WIRED!Sessions.. every last Wednesday of the month... see you at the Wrotham Arms, Broadstairs.. 8:30ish pm kick off!!!!!!

Wednesday 28 December 2011

WIRED! NewYear's Day.. the party @ The Lord Nelson

PARTY! PARTY! PARTY!..

Have you got any new stuff you don't need that you could donate the Help for Heroes raffle?

Got a business? Could you donate a service? Or, maybe a voucher?

C U on NYD!!

Sunday 18 December 2011

WIRED! NewYear's Day.. the party @ The Lord Nelson

Well, November's WIRED! has come and gone... and that will make it the last WIRED! this year, but, never fear.. (oh good grief!)

By popular demand we are back on New Year's Day with the "BIG" session.. yes it's party time. Starting @ 3:30ish.. and going on 'till much later .. FOOD! ~ BOOZE! ~ MUSIC! ... and a MONSTER RAFFLE!.. the raffle (and collections) are in aid of Help for Heroes..

This is THE way to start the New Year.. so be there .. or be square (oh good grief again!)

Season's Gretting to you all... and have a great 2012.

Ken

... and Frank, there really are no monsters...

Sunday 2 October 2011

The Vintage Sessions @ The Lord Nelson

The Lord Nelson on each second Sunday of the month... mellow music with house trio Veronica Cowper (vocals), Frances Knight (piano) and Paul Zec (Sax)

Capable musicians are invited to sit in.

Should be a gas!

Tuesday 27 September 2011

WIRED! on the road.. (again) @ Pavilion Oktoberfest 25th September

Now that was really good!!! ... thanks to all came along and supported us.. check the pics on the WIRED facebook pages.. "Broadstairs' Wired"

See you all on the 28th at the Nelson..

Friday 26 August 2011

The Birth of WIRED!

They say what goes around comes around, well…

One Monday evening, some nine or ten years ago, at The Lord Nelson in Broadstairs, a few local musos got together and had an acoustic open jam night; that was where it all started. After the first one, without exception, people would be there every Monday night. Some weeks, there were just two or three of us, with just one or two in the bar as an audience – Monday not being a popular evening out. Other weeks, there could be up to twelve or fourteen performers; with drums, guitars, violins, harmonicas, mandolins, shaky eggs (mustn’t forget the shaky eggs) and, for most of the time, myself. Yes, I can say I was there at the dawn of it all – along with a handful of others. It quickly became a regular feature: Every Monday night, there would be some people at The Lord Nelson – an eclectic mixture of instruments, singers, and all shades of ability. If we were very lucky, there were even people who came to listen.

The content was mainly Folk music – both modern and traditional – with some Blues, and even a little Country; there were even some original compositions thrown in for good measure. Often, the songs would involve death, heartbreak, booze, or obsession – frequently all in the same verse!

It was not too many weeks before some of the Blues-men in town, who had heard about the Monday nights, rocked up to add their particular edge to the evenings. They soon felt that there was not enough volume with just acoustic instruments and so a few small amps, and even electric pianos, started to appear.

It has to be said, some of us timid acoustic folks felt a little intimidated to start with; however, after plugging our acoustic instruments into an amp, singing into a microphone, and hearing the sound that was created – well, most of us became converted. This was, in its way, the forerunner of WIRED! Indeed, many of the guys and girls who were at those Monday evening are now regular attendees of WIRED!

Ken Wards, one of the first to come along to these Monday evenings, asked me if I would be interested in doing “something similar, but plugged in and ‘wired’ up.”
“Not keen, to be honest,” I said. “I don’t really understand all this electriconical stuff” – but, then again, I am a bit of a push over and so decided to roll along with it. It was decided that these ‘wired-up’ sessions would occur once a month – on the last Wednesday – due, in part, to the extra time and effort it would take to set up all the equipment and take it down again. On the last Wednesday of January, 2006, WIRED! held its first session. In the small, dark, and intimate function room of The Rose, WIRED! came to life. I am very proud to say that I, along with Brian Langsdon, had the great privilege (tinged with a significant amount of nerves) to open that session.

After many successful years at The Rose, WIRED! moved up to the Bradstow Mill. Unfortunately, I was never a part of that section of WIRED!’s history, as I was working in Spain at the time. However, WIRED! never felt settled there and, after a relatively short period of time, WIRED! moved again. This time, it came to The Lord Nelson, where Di (probably one of the finest Land Ladies this town has ever seen) has been looking after us ever since. So, now you could say that WIRED! has come home. What goes around comes around!

Below are some photos taken at one of those early Monday evenings – many of these are still regular contributors to WIRED!, but all were part of the reason for its conception.





There is, of course, one sad exception:
From those very early days at the Nelson, through to the first years of WIRED!, we had a resident drummer who held a special place in our community. Les died on Tuesday 11th March 2008 - his unique style and character were synonymous with WIRED! and our community of musicians and music lovers. He is greatly missed and will always be remembered.


Saturday 28 May 2011

70's Round Up - 25th May Review

Another great night, with diverse and interesting views on the 70's. Here's some of the highlights...











Friday 6 May 2011

And the next WIRED! theme is....

The votes have all been collated and the phone lines are now close; please don't call, as your votes wont be counted and you may still be charged.... Actually, please do call - we need the money!!

Anyhar, the results are as follows:

In third place, and going home tonight is.......... SWAMP!

In second place, and only slightly embarrassed is...... FOLK ROCK (better luck next time!)

So, without further artificial dramatising, in first place and taking centre stage as this month's theme, the star of next WIRED! is.......


Yes indeed, dig out those flares, platform shoes, and sparkly pimp suites, it's time to regress!
Time to Glam up!

As with last month, this theme is completely open to interpretation - so, if you've always wanted to do that Leonard Cohen number in the style of T-Rex, now's your chance!

Those of you wishing to truly enter into the spirit of things may want to dress up - here's a useful link...

And, if you want to get the skinny  on how to have a real n hap'nin' confab, check out this radical site - Slang Terms of the Seventies
Catch ya on the flip side, can ya dig it?

Far out.


Monday 2 May 2011

A good night for the CreeK boys...

Ebba's CreeK managed their own second coming last night, resurrecting themselves for their third 'final last stand' so far this year!

It occurred to some of us that there has been quite a change, over the years, not just in their music, but in the hair! Here's what the boys looked like, back in the day...



It's a wonder they made it this far, really!

Friday 29 April 2011

27th April Shake Down

So, the 79th WIRED! session (this number is plucked, completely at random, out of the air and other guesses are available) got off to a predictably chaotic start; after Ken and Brian opened with their usual carefully planned and precisely executed melodies, our much loved and frequently abused MC 'The Frank' demonstrated his own unique interpretation of what Heavy Metal is all about!

The whole night was a scream (or made you want to) and we're grateful to all who come along and make WIRED! What it is - mostly musical anarchy, but always truly great fun!

The highlight of the evening was Dave Dorman with a surprise appearance by non other than that bat eating legend Ozzy!

Here's a list of all who took part, thanks to you all...

The Frank - loud blue something
Smoke on the Water, Phil & the boys
Dave 'Wozzle' - Hi ho this silver is heavy
Larry - Sweet Caroline, where's my metal?
Geary & Pete with some bluegrass Jambalaya
Roger & crew bluesing it up
Justin - words can't explain!!
Ken & Nige - a bat out of nowhere (heading for Nige's nose it seemed!)
Olivia - Somewhere in fields of gold
Mike - Acoustic Heavy Folk
Dave Dorman & Ozzy Wasborn- been a long time since I thrashed my ... fill in the blank
Duncan & Lee with some Jazz metal, nice. Joined by Gabriel, a new face at WIRED!

See you again on the 25th...

No bats were harmed in the making of this blog.
------------------

Thursday 7 April 2011

The Blog is born - WIRED! gets with it!

So, here we are then! WIRED!'s official Blog breaks the scene.
Well, here's where the craziness happens, now you can keep in touch, up-to-date, and have your say - this Blog belongs to all those fantastic folks who continue to support, encourage, and enjoy good live music in their local pubs!
So what's in the Blog? Well, each month we'll post news about the last WIRED! event and lay down all the highlights, lowlights (surely not!), new faces, and any other interesting, amusing, unbelievable, made-up nonsense that comes to mind!
In addition, there will be various rants and raves that happen to force their way out of the dark manifestations of our minds... We'll try to keep these to a minimum, so as not to get locked away again.
If any of you have something that you're desperately in need of sharing, this here can be the platform from which you can launch it - it may be related in some way to the goings on of WIRED!, but it may just be something that you are passionate about and want to discuss with the fine and upstanding folk in the WIRED! community (of course, we'd ask you to bear in mind the close linguistic relationship between WIRED! and WEIRD when seeking comments from others).
There you have it, then - the WIRED! Blog is born, what happens now is anyone's guess. See you all at the sanitarium!
WIRED! Blogmaster

30th March...

Yes, yes, yes - it's happened again - WIRED! sees another great night of carefully organised and skillfully executed ballet of talent and musical prowess... Oh, alright... but it was a damn good night!

What a shame it was all over so soon!
Last month saw music ranging from Bluegrass to Rock, Acoustic Folk to raucous Blues. Many new faces graced us with some refreshing new styles and sounds, while familiar regulars provided a steady flow of some stompin' music.
If you were there last month, what was the highlights for you? What floated your cruise liner?
If you weren't there - well, you got some catchin' up to do!
A new feature, introduced last month - the WIRED! Theme Voteathon-a-Clapometer Thingy!
Everyone nominated a genre/style/decade, that the next WIRED! session would adopt, five of which were drawn out and voted on. These five were: Hardcore Death Jazz!, Punk, Heavy Metal, Folk Hop, and 40's/50's Swing. From these, the good folk at The Nelson, with all their musical refinement and cultured experience, chose...

So, next month's WIRED! - 27th April, 2011 - will have a Heavy Metal theme!
What does this mean? Well, it's all about interpretation. There's the obvious - play Heavy Metal music - but you could also take a Heavy Metal song and play it in the style of, say, 40's Swing? or take an 80's pop song and add some serious distortion! The aim here is creativity, something a little different.
There's no hard rule - so relax, all you trembling blues men that fear redundancy - the theme is entirely optional, but we encourage everyone to get into the spirit of the game...
For those unsure of how to respond to this Genre of music, here is a chart of appropriate gestures - so as not to offend...

We have posted all the responses to the proposed theme's, in the form of an AnswerGarden, posted on the main page. Please feel free to add your ideas, or vote for existing ones by clicking on them and hitting the submit button. We'll use these for future theme nights.
That's it for now, so go get your leathers on and start moshing! See ya on the 27th!