Performing in Knott End

After not being able to meet for eighteen months due to the COVID pandemic the Over Wyre Social and Activity Club held their first comeback meeting at Knott End Working Men's Club on the afternoon of 16 September 2021.

Having been asked by the organisers who rang round the members to see what they would like to do at their first get-together, their response was to mention me!

Coming over all humble and shy, I jumped at the chance. After all, all those lockdowns gave me time to put several new sets together and learn lots of new songs and I gave them a trip through the 1960s with dips into decades on either side. I seemed to go down well and the organisers have since told me that feedback has been great. Phew! Happen as well seeing as I am due to play again at their Christmas party!

After Dinner Entertainment

Last Saturday night we played at Lancaster Golf Club for a members' social evening. The food was excellent and there was lots of it. David and I don't eat much before playing but I couldn't resist a small helping from the buffet after the members had all been round it.

It put them in such a good mood they hit the dance floor almost immediately too and we had a great night. We think they did too!

Car Club Gig

On Saturday 22 June 2013 we were out at the Coast Riders Cafe on Marton Moss, Blackpool playing for a car club.

We got there a bit early as the cars were being judged and I wanted a few photos. This MG ended up with the top trophy for the night.

A Jowett Javelin sports car - no, I don't remember them either...

I do remember the Consul Classic though! This Ford was the first British car with twin headlamps that I remember. I nearly bought one for £65 when I was 17 but in the end bought a chunky Hillman Minx for £40 instead - cheapskate!

And had I taken the blue guitar that night, this rather scrummy Jag E-Type would have just matched it!!!

But I had the red one with me instead...

And one to match the scratch plate!

Oh yes... and we played a bit of music as well...!

Poulton Gig for Car Club

Saturday 8 December saw us out at Poulton Golf Club to play for the Christmas "do" of a local car club.

It was a superb night, the audience were cracking jokes with us and we got a lot of good feedback at the end of the night and afterwards. Miss Jeannie reached down to the bottom of the costume box to find the old Mexican sombreros we used to wear when playing "Dance the Night Away". So they made a reappearance!

Another surprise was bumping into an old friend from school! Janet Astley was one of the bunch of close friends from sixth form days. There was even a song or two she remembered from the old days when I was in a band called "Anacreon" and before that in the rather less nattily named "Heywood Senior High School Folk Group"...

David took this one of Jan and I behind Miss Franny and Miss Jeannie before we started playing. ...er... that is before the band started playing... Just so there's no confusion...!

Party at Garstang Golf Club

Last weekend the band were out at Garstang Golf Club to play at a birthday party. It was a big affair, formal dress and a sit down buffet for guests.

There were lots of people there too. We are there at the back of the dance floor, honest!

Once we got going it didn't take long before the dance floor filled up and we stuck mainly to our tried and tested dance stuff. Though there was time and chance to throw in a version of Billy J Kramer's From a Window from the 60s and the Bellamy Brothers' disco hit, Let Your Love Flow.

The big crowd pleasers gained their usual increased roars of applause. They include Elvis's It's Now Or Never and Burning Love, The Righteous Brothers' You've Lost That Loving Feeling and Take That's The Flood - which no one expects two old geezers like us to attempt full stop, never mind attempt to ramp up on the original by adding drama and a blistering guitar solo towards the end. Lifted? Yes we were! Thanks to the hosts for booking us and to the audience for their support and for spending the night dancing!

Model Trains at Fleetwood

Today I took myself off to Fleetwood High School to see an exhibition of model trains.

I never put so much effort into model trains myself. I was happy if I could set up a track and got one end to meet the other so a train could go round it instead of all this fiddle yard nonsense where you send a train from one end to the other and then send a different one back...

But if I'm totally honest, I never bothered much with scenery either... The front of the sofa was a mountain range and I had couple of plastic Airfix platforms and a few buildings, none of which in a real town would have stood anywhere near each other...

This one was modelled on a container yard. The crane gantry went up and down and the crane came down and picked up containers from lorries and placed then on trains or vice versa. The modern diesel engines made quite realistic sounds too - an innovation that was quite missing from the train sets of my childhood.

But I couldn't help feeling it was a boring setting for a model railway... sorry guys! Get some trains going, never mind all this fiddling about lifting boxes up and down... Still... whatever floats your boat I suppose!

And talking of things that I never had as a kid - this stall (Kytes Lights) had LED lighting sets for emergency vehicles and platform lighting etc. Brilliant! Really realistic too - model ambulances and fire engines had blue flashing lights behind their grills!

There was a large Scalextric track in the main entrance. The trouble with Scalextric was always two-fold: you needed a space the size of your entire home's footprint and the cars move at a scale rate of something roughly twice the land speed record and therefore fly off at corners far too readily...

I used to have a OO scale set called Minic Motorways which was excellent and you could have trains and cars going and both scaled the same! There was even a level crossing so you could crash them into each other!

Chesfield Tramways represents a 1950s town with Blackpool trams running through it. A brilliant set with copper wires strung over the roadways and mostly scratch built trams running up and down. There were Glasgow and Sheffield trams in their fiddle yard I noticed so they weren't just Blackpool trams. The trams actually do pick their current up from the overhead wires too.

A massive layout and N gauge trains allowing for a really intricate and detailed scenery layout. Or a lot of grass... The river crossing was good but not enough trains going for me. Surely that's the point of model trains? I can't be doing with all this bell clanking and lever pulling and signal setting - just get some trains going! Heh heh - ain't I a stinker?

This one was good - I loved this scenery! The setting was Arizona and there was a wrap-around layout with operators standing inside. There were more buildings on the other side so I wondered if we were seeing the back of it, but there was a train going round all the time, so top marks. The loco was making all the right noises too, including a deep hooter blasting out to wake the folks in the nearby reservation...

But for the best ever train sets you need to watch an old Addams Family episode. Two trains would be on a direct route to collision and the watching guest would say "They're going to crash!"
"You think so?" Gomez would say, pressing the plunger to blow up one of the trains!

Return to Toys Index Page

Club and Pub Weekend

Creeping Bentgrass were out and about this weekend.

We started on Friday night at the Longshaw Sports & Social Club in Blackburn. This was a charity night in aid of the Mayor's charities.

An upstairs function room, a stage and some rather hot stage lights! The crowd set the standard for the weekend, crowding onto the dance floor early on in the proceedings!

Then on Saturday night we played for a 70th birthday party (that's two of those in a week!) out at the Chetham Arms, Chapeltown. Again the guests made a beeline for the dance floor early in the night and a good time was had by all.

Our appreciation and thanks to those who booked us, particularly for the very kind compliments and feedback and today has been a nice, relaxing day which didn't start until long after normal get-up time...!

A Fabulous Time at the Party

What a wonderful fabulous time we had last night!

We were out at Garstang Golf Club for a 70th birthday party, playing a country and western set before the guests had a meal and then playing for dancing later on.

The lady wife of the birthday boy had done a lot of preparation for the event - there were games, competitions and a lot of fun and once the meal was over the dance floor filled up and we had a ball.

It's always very nice when bar staff tell us we are the best band they've ever heard and I have to say, the bar staff last night showed some excellent taste...

Huge thank yous to all concerned!

Check out the Creeping Bentgrass YouTube channel for samples of our work!

A Wedding Gig

Last night Creeping Bentgrass played at a wedding at Garstang Golf Club.

We set up our gear and then managed to have a sit down for a while as the meal was finishing and the speeches and then some family entertainment was still to come.

We played for the early part of the night before resident DJ Ricky took over. Generally the early spot is before people feel ready to dance, but in our case it went up to 11:00pm so we had a few people on the dance floor before we were done. If nothing else the dreaded Amarillo can always be relied upon to get a few people on their feet!

Here David is imploring me to play the next song in "his key!" - whatever that is...

Oh yes... and I've bought those shoes!

Christmas and New Year Gigs

A couple of gig reports. Fran hadn't picked her camera up for the first one but yesterday David gave me a disk of photos taken by Jeannie so I can now include a report here!

23 December 2010 saw us at the Wyrebank Banqueting Suite in Garstang, battling snow and ice to get there to play for a rather unusual event.

This was a pig club - a group that had reared a pig and was celebrating this night with the fruits of their endeavour. A meal of pork sausages and mash with plenty of sausages was followed by a sale of yet more sausages and a raffle - no they had other prizes for that!!!

Generously they invited us to sit with them for the meal and whilst David and I hardly ever eat much before a gig, (belching down microphones is never good...) it was an excellent meal.

Then we played for the rest of the night before slipping and sliding back on the ice to load the car in rather cold temperatures! Oh - and we were given a big bag of sausages as a bonus! They are rather yummy...

Last night we played the New Year in at Lancaster Golf Club. As I tuned the guitar just before starting I hit the end of a string with the tip of my thumb, feeling the string go right down into my thumb.

Muttering a surprised "Good Gracious!", I had to stick a plaster on the end of my thumb to avoid getting blood all down the neck of the guitar which would have gone sticky and perhaps not looked as aesthetically pleasing as I'd have liked.

Unfortunately the only plaster they could find was designed to cover the whole of the upper torso... Still, after a couple of songs I was able to take it off and apart from a mild soreness the thumb performed it's usual task of keeping the neck of the guitar pressed against my fingers with no problem!

And what a night! The dance floor filled as soon as we started to play and as we counted down to midnight there were balloons, confetti, cheers, hugs and kisses all round. No sausages though...

Morecambe FC Part 2

Yesterday we were back at the new Globe Arena in Morecambe to play for an hour and a half before the match. There were some seriously mouth-watering smells coming from food being served in the room.

Thanks to all those who gave us such wonderful feedback and comments both about yesterday and our performances on Tuesday.

Lancaster Golf Club

A brilliant night last night out at Lancaster Golf Club.

It was meant to be an open air event with a bar-b-que but the weather was most definitely not looking conducive to sitting outside and so we set up inside the clubhouse where we treated club members to some gentle songs whilst they ate and then went into full-on 60s mode and got them singing along and dancing.

We had a break whilst the prize giving ceremonies were conducted and then wound up the night with some rock and roll and then some gentler tunes for couples to dance together.

A very enthusiastic audience - we have to say a big thank you for making us so welcome and we look forward to coming back on New Year's Eve!

Club Night in Blackpool

It's not actually all that often that we play in our home town of Blackpool. But last night was one of the exceptions.

We were at the Highfield Road Club for a social evening for ex-servicemen and their wives. So did they want nice easy relaxed music? No...

"Status Quo!" came a shout from the audience as we threatened them with Cliffy... So Status Quo they got!

We had a great night, singing, playing and joking our way through an hour and a half of good old-fashioned fun! Fran and Jeannie seemed to mop up in the raffle too... We came away with a bottle of brandy and one of Martini... Honestly... you can't take them anywhere!

St Patrick's Evening at Aughton Institute

Last night we had an excellent time entertaining the folks at Aughton Institute.

It was a night of silly hats, green balloons and an entire run of our Irish repertoire - though for some reason David refused to allow me to play Delaney Had a Donkey...

Then once we had taken a break whilst the supper was served - well, we weren't missing out! - we carried on through the sixties and onto line dancing and then rock and roll. The ballads went down well last night too with couples getting up to dance to Billy Fury's A Thousand Stars, The Bee Gees' Words and Ronan's When You Say Nothing At All.

Nice to see Christine and Brian and several other people who have come to see us before and in response to a number of queries, yes we will be at Witton Park, Blackburn again this year on Sunday the 9th of May from 12:00 noon until 4:00pm as usual.

Large versions of the photos: top photo, bottom photo

New Year's Eve in Eccleston

We played in the New Year at St Agnes Social Club, Eccleston.

We had a fabulous night at this very friendly club and enjoyed a Jacob's Join buffet and a tough quiz based on recognising the first three words of pop hits. Even we struggled - and the act contained a few of them!

The first raffle prize winner wanted to take away the prize he had donated, because he said it was a good prize!

The MC, Len, kept us all entertained during the break with some very witty banter and we managed to fill the dance floor and have the audience singing along with us. At midnight we listened to BBC Radio 4 as Big Ben's chimes struck the turning of 2009 into the New Year and we played Auld Lang Syne and then You'll Never Walk Alone before another half hour of dance music.

A great way to spend New Year's Eve!

A very Happy and Prosperous New Year to all readers. May 2010 be filled with laughter, health, happiness, good friends and good fortune.

Rockin' in Eccleston

We came, we saw, we rocked! St Agnes Social Club in Eccleston near Preston was our venue last night and the large audience was superb. They sang, they clapped, they danced and they laughed at all the jokes - I think we may take them on tour with us...

Against a pantomime backdrop (yes we did - no we didn't) we went through our first half selection of country, folk and Irish.

In the second half we almost turn into another band as we go through the 1950s, 60s and 70s through to line dancing and then rock and roll and Status Quo and then last night we went through a few ballads too as folk flocked to the dance floor.

Our host Len, was very funny on the mic and we enjoyed a hotpot and trifle supper between spots too. Oh yes... and that's the New Year's Eve slot taken care of too!

Aughton Institute

Last night we played the Aughton Institute. With Bob we were back to a trio for the night.

And what a great night it was too. The organiser had started out by apologising that the audience would be smaller than normal because of half term, but there were plenty of folks there and we had a great night, with a few request, a full dance floor and a return invitation for 13 March next year!

So any of you in that area know where to find us next year!

Club Night

Last night we played the Highfield Road Servicemens' Association club in Blackpool.

Poor David has been suffering since the Saturday gig with flu and looked as though he should have been still in bed really but we gave them a good night and a chance to exercise their vocal chords singing along to country, folk and sixties songs, finishing up with Quo's Rocking All Over The World.

David explained he looked a bit rough due to being on heavy drugs (Lemsip) and the audience gave us a rousing burst of applause at every song ending and afterwards as Fran was standing by the pile of equipment we were ferrying to the car across the road many of them could be heard saying how much they had enjoyed the night.

So did we...Even David was back to his usual self after a few songs and the adrenalin had shaken off the flu for a while!

Golden Wedding Gig

Creeping Bentgrass were out at Garstang Golf Club last night, playing for a Golden Wedding party.

It all went down very well, though I had a couple of small mishaps - the keyboard refused to work at one point and it was one of those songs where I play a guitar intro first so we had to play the entire song without any help from the keyboard so no drums or backing fill, but no worries!

Thankfully the keyboard worked after pretending it was a Spectrum ZX and switching it off and on again! Then the guitar went silent until I fiddled with the cable at the guitar end. That cable has now been ditched!

And after all that I started to play the intro for I Will Love You on the keyboard and totally forgot the tune. The old befuddled mind went blank and I busked a fairly nondescript but compatable intro, trying to ignore David killing himself next to me whispering between the laughter "You've forgotten the tune haven't you?" I remembered it once he started singing the first verse...!

If we didn't make mistakes, how would you know it was live? Ha ha! Anyway I don't think anyone else noticed apart from us.