Dave Berry and The Cruisers, Coal Aston Village Hall - Saturday 9th January 2010

For the days running up to this event we suffered the coldest spell for many years and there was an ongoing question of whether the weather might force our first ever cancellation - it didn't. Thanks to snow clearing JCB man Pete we got the car park semi serviceable and when the evening arrived so did the 130+ audience including one couple who had travelled from Hull - this really put the locals who "can't come because of the snow " into shame ! Scuppered were unfortunately short handed, Corky shot down with the dreaded bug, but the trio battled bravely on and I reckon we got away with it !

Some people say they aren't keen on seeing Dave and his Cruisers but let me tell you, they are missing a treat. Once again they gave a most amazing set with blistering performances from the band. Dave is now 70 years old (or so it is rumoured) but on stage he looks and sounds as good as ever, it was a soundtrack performance from our youth and we all loved it. This annual gig has to be one of the best nights we organise.

 Here's a few photos I managed to take towards the end of the Dave Berry set : -

The Cross Daggers, Tuesday 29th December 2009

Another splendid evening at The Daggers. It's always nice to get out of the house in between Christmas and The New Year and, despite the weather, we had a great turnout for what seems to becoming another regular event. Our music was very well received amongst the crowd many of whom were friends so were far too polite to criticise the many mistakes and memory lapses that occurred ! Outside it was freezing, inside we enjoyed a warm glow (and far too much beer in my case)

The Christmas Show - Coal Aston Village Hall - Saturday 19th December 2009

What a superb evening ! In a way the weather helped make it, snow and frost outside, Christmas cheer inside. We were lucky to be able to feature an array of musicians with terrific variety in style and presentation and from quite a few people were complimented that we achieved the best ever Village Hall Christmas Show.

Scuppered opened the evening with a 3 song set finishing with the still hotly topical Steve Tilston's " A Pretty Penny" Fortunately there were no bankers in the building otherwise it could have been a take your money and B----r off moment - yes I'm still smarting from what GE Capital did to me in June ! Andy's brother Richard followed us on a gave a tremendous set of bluesy numbers including a wonderfully deep voiced delivery of Jim Reeves "Heartache". Then it was heads up for The Apperknowle Steam Band - a 6 piece including me old pal "Big" John Hayward, his wife Liz and our local percussion guru Albert Hattersley. The band were great with an eclectic set of songs and tunes delivered with great Panache helped by frontman Russ' intros' and some rather tasty musicianship. The first set was rounded off with an appearance of The Shambolics who, if I'm not mistaken, were generally taking the piss out of Scuppered. A couple of very amusing skits at our expense with an amazing appearance from the skies of a genuine Dave Cork Dummy complete with rocking chair. Great fun and it hit the spot with our audience. Any sarcastic comments about Dave's wife Lin taking the dummy home again were simply in jest !

After a longish break it was time for John, Geoff and Anne to hit the stage with Bone Lazy. They were superb as ever with "From A Distance" featuring Geoff on Piano as my favourite song from an excellent set. Andy joined them on bass guitar for their last song "Trouble" then Dave and I ambled into position and we did a short Christmas set kicking off with Il Jubilo and then into the Yorkshire Carol "Sweet Bells" taken with permission from the fantastic band St Agnes Fountain. We rounded off with The Bleak Mid Winter. Scuppered rounded off the night with a selection from the current set during which my voice went and returned about 6 times !

A big thanks to (in no particular order) All the players for their hard work and superb performances, Daughter Sarah for Sound (she were great) Rich Grad on computerised lighting, our wives Viv and Mary for organising an amazing spread for everyone, Steve Barnett, John Bennett, Big John, Geoff for early morning help setting up, and of course Santas little helpers (see photo) for being gorgeous and helping with the door/raffle and in making several sad old men feel very happy !

Here are a couple of Youtube links to something video recorded on the night by The Good Doctor John Bennett

The New Inn, Tresco, Isles of Scilly. Weekend 11th September

So much to say and so many photos to share ! This might take a while to get sorted so for now here's a few pictures from what was by any definition the best weekend we've ever spent as a group. Click on the thumbnail for full size photo !

Here we are 3 months later and I still haven't updated the site with more stories and especially with some photos from Emma Pelly, photographer and general all round good egg ! Who knows though, perhaps I'll get a day over the imminent Christmas break to get things sorted !

The Albert Inn, Woodthorpe, near Staveley. Saturday 5th September

A new venue for Scuppered with a recommend getting us in there from Craig, ex Landlord of The Devonshire Arms, Middle Handley. Landlord Russ had told me there were a couple of parties due that evening and whilst we were setting up mentioned the impending arrival of "Irish Mary" from Harthill. Now we know of Harthill as the home of the Beehive Folk Club who's attendees are of the average age, and I'm sure they won't mind me saying, of over 60 (well over in actual fact) so we were expecting her to be a fairly ancient émigré from the emerald Isle.

She arrived with her friends as we were mid first set, DING DONG in Lesley Philips style went through my mind "not too old then" commented John with his eyes as goggled as my own ! She was young, pretty and barking bonkers mad which made for one of the best nights fun we've had in ages. She and her cronies went for the music big time and by the end of the evening Russ was complementing us on the best night he'd had at the Albert yet (mind you he's only been there a few weeks)

At one point as we were mid jig or reel or something similar we had a bevy of young beauties dancing about 3 feet in front of us, I turned to John and asked who else he knew at the grand old age of 59 would be spending their Saturday evening having so much unbridled fun ! Needless to say Russ wants us back sometime soon !

The Rising Sun, Nether Green - Beer Festival - Saturday July 11th

Down in the car park, hundreds of punters, everyone up for a cracking good night. Me not driving, Real Ale by the bucketfull, good moods all round --- what could go wrong ?                The *%)%?@ weather, that's what !

It had said all day that rain was coming at 9pm but in true trooper style we set up at 8 under leaden skies, "it'll hold off" was the general opinion. It didn't. We started at 9pm and precisely 30 minutes later than forecast the heavens opened. But we were under an awning so "let's carry on" which was great especially as the entire crowd sort of joined us under the 10 square foot of plastic covering. The deluge built to monsoon proportions and it was when I saw our 240 volt extension lead swimming in 3 inches of running water that the thought someone could die took precedence over the urge to play. We pulled the plug and packed up the wet gear and headed to the bar ! Still, there's always next year.

Ashover Music Festival - Saturday July 4th, Sunday 5th

What a peach of a weekend ! We played at The Parish Church on Saturday evening, in fact we had been asked to host the concert. It was a terrific evening with Hannah James from Kerfuffle opening the proceedings with some super songs and clogging provided by pupils of the local School. Hannah has a brilliant rapport with them and they sang beautifully. Then it was Scuppered's turn and for the first time since goodness knows when I found myself singing in a Church. The most wonderful acoustics and I have to say quite revealing that I can actually sing without beer being involved. We were followed by a very talented attractive young woman Lizzie Campbell winner of the Rotherham young musician awards then an American harpist called Lily Neil who was simply sublime Finally the Ashover Brass Band who closed the evening up in fine style. My MC'ing skills were honed by the end of the event, just as well as the following afternoon I found I was on call again.

The Parish Hall was the Sunday venue with Scuppered opening. We had performed the Killers song "Human" on Saturday to great acclaim and were told in no uncertain terms that our lives depended upon a repeat performance. We did it amongst a 40 minute spot, the crowd (tiny but well formed) loved it .. no really loved it, terrific reception and well done Andy for having the vision to do it. Brighouse singer/songwriter Roger Davies who gave an outstanding performance of his songs + a couple of covers from the pen of Bernard Wrigley. Tasty guitar work and really PRO delivery with laid back style, nice one Roger. The superb youngsters 4 Square followed him on, quite amazing and so, so talented as multi instrumentalists. Their percussion work is simply beyond belief, catch them if you can. Finally the  Pseudo Francophile band "Heretique" gave a fantastic performance of native French material with acordion, Breton Pipes and Hurdy Gurdy as the unlikely mix of instruments.

It was a pleasure to be involved in this event, we had a ball and met some of the nicest talented people you could possible imagine. Big thanks to Alan James for getting us involved and rest assured "We'll Be Back"               Here is a review of the Parish Church gig on The Derbyshire Times' Website , we're pleased with the really nice comments !

Dave Swarbrick and Whippersnapper re-union gig. Coal Aston Village Hall, Friday 5th June

In some ways this might have been a high risk event, I was approached in February to ask if we could put one of 5  gigs on at the Hall, a huge fee - big risk ???

Absolutely no risk thought I, with the original 80's line up I knew we could fill the hall and so we did. Swarb, Chris (the nicest man on this earth) Leslie , Kevin Dempsey and Martin Jenkins were quite simply incredible. Scuppered without Hodgy did a short trio set which went down very well. After some shitty glitches with the sound made worse I suspect by a loss of battery power evident in Swarb's hearing aids as he changed them during song 3, the band got into the groove on this their first gig for 12 months with virtually no rehearsal. Their first set was brilliant, the second was sublime - I've always loved their music and to see them play together again after 20 or so years was again a total privilege. We were able to get 150 people into the hall for this special night and I reckon to a man they were thrilled by the performance. We've put some videos up on Youtube, 4 or 5 of the songs/tunes filmed by Village Hall stalwart - The Good Doctor John Bennett. Here's one of them, you can find the others from the Youtube screen side menu bar

Then here's some snaps to check out : -

Coal Aston Village Hall events

We reckon that April May and June each brought us the finest events we've been lucky enough to host yet !

In April we welcomed Steve Tilston with bass player David Bowie - of no connection to Ziggy Stardust - he gave us the most exquisite evening of superb songs and laid back performance, just delightful. His latest album, Ziggurat (which as a student of religious history at Abbeydale Grammar I can tell you was the name of a weird shaped temple near UR in Mesopotamia ) has many great tracks but for me an instant hit was made with his protest song A Pretty Penny that sums up what those twatting bankers have done to many of us over the last few months. Such a great song and good feel that Scuppered have immediately grabbed it into their repertoire. Steve is a thoroughly nice guy who I've had the pleasure of knowing for 25 years of so, if you get the opportunity go and see him live.

Then in May we were chuffed to bits to have Phil Cool along to the Hall for an evening. His act was superb and he again turns out to be the nicest of people with a genuine interest in what others are about. He gave the most extraordinary presentation of stand up/music/impersonation (or faceology as he rightly describes his talent) When he takes on a character he actually morphs before your very eyes - on stage we saw - Blair, Bush, Rolf Harris, Wallace (no Grommit) McCartney & Lennon, Dylan . etc, - actually saw them, no really ! It was the most amazing night and we all felt privileged to be in the presence of such a huge talent.

St George's Day and some other great gigs

Having been off line, in effect, for a few weeks now it's a bit tricky gearing the old brain up to cover a chunk of stuff in one go so I thought maybe just a few highlights :-

Here's a couple of piccys from each party : -

Viv Carrack sings in a religious choir, the song wasn't awfully religious but was real nice, a kiss from John who when he played banjo uke was the spit. of his twin brother Paul

3 Gigs, 3 hectic days - 10th, 11th and 13th April

We normally steer clear of gigs around Bank Holidays but this year we missed a trick and copped for a crazy weekend. The first event was the 60th Birthday of our friend and Scuppered Stalwart Viv Carrack, Sister in Law of the great local superstar Paul. His twin brother and wife Viv are friends of Andy and regulars to our gigs. We were delighted to be able to play at Viv's surprise birthday bash in The Plough, Sandygate. A lovely evening with ourselves going through the repertoire, Bob and jenny Colley did some music and star performer was John on Ukulele with a highly contrived rendition of Leaning On The Lamp Post with words specially sung for Viv .... sweet ! The only downside to the evening was our John sinking gradually into a horrible Tummy bug which left him looking shocking at the end of the night and unable to play on Saturday due to a long sitting appointment on the bog !

Then on the following evening we had Steven Tilston and bass player David Bowie booked at The Village Hall and despite it being Easter Saturday coupled with the sorry absence of John this turned out to be a cracker. Steve is the consummate singer songwriter for us folk fans, superb tunes and brilliantly crafted lyrics abound - with David on double bass they gave what for me was the smoothest, coolest, friendliest night we've had at the Village Hall for a long while. Scuppered survived without John, in fact we were told later that we'd done a good job, it's not often anyone other than Mother makes that sort of comment ! Our Sarah and her beau James did light and sound, marvellous job and all enjoyed by a full house. Steve's song "Pretty Penny" is a massively topical anti Banker rant with a great tune - I hope it's going to get done by Scuppered soon !

We move on 2 days to Easter Monday at The Rising Sun, Nether Green. John back in rude health and another fantastic night at The Sun. Ruth Grimsley did us a great favour after "set one" by asking a bunch of attractive young lasses to "pipe down" They had ruined the first few songs by over excited chatting but took her rebuke in good spirit. We went through a load of material including Old Dan Tucker and impro versions of "Duelling Harmonicas" and "Goodnight Ladies" and enjoyed a brilliant atmosphere thanks again to Landlord Robert. We're back there for the beer festival July 11th.

All in all a very busy few days but all in the interest of good fun !

Tuesday 17th March - The Royal Oak, Coal Aston. A St Partick's night special

We've always enjoyed doing the Irish music and this one gave us the opportunity of introducing ourselves to Village Hall neighbours, The Royal Oak. And what a cracking night we had, the pub was packed and for the first music event there for many years it proved a real winner. Loads of good friends in the crowd, a bit tricky pretending to be of Irish descent when everyone knows you but great fun. We worked our way through just about our entire repertoire of Irish and similar music, Andy takes a great lead on several of these including Wild Rover, Athenry and Black Velvet Band. John still struggling with his chesticles did a fine job on various tunes including his newly featured banjo piece in Old Dan Tucker. We really enjoy doing this song which I reckon will stick with us for a good while. Again, here's a few piccys taken by my fine son Paul (in between beers!) : -

CLICK ON THE THUMBNAIL FOR FULL SIZE PHOTO

Friday 6th March - D.A.R.E. Charity fundraiser, Mansfield Town FC

First time I've ever played for a professional Football Club ! What a very pleasant evening with a great crowd of people, noisy yes but great ! They had a packed room all there to raise funds for this excellent charity who are engaged in the education of primary school kids to make them aware of the dangers faced in drug and alcohol abuse. Some really top people there who have to be applauded for their dedication. Special thanks to David Gilbert, their CEO for "discovering Scuppered" at the recent Shirebrook School event. Here's a couple of thumbnail photo's to give an idea of the evenings set up. (click on the thumbnail for full size)  : -

Saturday 21st February. recording, mixing and Gordon Giltrap at Coal Aston Village Hall

We did some recording at the tail end of the Christmas Holidays, 14 tracks put down in 5 hours, no problems. We enjoyed the services of Andy Smith and his digital thingummy desk and have been looking forward to getting together ever since but due to holidays and various commitments Saturday was the first opportunity so we set up in the back room and spent the afternoon polishing up a few dodgy bits and generally applying vocal effects etc. All good fun. We hope to have the new CD ready in the next few weeks.

Gordon Giltrap, who was scheduled to appear at the Hall that evening, arrived mid afternoon and we were delighted to have him join us for a while and have a listen at our work. These photos will give you a bit of a look at our afternoon and show Gordon checking out progress with Andy Smith on the desk CLICK THUM8MBNAILS FOR FULL SIZE PICTURES : -

Gordon took to the stage in the evening and gave a tremendous show to a packed house, his guitar work is unrivalled and during the show he gave detailed descriptions of his several instruments and electronics which were interesting to both the laymen and the guitarists amongst the crowd. He is a genuinely nice guy and we were delighted to have made his acquaintance in the afternoon. The last 2 shots were taken in the evening, unfortunately from my back of the room seat I couldn't get decent action shots !

Thursday 19th February - Visit report  - Fairport Convention, Phil Cool/Ken Nicol. The Winding Wheel, Chesterfield

We went mob handed not only to catch Fairport in concert but also to see Phil Cool in action prior to his May visit to Coal Aston. Well we weren't disappointed as the entire evening was simply sublime. Fairport were in top form and played through a set list which has totally changed since I last saw them. They are consummate folk professionals and the performance was as good as it gets. For me the highlights revolved round the brilliant Chris Leslie, his new songs were great and his voice is better than ever. When he and Ric Saunders duet on fiddle the very hairs on the back of my neck stand to attention (funny that they are still there but the rest has gone!) Chris of course is coming to Coal Aston in June with Dave Swarbrick and the rest of Whippersnapper, can't wait !

Phil was totally jaw droppingly good, what a singer/player he is on top of his great comedic skills, he did a solo stint of "other players" songs including a terrific Paul McCartney and amazing Johnny Cash. We are definitely in for a cracking night from Phil at Coal Aston in May !

The end of the concert gave us a fine opportunity to distribute Coal Aston flyers as the audience left the building. The calls are already coming in thick and fast for tickets to these rather special evenings at the Village Hall ! (see giglist)

Saturday 7th February - Dave Berry and The Cruisers, Coal Aston Village Hall

                        Old Dan Tucker                                         Dave Gives it his all (and is still weird with the microphone !)

Saturday 20th December, Coal Aston Village hall - The Christmas Show

Unbelievably here we are again with what has become the big local event. We were sold out weeks ahead so our first problem was to find a room layout that would allow everybody to be seated in comfort - that kind of took all day really along with hanging various trimmings from the rafters but by show time we had a wonderfully festive hall to welcome our audience. The evening was full of talented performers :- In no particular order we presented The Call, Richard Hilderbrand, Jeff Heppell, Pete Jobson and of course Scuppered. Special guests were an imposter band called the Shambolic who quite frankly were little more than an outrageous piss take on Scuppered- complete with cardboard cut out Dave Cork impersonator.

Once more our 12 Days of Christmas went down very well, this year being themed on the Credit Crunch. It is now available to view on Youtube along with clips from several other performances during the evening. Have a look at our media page for the Youtube link. 2008 was another great show and special thanks go to our many helpers including Steve Barnett for decor management and door services, Mary and Viv for food arrangements, Jay for sound, Richard for lighting, Steve/John/Bri. as Shambolic and to all our other performers who did quite simply a brilliant job. Also a big thanks to all those who turned out for the evening.

Here's a few photo's -

        Shambolic                                               Jeff heppell                 RichardHildebrand                                       The Call

Katy and friend - Santas little helpers!                    7 Dances with John Sargant                     10% on Your Savings

Saturday 15th November - Scuppered at The Wortley Folk Club, The Black Bull, Ecclesfield

We don't get many Folk Club opportunities these days so it was a great pleasure to play at this fine example run by old pal Dave Atkin. A room full of appreciative people and I wouldlike to think we rose to the challenge. The only downside here is the 3rd floor situation of the club room which doesn't half take some getting too with all the gear, bad backs are us ! We had a great night and moved several of our "Truly" CD's - always a good sign - talking of which for once we were asked to sign several of them, how embarrassing !