Balham Music Evening - Tuesday 30th May - Bedford, Balham

Caitlin & Ollie

Brief review:  We went to this on the basis that Ilo was on the bill, but unfortunately she had dropped out at short notice. Thankfully, Tony Moore's set was OK and the duo called Caitlin and Ollie Clark were pretty good too. 

There was a brief interlude from an unlisted pair, photographed below, but I didn't catch their names.

Unfortunately, we couldn't hang around for the evening headliners, Arden.

Venue and View:  Seated table towards the rear - near the bar

Unlisted Act

Quireboys - Sunday 19th April - Esquires, Bedford

Spike, Keith & Paul

A sort of "hometown" gig for the Quireboys (well, Griff anyway!) at Esquires in Bedford. Now that's actually a fair trek from south of London, but as we missed out on seeing the boys at the end of last year due to a clash of dates, it seemed a worthwhile jaunt to see them in a tiny venue.

The handful of pubs nearby seemed functional and very quiet (some were suffering from a power cut). In the Ship, I managed to win the pool 3-2 on the final black. I was also quite pleased to find a chippy open on a Sunday.

The venue itself had 2 rooms - a nice bar and small stage in one and the "Holy Moly" room where the boys were playing. Social media from the boys had promised a prompt 8:30 start - predictably this slipped to 8:45. Spike appeared to be particularly "refreshed" after a spending time with Phil Mogg apparently the night before. The show was acoustic again - no drummer or bass - and the songs strangely missed nearly all the material from their new album. That meant we knew most of them and an enthusiastic sing-a-long was had by all. The late start meant we had to leave before the encore, but catching the fast train meant being home at a civilised hour at least.

Nice to see rock and roll being kept alive in Bedford! Yee-ha!

Setlist to follow.

Status Quo - Bedford Park - Sunday 5th August

Charity Shield (oh all right, Community Shield) at Wembley - United winning thanks to Edwin's 3 penalty saves! - for me then a high speed dash to the station to get to Bedford and meet Richard. Excellent outdoor bill for us - Quo supported by the Quireboys. Greatest hits from Spike and the boys and a solid performance from Quo in front of a decent crowd - although we had to leg it during the encore to have any chance of getting home. 

One downside for me are enormous insect bites on my legs. One is so painful on my ankle, I can barely put weight on my leg today - that can't be right!