Well, what a terrible year 2016 has been for celebrity deaths. First we had to cope with my personal god, Bowie, dying of cancer aged just 69. One week later and one of my favourite actors, Alan Rickman dies, also of cancer and also aged 69. Just last week, Victoria Wood, beloved comedienne and a national treasure also died of cancer, at the tender age of 62. And now, Prince too. I’m not sure I could cope with any more and it’s only bloody April. Needless to say, “Purple Rain” has now made it back into at least 2 of our upcoming gig setlists. I’m working on improving my solo at the end; my small way of paying my respects.
The first of these celebrity deaths was by far the hardest to cope with for me, but Prince dying suddenly has been a real kick in the proverbials as well. I had the honour of seeing him in concert just the once and it was a mind-blowing experience. He excelled in everything he did: song-writing, singing, and whatever instrument he tried his hand at. But he was a guitarist foremost, and one of my all-times favourites at that.
So, to pay homage to the Purple One, here are 2 clips that showcase his legendary talent. The first is a cover of the Radiohead song, Creep, which he transforms into something utterly new and beautiful. His solo at about 7 minutes in is quite simply one of the most impressive I’ve ever heard.
The second clip is “While my Guitar Gently Weeps” and was performed at a tribute to George Harrison. About half way through, Prince appears from the sidelines and launches into an incredible solo that seems to take everyone’s breath away, including his fellow musicians’. In a subsequent interview, he casually admitted he didn’t know the song very well, so just made something up on the fly. All I can say is Wow…
Right, sad news over with and onto the weekly roundup. It’s finally stopped raining every day, and we’ve even got some sun, but it’s still very cool out. This isn’t affecting the tic population however. Smeagol broke his personal best yesterday when he trotted in covered in 8 of the little buggers. At least he’s actually going out in the day now, so maybe he’ll finally shift his winter bulk.
We had our band practise on Wednesday, although we were one down as Roxanne was not up to it. We made do just fine and ploughed through our entire setlist with few issues. We’ll try and up the rehearsals to twice a week soon, as the clock’s ticking. On Thursday, we had a social evening. We had Manu and Mathilde, Gael and Corrine and Philippe round for dinner. Matt made an asian meal of all new recipes – pineapple, cucumber and pepper salad to start, followed by a pork stir-fry with egg-fried rice. For dessert he made a cherry chocolate cake – and it was all divine. It was good to see everyone again as it had been a while. We also had some champagne courtesy of Philippe who recently turned 50.
Everyone left us around 1am and we took things easy on the Friday. We also stuck to our guns and did not go to Musique en Herbe that evening, which was very satisfying. We did go the following afternoon for a gig rehearsal and there was no mention of re-recording our problem song, so maybe we’ve managed to put that one to bed.
That evening we had another social activity: Ridgit are currently over from Nottingham and we invited them over to dinner. Their son Alex and his lovely girlfriend Martina were over as well so we had a good time seeing them all. The meal was a repeat of Thursday’s except the porc was replaced with cashew nuts as they’re all veggies. Ridigt are still in France for a few more days so we’re actually going around theirs tonight too for some cheeky monday night socialising.
Right, I think that’s about all I have to recount. The next entry will have a major event to cover: we’re off to the UK on Thursday to attend my brother’s wedding! Really excited about it and looking forward to seeing everyone. Au revoir for now.