Hi, welcome back to another Tuesday and my Behind the Strays.
Friday 13th of February and tonight we are playing Metal to the Masses at the Underground in Stoke on Trent.
Load in is 16.00 and so we figured we would need to leave about 14.45 in order to get there in time. However, the traffic always seems to have a little plan for us, despite looking at the sat-nav for an ETA.
I picked up Grace and together we headed into town to collect Liam. I just have to mention driving down the A45 towards Birmingham centre and suddenly Grace came out with this very melodic gibberish, I was like what the hell was that?. She pointed at the number plate in front of us and was making words out of it for a vocal warm up and exercise. I dunno, last week she was cartwheeling in the car park and this week its random vocal warm up using vehicle registration plates. It did make me proper smile though.
Anyway, moving on, we arrive at Liam’s and then head towards the wonderful M6 and it didn’t disappoint. It was very slow moving from Junction 6 through to Junction 11 and then the road started to open up to Junction 15.
We navigated our way through Stoke and arrived at the Underground. I had never been here before, but Grace had played here with the Wild Strays back last summer. So, we looked to her for advice on the parking and lucky enough we found a spot right outside the venue.
We headed in and met with., and please forgive me if I get this name wrong. I think his name was Roy. Anyway, he seemed a cool guy and he introduced himself as the sound engineer. He then said we can start loading in.
We walked back towards the car and sure enough another car had pulled in the centre of the little tuning road and blocked us in. I tutted under my breath and then Alan stepped out the car, ALAN ? Alan is a lifelong Stray and admitted to me that out of all the gigs he has been too and trust me he’s been to many and supports so many bands on the independent scene. He said to me, he has seen the Wild Strays more times than any other band. That’s certainly commitment and it is very much appreciated.
So, our faces turned into smiles with hugs all round. We unloaded the rest of the gear and waited our turn for soundcheck.
I must admit, i thought this was a pretty damn cool venue.
We had been handpicked to play Metal to Masses and we were all excited to get the invitation. Yes we were a member down, but anyone that follows the Wild Strays knows our mantra.
The Show will Always go on. So here we are and we will bring the strongest show we can. We did get told that one band had dropped out tonight due to a member not being able to make it.
But uh uh, not us \m/
As a band we used to be based around Stoke and Stafford, but more recently members have moved to Birmingham. So, getting people to this show might be a little difficult, and i think we all knew we were not strictly a metal band. We are all Punk and Rock and Metal and Stuff.
Which I think makes us unique.
But a gig’s a gig and as I say, we were excited to be invited and have every intention on bringing a Wild and Kick ass show.
We sat about watching the other bands sound check. We had it confirmed that we were on first, which kinda suited us really, as Grace had two guitar rigs to set up. Her own Lead Guitar and then her Bass Guitar.
As we did for the Salty Dog, Grace would swap instruments throughout the set and play Lead guitar on the songs that had a lot of Lead parts and the swap to bass guitar on the tracks that were very bass driven.
The bass player from Banzai Pipeline was a pretty cool guy and said we could use his bass cab. His only request was that we don’t touch the settings. Which of course we were super careful about. Thing was when we came to set up on stage he was nowhere to be seen and we couldn’t get it working. Roy the sound engineer said, don’t worry we can DI the bass guitar.
So we said, ok cool. The only thing with this is, Grace would have no control over the volume of the bass guitar.
We sound checked 9 Lives and it sounded pretty damn good. So the stage was set and people started to come in. It was a nice size stage too.
It was time to hit the stage, our intro kicked in and we kicked off with the same set as the Salty dog.
Beast Inside is a blistering track to start with and Grace started the set on Lead guitar.
The next track is one of my favourites and there is a small music clip while she switched to Bass guitar. The song starts with all the attitude and I quickly realise, I genuinely can’t hear her bass.
Now with no lead guitar present and not being able to hear the bass guitar. The vocals on the monitors were not working. All I could hear was my guitar. I lost my way after the solo and we cut the song a little short. Not a big deal and probably no one noticed.
I said to Grace after the track, I can barely hear your lead guitar and couldn’t hear her bass guitar at all. We asked for more monitors, but he said he couldn’t get any more out of them. I didn’t know what to say really, but we carried on.
I have to say that only 6 days before we didn’t have any problems at the Salty dog in Northwich with this same set up and set list., but here in The Underground I couldn’t hear anything from the monitors.
Still the show goes on and as professionals, I think both me and Grace looked at one another and telepathically said, we can do this…
I ended up moving to the centre of the stage so I could be nearer her guitar cab and with more attitude we attacked Own Personal Hell which then leads into Liam’s awesome drum solo which always leads nicely into With your name on it.
Finally, finishing the set with the final track of the night The Wild Strays.
We won the crowd back with these last 4 or 5 songs and had the room clapping along to “Gather all the lost souls” and we finished with our usual big crescendo and a few cheers from the audience. We packed down and jumped off the stage.
I spoke to Alan afterwards and he said it sound ace out front. But you know when you know you haven’t played your very best, well it felt like that.
But we know one bump in the road won’t shake this Wild train we are on.
Tomorrow night we are back in our hometown of Birmingham, a brand-new venue for us called, So Called Studios and I got to say we blew the bloody roof off and put on one hell of a show.
But that is for next week..
Nah I’m only joking,
I would normally do this kind of blog in two parts, but I had in my mind these three gigs would be a trilogy of blogs. But, you see we have another show lined up the Friday March 6th which isn’t that far away and so I thought, ok let’s have Episode 1 for the first gig of the year, then Episode 2 as the battle of the band gigs and as these two gigs are back to back. The next gig will be the 3rd film of the trilogy and will be Episode 3 lol.
Hey we may even have a new bass player for then too. Who knows what the future will bring, but yeah so I thought I would cover both gigs this week.
I hope your still with me, my mind is a crazy little place sometimes, but yeah. Back to the story and here’s the night after the night before.
While we are on this topic, my new Behind the Strays with KT is no longer a weekly thing anymore.
I’m going to be popping up every now and again on Tuesday if there is a gig to cover or some good behind the scene stuff to cover. Just means it will always be fresh and full of nice content.
So, home to bed after a diversion from Stoke on Trent which seen us head the wrong way up the motorway to Junction 16 and then back down to Junction 6. Nightmare thanks to the night roadworks and closures on the motorway.
Sleep then wake for Saturday and another show. Man, I would love to do this for a living, another town another show.
That’s the dream right.
Anyway, back on with the story.
This weekend has been the arrival of Storm Dennis, he’s been a bit underwhelming really, knocked a few wheelie bins over, I’m joking. I did hear it was rough out there across the UK. I didn’t think Birmingham was too bad, but there again, I slept most of Saturday, it was indeed windy Saturday night, and Sunday.. well I binged watched Netflix for 7 hours under a duvet ?
Right, back to the plot.
This time Grace ran into town and picked up Mad Leg. This is a nickname Liam has acquired since he is a bloody awesome drummer and even getting screams from the girls in the audience. Honestly, I stand there sometimes and just think, yeah that’s so so cool. The way his double bass drum thunders through the house pa.
Ok, I’m rambling let’s get back on point. But yeah, they both collected me, we jumped in the van and headed to Acocks Green, Birmingham.
Only a short distance from our location and it was getting pretty windy out there to be fair, we sat in the van outside the venue when we arrived because we were a little early.
Then a BMW pulled up with what looked to be one of the acts, we later learned it was Jack Alexander Pretty, cool guys to be fair. As always, I don’t talk much another other acts on here. But all of the acts were strong tonight.
However, we did have one the Tinfish boys come down to support us which we all thought was super cool. Dave the guitarist from Tinfish was accompanied by Glubetser who runs Glubbox Sounds Radio. Really great guys and of course a shout to Ryan Lowry the owner of So-Called Studio. A great recording and rehearsal studio and now a cool venue.
We were first on here also, but again that made it easier for Grace to set up two rigs rather than normally just one.
So, same set but different venue. But this time Battle of the Bands.
We loaded into the back room and I walked up to the band Jack Alexander. I introduced us Wild Strays and we said hello to everybody and then we waited our turn to soundcheck.
We set up our merchandise stand which looked pretty cool as always.
It was then our time to set up on stage. Ryan did a great job at ensuring all bands had the best sound that night and then we waited time until time ticked down to hit the stage. Ryan had this awesome sound clip which introduced us to the stage.
We were proper fired up for this gig after last night.
The sound was excellent, I could hear everything and tonight, despite still being a member down, we were here to put on one hell of a show, and we did just that.
Everything was on point and tight. The crowd participation was ace and considering this was indeed a battle of the bands all acts were super encouraging of the other acts.
We had a scream on this stage, the change overs from Grace from bass to lead were flawless and we were told by members from the audience that we really did bring a strong, entertaining, passionate and technical but fun rock show to the table.
Even Jack Alexander said halfway through his set, please give it up to The Wild Strays, saying, quote; “Now that’s a real rock band”
So we ended on a high with a rapturous applause and smiles all round.
We now all look forward to the horizon of the summer of 2020 with a side mission of seeking a new Bass Player to complete the line up before we head to Evesham on March 6th.
Catch you on the next Behind the Strays.
Until then,
Keep it Wild, Strays,.
Love and respect, KT x