My next excursion was to do a twenty minute spot at The Castle in Portobello Road with a trio of blues musicians known as Eddy and the Wild Dice. We were supposed to do twenty minutes but ended up doing an hour and finishing off the evening. We’ll be there again tonight, (Friday 4^th May) at ten o’clock so that’ll keep me off the street for a while.

I also had a little outing to the Hideaway in Streatham for the Muddy Waters memorial get-together. It was good to run into Big Joe Louis, who opened the evening’s proceedings in his usual inimitable style. He was then followed by the house band and assorted guests. I was one of those guests but I’m not exactly sure how assorted I was. Anyway I did a couple of numbers and thoroughly enjoyed it. All I need now is some gigs. Ain’t that the blues.

A couple of days ago I received the publicity layout for the Blues Attic Revisited Festival in Banbury in September. It looks good and there is already interest in the event which takes place in two venues, with a great variety of  blues acts lined up.It will be good to catch up with Mick Clarke and Steve Smith among others. I’m looking forward to it.

I went to meet Chris Youlden yesterday and he gave me a list of answers to an online interview for Dave Peverett’s son Jason which I’ve got to type up to send in email form. The resulting interview will be on Jason’s website the Peverett Phile. The answers led to much reminiscing about the old times in the early sixties. This in turn proceeded to the idea that we should write it all down while we can still remember it. We even thought about a joint online book of some kind. As Mel Wright is more of an archivist than either of us, perhaps we should include him in the project should it ever get off the ground. Perhaps we could call it Autobiograthree?

A  few days later, I ran into Gordon Smith and he told me that his arthritis had really got bad again and was lasting much longer than usual. This meant he couldn’t play guitar for longer than a quarter of an hour. As a result he’s had to blow out a lot of gigs. I hope he can recover soon. He still manages to give guitar lessons to Jim Mercer, so perhaps I’ll have another guitar option soon.

I recently did an interview for a Greek site called Mixalis blues run by Mike in Athens I really liked the site when I visited it and there were some good photographs that I hadn’t seen before as well as some off my site. I really like the layout too which is no doubt down to Mike’s blues magazine work. Mike sent me a link:

Shakey Vick’s interview  which is how I caught up with it. I hope it works on this site too but if not I’ll try to get another link for anyone who is interested.

Last Sunday Gigi and I went down to Streatham to Graeme Miall’s Speakeasy promotion at Hideaway which takes place every two weeks. It was good to see Graham again, the first time since he left the Oval Tavern gig. Another great pleasure was to hear Errol Linton and his band who were the act that evening. A great band and some brilliant playing from Errol and the guys, with even a touch of Kwela in one of their numbers. An enjoyable evening and I have no doubt I’ll be visiting Streatham again.

http://thepeverettphile.blogspot.com/  in which he comments on various events in America but always includes a musician interview. He did one with me which he published last Sunday and as it was the first time I’d visited the site  I have to say I really enjoyed it and I will be checking it out on a regular basis from now on. He is also going to do one with Chris Youlden and probably Mel Wright our Waydown drummer.

I took Jason’s questions for Chris down to Wimbledon on Thursday when we met for a drink In the Whetherspoon’s pub opposite the theatre. Chris is still having problems with his foot which has been infected for quite a while and won’t be able to join me for a charity gig next week. This gig, which is on 25^th February is organised by the charity Veneratio which endeavours to get young and old people together.

It’s being held  at The Priory School in Orpington and the idea is that they get a young performer and an older performer to play a set each and then jam together. One-man-band Andy Twyman is 22 so I guess I must be the older performer. At the moment I’m suffering from a flu-type virus which has caused me to lose my voice so I can’t even work out what I might be doing.  I might have to call for the cavalry.

After I left Chris I met my partner Gigi in the Castle in Portobello Road. It has recently undergone a refurbishment and has definitely improved from the days in the mid eighties when I did a few duo gigs there. I remember wondering just what madhouse I had willingly walked into then. Come to think of it, there were many madhouse gigs I did in those days but got out alive. Looking back on it, I think I was being quite charitable even then.

With regard to other matters, Mel Wright informs me that he managed to get Bernie Pallo’s obituary in the online Guardian and to read it, the link is as follows:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2012/jan/15/bernie-pallo-obituary

It’s a good tribute to Bernie’s life.

I’ve just received the contract for our gig in September for the Banbury blues festival “Blues Attic Revisited” on Saturday September 8^th  at 8p.m. until 9.20p.m. in the theatre at The Mill Arts Centre, Spiceball Park, Banbury, Oxon. OX16 5QE I am looking forward to it as I have fond memories of the Blues Attic days. As I’ll be 75 a month later perhaps I’d better start thinking of another Birthday Bash while I’m still in full charge of a my faculties. Or at least I think I am. Now how did I lose those emails?

Talking about medical matters, a week ago I went to Wimbledon to meet Chris Youlden for a pre-Christmas drink. It turned out that a bad foot infection and swollen leg had obliged him to go on a heavy antibiotic regime which meant definitely no drinking. This meant that I had to drink for both of us, which, naturally, I endeavoured to do. I’m sure my doctor would have approved of my good intentions. Chris and I reminisced, without too much maudlin, about the early days when we did a few gigs with the late Dave Peverett and his brother. This was before Dave’s days with Savoy Brown and Foghat. Yes, the mention of Savoy Brown brought up a few interesting memories too. It’s good to see that Kim Simmonds is still going strong with the band. I then went up to Sloane Square to meet Gigi and some of her friends who had just been left a million pounds each And so to bed.

The perambulations continued for the next few nights with assorted parties and celebrations, My final outing was a couple of days ago when I met up with drummer Dino Coccia and his protégé Dean. We were joined by a friend of Dean’s who’d been living on the streets but was now on the up and was in fact helping others who were living rough. This was illustrated when we were about to part at Holborn tube station and he saw a homeless woman. He immediately decided to stay and help her. I gave him my loose change to do as he thought best for her. Ah, the spirit of Christmas and me an atheist. Despite that, I wish you all the Best for the Fest.