Robin 2, Bilston gig – 9 October 2014
Fourth gig at what must be the band’s favourite venue in just over four years! As good as usual? Let us know…
Fourth gig at what must be the band’s favourite venue in just over four years! As good as usual? Let us know…
✉ Letters Sent (51)
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(12 years ago by John From Rufford)
SIMON P
Rather frustrating to see UFO for sale tonight when I’ve got in on pre-order, but I can wait. We got a few songs though; “This One’s For Now” twangs, and “Old Age Killed My Teenage Bride” rocks out a tad. A new cover version tonight (I think?) from the Fab Four themselves. When was the last time “Numanoid Hang-Glide” got an outing?
10 October 2014
SIMON P
Or “Keeping Two Chevrons Apart” for that matter?
10 October 2014
jitsu_g
Brilliant gig as ever. Can’t remember last gig I went to were the singer claimed to be able to name any actor in Corrie pre 1982. My shout of Ernest Bishop was guessed correctly, great to catch up with BrumB and DrD again. Currently in hotel room of the Robin with a massive chicken kebab and UfO on the portable CD player. Can’t make Leicester but for those going to Manchester we are having a pre gig shandy in the pub that used to be an underground gents lav.
10 October 2014
Dave Batley
Cracking night great opener from jd meatyard set the scene for the night for me. Lots of favourites which I’ll let the sober mention. Urge for offal now annoying anyone in a ten mile radius. Another night well spent not watching tv and deciding colours to paint the garden fence and airfix kit to burn in the park.
10 October 2014
neilthechimp
Nigel – “I’ve lost that thingy again off my guitar, it’s fallen off, can you see it anywhere..?”
Ken – “The knob?”
Nigel – “No, it’s not a knob…… well it is a knob but it’ll have a proper name like a Gordon or something. Have you seen it?”
Ken – “No.”
“The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill” was the cover tonight but with a twist on the lyrics – something about Yoko sticking her nose in to Beatles affairs I think?
10 October 2014
Eric olthwaite
@JITSU The Lamp? Actually the ex kitchens of a children’s home rather than an ex toilet I believe. The white tiles are misleading.
10 October 2014
Bothy on the knoydart
Great gig, with an excellent old age duckwalk from Ken.
The guitar knob thing was a Rodney I think.
10 October 2014
Jonah varc
This was a tremendous gig. Nigel told us on a previous visit how he’d spent the afternoon in Walsall Arboretum whereas this evening was preceded by a breathtakingly audacious route to the Black Country – a wily and cunning use of the A55 then down through Wrexham, Oswestry, Shrewsbury and then the M54 and finally the M6: simply stunning, Nigel.
Perhaps even more impressive was his remembering that Graham Haberfield played Jerry Booth in Corrie. I was going to shout and ask if he remembered Graham Haberfield’s appearance in a BBC production of Germinal where all the proles had Black Country accents – what with us all in Bilston, but I didn’t….
10 October 2014
PAT BOONE ON THE COUNTY BASSOON
Brilliant gig and some real rarities. I actually think they are getting better and better. I have never heard them do Chevrons (this was my 15th gig), and also not heard a live Capel Curig or Reflections for a long time, let alone Numanoid Hang-Glide. Also picked up the new album – heard first 8 songs. Excellent so far.
10 October 2014
PAT BOONE ON THE COUNTY BASSOON
One more thing – should this website’s tagline ‘179 Songs Picked Over By Pedants’ now be changed…?
(Not until the new ones have been! – CtSO)
10 October 2014
Chris The Siteowner
Jim has posted an hour from this gig here.
10 October 2014
kingsbeef
A little too sober last night to really enjoy proceedings though hearing Reflections live for the first time made my night. Also on the plus side listening to Urge For Offal on the way home made up for the driving. A slow burn start but as always gets better with further listening – I predict The Unfortunate Gwatkin becoming a firm live favourite. And it was definitely a Rodney. CRESTA!!!
(Redacted as a spoiler – Ed)
10 October 2014
PAT BOONE ON THE COUNTY BASSOON
Yes, confirm it was a Rodney.
10 October 2014
kingsbeef
Well that’s a first. I’ve never been redacted before. Must get out more.
10 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
Last Night at the Robin, two Great Men and one lucky bleeder.
10 October 2014
Chris The Siteowner
Great work, Micky.
10 October 2014
WARDEN HODGES
Superb night, superb band and superb fans. Mad little mosh during Trumpton, that was fun. Thanks esp to Micky and Geoff for my goodies.
10 October 2014
Rob S
Musically great, and the banter at the start was good.
By my reckoning, the show ran at good 15 minutes shorter than other recent Bilston shows. My impression was that NB got fed up with the boorish drunken buffoons hectoring him and stopped doing the between song stuff.
10 October 2014
Phyllis triggs
Top gig at a decent little venue with one of the best sets I’ve had the pleasure of seeing.
Spoke to Geoff about plans for future gigs. Apparently Edinburgh and Bournemouth are ones to look out for and they expect more shows next year than 2014.
10 October 2014
Chris The Siteowner
Excellent! I’ve also heard word of an East Anglian gig, in a town where they haven’t played before…
10 October 2014
twistedkitemike
No set-list yet? Tut, tut; fellas. Here it is for you completists: –
Asparagus
Fred T
Numanoid Hang-glide
Surging
Reflections
THIS ONE’S FOR NOW (new)
Capel Curig
Floreat
Totnes
Squabble
Bad Wools
Monmore
OLD AGE KILLED MY TEENAGE BRIDE (new)
Bob W
Two Chevrons
Left Lyrics
Vatican
DPAK
JDOG
Chatteris
Trad Arr Tune
………………………………..
Evening Sun
The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill
Light Tunnel
Trumpton
Geoff had a few copies of the new CD, which were quickly devoured by the throng.
Mike………………………………………….
10 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
@Rob S : I agree 100%, One of them nearly bowled me over in my wheelchair, I’d got myself a nice spot at the front left next to the PA tower and halfway through he came through like a lunatic and got all macho and threatening, He came very close to wearing one of my detachable footrests for a gum shield, Just on E-bay now, looking for a stun gun for Leicester.
10 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
@CtsO: Wroxham?
10 October 2014
surprised of anglia
If it’s Great (sic) Yarmouth, I’d take two Bobby.
10 October 2014
PAT BOONE ON THE COUNTY BASSOON
Rob S I do agree with you. While it was a great gig from a musical point of view, some of the audience interaction/heckling was a little much – not from Nigel’s point of view, but because of some of the idiots watching him and the boys.
10 October 2014
EXXO
Sorry to hear that about the atmosphere & the heckling… NB10 has previously mentioned it as one of the best venues (obviously, or they wouldn’t keep going there). Doesn’t really like playing live all that much, and he’s not the only member of the band to feel that, but “half-way through a Bilston gig I start to feel alright about it” sort of thing.
The transition from about 27/28 songs to about 25 seems to be a recent trend and is inevitable really though, and Bilston shouldn’t take it personally. It’s still a phenomenal set length.
10 October 2014
Dr Desperate
[I hope nobody was offended by my interactions (shouting “Toilet flushes” and “Travis Tritt”, the reason for which will become apparent tomorrow). I also entered “Albert Tatlock” in the Corrie-naming sweepstakes – too easy.]
Another excellent Bilsto visit, with pre-gig Bathams in the Great Western.
Nigel spotted the Barnstoneworth United twin strikers on the front row, and asked where Treadmore was, before beginning ‘Asparagus’ unplugged (“Our usual smooth start”).
The setlist was as above, with several alterations from the handwritten list, which may account for the shorter than usual set. ‘Fred Titmus’ was a last-minute call-up (possibly to buoy Nigel’s confidence after he’d cocked up the words to ‘Asparagus’); ‘Foam Party’ was dropped, and in a change of plan ‘Squabblefest’ replaced both ‘National Shite Day’ and ‘Fix It…’ ‘Vatican Broadside’ was added towards the end, and ‘Trumpton Riots’ as a final encore.
The M53 had been closed, but luckily Nigel “the human satnav” had devised a cunning alternative route, which brought him a round of applause.
Some discussion on the subject of which celebrities were still alive, giving Roger Green’s mate Tony the chance to use his ‘Take Your Pick’ gag: “Michael Miles is still alive, did you know?” “No.” “Bong!!” (The teenagers can YouTube “Yes/No Interlude”, though it even airshipped Nigel, who misattributed it to Radio 4.)
Not much more banter, perhaps as a reaction to the bloke constantly calling for ‘Too Much Too Young’. Somebody, possibly the same bloke, came down to the front and demanded ’27 Yards of Dental Floss’, then couldn’t remember the first line. This may be another example of the Curse of Bilston, where on a previous occasion nobody could remember the third line of ‘Turned Up…’
The new songs were brilliant, as was the cover of ‘Bungalow Bill’. And as we know, THE NEW CD WAS ON SALE!!! (Apologies to those who weren’t there, I’m just a bit over-excited.)
Next gig for me will be Manc (another one where I won’t have to make a new AAA laminate). The underground bar is The Temple,
http://www.manchestersfinest.com/drinking-in-manchester/pubs-in-manchester/the-temple/
just round the corner from The Ritz on Great Bridgewater St. It actually is a converted toilet, and has a well-stocked jukebox (though more noted for its vast array of bottled beers than any real ale). Don’t forget it’s an early start, to allow The Ritz to sell expensive cocktails to students after we’ve been shooed out.
10 October 2014
Rob S
@EXXO – don’t get me wrong, it was a great show, the atmosphere was good and there were probably only a handful of tools amongst an audience of several hundred, but when the tools feel the need to approach the stage and gesticulate wildly to make their point, maybe the point didn’t need to be made.
Good to hear it wasn’t just me who got that impression, anyway.
10 October 2014
PaUl f
The Temple is apparently where Elbow drink.
10 October 2014
warden hodges
I’m sure Leicester will be a top gig also but yeah, my next fix will be Manc also and with the 10pm curfew it could be one of them rare moments where I actually get home the same night.
7 weeks and counting and time to learn the new songs.
10 October 2014
Rob S
Bilston 2014-10-09 – full show – now on the Live Performance Downloads page.
10 October 2014
neilthechimp
I wouldn’t call anything that was shouted towards the stage last night as ‘heckling’, just the drunken rants of the buffoonerrati you’d find at any gig. Ill-conceived warblings at worst.
Certainly nothing there to make Nigel head for the stairwell as far as I could tell. The Too Much Too Young put down was genius.
Looking forward to the Ritz and more UFO tracks in the set. Will be shopping for Durutti Column socks in the meantime.
11 October 2014
Dr Desperate
For those who weren’t there, in response to the calls for ‘Too Much Too Young’ NB10 played a few lines of ‘Enjoy Yourself, It’s Later Than You Think’, then said “But it never is, is it?”
11 October 2014
Vitus corialanus
Ah Bobby Svarc, we were the ones in front of you but to either side, that guy was a little..excitable…
13 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
A few more Cow Shed pics – http://modelstadia.co.uk/index.php/the-cow-shed
13 October 2014
EXXO
The outside wall of the Cowsheds there on Prenton Road West is genius Mick, but apparently there are those who don’t want any sneak previews of the lyrics ;-)
I didn’t actually get to my house today due to a freak series of events involving having no phone credit and therefore as a result no transport.
Tomorrow insh’allah.
13 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
@EXXO, Well yes I suppose so but the ‘spoof’ lyrics aren’t quite correct, I will take the accolade of genius with open arm(s) though, :-)
14 October 2014
FOR YOU I'D USE MY ROGER GREEN
The Robin 2, Bilston, Wolverhampton, Thu 9th October 2014 (11/10/14)
Roger Green:
Where, oh where, does the time go? It’s over a third of a year since the Blackburn gig. 137 days, there or thereabouts. 0.3753425 years if you prefer it in decimals. In the relativity of the universe as a whole, that is actually quite a small gap. But in Biscuit Time, it’s an age. Fortunately the summer has not been a total waste. The Chills, The Wedding Present, The Ainsley Band, Cowtown, The Fall (a virtuoso performance by Mark E Smith in York on what would have been John Peel’s 75th birthday), Cactus Knife, Yawning Dog, One Day After School, The Sunbeams, John Otway (both with and without Wild Willy Barrett), Dead Party Scene, Loz Campbell, The Cribs, The Lovely Eggs, Milky Wimpshake, Mario Goetze (his goal in the World Cup final, and Germany’s resultant victory, meant that I coined it in with sixty big pounds), Mi Mye and Sleaford Mods combined to help me through the hiatus.
The train route to this place holds no surprises now. Change at Birmingham New Street, on to Wolverhampton, and then the 25a bus to Bilston. Although there was a delay, apparently caused by a “trespasser” on the line between Berwick and Newcastle. Apparently the gentleman in question was taken away by the authorities before the train got to him, but the inevitability of life imitating art leads one to The Coroner’s Footnote. I was glad to see the Fighting Cocks supermarket still acting as a landmark on the bus route. It was even better to see The Major chip shop on the precinct in Bilston still operating at full output. Karen had drawn my attention to a number of reviews on Trip Advisor. 9 people rated it as Excellent, 5 as Very Good and 3 as Terrible. Some folk are very hard to please. Either the reviewers, or the shop of course, must have been having a bad day. This is one of the best chip shops that I know. I would certainly be delighted to be pointed in the direction of a better one.
From there it was on to the venue. I was able to take a quick look at one of the rooms at the Robin 2 Hotel. I would say “Compact, but meets all requirements.” And apparently the breakfasts score highly. Always an important factor. I’ll stop there one day, but I’ve always thought the logisitics of stopping in Wolverhampton have meant that one stage is cut out from the return home. Karen and I spotted a minimal amount of publicity for the gig. HMHB’s name appeared on a poster outside the venue, near the one for a “Tina Tuner” tribute act. My, how we laughed. And there was no mention at all in The Express And Star. Would you expect it to be any other way?
There was steady business in Woody’s Bar. We met Tony there, before we joined the surge into the venue. It wasn’t too long before JD Meatyard opened the show. It was actually just John on his own this time, but his passion for his work made up for the lack in numbers. Excellent versions of the Singer/Songwriter one, along with Standing On The Shoulders and the one about St Peter. And he even fitted in a bit of showmanship. Taking a swig of Guinness, he played the guitar one-handed. “That is the avant garde bit,” he said.
We had caught two songs in HMHB’s early evening sound check. They played Totnes and one of the new ones, Old Age Killed My Teenage Bride (available on the Urge For Offal CD very soon in good and bad record shops). The band were on stage for a standard 9 o’clock start. There was no walk-on music. The only accompaniment was a bit of whooping and hollering. “That’s another one of our dynamic entrances,” announced Nigel after he had eventually found the lead, to plug his guitar in. There was a bit of chat involving the two guys who were wearing Barnstoneworth shirts. One had McIntyre’s name on the back. The other had Davitt. “Treadmore must still be in The White Rose,” commented Nigel. He introduced the first song, Asparagus Next Left, with “This is a wary song about rural areas.” After a couple of songs he started talking to me about the band’s route to the gig. There had been some incident or other on the motorway, so Nigel (“I am a human satnav”) had guided Neil, somewhat controversially, around the A55 and A483 via Oswestry towards Bilston. It’s not a part of the world that I know particularly well, so I couldn’t possibly comment. He reminded the rest of the band that Reflections In A Flat starts in E Minor, which gave him the excuse to run out the old line about “Every toilet in the world flushes in E Minor.” This One’s For Now (another one on the new CD) is the song that I had previously known as You’re So Beige. It also had the “As told to the boil on the cab driver’s neck” line added to it at the end. I congratulated Gomez for putting up an admirable effort as a one-man moshpit. With a couple of exceptions, it was all a bit quiet out there. (By the way, Gomez contacted me the day after this gig to say he was in Kidderminster and had spotted a Blackwell Street and a Crossley Park.) Nigel pondered over the question “Is Magnus Pyke dead? If so, it must have happened on a busy news day.” Nigel claimed that he knows the name of the actor playing every part in Coronation Street “up to about 1982”, because the credits used to roll quite slowly, whereas nowadays they whizz by. A couple of punters put him to the test, but Emily Bishop, for example, was not the stern examination he might have expected. During Capel Curig we had some stage craft from Ken. My best description is a very steady, very measured, Chuck Berry duck walk. The kind that you do when you don’t want to hurt yourself. Shouts for “Too Much Too Young” were approaching the quantity that we might expect for “What Did God Us, Neil?” “We can do Guns Of Navarone,” replied Nigel. He sang a bit of Enjoy Yourself, the line that says it’s later than you think. Nigel, of course, had to qualify that line. “Except it never is (later than you think).” There was a bit of Radio Four talk. Nigel told us of the time when Geoff Davies had got him a spot on a Radio Four discussion programme “at half past seven in the morning”, he was keen to point out. The other people on the programme were Libby Purves, a stripper from Eastenders, the head of the British Hedgehog Society, and David Jason. Quality stuff, by the sounds of it. There was a bloke behind me who was filming the gig. Apologies to anyone who is watching this on You Tube, because I kept bumping into him. And that’s what I’m like when I’m sober! More shouts for Too Much Too Young led to Nigel expressing preference for Friday Night Saturday Morning. One guy came storming to the front demanding to hear 27 Yards Of Dental Floss. “I’ve been to see you sixteen times, and you’ve never played it!” “What’s the first line? I can’t remember it,” replied Nigel. The punter couldn’t remember it either. So it was left at that. Gomez told me how he, Howie and Daz had walked to Bilston from Wolverhampton bus station after discovering that the tram wasn’t operating. I wasn’t sure what was wrong with the bus, but it was their choice. The cover was a Beatles song which I had never heard before. You live and learn. Applause at the end were pretty thunderous. It looked like they might come back for a second encore, before the lights went up. The King Of High Vis was kind enough to grab a set list from the stage for Karen. It makes an interesting comparison with what they actually played. This is what Nigel wrote for the set list…
Asparagus
Numanoid
Surging
Trevor (Em)
Foam Party
Beige
C Curig
Floreat
Totnes
Shite Day
Fix It
Bad Wools
Monmore
Old Age
B Wilson
2 Chevrons
Left Lyrics
D Prague
JDOG
Chatteris
Village
?
E Sun
B Bill
Light
And this is how I reckon it actually went…
Asparagus Next Left
Fuckin’ ‘Ell It’s Fred Titmus
Numanoid Hang Glide
Surging Out Of Convalescence
Reflections In A Flat
This One’s For Now
Bottleneck At Capel Curig
Floreat Inertia
Totnes Bickering Fair
Running Order Squabble Fest
Rock ‘n’ Roll Is Full Of Bad Wools
Monmore Hare’s Running
Old Age Killed My Teenage Bride
Bob Wilson Anchor Man
Keeping Two Chevrons Apart
Left Lyrics In The Practice Room
Vatican Broadside
All I Want For Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit
Joy Division Oven Gloves
For What Is Chatteris?
We Built This Village On A Trad Arr Tune
And in the encore there was:
When The Evening Sun Goes Down
The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill
The Light At The End Of The Tunnel Is The Light Of An Oncoming Train
The Trumpton Riots
Big thanks to Tony for the lift back to Wolverhampton. It was great to see my friend Kath at her first HMHB gig since they played Kentish Town a few years back. Surprised not to see Dave and his mates, who are normally at the Midlands shows. And it would have been interesting to hear Nigel’s thoughts on the Dads Army re-make. Maybe that’s one for next time. At least there is not as long wait this time round.
14 October 2014
jitsu_g
top review as ever Roger ( not sure if you read these or you are copied, but hey ho) i would agree that Emily Bishop was an easy shout for Corrie names but i think Nigel miss heard my shout for Earnest Bishop and then did re address. think it was one of Crosby or Stills etc…. that he claimed the name to be.
I dont want to tell tales of my friends but Dr D did initially ask for Nigel to name Albert Tatlock. (sorry dr d )
15 October 2014
Dr Desperate
I did, I did. In my defence, the last time I saw Coronation St, Albert Tatlock was still in it. I should have asked him who played Mr Papagopolous.
15 October 2014
Dr Desperate
Papagopoulos.
15 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
Ena Sharples,.. David Hunter,.. Meg Mortimer,.. Stanley Ogden…………Albert Tatlock…..Albert Tatlock
15 October 2014
peter mcornithologist
@Dr. Desperate: After leaving Coronation Street, Mr. Papa was the head of a military coup in Greece in 1967.
15 October 2014
EXXO
@ Honved’s number 1 Fan: I can confirm that Roger doesn’t come on here and seems so blithely unaware of the internet that it’s a wonder he ever gets his reviews to Gez’s site, whence Pop-Tart Mark robs them with slightly more than necessary force and sticks them on here.
15 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
@EXXO I met the ‘Load of Bull’ geezer last week at Bilston, Do yo know him? Wants me to build a 1970 Molineux model, nice fella, bought me a bag of chips.
15 October 2014
warden hodges
Aye, Roger was scribbling away in his trusty notepad as early as the soundcheck. The cheeky ‘scouser’ in me got his pint from Woodys and watched on too.
15 October 2014
peter mcornithologist
@ Mr.Svarc. I wondered if you could knock up a model of Victoria Park,Hartlepool? Tis very compact,so materials will be cheap. Ps. Are you old enough to remember Jackie Sinclair?
15 October 2014
Bobby SVARC
I Certainly do Mr Peter, Saw him many times with my Dad who was 83 yesterday by the way, Jackie Sinclair was his favourite player, 100 games and 50 goals for the City, how the bloody hell did we manage to lose 3 FA Cup finals in the sixties eh?.
As for my models, ‘knock one up’……deary me. ;-) http://www.modelstadia.co.uk
15 October 2014
peter mcornithologist
@ Bobby Svarc. When Hartlepool were away we used to sometimes travel to Sunderland.I recall Sinclair and Dougan being an outstanding combination.Give my regards to Mr Svarc senior…Be well Mr.Bates. Rodney Fern always made me smile.
15 October 2014
bobby svarc
Rodney was the nearest thing to Marty Feldman, good player though and like me was a cult figure at Filbert Street, scored the winner at the Field Mill swamp in 1969. Now Dougan was class personified, the old school who used to stand on the kop idolised him and still sing his song today, like all of our good players he was sold to keep the Shipman family basking in their wealth.
16 October 2014
John From Rufford
Reminder for Nigel, the human satnav; The road out of here is a trunk route;
A41 Birkenhead to London, via Bilston, easy…
17 October 2014