NEWS.....Updated 17 May 2008
News May 2008. What can I tell you that you will find interesting? I am also acutely aware that I might be the only person to ever read this!
OK, here goes. We played a gig recently at the Picturedrome without a sound engineer. Fortunately there was a guy in the crowd (thanks
Paul) who owns quite a complicated stereo and thought he knew a little bit about sound engineering. He mentioned something about Bass
and Treble, which seemed to impress the boys (Griz thought it was the name of a pub somewhere) so we set him loose on the desk.
He did a pretty good job, considering we only coopted him on minutes before we went on stage. We had previously applied a similar logic to
choosing a manager (Andy said he had previously kept pigeons, which we thought was evidence enough of his professionalism.) The gig went
OK and the crowd had a great time, so all in all not a bad night. Our current number one fan, Michelle, has bought a sound engineering
book so may well be driving next time round! Spratton Folk Festival looks set to be a great event - we are playing on Saturday 12 July,
warming the crowd up for headliners Peatbog Faeries (I won't tell you what Griz thought this was!)
We have some great gigs booked for the rest of the year, but we are always looking for more. If you want to book us, please
phone Andy on 07794 806338 for details. Rob is planning our world tour of Dublin, after which we will probably update some of our long-overdue
photos pages. That's it for now. If you want to know more about the band or there is something you would like to see added to the website,
please let Andy know. Thanks, Gary.
News January 2008. Well it has all been happening. Bryan has retired from the band. There must be loads of
jokes that start "old drummers don't retire, they just....". Please leave some comments on our guest book to finish this one off!
Bruce Almighty is now our official drummer. "The drummer is dead, long live the drummer", or something like that. Selected from a cast
of thousands, his career, once promising, has now officially peaked. His only claim to fame as he looks back on his life in decades
to come is that he once graced the stage with the greats, Jenkins, Osborne, Watson and Ashton. Lap it up Brucey boy before the
fickle hand of fame pushes you off the stage (or did he fall, we will never know! Either way, compensation is out of the question Griz.)
We also have the return of an old face in the form of Andy Tennet. He has agreed to try to bring some sort of order to the chaos
that is The Angels Share. Andy will be handling all bookings from now on - our fate is in his hands.
We have played some great gigs in the past couple of months, two at the BBC, both good fun. Our highlight though was the
10th anniversary gig on 8th December at The Picturedrome. We were, as usual, the best band to play at the venue in December,
our fans doing us proud by filling the place and buying more beer than any other crowd that month! Well done. We gave away
loads of t-shirts. They are now a collector's item and we have heard reports of people emerging from the mosh pit after a
bit of, er... moshing(???), without their prize shirt, so bring some spare clothing next time you venture out to see us
wearing your favourite item of clothing.
We are starting to get ourselves sorted for 2008, with a few gigs lined up already (see our gig list for details), but
we are always on the lookout for new dates and new venues, so give Andy a call.
Thanks for taking the time to pop back to our website. We look forward to seeing you all at our gigs throughout 2008. News October 2007: Well, it has taken us forever to update our website! I blame the government. Since the last update, we have
played a gig or two. Great Doddington back on 21 July was a good one, as always. The crowd at this venue are always attentive
and appreciative and we love playing there. We also played a gig at the Broomhill Hotel in September. It was a bit of a bugger
getting the van up to the back door, but that lawn was fairly firm and at speed the low hanging branches didn't seem to present too
much of a challenge - I'm sure they will grow back eventually. We have had a few appearances at the Picturedrome and the Black Bottom
Club, all good and thoroughly enjoyable. We have also played at Herbies' 60th birthday party - he was looking well for a man of his age. The gig at Spratton Hall School
back in January was all for a good cause and well organised. Thanks Katy. We have also returned to Crockwell Farm for the odd private function.
A great venue, good food, superb location and, of course, great band. Perhaps the biggest news is that this is out 10th year playing together as a band. We have our 10th anniversary gig at the Picturedrome
on 8 December. It promises to be a great event, with t-shirt and CD giveaways, pin the tail on the donkey, pass the parcel
and beat the hell out of the pinyata (is that how you spell it?). We should also have lots of lemonade and other fizzy drinks, the odd
tear caused by too much excitement and an early night all round. If you think that sounds like your bag then come on down! Or you could
just get pi**ed and rowdy on Mr Richardson's beer - either way it will be fun. Bruce has grown up and left home. He is now studying at some University somewhere and living in the cellar of a pub. He will make the occasional
guest appearance at gigs in the future. Bryan keeps threatening to hang up his drum sticks, but gets that attractive twinkle in his
eye whenever we play anything that isn't a waltz. The rest of us are still there and always looking for work, so if you know of a venue
out there that is crying out for the best celtic rock band in the world then give us a mention, and we may buy you a pint out of sheer gratitude. We hope to upload some photos within the next 2 years, so keep coming back. Thanks and TTFN. Even more entertainment for you!!!!!!! Check out our Caption Competition
page for a chance to win some great prizes, not to mention the two week holiday on Bermuda, all expenses paid, which I
shouldn't have mentioned because it isn't one of the great prizes anyway. You can now download your favourite tracks
as MP3's, and carry them around on your i-pod! How cool is that! Please visit our Music Download
page and click on any of the links to download a track. Our first album, Sufficiently Different is on there
at the moment however we will add other tracks in the coming weeks. Photos from Spratton Festival 2006 for you to have a look at........... News September 2006: The website has had some updating today. Our new CD is now listed on the
website and well worth a look. We have also updated our set list so you can now see details of more of the
numbers we are playing at our gigs. The next big date for us is a three day show in Weston Super Mare, brought to you
by the folk supremo James McKeefry. Should be a great few days. In other news, our manager Mike 10% Mitchell has had
enough of us and moved on to new ventures; who can blame him! Thanks for all of
your support over the last three years Mitch and all the best for the future. Some new photos from Spratton Folk Festival 2006
have also been uploaded today. Photos from a recent Picturedrome gig Here are a few other recent photos News August 2006: The Spratton Folk Festival was great. What a fantastic stage, great crew and superb crowd.
If you came along then you will know what I am talking about. We should be uploading some photos to our website in the next few weeks.
We also played at the Pisturedrome on 22 July, assisted by Jeff on the desk because Dom was away getting his temples massaged!
Last night we played a 25th wedding aniversary. The crowd had a great time, assisted by just a little bit of alcohol, mainly for
medicinal purposes of course. Our next big local gig is in aid of MacMillan Nurses. Come along. Tickets are selling fast. Between now
and then, we hope to record a charity CD in aid of cancer relief so please bring along some change to buy one. 100% of the takings
will go to charity. That's it for now. News July 06: We played at Great Doddington over the weekend. Always a great venue with an appreciative crowd.
We were also fotrunate enough to have a few loyal fans along (Hi Michelle & Jackie), who brought groups of friends and family;
it is always good to see familiar faces in the audience. It is also starting to feel like the faces at Great Doddington are
becoming familiar too, with some dancing by the usual suspects; the team that organises the bands at Great Doddington did us
proud again, laying on a good venue, good crowd, friendly atmosphere and sarnies at the end. We very much appreciated the welcome
and would love to play there again. We have just got back from a gig at the Houses of Parliament would you believe! Richard and Oz entertained
a crowd of over 50 peers and MP's at a reception for the Big Lottery's Awards for All scheme. Steven Boyce of the Awards
for All Scheme Board paid particular tanks to our two heros for the sterling job they did entertaining the crowd. We attended
the event thanks to our association with Spratton Folk Festival who received a grant from the Lottery this year. Also at the event were Tim George, local Spratton musician and writer, who spoke with Sir Clive Booth, chairman
of the Big Lottery board, about the important role that Lottery funding has played in providing him with opportunities in his
local community that he would not otherwise have. Sir Clive couldn't help tapping his foot to the sounds of our duo; we may
be asked to play Lottery events again in future, who knows! That makes two Palaces in one month. Must be some kind of record.
Photos of the event will follow when we get them. Our much vaunted new CD has eventually arrived to huge critical acclaim..... It is in support of Make a Wish.
50% of the profit will go to that foundation so please buy it and help support this great charity. The CD will be featured
on our website in due course. In other charity news, Kathy Hill wrote to us to say that the NSPCC gig we played in April raised
£1782.04 for the society, which is a superb achievement by Kathy and her team of helpers. She is now doing the rounds of local
businesses to see if they will match her fund raising....big business dig deep please! She confirmed that her Dad also
entered into the spirit(s) by taking some very blurry photographs throughout, however we may get some better photos
from a more sober friend in due course. As soon as we get these, I will post them on the website. That's it for now. Keep tuning in for more soon. 16 June 2006 - First news is that the website hasn't been updated for ages (thanks Kathy!) however
I have got my thumb out of my a** and I am sorting it now! It has been a busy few months, with gigs and changes along the way. In January we played a 40th (or was it 50th?) birthday party for a friend
of ours. Everyone seemed to have a great time with lots of drinking and dancing, as these
occasions require. February saw some rehearsing but not much else. Into March, we played the Corby Irish Centre on Paddy's night and the
Picturedrome the night after.
The Irish Centre gig was fantastic, with loads of drunken people falling over, (some onto our kit),
the odd scuffle and much dancing and merriment. The Picturedrome was also fab, with loads of dancing,
screaming and familiar faces smiling - we love playing there. In April we played a charity gig for NSPCC, attended by an enthusiastic and appreciative
crowd, at the Cripps Centre in Northampton. The event was a great success, raising lots of money for NSPCC.
In more tedious news, we also renewed our band insurance! We had a wedding in May at Croxley Farm - a super venue at which everyone ate, drank and
made merry - somewhere along the way we also lost Rich, our Sound Engineer, and took on a new man, Dom, who
is doing a great job for us. Rich is currently working at Disney and will be back in September (Hiya Mickey) -
you can follow his Mickey Mouse antics at his website. We also recorded a new CD (which should be out in a week or two) at
Sensible Studios in London, a great studio and a super engineer,
Wes. The CD is another charity item, to raise money for Make a Wish, our
chosen charity for several years now. We spent two intensive days playing, followed by another day mixing
and further days by the studio finishing off the recording. Our thanks to Jeff, Wes and the team for their work. Here we are in June. Last weekend we played at Blenheim Palace again, for Make a Wish - we had
fun and games getting our wiring across the Great Hall without causing any damage to the priceless items in there.
We played before the superb meal and again afterwards. At the same event, Amici
also entertained the crowd before dinner. As we approach the Summer, our plans for forthcoming gigs can be seen
in our giglist, including the one you see on our homepage,
Spratton Festival. You may know that we are heavily
involved in the organising and management
of the event and feel this really is our own festival. We welcome our loyal supporters along and guarantee a great weekend. Thanks for checking back in with us and have a great summer.
It has been a while since the website was last updated however there have been lots of happenings to tell you
about in that time. Firstly we have played some fantastic gigs since June. The most memorable were the Spratton Folk Festival
which Gary and Oz both played a part in organising as well. We hope that it runs again next year - the signs are promising but
there is lots of work to do in the meantime (keep 14 & 15 July 2006 free). Other favourite gigs in the interim have been the
Picturedrome (always a fantastic
venue that just seems to get better and better). Monty regularly works the lights for us when we play there and that makes a real
difference - I particularly like the ones that sweep across the crowd and stage (GOBBOS?)- makes us look like we are playing a major
stadium or something! We have also played twice at a new venue; Careys at Coventry. This is
well worth a vist. The Guinness flows
freely and the entertainment (i.e. us) is well worth dropping by to see. On Saturday night we discovered a little gem in the form
of Great Doddington Working Men's Club. What a great crowd. They listened attentively throughout and applauded rapturously.
It is nice to play a venue where you can put some thought into the numbers (particularly the quieter ones) without having to
shout over the noise of the crowd (not that we are complaining about noisy crowds - keep on screaming by all means). It is nice
to have a different reaction occasionally because that has an impact on the way that we play and what we are able to do.
We hope to go back there soon. In other news, we now have a different Sound Engineer. Andy, our knob jockey, has moved on to pastures new
and into the breach has stepped Rich Soper. Rich is an accomplished engineer with many years
experience. He has played a key role in our many recent technical acquisitions and is starting to make a real difference
to our output. For those of you with a technical bent, prepare to drool over our significant recent purchases. Perhaps
the most notable buy is our new front of house desk. The Allen & Heath is
a great addition to our technical kit and enables us to get all of the mixing (drums included), off stage so that we
can concentrate on playing. Another great buy is a rack mount Crown power amp for our stage monitors and a set of four
JBL wedges to blast the front line. We have also brought Bryan an EV Eliminator to use as his own drum monitor, also
run from a separate amp. This gives us four independent monitor mixes. For those of you who don't go for
technie stuff, what this means is that we can actually hear ourselves properly, for the first time since we started
playing together all those years ago. This has moved us on to a new level, both professionally and personally. We hope that our
hugely improved sound, on stage and front of house, will bring the band on in leaps and bounds. If you thought
we were good before, listen to us now! If only we had the looks for fame and fortune! Thanks for sticking with us - the demand for our new CD (yes, I am afraid we are still working on duplication)
demonstrates that our fan base is strong. We know many of you personally, and like to see familiar faces in the crowd.
Keep supporting us. It is your participation that keeps us going. We will try to keep the website a bit more up to date, when we aren't busy organising folk festivals
(some said we only did it to get a gig - harsh but fair) Check out the photographs below. 16/7/05 - Spratton Folk Festival. 25/6/05 - Gig list updated today. Check back over the next few days for updates on how our gigs went over the last
couple of months and hoe the recording session went. 25/4/05 - Website updated today. Check out our updated gig list as we have some great shows coming up, notably at the County Tavern
and the Picturedrome in Kettering Road,
Northampton.. On more technical news, we are looking to invest in our foldback and front of house equipment in the coming
months to bring us into the digital age and improve our sound still further ("Is that possible?", I hear you cry!!) If you
want to join our e-mailing list, please send an e-mail to Oz with your details simply by
CLICKING HERE. Please also leave a comment or two in our guestbook at Bravenet. 24/4/05 - We recorded live at Molly's Mar tonight. Everyone had a great time and the audience were particularly fantastic (thank you everyone).
We have had a quick listen to the rough (and we mean rough!) cut of the recording and all of the screaming that you did has been picked
up beautifully! We now have some work to do in mid May back in the studio to tidy things up a bit and choose a selection of numbers
for the final CD which should be out in July. Don't forget to hang on to your tickets as they can be redeemed for a discount off the
selling cost of the cd. Once again, thanks for your support; you make it all worthwhile! To view the photos click on the following link: 24/4/05 - Molly's Bar, Northampton. 6/1/05 - Website updated tonight. A great final few months of 2004 with some good gigs around the county.
We are planning our schedule for 2005 and already have a number of bookings - Available dates are now looking fairly tight
so give us a call if you want us to book us to play at your do. The truck is now on the road and will be loaded with all
of our kit tomorrow morning! 27/10/04 - Website updated tonight. Keep watching this space for news of forthcoming gigs.
the Angels Share are also billed to play the forthcoming Spratton Folk Festival, the newest and most vibrant
festival on the folk scene. Check out the new festival website at Spratton Folk Festival for further information. The website is still under construction
but will be up and runing soon. Keep checking back for further information. Make a provisional note in your diaries for 16 July 2005. October 2004 - We are buying a truck.......Aaaarrrrrrggghhhh!!!!!! Five go wild in....
er.... Northamptonshire. Watch this space - it looks like two back ends welded together! Registration
plate, what's that?? MOT, surely not....! Er, insurance, for us? Apparently Richard phoned SAGA to
ask about insurance for a band truck, and when they stopped laughing about the fact that a man of his age
was still gigging, they said......er.....no! 15/10/04 - We played at a charity event for Make a Wish Foundation in Whitney. They are a great charity, supported by the good and the
great including such notary individuals as Jude Law, Keith Chegwin and, er, us! The growd had a great time. We played a
number for James which Bryan and Jayne appreciated. Brought a lump to all throats. 11/09/04 - We played at the Picturedrome in Kettering Road,
Northampton. Probably our favourite venue. It was a fantastic start to our
gigging season. Crowd were fantastic and loads of friends turned up, probably
thanks to Andy's advertising. Good knob jockying. We hope to be back there
early next year. 13/06/04 - We played at Blenheim Palace at a high
profile charity event for our chosen charity, the Make a Wish Foundation.
We had a great night although Gary forgot his cufflinks and some nice boys
from the Royal Horse Guard made him some out of old buttons! Jude Law and
his girlfriend said that we were very good so we gave them a free CD to see
if they might book us for some fabulous private party in the future.....We
are still waiting by the phone Jude! The event was featured in Hello magazine
but not to many pictures of the band unfortunately! We have put a few pictures
of the event on our website above. Take a look.
