We are a pub rock band and we play pub rock…in pubs, so why we agreed to play a Rugby club presentations event I can't imagine, perhaps it was the money I don’t know, but in retrospect it was definitely not worth it!

We arrived at 6pm to set up our equipment; the event was to be held in a large marquee tent on the club grounds. A long stage ran along the back of the tent for the band and the disco, in front of this were tables where food was to be prepared. The gear was set up in about an hour, since there are five of us in the band we used about two thirds of the stage space. The disco arrived just after we had set up and the DJ informed us that he had arrived earlier and drawn a line on the stage to allocate his right to half of the stage, since we are an amiable bunch and used to playing in small pubs where we can barely move, we gave the DJ his space and squeezed the gear onto our end of the stage.

We were due to start out first set at 9pm after the dinner and trophy presentations. Dinner went on a little longer than expected and the presentations started at 9pm, by this time the Rugby boys were starting to get a little tipsy. The first speech started, “I know there are women and children here tonight, but #uck ‘em this is a rugby club” and so it went on……and on……and on.......... During this time the band were standing outside the tent, unfed, getting colder and just a little bored. Entertainment did present itself however in the for of a drunken rugby wife with a request for a song, she was a bit worse form wear and was trying to hum the tune so that we might recognise it. During this process, she found every now and then that her stiletto heels were sinking into the earth where she stood. It took three tumbles, each revealing her brightly coloured underwear before she decided to stand on something more substantial.

You need to imagine this…. A good looking inebriated girl, getting slightly annoyed because we do not recognise that she is humming the theme from Record Breakers, while her stiletto heels slowly sink into the mud until she looses her footing and falls backwards, legs in the air, revealing her frilly red knickers….and this happened three times.

Anyway, we got called in at about 10pm to start the show, “just grab the mic off him and start!”…… Now this was no easy task, you try getting a microphone from a drunken Hulk that loves the sound of his own voice using expletives every other word.

We started the set at around 10.30pm and believe me when I say that this is not a good time to start a gig in front of a rugby crowd. During dinner the wine had flowed freely and there were only a few left standing. Those that were standing were in no mood to be entertained by the likes of us! After a couple of hard rocking songs, this guy that looked like ‘The Thing’ from the Fantastic Four comics came up to the singer and grabbed his testicles, now this may be a term of endearment in Rugby circles, but if you are not used to it then it can be a little off-putting. He repeated this a number of times and when he was not doing this, he was coming up to me, putting a beefy arm around my neck and asking if we could play a song that I had never heard of. Normally, I would not have thought twice about nutting someone for this type of behaviour, but I have a feeling that this guy would not even have FELT it. The other thing that put me off this course of action was that 'The Thing' was by no means the smallest member of the rugby crowd.

We got through the gig but the outcome was a huge band argument about playing this type of venue that very nearly caused the demise of Bristol's best pub rock band.

 NEVER again.