Welcome to a Rock and Roll Christmas

Hi Everyone

Perhaps a lot of my Rubbish readers will be surprised to know that I had a band called The Chessmen (get it Mate - Chess) before the Beatles were formed.  Our first public appearance was at the local Church Institute on Wednesday 27^th February 1957. In 1956, there was an uprising against Russia’s Communist rule in Hungary. As expected, the Russians came down very hard on the population, and many people had to flee the country, so we decided that the money raised at the dance should be given to the Hungarian Relief Appeal. When I look at the ticket price of 2/- (10p), I am amazed that we raised £70. As a band at that time, you had to play for dancing – quickstep, waltz, foxtrot etc. And also some old time dances such as the St Bernards Waltz etc. and novelty dances such as the Conga, etc. As a dedicated non dancer I was definitely more comfortable playing for dancing than making a fool of myself on the floor. In 1956, the world discovered Elvis and Rock and Roll so we had to play this ‘new’ music with our own Elvis in the band. In August 1957 my music teacher said that he had got a gig for us on New Year's Eve at a hotel twenty miles away. What!! - He had never heard us play, and he had booked us into a posh hotel on New Year's Eve to play from 9-00pm to 1-00am. Despite my excuses and protests, he just smiled and said: "You can do it, and by the way, you will get paid £24". On the basis that most of us earned about £4 a week, £24 was a fortune, but with the doubts whether we could do it, we had the added problem of how to get there and back. In 1957, none of us could even think about owning a car, and there were no van hire companies. The solution came from an unlikely source, our local doctor, who for some strange reason that never became clear to me, owned a Bedford van. The bad news was that we had to pay him £10 so our week's wages in 4 hours became half a week- still very good. The next problem was that we had no uniforms, so we bought six matching sweaters that were all about two sizes too small, even though we were all very slim teenagers. At the hotel, we set up for the 9-00pm start. We had no speakers or microphone, so everything was acoustic. As usual, we started with a quickstep, but as most people were in the middle of their meal, we were playing to about 6 or 8 couples at most. After about an hour, we decided to give the rock and roll a try, but to say that it went down like a lead balloon was an overstatement. At that point, we panicked as we knew that without it, we could not possibly play until 1-00am. We had a break and then came back in the build up to the New Year. Suddenly, the floor was full of people from the restaurant and the bars, and after the usual Auld Lang Syne, the conga and all that stuff, we tried the Rock and Roll again. Suddenly, we were rock stars and the youngsters in the room, in particular, could not get enough of it. We finished at 1-00am to be told that we were the best band they had ever had, and the hotel offered us a repeat booking for every Bank Holiday during the year. It was a great compliment and a tempting offer, but the Bedford van hire was a one off so the cost and distance meant that it was an evening never to be repeated. I shared £14 between six of us, dropped them all off at home, took the van back and then walked back home. I was in bed by 4-30am to be ready for work at 9-00am on New Years Day !!. Sadly we never achieved the fame and fortune that the Beatles had, but at least we were rock stars before they got together. Maybe they will book us for the legends slot at Gladstonbury.

I know that Christmas has been with us since mid September, and I suspect that most people, including myself, refuse to think about the C word until at least the start of December. For the Main Contractor, Christmas is already done and dusted with presents bought and wrapped, Christmas cards written and eager to be posted, and all the main food items in the freezer waiting patiently to be eaten. Having said all that, she told me with a smile that there was nothing yet in my festive bag. Now she is scouring the local area with a pair of secateurs for holly for the traditional Christmas wreaths, but frustratingly, every berry laden bough is too high to reach, much to the delight of our local bird population. Anyway, I know what Santa is bringing me this year, as I have given the family my wish list, unless they decide to lose it on purpose. At least if I get something off my wish list, it will be useful, and I won’t need to wrap it up to give to someone else next Christmas. 

Last week I wrote about great one liners in Hollywood films of the !950s and 60s. I thought perhaps it was a dying art until I saw a new film in Netflix this week with this wonderful line, “Everything has an end, except a sausage which has two”. It’s pretty obvious but very clever. So this is the challenge: beat that.

Just a Thought:

If Elvis had only sung sad songs, he would have been known as Elvis Depressly.

Parents are the best people to give presents to - they appreciate them no matter what, except the Senior Partner, of course. 

With everything so expensive this Christmas, it could be just German sausage and cheese for Christmas dinner, but that is the Wurst-Kase scenario.

Brian