Mill Hill Music Festival - Dear Diary Day 3

A day off from the festival of sorts. No sound systems tonight & my beloved was doing a gig in Elstree with the BBC Elstree Concert Band. That went well but it meant I was babysitting. She got home at 10.30, so I shot up to the Angel & Crown to see the end of Alan Warner's show. I've known Al for 30 years. He's a great guitarist - he made his name in the 1960's with the Foundations and like me he still loves playing. He told me he's a great grandad now !

My band, the False Dots recorded our first demo at his studio, as did other local luminaries "The Polecats". They released theirs on Nervous records - "Rockabilly Guy". This got them signed to Mercury records. Funnily enough, I always wanted to get signed by Mercury as "Mercury Blues" by the Steve Miller bands was one of my favourite numbers.

Anyway, their set (what I caught of it) went from George Formby's "When I'm Cleaning Windows" to "Sweet Home Alabama". As ever with Al, it was a great show. Bought him a beer after and had a chit-chat. Three days in & the festival is going great.

Bizarrely in the car home, the news on the radio was that Mike Freer had brought down Boris Johnson's deputy Mayor Ian Clement. It seems Clement claimed for lunch with Freer and Freer said he'd not been there - he'd been at a funeral in Inverness ??? I'd say that it is good to hear that Mike Freer is refusing to collude if some fiddling of expenses has gone on. I'm steering clear of these issues this week, but it seems such a strange story that I had to comment. I believe these two attended the same BT Vital Vison junket in the USA at our expense. Seems a bit odd that Clement used Freer's name like this as these courses were meant to build social networks??? With mates like that ......

Anyway Tomorrow - Tuesday - we've got the Klezmer show at Mill Hill East Church with Stewart Curtis.

Also a quick reminder that if you want to say hello, come down to see my band, The False Dots, at the Mill Hill Sports Club on Friday Night.