs to tell you about:

Wednesday March 6th we're first on the bill at The Cluny 2 with St James Infirmary and Illustrators 

Saturday March 30th we're putting on a Garage night at The Central. Viddy...

Also taking our show to Lumley's The Old England Friday 3rd May for a pub gig starting about 9pm.

There's also been some things put on www.thefalsepoets.co.uk

That'll dee fer noo

Winters Returning Song

Sunday Service at First Avenue after a four week break. We haven't been resting on our borrowed laurels in the interim tho - oh no! Tristan brought 3 songs (left another one at home) and I fetched one along to work on, the Rhythmic Poets having heard demos and taken the initial sketches onboard.

First hour was spent getting back up to speed with the familiar numbers. We're used to the room being a sweatbox, so it was weird getting cold hands off the fretboard. Pete sacrificed watching the match to put up with such discomforts!

So, as well as the new songs, which got 3 runs through each, Why Do I Cry and The Squires' Going All The Way have both been given a bit spit and polish, the latter properly taking flight for the first time.

This blog's demo recording is brought to you courtesy of Tristan's new Zoom H1 recorder, hence the different, not as abrasive sound:

You're Gonna Miss Me

For those of you eager for a more intimate frisson of fuzz frenzy, arrangements are in place for some Spring-some garage shenanigans in the new year. Our warmest welcomes will be extended to you all.

Where autumns shadows idly muse

September 15th

I've lost count of what number rehearsal thing we're onto now - 7 or 8 - at trusty old First Avenue. Recent rehearsals have taken a shape of playing the set of the 11 of so songs we've got down pretty well, an hour or so of working on newer things and then repeating the set.

That 11 song set in full:

You're Gonna Miss Me

1-2-5

Pretty Big Mouth

I'm Gonna Make You Mine

I Ain't No Miracle Worker

Action Woman

Little Black Egg

I'm Not Like Everybody Else

Primitive

Hey Joe

I Can Only Give You Everything

All Day and All night is taking on a role of beery encore. The Bad Seeds' (not the Nick Cave one) All Night Long was given it's first run out with the proper chord changes in the middle bit. First runs out for My Flash On You (tho' our footing is trying to gain a-hold somewhere between Love's and Thee Sixpence's respective versions), Can't Explain, Tristan's new song When the Morning Comes and something I've cobbled together from a few chords thrown out at the last one called Stick or Twist.

To fill in the final few tired moments there was a fun blast through Territorial Pissings as well as Gloria. We've played that before and it sounded pretty lame, but didn't sound too bad this time! Might have something to do with Pete's later observation that it felt like we clicked as a band somewhere through the second run through of the set. These things take time, as someone once said about something totally unrelated, perhaps.

I was somewhat discombobulated early in the rehearsal by mucking about with that delay rack thing. No tech-head me.

The False Poets' Facebook page is public, so if you're on there - give us a likey for random updates.

The Nightcrawlers' Little Black Egg

September

Back at First Avenue to see September in with our 6th rehearsal. 

It was a couple of runs through the 11 song set. All Day and All of the Night has shapen up and All Night Long is just about there, too. The only thing with that one is the chord changes during the instrumental break need pinning down.

Dirty Water received the briefest of runs out - maybe we'll persist with that. 

Pete and me started kicking round with a few chords. Dean came up with an interesting beat, Tristan added some wah-wah licks and a fuzz-tone riff and ad-libbed some words on top. Our first genuine tune of our own took some shape! I've got some words and structural ideas for next time and am pretty confident that it'll be formed a week Saturday when we rehearse next. Provisional title of "Stick or Twist".

I agreed with Dean that we played best about a half hour in once we'd warmed up!

From a tech point of view, I took along my Zoom RFX 1000 delay rack. I've lost the adapter for it. Alas, Tristan's adapter didn't fit, so that's on hold til the adapter from ebay arrives. Continuing the tech-y vibe, Tristan brought some kit along to record the session. Like me, he has a Zoom MRS-4 track recorder. He managed to record 40 tracks in all with better results than I managed as he had some other kit there. Will find out for next time what that was!

As promised, here's a song from the session

I Can Only Give You Everything

5th Rehearsal

Quick update on Saturday, seeing as I let the 4th one pass by.

First 3 hour rehearsal for The False Poets on Saturday - £34.50 with the kit hire from First Avenue.
Tristan drew up a set of 11 songs that we do best: Can't remember off the top of me head what it is! Starts with You're Gonna Miss Me, ends with Hey Joe then I Can Only Give You Everything. We basically played the set at the start and end of the session with some bits and pieces in between.

First attempts at Going All The Way by The Squires, You Ain't No Find Of Mine, a few bars of Can't Explain and a few runs through of All Night Long. Also, a largely instrumental go at It's My Life and a fun romp through Territorial Pissings that Tristan sang very well! (Although he missed out the 'Never met a wiseman...' verse).

I took my A mouth organ along and had a parp on the Elevators' track. It sounded passable, so it looks like that'll be in. A new one's needed for 1-2-5, so I'll be looking into that.

Sounding better over all. Having a proper bass amp to use helps and the vocals were both at the best levels yet. Some of the songs we play too fast still.

No recordings this time, but hopefully at the next one there'll be some to stuff to possibly share from 1st September.

Broken String Count: 3 - all Tristan's.