Leisure

Sitting in the Freeport cinema it’s often easy to miss out on the film being shown because of the younger members of the audience who take it upon themselves to provide alternative entertainment. However, today they were no problem at all and I have a suspicion that it was the film we were watching that held their imaginations for longer than usual!

In fact, Night At The Museum is a pretty good film for adults as well, although it isn’t exactly a difficult plot to follow – it is aimed at those who want to have a chuckle without having to think too hard. The story is fairly obvious really – Ben Stiller plays the divorced father of a ten-year-old child, and needs a steady job in order to stay living in the same apartment. Taking on the night shift at the museum he finds all hell lets lose once the doors shut, and it is simply a story of how he brings some order to the proceedings. Oh, and there’s a theft to solve and the problem of improving the number of visitors to the museum itself…
All very easy, and no real depth of thought needed, but this film has a cast of characters that make it shine just a little bit more than you’d expect. Robin Williams plays an uncharacteristically understated role, which is refreshing, Mickey Rooney makes a screen appearance (been a long time since the last one, I think), Dick Van Dyke (without the accent) is a central character, but by far the best for me has to be the British contingent. Steve Coogan and Ricky Gervais really steal the show for me, with Coogan playing a (miniature) Roman general and Gervais playing the museum director. The absolute best part for me is where Stiller is telling off Coogan and Owen Wilson (a cowboy) – Coogan’s responses and expressions are priceless!

All in all this is an easy to watch, thoroughly fun yarn – I’d recommend it for anyone who wants a light hearted way to spend a couple of hours without taking anything too seriously. The special effects are bordering on OK, so don’t go for those. The plot is thin, so don’t go for that. The fun is definitely in the cameos from the supporting cast – definitely worth seeing Gervais and most certainly Steve Coogan… neither of whom I was expecting to steal the show quite to the extent that they do. Take the children too, they’ll really enjoy it!

Well, it has been about ten years since I last did anything like this, but on Saturday 28th October I played in a band again!

Neil Herd (who was the tour manager for the BBC Blast tour) invited me to play drums with the Trophy Husbands at a wedding event near Northampton. I had the songs to learn about two weeks beforehand and loaded them on to my iPod, listening to them whenever I drove anywhere. We had one rehearsal in London (at The Premises in Hackney) on the Friday night and then it was all systems go for the gig.

The music was distinctly country and western, which is something I have never played before, but essentially it is pretty similar to 12 bar (in places). If not, it’s definitely a shuffle of some kind!

The biggest problem (apart from driving to Northampton) was the volume – everything seemed a lot quieter than I remember it when I was playing 10 years ago. It called for the use of Multi-rods instead of the usual 5B sticks, but what the hey… it felt good to be back behind my old drum kit once more!

The kit is an old Pearl Export series from about 1988 which has served me well for all this time. I bought a new stand from Allegro Music in Chelmsford (lovely people in there these days) and used this to hang a drum from instead of using the old Gibraltar rack system.

The kit layout was:

22″ Bass Drum, 12″ and 14″ toms (one high, one in the classic floor tom position), 14″ Brass piccolo snare, 20″ Paiste 2002 power ride, 17″ Paiste Crash, 10″ Zildjian splash, 14″ Paiste sound edge hi-hats. Small, but perfectly formed and eminently suitable for the music and the gig.

Would I do it again? Yes, certainly! I don’t think a regular spot in a band would go down too well with the family these days, but the occasional gig here and there, why the heck not?

I’ve just got back from one of the most amazing west end shows I’ve seen in a long time. The Blue Man Group, showing at the New London Theatre in Drury Lane (where ‘Cats’ was for so many years), is a 100 minute extravaganza of light, rhythm, humour, poignancy and audience participation.

It is very hard to describe what happens in the show. Three main characters mime their way through a vibrant series of sketches to a powerful backing provided by four live musicians. The three are the ‘blue men’ wearing what looks like blue latex coverings over their skin areas. They have expert comical timing and convey so very much through looks and body language alone.

They do come in to the audience – right in! At one point they had a small camera inside a viewer’s mouth and showed it on a large screen. The clever bit was the subtle cut to video as they pretended to push the camera into the man’s throat and onwards… yuk! Very very funny, all the same.

The entire auditorium becomes the stage and the audience become willing participants in a feast of visual effects. Far from being tiresome, this show is fascinating to watch, great fun to be in and has an amazing drummer!

I guess it’s a mix of excellent fringe theatre with west end glamour, rock music and a message about electronic communication…

An internet cafe is described as a place full of people who are not going to talk to each other, whilst staring at a screen talking to people who aren’t even there. Seems a bit like any web space to me!

The finale is nothing short of awesome. Yards and yards of paper… revolving plastic pipes, audience participation, music, humour, wonderment! I can’t really describe it as well as it deserves. If you want a great show that is beyond the normal story telling song and dance act, then go and see the Blue Man Group at the New London Theatre in Drury Lane. You won’t be disappointed.

The search continues…

I have had a few comments on my blog from my earlier post about Limara body sprays, and I am still looking for any footage of the (infamous?) advert from the 1980’s. If you know of it’s whereabouts…do let on!

In the mean time I have been fortunate enough to be sent an image from the ‘Remember My Name’ single sleeve.

Thanks to Erika from the Stevie Lange web site… more research to do! Click the icon below to hear a short audio clip…