After working with a mountain of sound and light equipment at the Racehorse gig last week, this was the time to see if the new, dense Wilson could cut it in a more conventional small club setting. The verdict appears to have been a resounding "not half!". The mighty little Labour Club PA punched above its weight once again, the band squeezed itself into the stage area (which we were sharing with a large Christmas Tree!) and we even managed to draft in the celebrated oil wheel in an effort to vibe up the room. Of course, what you really need to vibe up the place is a pack of raving punters, up on their hind legs and baying for dub mayhem, and happily, with tonight seeing the birthday celebrations of both the Great Yvette Bailey and Public Enemy Number One, the right reverend Lindsay Spence, a crowd was soon assembled. A few "faces" in there, too, including Mark Refoy, Big Tim Sansom and none other than Laurence O'Keefe, who has been in town working on the feature film "Kinky Boots", shortly to put Northampton NN1 on the silver screen, thereby boosting our New Barcelona status to almost painful levels. (Actually, there have been two feature films shooting in town this month, so let's make that really full-on painful, shall we? Lovely!) We played The Temptaions, The Streets and The Kills and Joe Woolley delivered a strong opening set, much to Big Tim's fascination. The Wilson sirens started up with MC Bot nowhere to be seen, but we've got used to this at the Labour Club. He soon turned up to wreak shouty havoc on the assembled as the rest of us cowered up against the walls, fearing for our effects pedals' immediate security. Altogether a lovely night, well-received. Thanks, everybody.

Cheers now,
Pat
xxx
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