Howdy Folks, a great night in Jannali started with a warm almost summer temperature drive down South, with Vertical on Roadie duties in our beat up, hired van.

Cheers Dave...of course a few hours after this picture was taken we were asking Dave a different question (more on that in a moment)

The last time we played Jannali was as a support for the mighty Radiators, and it was good to be back there, especially with such an enthusiastic crowd.

We had some very special guests drive all the way down from Newcastle to see us. Cheers to Linda and Gina, also to Jenny, Steve and all the other folks who made it a grand evening.

Once again we tried introducing some of the new songs, Black Crow was well received, but unfortunately 'Country Radio' didnt make it out of the starting gates, despite a rehearsal this week, after Mr Wizard decided it wasnt cooked enough yet (sigh) oh well, back to the oven for that one.

We were glad to be joined by Redline, Mr Mike Rix on Bass for the night, and as per usual, he put in a great show, here's a moment of Redline doing his stuff.

 And what would a blog be without my recurring fascination for signage:

As the evening wound down, the crowd were not going  to let us go without a few extra numbers and we had recourse to the Boogie (its title is Over Yonder), a song  about a band being pulled over by the cops for playing too much Canned Heat,  when all of a sudden the local Constabulary arrived in numbers, with dog!

Too late to stop the song, we plunged ahead,  but it gave me the opportunity to paraphrase a great line from the Blues Brothers 'I'd especially like to thank all the members of  Law Enforcement  who've chosen to be with us tonight'.

I thought it was downright hilarious (I am easily amused), the crowd thought it was funny and an unsmiling policeman looked at me with an expression that suggested he didnt share my sense of humour.

Heh. Funny thing is, its been two years since we played Jannali (or thereabouts)  and they had a sniffer patrol wander through that night too. Fortunately for us, we're all law abiding citizens ;-) For a band we can be soo tame. Ahem.

 Thus with the Police leaving empty handed but still slightly grumpy (hey we were playing that song anyway and its not like we were singing NWA's F*** Da Police..), the lights getting turned up and the crowd well danced out, we began the pack up process only to have the conversation with the Roadie no band wants to have...'Who's got the keys to the van?'

Uh oh.

With 6 speakers, 2 amps, 1 desk, 2 mixers, lights, cables, stage box etc etc not being able to get into the van is Un Grande Probleme, vraiment!

Whilst we retraced our steps, checked seats, bathrooms, the lost and found, the car park, the street, the van, the stage area, all pockets, other peoples pockets,  discussed the pro's and cons of a tow truck, the NRMA (wouldnt work, they could get us into the van but wouldnt be likely to hotwire it for us), various suggestions about contacting the nearest under age car thief, things were looking grim.

However, our eagle eyed barman had seen Dave drop the keys into a bag of cables and after rechecking it twice, we found them lodged in the midst of a rolled up power cord. Hoorah! From tragedy to triumph in half an hour!

Hurrah!  a great evening of playing and dancing, a brush with the Law (nice doggie!) and a lucky escape from the Tow Truck Pirates, what more can you ask for?  We look forward to getting back down that way soon.

We've got the next two weekends off while we work on the new material, then we plunge back into it at the Bald Rock on the 26th of November. As we continue working on the new stuff, I'll try and post some snippets from rehearsal.

MJEB