Friday was one such occasion. I did imbibe a few alcoholic beverages with some good friends and talked myself into going to a gig that one of them mentioned, that was taking place on Sunday. Please bear in mind that gigs are horrifically expensive things for me, it's always 2 or 3 tickets (myself, my youngest daughter, sometime my wife), my daughter always wants a T-shirt, food and drinks, plus travel costs, so a gig usually costs me in excess of £150. I have been going to around 2 gigs a month this year...ouch!
I had planned to do nothing on Sunday, it was to a recovery day but I ended up on the 8 O'clock train to London. I ended up sitting through the Church service at the Chapel in Greenwich and then I ended up taking my youngest up to Camden for lunch. We went again, to the Temple of Seitan. As I joked with my daughters, they may well eat and drink the body of Christ in Chapel but in Greenwich we eat Seitan. I laughed, they didn't.
I had their cheeseburger with bacon and we split a large chips and gravy. The burger was OK but I do prefer their Spicy Temple Burger. The large portion of chips was enough for 3 people and they were delicious. Again, the Temple of Seitan never ceases to amaze me, the food is great (despite my burger review - it was still very good) and it is such a find for vegetarians/vegans and GF folk. If you fit into those categories, go and try the Temple of Seitan, it is the future of animal free fast food.
I had an unexpected call from one of the 2 friends that was coming to the gig and he'd arrived early. We met and he took us to the Devonshire Arms, a dingy pub that is festooned with skulls and rock posters and the inviting motif above the door, "Come to the Sabbath" with a a horned rams skull beneath it. Here is the bar:
It had Trooper on tap so all was not lost to those that entered. The music was pretty death metal but they allow the patrons to request tracks and Anouska went to town.
We had a fantastic afternoon, drinking and chatting, Anouska winding up my wife by telling her that my friend Darren had dragged me to the toilets to be sick as I'd drunk to much and watching the panicked reply. Anouska thinks this might become her new local. We met a fellow Wildhearts fan, Paul, a Geordie living in London, close to my age, and he too, saw the Wildhearts and left early, missing Reef, agreeing that it felt like the end of the night. Anouska socialised and made some friends, and late last night was messaging some of them on social media and they told her she had friends there if she wanted it.
We had such a nice time that we agreed that we would do something like this regularly, take a day once a month or so and find a pub we don't know and go for a lunchtime drink.
We met my other friend Rai and Elizabeth a bit later and went for a drink in the World's End and was served by a really miserable barman. I have no idea why some people go into customer facing jobs, if you can't keep your bad attitude hidden, go and find another job.
On to the Underworld, the venue for the night, and despite it being a venue that many bands have played, it is not somewhere I had been before. I wasn't a fan, the sound was pretty poor and it wasn't a great venue. However, Love Hate were from the 80's LA scene that spawned Guns n Roses and are pretty much the last man standing (although Love Hate only have 1 original member now). They tour quite regularly and I always um and ah about whether to go and when I do go, I am always blown away at the numbr of good songs they have that I have forgotten and last night was no exception.
Jizzy Pearl was always an exceptional frontman, he always had the appearance of good times but he is a clever man and a brilliant writer. He documented the rise and fall of Love Hate in a blog and it was engaging, funny, sad but never bitter but I believe he took it down and possibly released it as a book that is now out of print.
Anyway, he was promoting a new album and the 2 songs he played off it were brilliant. The rest of the set was made up of Love Hate classics including the incomparable and dumb "Why do you think they call it dope" a genius song that is as catchy now as it always was and is an absolute scorcher of a song live: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6odiltGGz_Q
It was a spur of the moment gig, following on from a really good Sunday afternoon, glorious sunshine, great company and it felt like we were entertained by an old friend in the evening. Some days are just meant to be.
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