WAKEY WAKEY, WORLD!
Time to start turning again, you sexy blue marble! There are no words, or maybe there are, let’s see shall we? – Absence makes the heart grow fonder! – Long time, no see! – We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when! – We don’t talk about Bruno… erm, where were we? Oh right… WE’RE BACK, BABY! Dancing shoes dusted and feet keen as mustard, coiffures betowsed (or toupees deloused), ruffles inflated and hips pre-gyrated, here we go again… It’s only blooming Letham Nights Number 65, you absolute flaming saucepots, you!
Yes, here we all came, bleary and care-sodden, emerging from our isolation baskets like dazzled rescue donkeys blinking into the light. “How does this all work again?”, “Who are all these people?”, “Is this five pound note current, or is it from the before-times?”. But nervousness soon gave way to vervousnous and off we sailed into the funky blue yonder…
Opening the re-opening (if you follow) was old friend of Letham Nights, Robbie Ward. Robbie has walked amongst us many times, in several musical incarnations, once solo and several times as part of bands with names too long and varied to list here for reasons of time. On he came with his trademark humility and quiet charm, and gave us just what we needed after all those months of absence; a great big dose of humanity. No one does humanity like Robbie. No misanthrope, he. He casts his anthropological eye over the profound and mundane and turns them into beautiful, moving and hilarious studies of who we are and what makes us tick. From wandering down to Broughty Ferry harbour with a nice ice-cream to the frustration of trying to predict the behaviour of the number 73 bus, Robbie doesn’t miss a detail. It’s a small world, when you say hello, after all.
Tom McGuire and The Brassholes were the last act to play Letham Nights in 2019, so it seemed only fitting that they kick start us into the new era. And here they came, all present and correct, Brassholes to a man, but… where’s Tom? Confusion and anxiety reign… worried shouts (“Tom, Tom, where are you Tom!”)… should someone call the police?… but wait… what’s that under the stage?… racoons?… badgers?… The Upside Down?… OMG, IT’S TOM McGUIRE! He’s been under the stage since 2019, (you see?)! Looking hugely chipper for a man who’s spent over two years in solitary, and with a cry of “I don’t know what year it is, but I know what time it is. IT’S TIME TO ROCK!”, Tom seizes his Fender Starcaster and, white jeans shining beatifically, launches into a family-size slab of hair-funk the like of which the world hasn’t seen for exactly two years and six months. Over the following two sets, Tom and the Brasshole family take us on a stomping, horn-fuelled odyssey into the screeching bowels of G(lasgow)-Funk.
But it’s not only the band who came to rock…
Cut to young Darren, minding his business, throwing some shapes in the crowd, until Tom asks him what he was doing in 2008…
Turns out Darren was playing guitar in 2008…
Turns out he still plays a bit…
Does he want to jump on stage and play a solo, Tom asks…
Yeah, okay, Darren answers…
Well, this could go either way, we think…
Turns out there’s nothing to worry about folks. Darren absolutely shreds it. The axe is still smouldering as he hands it back to Tom. What a moment, what a man!
The dancing, prancing and bonhomie continue unabated until viral hit ‘Ric Flair’ blows the bloody roof off and by the encore, it’s elbows and emotions spilling out all over the dancefloor before we all head off into the spring evening to enjoy the green shoots of new growth. See you next time, everybody!
