First of all apologies for not posting for a while , the problem has been with the crappy Bravenet utility that I use. It's been unavailable until today - that's what you get for doing things on the cheap eh ?

Broken Heroes attracted a decent crowd for their gig a week ago. They played a well received set of covers in their own inimitable style and for my money are a better band than they've ever been. What they do , they do very well. Nice one boys !

Saturday brought with it a District mini-tour to Bristol to attend the first ever UK gig of James McMurtry. OK , he's not a household name yet but he's a multi-award winner in the US and for his first gig this side of the pond he chose The Polish Club in Bristol. After being stung for £3.75 for a pint of Guinness in the pub across the road it was a relief to see the doors to the club open up and get inside.

The Polish Club was tucked away in a sidestreet of Clifton and was a bugger to find. The "club" part of the building was effectively the cellar of a converted Victorian house ( no doubt originally funded by proceeds of the slave trade) , it had a bar and a small stage - perfect. The gig itself was a stormer , James and "The Heartless Bastard" who included ex-Faces keyboard player Ian Maclagan played a 2 hour set that was lapped up by the sell-out crowd. One of the gigs of the year for me.

Another Friday, another gig at The District. In a break from the norm we'd been tipped off about a local soul band making a big impression on the local scene. Both Gaynor and myself are huge fans of Motown and had wondered what our regulars would make of a night of soul. Thanks to the quality of Supernatural we had nothing to worry about, from the moment the lead singer open his mouth I could tell that we were in for a good night.

 

I didn't enjoy all the songs that the band included but it was easy to get swept away with the vibe that the band created. Regrettably I even troubled the dancefloor at one stage - apologies to all who witnessed this badly judged public display of rhythm.

It's nice to shake things up a bit with the type of bands we're attracting to the club from time to time. Reggae's next on the agenda. Now that will be interesting.

 

 

 

 

 

From the opening instrumental intro ('Pulp Fiction' theme as made famous in these parts by PANAMA RED) there was an indication that SUPERNATURAL were not going to be your average Soul band. A truly excellent acappella intro, from vocalist Wade, set the bar (his voice was superb throughout the gig) and although the band may have lacked the power of a Rock band his passionate vocals made up for it and certainly elevated the band to another level above what could have been a karaoke like perfomance. Obviously Motown songs were represented in abundance, but also brilliant versions of songs by GNARLS BARKLEY ('Crazy'), AMY WINEHOUSE ('Valerie') and STEVIE WONDER ('Superstition') amongst others - and the fact that they got Mike to strut his stuff on the the dancefloor speaks for itself. What would it take to get Nick throwing shapes?... Shake it up indeed...

Valerie is a ZUTONS song , and a bloody good song , ruined by Mark Ronson and that beehived druggy bitch.

'Valerie' is a ZUTONS song! How could i forget? Especially as i've played it in the past... and their version is 'bloody good' in comparison to the (timid/lame?) Winehouse/Ronson effort... Dai, thanks for pointing out my error. :)

But the version of Valerie that Supernatural played was the Winehouse / Ronson interpretation (which is OK in my book).

That's true, Mike. It was the Ronson/Marge Simpson interpretation that Supernatural played rather than the more uptempo Zutons original... and it's always good to hear another musicians take on a song and Supernatural delivered.:)