THE GIG THAT NEARLY NEVER WAS!!!!

What can go wrong? Well…. nearly everything!

5am and nothing was stirring… except for me. Marc, Chris (Gibbo’s dep for this gig) & Squirrel were well on time for our departure to pick up Mike enroute to London City. We met Tracy, Leigh, Dave & Rich at the allotted 7am. Checked in and proceeded to the restaurant in Duty Free for a thoroughly deserved breakfast, all seemingly ready for our 8.25am flight to Zurich.
This is when the day was turned upside down!
8.00am All flights in and out of London City were cancelled until further notice due to low cloud around London.
9.00am The Swiss Air desk re books us all on the 1.50pm flight to Zurich….from Heathrow!
10.30am We catch the bus to Heathrow that decides to take a route straight through the centre of London.
12.15pm We arrive at Terminal 2 Heathrow
12.30pm We check in, go through to Duty Free and await our flight to Zurich
1.30pm We get called through to board our flight
2.30pm …still on the runway at Heathrow – we missed our take off slot!!!
By the way… did I explain that we had to be on stage in Bern at 5pm, local time!!!!!!
3.15pm We finally take off
5.15pm We land in Zurich and clear Passport Control and the baggage hall in record time.
5.30pm We are speeding toward Bern
6.30pm The normal 90 minute trip takes an hour(!) and we arrive at the venue. Luckily there are over 400 people still waiting for us.
6.45pm We go on stage to the most rapturous ovation I have ever encountered. Apparently, the crowd were made aware of our plight.
The required 60 minute set ended up being 2 hours long including 2 encores. What a show! Absolutely fantastic!
We did however, have one more mishap, when Chris Kibble our keys dep fell off his riser and nearly knocked himself out. I did what any trooper would have done; I made sure he was okay, gave him some water, told to stay still and get his composure back and then played keys for the rest of the song!!! Thankfully for me, and the audience, Chris returned for the next song to finish the gig, nursing a very sore arm and leg.

The next day was nowhere near as exciting as everything came and went on time except for the shenanigans in Duty Free. But then we wouldn’t be The Chicago Blues Brothers without the odd bit of drama and chaos!

TURKEY WITHOUT THE DRESSING!

Just back from a truly restful and much needed break.
I took the picture above whilst enjoying copious amounts of EFES PILSNER.
Now… to those that have visited the country of Turkey – especially the Dalaman Coast – will bear witness to its extreme beauty and hospitality. The areas of Calis, Fethiye and Olu Deniz warrant high praise indeed.
Anyway…..

‘Stitching up’ various members of our fraternity by posting caption competition seems to be fair game and very popular of late.
Not wanting to miss out – and somewhat reversing the scenario – I have also posted my own pic which I will gladly put up for a suitable caption ……. and eventual ridicule!

Yours,
Pete Tobit
Producer - & very occasional ‘JAKE’!

BRING ME SUNSHINE……..

The Roses Theatre in Tewkesbury must be situated in the some of the loveliest countryside that England boasts.

Well as some of you may or may not know, the late great Eric Morecambe suffered a massive heart attack on the stage at The Roses Theatre and passed away in dressing room #2 – good job Tracy doesn’t know as she certainly would not have occupied that one.

In actual fact, Tewkesbury was the site of the last CBB visitation from the ‘other side’! We were staying at The Royal Hop Pole Hotel and after a terrific gig and a certain amount of ‘partaking’ in the bar we all retired to a sound sleep – some more soundly than others. Our drummer of the time – the infamous Roger Jacobs – was, shall we say, visited by a young lady! Hang on… I hear you shout! No this wasn’t a young lady of substance, but one of a ‘see through’ variety that happened to talk to him, sit on his legs (he was in bed and under the covers at the time) and then proceeded to vanish – Doh! The next morning presented the rest of the band with a rather shaken and dishevelled drummer.

Well enough of the Derek Acorah stuff and onward with the show…..

An initially very reserved audience soon gave way to the usual raucous shenanigans and once again CBB have worked their magic and given that we are back next autumn, the audience must have gone away extremely happy.

Here’s to next year and hopefully the only spirits we encounter then will be in a bottle …… hopefully marked Remy Martin!


Cheers- Pete.

'I actually ordered two- and could you please not throw the other one...'

It's time for a caption competition. Here's a picture of Mike relaxing in the luxurious surroundings of the departure lounge of Marseilles Airport on our recent visit there. Can YOU come up with a snappy one-liner to sum it up? Leave us a comment and let us know!

Cheers- Leigh

Purple Hayes

I thought I'd say a few words here about last night's Beck Theatre show- it was that rare thing for me, a local CBB gig. Having spent most of the previous couple of weeks fending off phone calls, text messages and e-mails from people asking for free tickets I spent the days before the show attempting to shake off a rather peculiar virus that among other things caused my hands to swell up (Pete alluded to it in his last posting about our Dunstable show) and my limbs to ache. Come the day of the show I still wasn't feeling 100%- I was asleep until about 10 minutes before we had to leave for the venue- but in the end everything went well with everyone I spoke to after the show saying how much they'd enjoyed it, and my Dad complaining that there weren't enough guitar solos!

Excellent!

Thanks to all who made it all happen- you made a happy man feel very old...

Leigh.

…on a wet Tuesday in Dunstable, CBB ROCKED!!!!!

Imagine a theatre that has everything a touring production needs to make sure they have a good night:
Great Parking, Perfect Access, Great Technical Crew, Fantastic Stage, Phenomenal Theatre, Helpful Front Of House Staff, Amazing In House PA Rig……..and a full house, and you must be at The Grove Theatre, Dunstable. Hurrah!!!
The Cast raised their game and the Dunstable gig will definitely go down as one of the finest in CBB history.
Leigh’s hands were on fire (literally!), the guys sang out of their shoes, Tracy was….Tracy, Marc, Ian & Squirrel out did themselves and finally the Brass players even behaved!
The show was memorable in so many ways I would not even try to list them, except by saying a huge CONGRATS to all involved – on and off stage.
Where to from here? Well, Hayes in a couple of days, and it’s Leigh's home town gig. I really hope his hands are better by then!

Pete Tobit
CBB Producer Chappie

Hello Harlow!!

Driving into Harlow I am reminded that the Government of 3 or 4 decades ago must have had a template for new towns as it feels just like Basildon or even Stevenage!
Once the ring roads and roundabouts are successfully circumnavigated (!) the Playhouse Theatre looms ahead, and very modernistic it is.
With Mario away undertaking ‘Briefcase’ duties, I, once again, am forced out of self inflicted retirement!
The theatre is great with the production crew even better and all too quickly we are sound checked and ready for the off, with one exception – Leigh O’Guitar! Leigh calls to say that he is involved in a bomb scare in Uxbridge and will try and be there before the start – well, he will be, because we can’t start without him.
With the ‘G’ forces still apparent on Leigh & Shirleys faces (they managed to make it from Uxbridge to Harlow in 45 minutes. "’onest M’lud, they didn’t break the speed limit!" Yeah, right!
The show goes up on time and is a stonker with only a couple of lapses of foot in mouth on my part – Hey, I haven’t done the theatre show since….the last time!
Onward and upward then and all go for Dunstable where we’ve got quite an audience, apparently.
Anyway, time for a curry in Old Harlow!
Pete Tobit
Producer - & still very occasional ‘JAKE’!