review160308

FaBclub Review
16th March 2008
Written by Liz Montgomery

It's a wild and windy afternoon outside, just like the rest of the week, but
inside is cosy and warm. And the room is pristine in its new blue and
white paintwork. A packed house today - so lots of gossip to catch up on.

Dennis eases us into the afternoon with a gentle slightly sad song about
Old Age and Loneliness. Up-pace next with "Bookworm" -one of his
jaunty songs - this time one about passion (?) in the library - and not on
the pages of a Mills & Boon novel either…the historical fiction section
will never be the same again.

Ron and his beautiful Gibson guitar joins us. He always has surprises for
us and today is no exception - a Robert Plant/Alison Krauss song from
their excellent recent collaboration gets the Ron treatment and that
beautiful C&W classic "Keep on Movin on"…

Margaret provides us with some Irish songs for St Patricks Day - The
Black Velvet Band and Wild Rover - and lots of singing along from the
assembled masses.

Bernard and Maureen continue the Gaelic theme with some haunting
tunes on concertina and guitar.

And onto another duo - Len is joined by his cousin Dave also on guitar
and we move forward into acoustic music from the 20th century. "Cry
Baby Cry" - a relatively rarely played Beatles song nowadays. And then
Dave sings for the FaBclub for the first time with the Dylan classic -
"Knocking on heavens door" -aye and a FaBclub virgin too.

John Hare teaches us to sing along with his chorus to the rousing
"Knocking at the door" - sweet segue there. And another Irish one - this
time a slow and deeply soulful ballad - "Maids of Coolmore". Beautiful
and barely a dry eye in the house after.

Helen in great voice keeps the Irish theme up and running with
"Spatschill Hill" and follows this with the Ralph McTell song "From
Clare to Here" - which is sort of Irish too (maybe not : - discuss)

Dennis has his new album ready to go - 14 tracks for only Ł5 - of which 7
have a full orchestration.

Tone Deaf Leopard round off the first half. "Foggy Foggy Dew" has been
misplaced historically according to Trevor. So now it's not from Ireland
but from an Island - calypso style - limbo dancing not obligatory though.
The World Tour continues on into the African continent with "Wee and
a Shave" - of course.

After an appropriate break for a shave and a wee (well maybe just the
fluid rebalancing part) we are off again. And we needed an opportunity to
open the doors and cool the room down a bit - it must be all that creative
energy!

Jo and Kathy together today with lovely work on concertina and guitar.
"Song of the Fool." And "Enrico". Then Bernard joins them with a
second concertina for an appropriate tune for the afternoon "Fanny
Power".

Back to solo artistes with Bill Pardon and the famous FaBclub collapsing
music stand (we must buy a new one - donations welcome). Bill is
threatening to retire "Man from the Pru" and his maturing endowment,
so this may be the last time we hear it for a while. His contribution to the
Irish theme is "Whiskey in the Jar" - a bit more traditional than the Phil
Lynnott version though.

Norman is on guitar today. "Your Cheating Heart", "Girl of your
Dreams" and "Livin' Doll" rock us through the 50s and 60s. Cliff eat
your heart out.

The raffle has lots of prizes today and Clive wins the (very vocal) cuddly
duck.

A Ron Trueman-Border song is the opening song for Ben - "Whatever
floats your boat" with subtle harmonies from round the room. He follows
up with the lovely Richard Thompson number - "Bees wing" - one of my
favourite Thompson songs ever -such amazing lyrics. Thank you Ben.

What a great line up this afternoon! Struggling to retrieve a plectrum from
his pocket to ribald comments from the audience, Alan Neville provides
some social commentary with "Not enough" about growing up
-dangerously and terminally. Moving stuff. Alan has also been inspired by
the terracotta army exhibition at the British Museum, and performs most
of this great song about the questionable plans of the "worst Emperor of
China", with some classic Neville rhyming couplets "Army of Clay". And
"An Irish song" to complete the contribution - about Irish singers always
singing about Ireland.

I'm on next with "Winter Dreaming" which seems to be an appropriate
poem for a cold winter's afternoon, then "Growing Old Disgracefully" gets
a fresh outing. I'll get them both right soon.

To round off the afternoon John Stafford has been lent a guitar by John H
to perform. And we all have to sing along to a bit of skiffle. Or actually
some good solid home town blues in Johns inimitable style. "Worried
man" gets us all rattling and rolling and a mixed rhythm presentation of
"Bobby Magee".