It’s over!
It was fun. As usual, there was an unpleasant surprise. The last time we played (Hallowe’en) the opening bands played over their time and we only got to play half of our set. I think we were officially cut off after 5 songs and then we squeezed 3 more songs on simply because we just would not get off stage.
After that disappointment I was insistent about how our next show should go down: we would start at 10 and we’d finish at midnight. The other band could play before us or after us, I didn’t care – but we would play a full set during the spot on the clock where our fans would actually be in the club. So it was agreed, and in fact we went one further by playing two sets tonight, complete with a costume change and a change of bassists (from Troy to Bob!). Merrick was up in arms when he heard that the other band, GG Dartray was going on after us, and I did feel bad for them because after we finished playing about 90% of the crowd left, but you know what? I think we’ve paid our dues after 11 years and we deserve to have a show go as planned. GG knew what they were getting into I think, and also – they were pretty good! So go and see them the next time they play because that will ease my conscience.
This time around our plan was threatened once again when we found out – once we got to the club, mind you, and not before – that the bands “had to” be playing until 2:30. In theory this meant that we would have to start playing between 11:00 and 11:30 instead of 10. Frankly, I wasn’t interested. If the sound man was willing, I was keen on going on when we wanted to go on. And the sound man was willing. In fact, Adam (sound man) was great. I could provide stories about bad soundmen but I’d have to consult Warren’s memory. But look at me, all digressing.
So we didn’t go on quite on time, but after being constantly asked how soon we’d be going on by various fans, I gathered the troops and asked Adam if we could go on in 10 minutes (this was about 10:20). We wore our Spaceship Zero uniforms for the first set, we had a 20 minute break and changed into our monster costumes, and played another set, including some encore songs that we had not practiced. In fact Warren just got back from Antarctica 2 days prior. All in all, though, I was really happy with the show. The fans came out, old friends and new friends finally saw us play, I sold a whackload of CDs, and we had a lot of sweaty, stupid fun. We played a slow version of Burrow Your Way to My Heart that we had just made up on Tuesday, and we had a little impromptu song about Marlo, and I gave out some D&D miniatures to those who answered the space trivia (the answers to which were Sedna and Kuiper Belt). Oh, and we video taped the show from three different cameras so we’ll have some good stuff for the Thickets DVD.
I don’t know what time GG finished up – but I’m just going to go ahead and say 2:30 and Stewie can contradict me when he gets home.