Eggtimer Gig Cancelled But I’m Playing St Patrick’s Day!

Due to unforeseen circumstances Eggtimer will not be playing the Marlborough tonight. However I will be playing 12 Bar Club on St Patrick’s Day. More info later.

Lovenite! TONITE!

I can’t wait. Plus I have loads of things to learn between now and then so physically I have no choice. Last nite Kev and I decided to throw in a couple of songs that were not on the list. Stick them along with The Cult song we decided to do on Tuesday and you have a couple of heads with limited boxes quickly getting filled. Woohoo!

Fri 13th Feb 2009 – Lovenite! 12 Bar Club

I’m hitting the 12 Bar again with Kevin Hylands this Valentine’s Day – Fri 13th Feb actually. Here’s the blurb:

Back for the third year Kevin Hylands and Cormac Heron return to the 12 Bar for their now annual Songs For Lovers performance celebrating the best and best of love songs ever written. This year they will be performing classics from mostly homosexually celebrated artists and some straights including O’Dowd, The Big O and Obba.

Warning! Songs will include banjo and celestial harmonies. You are advised to bring an extra pair of underwear.

£4 entry with a picture of this page on your phone if you arrive before 8pm. Performance begins as ever at 8.04 pm. (Bar open til very late.)

12 Bar Club

London

WC2H 8NL

12barclub.com

Fri 12 Dec 2008 – World’s First Web 2.0 Gig?

I am playing in the 12 Bar Club in London on Friday at 8.04 pm.

In 2005 I wrote a song with John Devlin called Welcome To The Paul Gadd Institute Of Child Psychology, or rather John wrote it and I threw in the odd comma and full stop, and then in December I performed a musical comedy show called Welcome To The Paul Gadd Institute Of Child Psychology – The Nativity Rock Opera! OK it wasn’t a real rock opera but it had songs, some gags and a vague plot.

I have decided to stage the show again to mark the former Glitter king’s release from prison.  To be honest as it was my first proper “show” I ever staged and it was well rough round the edges. So how could I do it again and keep it fresh along with the edginess?

For the last 12 months I have been intrigued as to how a Web 2.0 influenced gig would work. As in, the audience would write the content and therefore guiding the performer, as well as interacting with the space in a more performerlike fashion. Well the way I saw it was that if the audience were to give me come content and play some songs then maybe it might actually have more sense in it as well as sounding nice. So here it is: my first Gig 2.0 gig. Is it the World’s first? Not sure but I haven’t heard of any of this before.

Come on down. I wanna hear you play.

Fri 24 October 2008

• Act: Cormac’s Funk Banjo Musical – Abridged 20 minute version. Last ever performance of this show!
• Event: Placard Headphone Festival - don’t forget your headphones! (1/4″ socket)
• Venue: Shunt
• Time: 11 pm
• Address: Joiner Street, London Bridge Tube Station
• Entrance: £10. (1/4″ adapters for sale @ £1)

Fri 10 Oct 2008; Fri 17 Oct 2007; Fri 24 Oct 2008

Looks like I will be doing a tour of the Fridays starting with this one (10 October) in The Marlborough Arms, Camden. Then I’ll be going back to basics in the 12 Bar Club the following Friday (17 October) and then playing at the second London Placard Headphone Festival (24 October) . For more info check out my gigs section. Come to the 12 Bar Club gig on the 17th if you can. It’ll be me doing what I do best, though I haven’t quite worked out what that is nor what I will be doing.

18th Sep 2008 World Tour Of New Cross: Tonight!

Hey there! I am doing a Phil Collins by playing two gigs tonight in New Cross. One in Montague Arms, the best rough pub in the country! Come on down! Also I am playing two gigs on Saturday at the Placard Headphone Festival – see gigs section for more details.

Thurs 18 September 2008

• Act: Cormac Heron
• Event: The Ticket That Exploded
• Venue: Montague Arms
• Time: 9pm
• Address: 289, Queens Rd, London, SE15 2PA
• Entrance: £3 (Cheap)

Thurs 18 September 2008

• Act: Eggtimer – Improvised Rock (Cormac on bass)
• Event: South Of The River Electric
• Venue: Goldsmith’s Tavern
• Time: 10pm
• Address: 316 New Cross Road, London, SE14 6AF
• Entrance: Free

Top 10 Tips For Touring Mega Rich Pop Stars

It would seem that many pop stars can very easily forget what it was like when they were very grateful for their fans attending their gigs and now are just taking them for granted so I have compiled a top ten list of concert etiquette for these ingrates to check every so often.

1. When booking a tour, ensure that the performance will be of a good sound quality. Make sure:
   • There are enough speakers with powerful enough amps.
   • These speakers are pointed at the heads of the audience.
2. Having ensured that the audience can hear you, now do the other side of things and ensure the audience can see you. Put up enough screens so that the people you have charged £75 can see what is going on. (When you sell DVDs you don’t make sure that the image only fills 5% of the TV screen.)
3. Try and book the concert to match the demand for the tickets. If you notice that the concert sells out in under 2 days (and that includes when it sells out in 20 minutes) then put on another show.
4. Continue to do number 3 until until the demand has dried up. This will do three things:
   • Stop tickets being sold on eBay for 10 times their face value.
   • Make you more money.
   • Increase your fan base (providing you have fulfilled points 1 and 2).
5. Try to remember what it was like when you were starting out and were doing anything to make ends meet e.g. working as a waitress, placard-holder or rent-boy. In other words try to make money but don’t be vulgar by charging obscene amounts. Have a chat with a rent-person and ask them what they think is enough money for them to get by on for a week to gauge how much you should charge. What you then charge will be a truer reflection on yourself. (Right now you are just being deemed as willing to put out charity records as long as it boosts you career but when it comes to looking after your fans you are screwing them for every penny.)
6. If you do book a gig, play it! Don’t cancel it the week before just because you messed up on point 3 by booking too big a venue on a Monday night in a country you haven’t played in 14 years. (Prince take note!) Similarly don’t get so messed up that you can’t get out of the room where all your drugs are. (Amy and Pete take note – but then again you’re hardly mega rich are you?)
7. If you do mega deals with Live Nation (or whoever are putting on your concerts) then ensure they carry out points 1 and 2. But remember! The buck stops with you, so you cannot offload any blame.
8. If you have messed up on points 1 and 2 then never, ever, ever let your promoters gloat like this. Remember point 7: The buck stops with you and therefore any gloating will look very, very bad on your part.
9. If you love it do it! Prince got it so right by playing 21 nights in London and then playing afterpartys where he could let his hair down and play what he wanted. In fact Prince has it so right in very many ways. He doesn’t charge too much and is a proper showman. His screens mostly just show him as he is such a good, singer, guitarist, pianist, dancer, bassist, drummer, etc. His main problem, as he rightly states, is that he has too many hits.
10. If you do make a mess of things then promptly apologise. It’s only manners you know. You greedy shit.

These tips were inspired mostly by the comments of this thread.

Madonna Complaints

Madonna played Wembley last night and many are complaining that the sound was awful as well as the fact that her show started late and therefore ended very late leaving many people stranded and even some having to sleep rough on the streets of London. So where to complain about Madonna concert?

Those wishing to complain about the Madonna gig should write to info@livenation.co.uk stating their full contact details (name, address, phone number, email), the nature of their complaint (please be specific, e.g. what you could or could not hear etc.) and your seating and booking reference numbers (these will be on your tickets).

Warning! Live Nation are only able to deal with the purchaser for those of you who bought off eBay. (That includes me!)

You can also write to Madonna via her website here.

Live Nation will be handling Madonna’s new studio efforts, tours, merchandise, DVD releases, sponsorships, licensing agreements, fan club, Web site, and TV and film projects until 2017. They also other large acts including U2.

The Last Gig In The World

Eggtimer play their special brand of improvised rock to celebrate the end of the world as reported here.

Venue: New Cross Inn

Address: 323 New Cross Road, London, SE14 6NF

Admission: Free. (Even if it’s not you can just come and storm the place. So what if you get arrested. We’re all gonna die anyway.)

Sex Pistols Live In Apollo 03.09.08

SEX PISTOLS HAMMERSMITH APOLLO JOHN LYDON

Originally uploaded by wheelzwheeler

Saw the Sex Pistols on Tuesday night and am glad to report on how amazing they were. Let’s not kid ourselves, Sex Pistols are a rock’n'roll band… but they are a rock’n'roll band with a difference.

On July 3 1973 whilst David Bowie was retiring his Spiders From Mars on their last ever gig, pre-Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones was burglarising Mick Ronson’s Gibson Les Paul backstage and here was Jonesy tonight playing that same guitar in the very place where Bowie sacked Ronson playing a gig with Johnny Rotten who was actually banned from playing the venue 30 years ago! This was historic.

The guitar sounded awesome. OK the man playing it is as fat as he is tall but he certainly had all the chops. The guitar sounded more monstrous than any of Iggy’s guitarists – of whom I have heard many.

“Your band is only as good as your drummer!” you’ll often hear from wise old stranger during a pub soundcheck and Paul Cook was on form. No heroin addiction for this boyo. And Glen Matlock was there to play the bass. (I would have preferred him with a plectrum and plenty of middle with less bass but hey.)

Johnny Rotten (as he’s currently calling himself) was the main ingredient (after the sound of the guitar and the songs). Whilst hearing Rotten/Lydon sing it struck me how utterly inventive the man’s melody structure is. I realised that there has never been anyone who sings like him either before or since with maybe an exception of Captain Beefheart.

And the power! He blasted his vitriol with hurricane-like ferocity. You knew he was a 50-something old geezer but when the crowd was shouting things like ‘You fat bastard’ he just replied “Which one?”. He didn’t give a damn about the (plastic) bottles of beer being thrown at his head. He was intent on delivering a memorable show. And what an awesome performer. Theatrical gestures and spaslike body pops. Utterly grool. (Whatever that word means.)

The crowd were up for it too. As Johnny Rotten remarked, it was good to see that the balcony had standing room only. And it was heaving!

They played the entirety of their one album as well as Did You No Wrong, Stepping Stone, Baghdad Was A Gas – renamed version of Belsen Was A Gas. An unlikely but great track in the encores was Hawkwind’s Silver Machine. Sex Pistols hippies? Of course they are. They always were. Just a hippy rock’n'roll band… but with a difference. And what a difference!

Eggtimer Live In London

Eggtimer will be performing their live improv rock on Sat 23 Aug in Spice of Life, London at 10pm. I’ll be on bass with Joe Moon on vocals. Apparently there’ll be a couple of guitarists and we’re still looking for a drummer. Gonna be a great gig!

27 June 2008 – Eggtimer – Let Loose In Camden!

We are playing in Nambucca, 596 Holloway Road, London, N76LB tomorrow. On at 8.45. Come on down if you are in town. No two Eggtimer gigs are the same. No two Eggtimer songs are the same. All our songs rock though. Don’t believe me? Ok, fair enough.

Fri 14th Feb 2008 – Hylands & Heron! (Back By Popular Demand)

• 12 Bar Club Denmark Street, London, WC2
• Date: Friday 14 Feb 2008
• Time: 8.04 p.m.
• Price: £4 b4 8 with a picture of this page on your phone; £5 after 8 with a picture of this page on your phone; £6 if you are stupid

The genius thing about playing a gig on Valentine’s Day is that it’s already genius. The sad thing is that only lonely saddos come and see you play. Well Kev and I have decided to play the songs from our Valentine’s Day gigs of this year and last year in what would be The Best Of The Valentine’s which will actually be the worst of the music of both shows.

We put in so much work for both shows that we are putting none in to this one. Still we are overrehearsed for it. Come on down. You will laugh your wet pants off.

Musical Terrorist

 

Whilst I am getting up to speed with It Is Whatever here’s a picture from my St Patrick’s Day gig in New Cross. Taken on 17.03.07 by Mickey Blue Eyes. I like this picture. It reminds me of home from when I was a boy and you had to run to the shops for a pint of off-milk whilst dodging bullets, nail bombs and blessing priests.