On the 5th May we were invited to play Toska's Salford Temptation, a three day event organised by Toska Wilde who we had previously played for in Margate. We'd never played up North so we were quite excited. Unfortunately M totally lost her voice on the day before we were due to travel. Being us, we thought we'd go anyway, in the hope of a sudden recovery.
It was a pretty cool journey, we got to see some sheep and mountains, some spherical children and a sign to 'lolsworth'. Plus three of the band at least were able to sing along to the in-car mix tape. It was apparent though that M was not able to sing, or even to rap which was our plan B. So we went to the venue to make our apologies and it turned out that the gig might not be going ahead due to a flashing incident the night before! Apparently, even though it was a very punk venue, the sight of Luis Drayton's member had caused great distress and the further publication of photo evidence on Facebook nearly sealed the deal.
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| Luis Drayton - offensive penis? |
Luckily, good sense prevailed and the show went on, although the furore had set sound check back by a couple of hours so we we high tailed it back to our Premier Inn to get changed and get some food in so we could come back and watch the other performers. As it turned out, several bands had had health and safety issues and had to pull out. Toska suggested there might be a curse on whole weekend! Of course we don't believe in curses. Except, then a vital text message from the Get saying they were setting up on stage got delayed for 45 minutes between Gary's phone and M's, so we didn't get back to the venue in time to watch them which was really disappointing. We did get to see the anarcho punk of the Black Light Mutants though, and they were pretty good.
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| note the pinky held aloft - even punks can be classy. |
Unfortunately there was a smoke machine in the venue and it was quite difficult for Manda with her asthma and M with her throat infection to breathe. We hadn't had time to eat so we thought we'd quickly nip to the nearest chippy and get some fresh air, then head back to see more music.
However, it wasn't a very chip shop sort of road
And after about 40 minutes we gave up, got in the van, and found the nearest chip shop we could, which turned out to be in Oldham.
By this point we had missed quite a lot of music and M was really flagging, so we went back to the Premier Inn for a nightcap and turned in about midnight, like the soft southern indie kids we are.
Back at the venue, Toska was sporting his tiger stripes and being an absolute star for taking on such a huge task as a three day festival, no mean feat even without a curse!
Thanks again to Toska for being so brave and for inviting us to play, even though we epically failed.
And now, at the risk of turning this into the Lost Harbours Blog, here are some scenic photos M took while on the chip quest.
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| God moves in mysterious ways, and so do the working class. |
