Glastol/Brisgow Gratitude

Glasgow Gratitude

Thanks to HL for putting on the gig.

Thanks to everyone who came to the gig.

Thanks to everyone else who played at the gig.

Thank to HL for referring to “everyone on the bill” as “not recognisable.”  I’m recognisable, am I not?  I mean, I look a bit like my brother, but I’m definitely me.  Recognisably so.  (I have, on occasion, failed to recognise myself in a mirror, but that’s another story.)

Thanks to L for a guitar masterclass.  Inventive, percussive, beautiful.

Thanks to Uncle D for the rubber bullet and the slingshot practice.

Thanks to Uncle G and Auntie K for the best reviews of anything ever:

“I didn’t want to hear about that girl’s abortion.”

“I couldn’t understand a word that boy was saying, was he not just shouting to himself?”

Thanks to Mum and Dad for driving all the way to Glasgow and back.

Thanks to Cousins T and D, and HL and Da, for being my drinking buddies.  Special Thanks to Cousin T for takin me to all his raucous haunts.

Thanks to everyone at Mallone’s on Saturday night, for looking after me and T and generally being lovely and welcoming – and great craic.  There are probably pubs like this in Bristol, but I haven’t found any.

Thanks to everyone at Mallone’s on Sunday night, when I was cajoled and arm-twisted into playing a song.  Thanks to D for lending me his guitar.  Thanks to the people who gave me props after.  (In case you’re interested, the song was Union Man. One woman said it was “a great working class song”.  Then she got me up dancing to the next Irish classic.  Good times.)

Thanks to the whisky expert in the whisky pub for the recommendation one, and for not getting annoyed the fifth time I asked what it was called.  I’m no expert, but it was very, very good.  (From The Highlands, I remember.  (One of the four whisky-producing regions of Scotland, if memory serves.  (The others being Speyside, Lowlands and Islands, if I’m not much mistaken.)))

Thanks to all the people in England that call/ed it “Glez-ghee”.  No one in Glasgow, or Scotland, ever ever called it that.  Ever.

No Thanks to Celtic for getting humped in the Europa on Thursday night/Thanks to Celtic for hammering Dundee Utd 5-0.  Good to get to Paradise once in a while.

 

Thanks to The Green Brigade for the noise, and for this:

In case you can’t read it (because some of it is yellow on white), it says “Police State brought to you by the SNP”.  It got a lot of loud support from the rest of the crowd.

Thanks to Cousin T for knowing how to get home, and keeping us right with the time.

6.30pm:

“The last bus is at half-eleven on a Sunday.”

“We’ll never be out til half-eleven, mind.”

11.20pm:

“We’ll need to go in a minute, to get that last bus.”

“Aye, right enough.”

Thanks to the people of The Clutha, who seem to have recovered very well indeed.  It’s a cool place (although it was a wee bit loud for some of us.  (Not this kid)).  There’s a tree growing up through the middle of it, and it’s actually the courtyard of the next door pub, with a roof over it.  Plenty of character, and some characters.

Thanks to Auntie K for feeding me up.  I put on half a stone, at least.

Thanks to Cousin D for some quick-witted (if terrible) jokes.  EG:

“I met a bloke from Iceland last night.”

“Sales assistant?”

Thanks to Cousin K for playing Hide with me.  It’s not like Hide & Seek, mind; you have to hide right in front of the other player.  You just cover your own eyes: if you can’t see them, surely they can’t see you…?

Thanks to Cousin D for his generosity; I’m sure he got two rounds in for every one I did.  (How did I allow that?  Well, we couldn’t find a cash point, and then…oh, you know…the buildings in Glasgow are very nice and there don’t seem to be many new ones in the centre of town and cash points are small and sort of hidden, they don’t stick out or have big signs on them and most of them seem to charge, and y’know, fuck that, so…also, Cousin D is generous anyway, the whole family’s like that, as it goes…)

Thanks to the family: McGillans, Waterstons, Fergusons, Dunnes and others with different (and sometimes less obviously Celtic) names. 

Be good to your family, y’all, no matter where your families are…

Bristol Gratitude

Thanks to everyone who was at The Stag on Tuesday to welcome me back to Bristle.  It was the kind of gig that reminds me why I still play gigs.  Much Love to all y’all.

Thanks to Mick “I’ve got two guitars” Mac for putting on the gig, and to his band The Frantic Escalators.

Thanks to HW for her Vogon poem (the subject of it looked suitably embarrassed), for playing guitar with a vibrator (no one seemed to notice this time) and for the most awkward non-hug ever in a lifetime of awkward social interactions.  “Oh, we don’t have to hug as well, do we?  I’m Northern, we don’t do these things.”  I felt rejected and amused in equal measure.  Well played.

Thanks to K-Dog, F-Dog and B-Dog for coming along, was a very pleasant surprise to see youse.  Thanks to B-Dog for bringin a wee crowd with him as well.

Thanks to those who bought CDs. I didn’t know there was anyone left that would have any interest, but who didn’t already have them.  Actually, I didn’t know there was anyone left who bought CDs at all.

Thanks to Mikey “I’ve got a Rickenbacker” Mc and his band The Frosty Calculators.  I giggled to myself at the bar for ten minutes thinking up alternative band names for them, based on their actual name.  (Can’t remember how many there are on the list, but at least ten, I reckon.)  So, Thanks for that as well, FCs.

Thanks to JS for playin a rip-roaring set of weirdness.  I wondered how it would be received at The Stag.  Very well, it turned out.  Top-notch entertainment.

Thanks to JDM for referring to me, from the stage, as “The Tim Boy”.  He hugged me when he saw my Celtic shirt.  Always good to meet someone who knows (the histoorrrray)….

Thanks to Mickey “I’ve got a brand new combine harvester and I’ll give you the key” Macca and his band The Fucked Catheters.  Maybe the best set I’ve seen them play. 

Thanks to the Bristle family. 

Be good to your family, y’all, no matter where your families are…