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Personnel:
Fran Ashcroft - Guitar/Vocals
John Drazek, - Guitar
Pete McCarten - Guitar
Dave Mohan - Drums
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Influences:
Beatles,
Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Carl
Perkins
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Setlist
Sample:
Blue Suede Shoes, Bad Moon Rising, Long
Tall Sally
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Equipment:
Guitars; Hofner Club 60, Futurama,
Shaftesbury Rick copy, Premier drums. No
bass guitar, we didn't know anyone who had
one. Amplifiers ranged from a home made 6
watt combo, a Selmer practice amp Pete
bought for a pound (a mighty 1 watt 2"
speaker), and my fab Watkins tremolo amp,
15 watts!
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Rehearsal
Space:
Local
school hall, which was a huge, cavernous
school hall.
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Band
Vehicles:
The
drummers dad drove him in their car, and
the rest of us carried our guitars and
amps on the bus.
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Fashion
Statement:
Nothing
cohesive at all. Another band I played in
bought cheap red nylon shirts that
melted.
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Best
Gig:
Downs
Syndrome Centre Xmas party, 1969. The show
also included a crap magician who accused
Pete of drinking a bottle of milk
essential for one of his tricks. Mayor and
Mayoress of the town were dressed in full
regalia and sat on a ratty old sofa placed
directly in front of the stage. As you see
from the photo, we were a very odd looking
band, and the whole scene was quite
surreal. We were paid one pound each and a
pocket handkerchief.
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Gig
from
Hell!:
There
were so many...new years 1969, youth club
dance; two bands on the bill, the first
were even worse than us. Their roadie had
the brilloiant idea of removing all the
insides from their combo amps, and placing
the innards next to the speaker cabinets,
in a pathetic effort to emulate marshall
stacks with their puny gear. It looked
like an electricians garage sale. There
was some rivalry between our bands, and
they switched the power off halfway
through our set. The night was completed
by an invasion of bikers, who climbed out
of the windows, scraped snow off the roof,
then had a snowball fight inside!
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Last
Gig:
Even
worse than the Gig From Hell. We played
old rock and roll, but the audience wanted
progresive rock. Not only was this beyond
our skills, but the drummer didn't show
up. I think we lasted about 12 minutes
before being mercilessly booed
off.
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Comments:
Have a look at
Fran's website @ http://www.peacework.com/HappyBeat/ashcroft.html
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