Bonjour. First thing, last night we finally got our hands on the last few videos of our concert, so as you can see, there is now a highlights video. The sound quality is patchy-to-bad, but you get the general idea. Matt mentioned that a journalist from the Sud Ouest paper was at our gig, and sure enough our soirée has had a (v brief) mention on their website. We’re hoping to nab a printed copy too.
Ok back to the narrative. We had a very quiet start to the week in which little happened of note. I had to pop out on Wednesday to meet a woman on behalf of a translation client of mine. This took about an hour or so and then on the way home I called in to see Josiane and Cammi to collect a CD of photos of the gig. We also discussed our big plan for this week, which is the story behind this blog title. J & C’s daughter Laetitita is the one who lives in Belgium and works as a tour manager for various bands. One of these is called Selah Sue, from the Flemish speaking side of the country, and she and her band are currently touring. We’d heard some of her music when we went to visit Laeti and mostly liked it, so we were only to happy to say yes when we were invited to go down and see them at Bordeaux on Thursday night.
We found ourselves a budget hotel about 25 mins from the venue and set off for Bordeaux after lunch on Thursday afternoon. Her parents were going as well and were already down there, shopping in Josaine’s case and helping Laeti in Cammi’s case. We eventually caught up with them at the venue around 7 pm, were issued with free tickets and special “after party” stickers and sneakily queue jumped our way inside. There was a small and very posh restaurant inside the venue and Josiane kindly treated us to dinner there while the other 2 dealt with last minute preparations. The venue itself didn’t look much from the outside but held about 1200 people. It was a sellout gig too.
We missed the first act but got in in time to see all of Selah Sue’s show, albeit from the very back of the room (and behind a 6 foot tall afro-haired youth in my case). We’d heard her music beforehand and it is quite minimalist and electronic, but she and the band really brought it to life on stage. They’re all very young – in their 20s to 30s – but very professional and talented. She put on a great show, and her powerful voice belied her petite frame. She’s relatively unknown but already has a dedicated cult following and indeed, many of the kids knew all the words.
Their set ended around 11 and then we met up with Laeti and the others back stage. We actually knew one of the band members already: the bass player, Eric. He and Laeti were going out when we first met so he’d been out to the Dordogne a couple times. We knew he played bass professionally but I was nonetheless blown away to see him rock out on stage. We had a few drinks and exchanged some polite words with the band (the lead singer herself was having a mild prima donna moment and so wasn’t about much) and then they were piling off into their bus. Their next stop was Toulouse the following night and then from there, they were off to Luxembourg. It must be exhausting work going through that every night.
Our 38€ room was about as you’d expect, although the bed was even worse than it appeared so we got a very patchy night of not-quite-sleep and were back on the road home as soon as we got up. That wasn’t it for excitement this week though. Last night, we and around 20 others were invited to a restaurant in nearby St Jory de Chalais to help Barry and Carol celebrate their 40th anniversary. This clashed with another local event meaning Cammi couldn’t make it so we took Josiane with us. The restaurant is called the St George and yes as you may have guessed, is English owned. However, the chef has lived here around 20 years and it shows. I didn’t realise ahead of time that it was a set menu, so did my best with a main of beef, but the starter (puff pastry willed with goats cheese and leek with slices of smoked duck breast) was delicious and authentic.
We were a mix of about 70/30 english/french, including an odious english couple that we tried and failed to sit a distance away from. Luckily for me, I was also next to a Frenchman I hadn’t met properly before, Fred from Matt’s conversation class. He opened by saying, so you’re Matt’s partner? Well then I must give you a kiss hello as he’s a lovely guy. I proceeded to have a great time getting to know him, interspersed with politely disagreeing with some mildly racist comments from the english woman.
We left the place sometime after midnight, dropped Josiane off and got home with both a full head of steam and the last concert clips that Neill the cameraman had brought to the restaurant. We reviewed the films over a nightcap and started to jot down a few song ideas for our next gig, whenever that may be.
Lastly, the obligatory comment about the weather which in stark contrast to the States, has been unseasonally warm this week. It hit a high of 19 today and didnt even go below 10 last night. It’s due to go rainier soon but still no frosts in sight for the timebeing. Ok, c’est tout.