DEAR DIARY BY BARRY QUINN

Canada & UK April/May 2004

Where to start ?

Mmmm well I’d planned to keep a daily diary and did so for about a week but that first week in Toronto and in England was stressful.

The diaries became a little too personal and honestly were depressing.

The two Toronto shows we barely scraped by as those who were there will attest, although the 2nd gig at the naval club made for a great stress release for Darren who smashed his drums after My Generation like I’ve never seen before !

We did get video of that and as soon as we can we’ll put it up.

Finally headed to England which the flight and time spent in the airports were a blur, I tried to numb my brain courtesy of a little bit o medicine. That helped somewhat.

1st gig May 5th was in Leeds

which one would think was big Who territory...au contraire.

There were a few regular Who/Wholigan fans there who had a good time but the crowd was sparse and I doubt we’ll return to Leeds again .

The band was still pretty rough at this point...I forgot to mention that we had somewhat of a new addition to the band in the form of our guitarist ‘bones’ ,who hadn’t played with us for 2 years, so we weren’t too comfortable with each other yet.

May 6th the zodiac oxford

Man we are doing some driving in our rv this time around, we flew into in London then up to Leeds then Oxford and you’ll see by the list of gigs how much driving we did.

Anyways back to the zodiac in oxford , a cool little town.

Not too bad a turnout , definetly Who fans :)

After the show me n the lads pogoed around the dance floor to the sex pistols, I don’t think people knew what to make of us har har !

The only thing wrong was I couldn’t find a good chippy which seems harder and harder to find in England, if you want kebabs or indian food no problem..but good ole fish n chips is not happening .

May 7th princess pavillion Falmouth

HOLY COW! this place is a long drive, but man it was a beautiful area and the pavillion sat right above the beach in a lovely garden setting.

Apparently Pete has a place here and sails in the area, also Roger was at the same pavillion 2 weeks beforehand for a friends sons graduation (or something like that)

Everybody that ran the gig and pavillion were extremely nice and fed us well

(I finally had some decent fish n chips :)

A nice big stage with plenty room for swinging my mic, the hall held about 500+ I guess, it seemed full from my vantage point and the crowd was right into it.

There was crazy fella who when I went into the crowd for Magic bus grabbed my bum and gave me a kiss and later jumped on stage and performed fake fellatio...GOD KNOWS WHY?

He was just having fun with his mates so all was good.

We all enjoyed this show and later went out clubbing as we seem to do after every gig till around 5am+

Darren kept playing poppa bear and gave me hell for partying too much, funny thing was he also was out every night with me !

May 8th The Flowerpot Derby

Pretty well the smallest stage in the world with a steel beam going across the front of our faces and with bones being 6ft 7 or so all the people could see was his crotch and guitar which was quite funny.

Needless to say there wasn’t a lot of mic swinging going on.

The place was PACKED, these nutters were singing every song and just losing it !.it was great.

Once again we did the after hours party except this time it was at an all night indian restarant, which made for a smelly rv/tour bus the next day pheeeeeew!

May 9th barfly Glasgow

Our 5th show in a row and another long drive.

We show up ,the club obviously catered to a punk/hardcore kind of audience.

I didn’t see any posters or any promo at all and we were playing for ticket sales only.

Well only 12 tickets had sold in advance and those who were there (20+) said there was no promo anywhere hence the small crowd.

So we drove all day and spent a fortune in petrol and made 40 quid and spent that on food, we weren’t happy fucking campers I’ll tell you that !

Again Darren and I went out to a couple of clubs , one was a hardcore punk/death metal place where we stood out like sore thumbs .

So we left there after a while and headed to a great club/pub that played zeppelin and stuff and some Who which I actually got up and danced to.

..and yes numerous beverages passed our lips hic ;}

May 10th..day off

We ventured off to Edinburgh and parked at the castle, man what a great place Edinburgh is.

I used to go every year with my dad to see the military tattoo which still goes on and is a brilliant event.

Myself, Darren and Mike (our roadie/driver/bank) walked all around stopping occasionaly for liquid libations as it’s thirsty work being a tourist :)

We’d like to play there sometime , so if anyone can steer us in the right direction.

May 11th Kidderminster

This gig was originally put into motion by John Peutherer from ‘relayers’ who is a bit of nutter as well but appears shy but carries a mischieveous keith moon grin as if he just did something wrong but isn’t going to tell you.

I digress, this place was a quaint little pub ran by Andy who was nice as ninepence and kept the beers flowing from early morning till the wee hours.

A lot of people from different who chatboards such as theshout and relayers showed up here and felt like a homecoming really.

The “stage “ was on the dance floor with people a scant few feet away who would soon feel the swish of my mic hurtling towards them .

This was a good night complete with the destruction of the gear, John sent me some photo’s (271) which I’ll put up on our site asap.

Before we played a couple of local lads played some accoustic who songs and did a fine job.

After the gig we all proceeded to the back bar ,and after more beverages of choice (beers,southern comfort, gran marnier etc) the accoustic guitars came out.

I can’t remember every song that was played but I think ‘a quick one’ and others + bones played johhny cash and stompin tom connors,the pogues.

Dave played yngvie malmstein style over everything !

I don’t quite remember leaving that night but I guess we did.

There were some hangovers in Kidderminster the next day I tell ya.

May12th The Boardwalk Sheffield

Sheffield was the offical laundry day for the dirty rotten filthy smelly wholigans, except for bones who seemed content in wearing the same shit day in /day out...no kidding!

We need to talk to that boy.

Didn’t see any of Sheffield apart from the club which seemed like a great venue.

Not a huge crowd but obviously who fans (this seems to be a trend)

We wouldn’t mind returning here.

There was an after party somewhere damned if I can remember where though.

May 13th Debees Winsford

Oh man...heres a story and a half !

This pub is pretty well isolated but holy shit these people can partaaaaaaaaay !

I’d like to relay every second but the lack of functioning brain cells makes that task impossible.

The days events were pretty non descript, but as the night drew closer it was apparent a sleeping dog was about to be awoken.

Upstairs in this place theres a band that lives and rehearse there called ‘orinoco shores’

http://www.orinocoshores.co.uk/

Well they opened for us and put on a great show, if I had to put them in a box I’d say they were a mixture of jet/oasis/surf music.

They are definetly a local favourite.

Well come our show , these local nutjobs orinoco shores fellas stood right at the front and wore great big smiles and shook like lunatics having a fit.

The vibe was obviously picked up by the rest of the crowd. Funny thing was (now in retrospect) everything was going wrong for us and the gig was being webcast.

I was suffering from exhaustion and could barely stand and actually had to leave the stage a few times to rest.

Darrens drums wouldn’t sit still and at one point we had to place the monitors in front of the kit., darren kinda lost his composure shall we say.

The overall mood of the band wasn’t great and we thought we put on a crappy show, but after the gig we got nothing but compliments (thank god for beer consumption affecting rational thought )

The promoter/club owner made the mistake of allowing the band carte blanche at the bar to which Dave took full advantage.

One would think you would just go to the bar and get ..say..a pint of beer, but NO not Dave, the guy orders pint after pint........of WINE !!!!!!

Not that the rest of us were angels mind you.

Next thing I knew was it was around 4am, and people were still partying , I had to crash.

The others stayed up and Dave apparently jammed with the band upstairs till 7am or so...

crazy muthhaaa !!

Yet another day after spent in a haze, when will we ever learn ?.........apparently never.

May 14th Telfords Warehouse Chester

Yaaaaaaaay only a 1/2 hour drive to this gig if that !

What a beautiful town Chester is , very historical.

The bar/restaurant was or looked like an old mill or barge lock I’m not quite sure but it sure was nice.

http://www.telfordswarehouse.com/

The owner was the brother of the previous nights gig.

The place was packed and very very very hot !

Not much room to move but we enjoyed the show as did the crowd.

No after party tonight (well not much anyway)

Hopefully we’ll be back here.

May 15th Newcastle opera house

Home again to the incredible opera house which has sadly since closed.

Not quite sure where we are going to play in Newcastle next tour.

We met a few lads downstairs at Dylans quaffed a few bevvys (not too many mind) and did a closed door soundcheck for Mick and his mates & misssus bibby.

Mick gave me a Newcastle United top signed to me from the one and only Alan Shearer, which I wore for the encore and it now proudly hangs on my wall at home.

You hafta love the geordies , always friendly except doon the bigg market after closing time and especially if Newcastle lost.

Once again the opera house crowd was brilliant and they sure kept the bartenders busy during the show.

Dave was again the star downing a pint of Newcastle broon ale in one shot, thanks to everybody who kept buying the band drinks.

It’s beyond me how we get through the night thanks te yee lot like :)

We got a good pre show write up in the chronicle and an excellent gig review afterwards.

Of course there was the pre requisite after party side stage (photos can be seen on the site)

We also went out clubbing with my brother and his wife to be, we danced the night away.

Searched in vain for a good chippy...nowt but kebabs to be had.

A day off ?

Sunday found The Wholigans spending the afternoon at the buffs social club in Wallsend with bones playing guitar and me singing every tune we could think of, I believe the locals loved it and are still talking about it.

May 17th Brentford football club

All the way from the toon doon to London , we spent the day wandering around London...

Carnaby st...soho ...piccadilly circus etc

Back at the club we had a local opening band , it was a few young lads who played their heart out but it was obviously their formative years...(we all have to start somewhere)

We played fairly well and the crowd of 99.9% males seemed to love it.

A good ending to a busy tour.

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Spent the next day or so around Shepards Bush and had a meeting with satan, but thats another story .

We’ll be going back to tour the uk next March /April but until then we have some big shows here in Florida.

Oh...I forgot Bill Canell of the nyc who tribute band ‘who’s next’ will be playing a number of uk shows with us as will our regular Pete Chris Bacon.

We’ve locked bones in a closet with the entire who catalogue and a cd player we may let him out by 2006...maybe.

Till next time loogans..........turn everything louder than everything else.