HA!

Hello all fans of the Quad (not the quad at school, but the mighty Quadrophobe who present awesome music everytime they are anywhere). Saturday was a good day for music, and I will tell you why.

For those unfamiliar with the Astonbury festival, it is held in a village by the name of Aston Rowant (hence Astonbury) at the local cricket club. As soon as we were offered the chance (by one of Jim’s work associates) to play in the back of  truck, we were powerless to say no. We enjoy trucking (now a phrase for playing in the back of trucks, not just for driving them).

And so the Quadro-fun began – I believe that a certain Jim was there from rather early on to sample some of the cricket and help set up some staging equipment ready for us to arrive later on at about 6pm. As the show (for us) was not starting for a good 2 hours it meant that we had plenty of time for a soundcheck and other such luxuries (drink. food. drink). We were fortunate enough to get these provided for free (SCORE), and I enjoyed a jug of Pimms with keysman (Pete is now just known as keysman) before waltzing on.  Soundcheck was interesting – mostly fine, but then it turned out that a certain Michael Wilkins had a mic that appeared to no longer work. EEEEK. So with a regular “I can’t dance and play anymore” stand up mic. For Mike (heehee). 

This proved only a slight hinderance and mild annoyance in our quest for playing tunes as we put in a fairly solid set. I say fairly, because although I thought it sounded good, it was hard to see what the reaction of the audience was as 1. It was dark, 2. I had Aviators on 3. I probably should have been wearing my actual glasses rather than aviators, and 4. As the rain was so intense the majority of the audience were a good 40/50 feet away (I’m bad with distances so this may be exagerated or under estimated. I’m just not sure).  Well played to those who did boogie on down in the rain though – we felt the love.

So yes, the set: we integrated some covers (not as many as we have done on the last 2 gigs, but some)  in amongst our own brand of sound,  and we played it pretty well. Sax balance was lacking, though all solos were transferred to my mic which meant at least the important bits were heard (arguably of course the trumpet is always more important than the sax due to it being a superior instrument, but I won’t go there :p ). I give this gig a B-. Excellent hospitality and nice event but unfortunately weather along with minor sound issues did not permit. Looking forward to the event next year though!

Adam