New Wine Week A

26th July – 1st August
New Wine
Shepton Mallet

I had a great week handling the house act duties at the ‘Rendezvous’ cafe at New Wine again this year. I packed pretty light just taking myself, a tent, a sleeping bag, my old camp worthy guitar, a few hats, some books, one pair of jeans for the week and a few t-shirts. I packed just about right. I also packed my frisbee but its so hard to play frisbee by yourself. Man I felt like a loser.

It was a fantastic week. I had lots of time in the day just to chill out and read and strum and read a little more. It was just what I needed. I had a great time playing too. My job for the week was to play an opening set each night as well as a couple of longer sets at the start and end of the week. My personal highlights of the week were:

– Pitching my tent all by myself and not having to ask anyone for help
– People being thoroughly kind and joining in the fun every night
– Getting stuck into some great books in the day
– Getting some nice chill time with Charlie Groves
– Really enjoyed meeting Nicki Rogers and her performance with Matt on guitar was tops
– The Toybox staff that host the venue are so hardworking and friendly and awesome
– Having Steve Weeks play with me on the Thursday night was fantastic fun. And the Our Dad gig after that was superb. And yes I had a little dance. Not all out shapes and stuff. I just kept it low key and groovy.
– Eoghan Heaslip was superb leading in Venue 2
– Doing the stripped back band thing with Willy and Matt on the last night. What a fantastic little vibe we had. Man those boys can play! Was the perfect way to end the week.
– The ‘Little Light Wembley Experience’ grew and grew every night until on the last night we nearly blinded everyone in Somerset.
– Fitting the tent back into its sack. I’d been worried about my tent rolling abilities all week.
– Coffee and donuts with Stoney on the last morning. Except for the psycho bees that were seriously digging the cinnamon. Scary.
– Getting back home to my girls. There’s no better feeling.

What a week! If there’s any New Winers’ out there hope you had as great a time as I did and that the real world isn’t biting too hard.