It seems that the photos and music for James's funeral are all in order, so I'm taking a moment or two to think and ponder.
Let's think about Saturday, probably one of the hottest days of the year so far. Thankfully, the train to Canterbury West was air-conditioned and the painfully slow journey doubled up as a sojourn in a refrigerator, which was rather nice.
The streets of the city were packed with tourists blended in with a distressingly large number of people who appeared to be street-people at a loose end in the heat, both groups apparently oblivious of the other. I made a note to self not to return to the Travelodge via the underpass later than night; I didn't want to invite a mugging.
A mugging on a muggy night.
At the Salvation Army Annexe, Picturebox, minus one of their guitarists, were sound checking and I made myself a cup of tea and enjoyed the songs as they ran through them. Ian was playing a thick cardboard box cajon-style, and I recognised it as the same type as the Pop-Up Chefs EPs had arrived in a couple of weeks before. Well, clever old me.
I tried out Heaven Avenue in my own check and got halfway through Summer Days before realising that I would not be able to sing it. I wrote it after McDad died and it's just a bit too soon after James to be able to do it.
As with every time I've played there, only one person (apart from the guitarist's lovely girlfriend) showed up, but Picturebox applauded loudly enough in quite a Glastonburyesque way. I was consoled by the fact that even when The Loft played there, they had a similar lack of people, and they are much more famouser than me!
The problem was, when Picturebox played their set there were only three of us to applaud. About halfway through, I noticed Ian smiling at the door and when they'd finished that particular song, he said that there were some people peering through the window. I went out and got them- four very nice Italian men, one of whom said he was a guitarist. They stayed for about four songs (not too bad); I'm not sure whether Robert Halcrow was pleased or not that they came! Lee from Dover turned up just in time to see the last few songs, and I have to say that they played really well. Robert on violin bass sounded very 'Soft Machine' and gave their songs a whole new sound. Excellent.
Next day, I realised that I'd had no dinner. Luckily, there was a Greek bakery just around the corner, and I bought a freshly baked pastry that was about 15 centimetres square, bulging with vanilla custard, peppered with enormous quantities of cinnamon and icing sugar, and probably meant for a family of six.
'I can take half of that home for later' I thought, as I polished off the whole thing.
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