The REOFFENDERS

Punk Rock: Classic and Modern

The REOFFENDERS are on an indefinite break. Never say never, but we currently have no plans to play. However, we had joy and we had fun... and we blogged about it. Enjoy reading and reliving some good times.

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Monday, March 31, 2008

Cornwall Minitour

Friday

We left Exeter at 3.30pm driving through rain and hail. Not a good sign. We got to our caravan which was rather nice. Compact little bedrooms but a decent living space, and heaters in every room. Cool. Indesit did look a bit cramped though - he's a bit too long for that size bed.

We had a quick meal and then went to Helston for the evenings gig. It was an early start as the Bell have had neighbour problems and need to finish music by 11pm. It was nice to see familiar faces from our last visit there. Apparently they've been talking about us all week. Awwww. one guy was a little bemused to be told that there's a photo of him being stroked by Hoover on our website.

As I went to get changed, I discovered that I didn't have any makeup with me. Nooooo! I can't be Morphy-Richards without loads of black cack on my face! The barstaff helped me out by lending me eyeliners which I used to "colour in" lips and eyes. Job Done. Thank you ladies.

We were packed away by midnight which gave us time to visit The Blue Anchor at the bottom of the hill. The others were sensible with their drinking whilst Indesit and I indulged in Spingo Easter Special beer at 7.6%. Wahooo.

Back at the caravan, John was transfixed watching TV while the rest of us went to bed after a quick coffee. It's not often I make it to bed before John!

Saturday

After a cooked breakfast in the caravan, we popped round to Paul Pondlife's house for a cuppa and to shoot the breeze before wandering into town for some grub. Katie had shredded too many drumsticks the night before so we were also in search of a music shop so that she could stock up on some spares. Paul pointed us in the direction of a great little shop that had all sorts of gems. Hoover and I invested in new kazoos (very expensive don't you know) whilst Indesit treated Katie to some "light up" drumsticks. They're clear perspex and when you hit something, they light up red. Well it had to be done really!

We called in at Wetherspoon's for tea to get out of the rain which was pretty nasty, before hunting out the Acorn Theatre. Attila arrived shortly after us and we proceeded to soundcheck the three bands. Before long, it was time to get changed and play our one hour set. People came through from the bar as soon as we started playing and we went down really well. People seemed to "get" us. Attila joined us for the last three songs: Ruby Soho, London Calling and one of his own songs, Commandante Joe.

After a quick chat with Paul Pondlife (where he delightedly told us that the night was a sellout) it was time to get the drinks in, which is where the evening started to get messy. Indesit and I decided to save time by buying beer in pairs. Oh dear! We met up with our friend Sara who had impulsively decided to move from Exeter to Penzance! Wow! Normally she drinks a half pint of beer in an evening, however she was grinning like a mad thing confessing to be on her third bottle of St Austell's Proper Job (5.5%). Oh dear oh dear!

Attila was great as always but I was most looking forward to dancing to Pondlife. They played brilliantly as always (I'm still singing Bella Ciao). I've got to make sure I see them more often. The rest of the evening is a little blurred (if not non-existent in my memory). We gave Paul Pondlife a lift home. As he got in the van, he managed to close the door on my hand. I've got a line of bruises across three fingers. Ouch!

Katie took over the "mum" role and kept an eye on myself and Paul who were by all accounts very entertaining. Well we do our best!

Sunday

Surprise surprise, it was a very slow start to the day. Paul and I looked a little less than healthy but as it was a nice day, we decided to get some air and went for a nice walk with Katie along the bridle path on the bank of the river Hayle.

After lunch, we headed to St Ives so that Paul could watch the Liverpool v Everton match. The Queens, where we were playing later, was showing the match so we stopped there. Hoover and I went for a wander in search of seals but didn't find any.

We all met for tea at a lovely waterfront cafe before unpacking all the equipment. Sara turned up to say hello but was also feeling a bit rough so departed before we started the gig. Our friend Kayne popped it to say hello. He was working that night but had to call in to say hi. Next came Bettina and Tony. Blimey, it's gonna take us ages to set up at this rate! ;-)

Shocking news... while setting up, we discovered that Britney's middle tooth had been coloured in the night before! Hmmmm, we have our suspicions.... We also realised that our tambourine was very likely sitting next to the monitor on stage at the Acorn! Damn!

The whole town seemed a bit quiet. The weather had been awful and an early Easter had thrown the tourist season out of sync a bit. We started the gig with a small audience which grew throughout the gig, with everyone rapt in what Hoover was going to say next. I'd offered to drive and let him drink for a change. I figured I'd probably had my share the night before. When Hoover has a couple of beers, he talks to the audience more. Introductions to songs become progressively longer - its a running joke in the band. He was on fine form, being very "talented and funny" which brings an extra something to the gig.

My favourite moment of the evening was during Seasons in the Sun when a guy was crying with laughter, so loudly that we hesitated before starting the next verse.

We got back to the caravan feeling quite tired after three nights of gigging. Paul and Katie stayed up later writing a new song that Paul had penned last week. I couldn't keep my eyes open and left them to it.

Monday

We had to leave the caravan by 10am which is a shock to the system for me, but we managed it. Katie was in her own car so we left her at the site and stopped at a cafe on the A30 for a big breakfast. We hadn't gone much further when I noticed a red light flashing on the dashboard. We pulled over, popped the engine open and found steam coming out! Bugger!

The next two and a half hours were spent chatting by the side of the road waiting for the breakdown service to check out the problem, and then for a new truck to come and tow us home. A hose needed replacing but was incredibly inaccessible and wasn't fixable by the roadside. Bugger!!!

We had to tow Iggy 100 miles home which was a pain. We all could've really done with the afternoon chilling before getting on with all the stuff we each had planned that night. A couple of months ago, we got chatting to Matt from Ocean 6 and it turns out he's a VW Specialist. He's looked over Iggy and done a bit work on him. In the 18 months since we've had Iggy, we've had a couple of people work on him. One guy who as near as damn it sabbotaged him, another who missed things sometimes. We've never found anyone who had known what he's doing the way Matt does, or has given the bit extra time to prevent problems from occuring. Cheers mate.


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Thursday, March 27, 2008

See you in Cornwall?

Five go mad in Cornwall once again this weekend with three back to back gigs:
  • Friday - The Bell, Helston
  • Saturday - Acorn Arts Centre, Penzance (with Pondlife and Attila the Stockbroker)
  • Sunday - The Queens Hotel, St Ives
All three gigs will be very different so if you're tempted, you can rest assured that you'll get different gags from Hoover each night ;-) Friday and Sunday are free entry, with Saturday's gig being £6 (+ £1 booking fee - booking is advisable)

We're staying in a caravan and they're predicting gale force winds! Oh well, it'll still be a good weekend


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Ewan Oosami rocking it with Angus

You may have seen Ewan Oosami standing in for Paul Indesit on guitar for a few gigs? Ewan is also playing with a new AC/DC band called Angus, whose lineup includes our good mate Shaun from the Barracoodas - what's the chances of two lefty guitarists in one band! Ewan and Shaun are both capable of talking under water so its mightily impressive that they get any music played.

Expect the loud rawwwk beast that is Angus stomping near you soon.

Check them out at myspace.com/angusrockband


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Sunday, March 23, 2008

Acorn Theatre, Penzance - March 29

... is expected to be a sellout, and with the mighty Pondlife, Attila the Stockbroker and The REOFFENDERS all appearing for a measly £7 (inc booking fee), its a bargain!

Book Now


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War Wounds

We played at the Lansdowne in Dawlish last night. It's been quieter there the last couple of times we've played but we had a packed put last night with everyone very up for it. Big thanks to the girls on the stools at the bar swaying along to Seasons in the Sun, nice blonde lady who sang to EVERYTHING and smiled alot, and the guy wearing the Little Big Daddy tshirt who Bully offered to share his defibrilator with ;-)

The night did incur some injuries though. Paul had already fallen on his back on stairs outside Zephyr the night before. Adding to that:

  • Someone fell over the monitors, knocked two mic stands over - one which hit me in the forehead with a mic. Ouch. I've got a golfball sized lump on my head

  • Packing away, John caught Katie's face with a drum stand, drawing blood

  • I tripped over Johns clothes suitcase while carrying a PA speaker out of the pub. I went down on my knees and dropped the speaker. I also hurt my foot in the same incident although that might have been through kicking aforementioned suitcase really hard!

  • Walking to the van, Paul fell down an uneven curb - that's silly big boots for ya

Quite impressive list of injuries for one weekend!


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Saturday, March 22, 2008

Gremlins and Cymbals

Do you ever get "one of those days" where everything goes wrong? I figured we write a lot of blogs saying how great things went so its only fair to share when things don't go quite to plan.

We were setting up in Zephyr Bar in Exeter last night when Katie suddenly realised that she didn't have her cymbals with her. I did a bit of ringing around and Phil Smyth came to the rescue, suggesting The Showman who have a drum kit for jam nights. Paul at the Showman was sooooo kind in letting us borrow their cymbals - big thanks to both Phil and Paul for saving our bacon.

The next glitch was our monitor speakers stopped working so we couldn't hear what we were doing. John and I ended up singing too hard because we couldn't hear ourselves. We both had colds already so that didn't help the sore throats. It was really difficult for the musicians to stay tight when they couldn't hear themselves never mind each other.

Added to that, I couldn’t get the lights to work properly. They have a microphone on a master light unit which picks up sound and reacts accordingly. Normally I put the master next to Paul but I couldn't get it close enough to him so had to monkey around with the speed and sensitivity settings. Got it close but as good as normal.

We weren't at our best but we were good enough that most of the audience wouldn't have noticed. I just felt that we weren't getting into it as much as normal because we were stressed and distracted. Hey ho... it happens, fortunately not very often.

Zephyr did seem to enjoy the gig though and we're looking forward to seeing the place next time when they've got the stage and lights sorted. Yummy! Thanks to Ali and Steve at Zephyr for booking us - we'll be back, and better, very soon


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Monday, March 17, 2008

Guernsey.... We Thank You!

What an amazing weekend! We're back from Guernsey after our most recent mini adventure and first gig that involved getting on a plane.

Thursday


Paul came over to mine and John's house on Thursday night. He'd been full of lurgy and thought a couple of beers might help him sleep. Plus, we were using one big suitcase for shared luggage so that we could take an extra guitar. We were entitled to one case each in the hold. So we had a bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, snare drum and our big case of assorted stuff for the hold.

Paul and I went to the Exeter Inn, my local, for a couple of beers and then came home and chatted for a bit. Well, until 1am! Will I ever learn? I expect not ;-)

Friday


At 5am, three mobile phones set off their alarms! Urgh! I got up and made coffees. Oh and swore alot. Anyone who knows me knows that I don't do mornings. Bully and Katie arrived at 5.45am and we were in the taxi by 6am. Our next door neighbour has a VW Transporter taxi which was rather convenient. Seats for all and loads of luggage space.

The queue at the airport was ridiculous, even when using the fast track check in service. I was impressed to see Paul put his Gibson through the oversized luggage without climbing in with it. He's been a bit concerned about his baby being put in the hold. Bully got stopped in security for ages. They wanted to search his Big Muff! (That's an effects pedal if you didn't know!) But there were lots of jokes made about cavity searches.

The flight should've been 25 minutes long but fog over Guernsey meant that we were taken to Jersey. We sat in the plane on the runway for ages while the captain checked the weather. We were told that we had a one in four chance of landing in Guernsey. If we couldn't land, we'd be taken back to Exeter. Nooooooooooooo! I didn't get up at 5am to sit in Exeter airport all day! John spoke to Nick (the guy who booked us) to ask what he wanted us to do as we had the chance to get off in Jersey and take the ferry. Nick assured us, "it happens all the time, stay on the plane".

We got chatting to a fellow passenger who lives in Guernsey. "Oh, are you the punk band that's at the Doghouse tonight?" Kewl... people know the gig is happening ;-)
We managed to land in Guernsey and proceeded through security. As soon as they saw the guitars we were stopped and everything searched. *sigh* It wasn't helped by Indesit saying "I wish!" when asked if we had any illegal substances with us. I knew we should've brought the gaffa tape! After we'd been frisked, we were greeted by Nick at Arrivals. He sorted out a taxi to follow as he couldn't fit 5 of us and all the gear in one car but we were reunited at the Doghouse 15 minutes later and shown to our rooms.

The Doghouse used to be a hotel so we had what probably used to be a suite comprising of a bathroom and two adjoining rooms. This did mean that the girls had to go through the boys room to get to the bathroom, but we coped.



We went for a wander and to forage for food. We stopped at a cafe which made us breakfast even though breakfast time had finished. Sadly the breakfasts were a bit disappointing and very expensive. Still, it helped refuel us a bit.

It was pretty wet and miserable so we went for a short wander and found a pub. In the corner was a retro games machine so Katie and I played Pacman and Frogger for ages.

We were back at the Doghouse for 3pm to soundcheck. Todge our soundman was very welcoming and before long we had a pretty nice sound, although it was weird hearing Paul without his Randall amp which has lots of bass grunt. We had a couple of beers (Randalls of Guernsey) before dinner. The servings were huge! We hadn't had a lot to eat so we had starters and main courses. We had a lie down before getting changed for the gig.

The Doghouse was full with expectant people waiting for the gig to start, and very enthusiastic they were too. A couple of guys got a bit too enthusiastic and fell into the monitors, knocking a mic stand towards Paul's Gibson. Hoover and I adopted our defensive positions on stage so we could push people back before they fell over the monitors.

Nick was delighted with the performance and reports came back to us that it was the busiest Friday night they'd had of 2008. Excellent! We were in bed for about 2am having had a very long day.

Saturday



I woke up at 9.30am and chatted to Katie for an hour before getting up. John had gone out early to meet a friend of his mum's who lived on the island so we arranged that we'd meet up with him in St Peter Port after breakfast. The Doghouse doesn't do food before 12ish and by that time, I felt more like lunch so opted for pizza. The chef was very accommodating making whatever we wanted for breakfast whether it was on the normal menu or not.

The weather had got worse today so we mooched around a few shops in town before finding a pub. Are you spotting a theme here? We had wanted to get a bus around the island but decided looking through steamed windows on a miserable day wasn't the most fun we could have. We weren't soundchecking today so went to our rooms and chilled out. I'd brought portable speakers so Paul and I took turns to plug them into our mp3 players... in some cases, unplugging it from the other's rudely before the end of the song ;-)

My neck started hurting at teatime (no idea what I did to it) and I had the onset of a sore throat which felt more lurgyish than singing too much. I was feeling like I was falling apart by this point.

Once again, we had an expectant audience waiting for us, and lots of new faces. Its often the case that the Doghouse has different clientelle on both nights. We found that both nights, people were going nuts for the 70s classic punk, although Green Day went down rather well tonight and there were three ladies doing the actions to Seasons in the Sun which was great to see.

Paul had borrowed a guitar from a local that he'd met the night before in the pub. They'd got talking Gibsons and Vinnie had brought in his £4k Les Paul Custom Special for Paul to play at the gig! Blimey! You'd have to prise Paul's Gibson out of his cold dead hands before he'd offer his up!

We stayed in the bar talking for quite a while before moving to the boys room. Katie was already fast asleep and didn't hear a thing. I think we went to bed at about 4.30am.

Sunday


I woke up with major neck pain, to the point of struggling to get out of bed. Once I got up and moving though it eased enough so that I didn't look obviously crippled. We were scheduled to play an acoustic set on Sunday but had been told the night before that there weren't many bookings for lunch so not to worry about it and enjoy a day off. That was a very nice, and tempting offer, but we decided to play anyway. It had been advertised and we didn't want to disappoint even one person.

Paul and I played a few songs that stray from our normal genre: Nine Inch Nails, Foo Fighters, Muse and My Chemical Romance. Bully played a Wayne County song which was very entertaining and had everyone laughing and clapping, then Katie played guitar and sang some more mellow songs such as Lisa Loeb, Otis Reading and Jewel. Kewl. We finished the set with some jamming of punk songs in a different style. I Want Candy with a funky groove is fantastic. I realised after the gig that I'd forgotten to bring my minidisc recorder downstairs! Doh!

We had a beer with some of the audience (who'd also been to the gig the night before) before finishing packing and heading off to the airport. We were all really sad that we had to go home, it'd been such a good weekend.

The flight was delayed by 45 minutes but both the flight and the taxi ride home were very quick. I made some food and then went straight to bed. I was knackered!

I can't speak highly enough about the people of Guernsey who were very welcoming and couldn't do enough for us. Particular mention has to go to the Doghouse staff who bent over backwards for us all weekend. Thank you very much. We'd love to come back again ;-)


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Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Acoustic in Guernsey

As part of the coming weekend's gigs, we've been asked to do something "a bit quieter" on Sunday afternoon. What ya trying to say? ;-)

Indesit and I have been going over some songs that we used to do in Calling Orson and then in time honoured tradition, thinking of new things that would be exciting to do. So with less than a week, we're adding five new songs. I'm busy cramming words like there's no tomorrow.

Bully and Katie both have their own original material so it'll be quite a nice assortment, if not a little eclectic in places. Hopefully I can get a half decent recording on minidisc.


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Monday, March 10, 2008

Mental as Anything

So here I am at stupid o'clock in the morning writing blogs because my body clock thinks I'm nocturnal. That's what 6am and 3.30am bedtimes will do to you! Oops

We played at our favourite venue last night at the Vintage in Wellington. It was pretty busy when we were setting up but by the time we started playing, the pub was rammed with people pogoing their little socks off.

We did a very different setlist in that it was a bit upside down. You see, you work out a good order for songs which is great, but then people get used to that order. So I mixed it up a bit. I knew the good folks in Wellington wouldn't mind ;-)

I thought Steve was going to pass out with excitement when we did Seasons in the Sun! The whole pub was bobbing up and down and swaying from side to side with us during that one. Great to watch!

The end of the first set was getting pretty hot and sweaty with Babylons Burning and Nellie the Elephant (which featured great audience singing in the choruses).

I went outside at half time because it was so hot. Thankfully the aircon (just behind Katie) was switched on for the second half which helped a bit. There was some serious moshing going on by the end of the gig with mental jumping about and good natured shoving. Good to see people being picked up when they fell down.

We're in the garden next time for one of Dave's Bank Holiday Extravaganzas! It's ages away! How will we cope?


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Monday, March 03, 2008

Where Did Everyone Come From?

We arrived in Taunton on Saturday a little tired from the night before and lacking in energy. As we finished setting up, there were 7 people in the Pen and Quill. Oh dear! This could be hard work!

20 minutes later, we reappeared after getting changed to find a pub full of people waiting for us to start. Now that's more like it! Energy levels were restored by the reaction of the audience and we jumped around despite us dripping with sweat in a very hot room.

I'd deliberately done quite a different set as we've been to the P&Q before and I wanted to keep things fresh. In hindsight, it was quite a heavy set with things like Walk Like an Egyptian and 99 Red Balloons missed out. But it worked a treat. The guys that have seen us every time loved it cos they didn't know what to expect next and the people who were knew to us "got it" and enjoyed all the songs, even the ones they didn't know.

It's a shame there's so many tables in the P&Q. You end up with no-one wanting to be the first to dance which results in lots of rigorous head banging from a seated position.

Next time... we'll play a song that you HAVE to dance to early on! Ha! That'll get you ;-)


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Long Time No See

On Friday, we played the Green Dragon in Coombe St Nicholas for the first time in nearly 18 months. It's taken us this long to match diaries again!

It's quite a small pub but they don't seem to have any neighbour problems and everyone seems up for a bloody good night out. I was pleasantly surprised to see one girl go absolutely nuts when we started playing Psycho and she jumped around like a mad thing. Tis nice to know that the Power of Goldblade Rock n Roll is spreading.

We finished the night with quite a mosh pit in front of us. We were wondering whether we should get the attention of the landlady so she could calm things down and then we realised she was in the middle of the mosh, pushing like a goodun! ;-)

A bloody good night. Thanks to everyone who came out and we'll see you all again at Lyme Regis in May


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