The Gecko 3 Blog

Sat. July 14th, Amsterdam, The Waterhole; www.waterhole.nl

Sun. July 15th, Noyelles sur Mer (Northern France); Relais de la Baie; http://darbyshire.free.fr/various/cafe.html

Mon. July 16th, Paris, Fleche D’Or; www.flechedor.fr

Thurs. July 26th, Paris, Fleche D’Or; www.flechedor.fr

Fri. July 27th, Paris, L’Olympic; www.olympicsimart.blogspot.com

Sun. july 29th, Huy (Belgium), Ca Jazz a Huy festival, Barabas; www.pays-de-huy.be/index1.html

We are actively seeking gigs in the South of France.  If you can help, let us know.   

So this weekend we all got wet.  Hugh was in Glastonbury (haven’t heard from him yet so he may still be stuck there with his gold lycra catsuit (I’m not kidding)) and me and Moose up at the Outsider attending KT Tunstall’s great gig.  Thanks to KT for the tix and the party and thanks to everyone for such a great time. Despite the rain, The Outsider was a cracking festival because the vibe was so nice and friendly… and the campsites well drained. 

 After our recent gig in Leith and our airplay and interviews on Leith FM we are now clearly huge outside Edinburgh – even before the tour.  On that subject, there are a number of gig related items which I should tell you about. 

The first date in the Fleche D’Or (17th) is now being shifted though we don’t yet know when to!  The others still stand and we’ll confirm the date in L’Olympique as soon as possible.  We are also pursuing possible late dates in Chamonix (thanks Karine) and will seek out gigs in the South when we are there if we can stop loafing in the sunshine long enough. 

August is looking busy on our return with dates at Acoustic Edinburgh (Tues. 7th Aug), The Redbourn Festival (Sat Aug 11th) and The Jazz Bar (The Saturday Night Fish Fry, 18th Aug).  We are also in the process of arranging an appearance at identity Parade (possibly Fri 17th but we’ll keep you posted.)  August will end with our second Highland Safari with the wonderful Amplifico and others (24th-26th Aug)  The Saturday gig will be at the Fuaran bar in Auchiltibuie; the Friday gig tbc. 

Watch out for a new website with more video clips, pics and music to download,; coming soon.  (No pressure, Moose :-))       

    

The Roy Ayers support was fantastic.  What a totally cool man! He came and had a chat with us before the gig just to say ‘Hi’ and wish us luck.  He played up a storm and we had another chance to speak to him when we headed backstage afterwards.  I was in the middle of complimenting him on the energy of the whole band’s performance when he said ‘Energy?  You hear that?  He said energy. Ah’m sixty-five years old.  If Ah move my leg, Ah get tired.’   Anyway, as I mentioned, my guitar is named after Roy and the great man was kind enough to sign it for me!   ‘Peace and Love to you and yours, Roy Ayers, 2007’  So of course the first thing I did when I got home was take a look at it again, and then since Roy is such a nice guitar I had a wee play, and then of course I noticed my fingertips on my right hand were covered in blue ink – which was the moment I realised that the CD marker pen that I got him to sign it with is not apparently smudge free on varnished wood… oh good.  So now it reads ‘ieace and iove’ since I decapitated the top line a bit.  I think it is rescue-able, but I haven’t had time to sort it yet so I played the Skye Festival with the front shoulder of Roy (the guitar) wrapped up with a bit of paper and masking tape.  I contemplated writing ‘Save Darfur’ on it just to look as if it was a radical statement, not just a piece of incompetence on my part, but then I got worried that although I am concerned about the plight of the people there, someone might ask me to point it out on a map.  I decided that looking like my guitar had a bandage on because I’m a careless tool was probably a better policy. 

I’ll post a pic of the signed guitar when i get it sorted (that’s if the whole thing isn’t just a blue blob by now.)

Marty

So much happening right now and I’m so confused by the fact that Hugh has actually been on the blog so all I can think to do is tell you about the upcoming tour.

We have five dates so far:

It kicks off in The Waterhole, Amsterdam on Saturday 14th July

La Fleche D’Or Paris, Tuesday 17th July and Friday 27th July;

L’Olympic, Paris (date to be confirmed but the gig is on)

and finishes up at Ca Jazz a Huy Sunday, July 29th (which is also my birthday, so I doubt we’ll have any fun at all.

We are currently in negotiations to get another couple of dates added on down South but can’t tell you anything more right now.  In essence, then, Amsterdam, Paris, the South of France and a Jazz festival in Belgium in the space of two weeks…    

Marty