Mancunian Blues
Created | Updated Sep 30, 2004
A Man on a Mission
Mission: To stage a Narcissus gig at Jabez Clegg on the 20th September as part of 'Freshers Week' and 'In The City' festivals.
Mission Objective: TO ROCK
Name: the_jon_m
Codename: The Master Bluesman
Mission Role: Band Manager
Equipment: Paper, Car – Ford Mondeo, black hat, dark suit, purple tie, shoes, unpolished, skull on stick, sunglasses – green
T hour: 23:20
Mission Log as follows (times approximate)
- T minus 1.5 weeks Start planning flyers and posters
- T minus 7.5 days Print flyers from promoter, find file is corrupted and flyers come out skewed and 8 times too large. Print self designed poster
- T minus 6.5 days Notice poster doesn't mention gig details such as location or date. Find drawing board, return to it
- T minus 6.2 days Embark on flyering trip
- T minus 6.175 days Remember I need to buy blutack1
- T minus 6.15 days Find shop that hasn't sold out of blutack. Poster 3 pubs and kebabary, flyer 4 pubs, give demo to another pub, spends 2 hours walking round damp streets in Manchester. Claimed 1 free beer
- T minus 2 days Arrange transport details
- T minus 16 hours Due to leave the cave to move car towards city centre
- T minus 15 hours Find alarm clock is not turned on
- T minus 14 hours 45 minutes Leave to drop off car
- T minus 14 hours 20 minutes Leave car in strategic parking place and walk into the city
- T minus 14 hours 19 minutes Starts raining
- T minus 8 hours Leave work towards car
- T mins 7 hours 45 minutes Try and flyer UMIST Fresher Fair. Find out there are no societies today, just companies and all the freebees are gone
- T mins 7 hours 30 minutes Reach car
- T minus 7 hours 27 minutes Move car to location outside drummers house
- T minus 7 hours 20 minutes Starts raining
- T minus 7 hours 19 minutes Start loading drum kit
- T minus 6 hours 50 minutes Arrive at venue, spot on time. Loading doors not open, no sign of promoter and bar staff rushed off feet with customers
- T minus 6 hours 45 minutes Second car arrives; we unload stuff into the fire exit to attract attention of staff
- T minus 6 hours 30 minutes Loading doors opened; move stuff upstairs
- T minus 6 hours Equipment moved in and set up has started; no sign of singer or promoter, sound guy is stressed. Reach 'everything is fine' and leave for home
- T minus 4 hours 30 minutes Have tea with guitarist in Battered Cod. No steak and kidney pies, had a S&K pudding instead, interesting. Nice chips.
- T minus 4 hours Leave for venue
- T minus 3 hours 20 minutes Doors open
- T minus 3 hours First band on stage: Silent Quarter. New 3-piece line up of three female vocals and 1 guitar playing melodic folk influenced music. Having minimal accompaniment really highlights the quality in their voices. Excellent start to the gig
- T minus 2 hours, 30 minutes Second band – Smiling Politely - pulled out rudely. Third Band – Midland Railway - due to take the stage. Fuss going on. Bassist has arrived without a battery for his bass and borrowed Narcissus's bassist's bass. Then broke it
- T minus 2 hours 20 minutes People finally tell me what is happening and I clear up the fuss that all that is needed is another battery2. Bassist can't go because he is wearing a skirt3 Leave for shops
- T minus 2 hours 19 minutes Starts raining
- T minus 2 hours 17 minutes Pass kebabary; notice poster is missing, glare at kebabenist
- T minus 2 hours 16 minutes Buy battery, head back
- T minus 2 hours 15 minutes Rains harder
- T minus 2 hours 13 minutes Get back to venue. Damp, See sound guy having panic attack over phone to promoter
- T minus 1 hour 50 minutes Midland Railway, delayed, take the stage. Another band formed from the ashes of Pink Fluffy Cold Machines, who take geek rock to new levels. One of the few bands who can get away with singing about online football management games. For some reason all the chairs in the hall migrated to in front of the stage
- T minus 1 hour Deviant on stage. 3 piece using synths, guitar and a vocalist. Very Gary Numany and well staged with a large supply of dry ice. Not too keen personally on the style of music, but, hey, can't please everybody
- T minus 10 minutes Narcissus take stage and plug in. All sound levels wrong. Ponder why they needed to sound check! Glare at sound guy. Venue is too dark for glaring to be effective. Wander over and discuss levels. I move chairs out of the way of the stage
- T = 0 Narcissus
- T plus 1 minute Singer appears from toilet and takes stage, set starts
- T plus 1 to T plus 30 Dance, take photos, chat, make notes, wave skull about, sing along, enjoy myself
- T plus 35 minutes Congratulate people
- T plus 55 minutes Open car, start loading
- T plus 1 hour, ten minutes Finish loading my car, try and locate singer
- T plus 1 hour 11 minutes Give up waiting, let second car deal with him. Drive stuff to drummers house. Noted absence of rain
- T plus 1 hour 16 minutes Unloads stuff
- T plus 1 hour 20 minutes Debriefs with drummer, drum tech, drum tech's brother, drummers fashion consultant and a glass of juice
- T plus 1 hour 50 minutes Guitarist arrives after dropping off band members. I leave for home
- T plus 2 hours 5 minutes Arrive at cave, start making notes on performance
- T plus 2 hours 15 minutes Get fed up, fall asleep
- T plus 12 hours Type up notes and send round to band
- T plus 12 hours 15 minutes Find out 2 of the email addresses are wrong. Get different responses and continuations of comments from band members
- T plus 2.4 days Send out second set of notes and requests based on talking to band people
- T plus 2.5 days Find out I'd sent a blank email, send real email
- T plus 2.65 days Find 80 flyers in my bag, decided to write this article on them
- T plus 2.75 days Return to Jabez Clegg to se if I can locate Keyboardist's box of keyboardy goodness. Find half of the bar is filled with expatriates of Sherwood Forest, the rest is filled with people in bath robes and night clothes. Note that I am glad not to be a fresher. Also note a few of the more flattering nightie/pyjama combinations
- T plus 3 days Meet most of band in Jilly's Rock World, find somewhere to send demo, fails to pull, draws line under Fresher's week
- T plus 3.45 days Finish writing article on bus in morning
Mission accomplished, retrieval mostly successful. Still have 74 flyers left!
Love, Peace and Blues
tjm
1Other sticky gooey stuff available.210 mins to and nobody though of that??!3It's Freshers week and at least he shaved his legs, few people will actually notice!!
