Man versus (drum) machine

I was in a band in the mid 1980’s called Between Us that I left my Psychology Degree in University for. We were bank rolled by a marketing Director in Smithwicks, and he bought us very expensive equipment. I got a tasty creamy Pearl 6 piece kit worth about 2500 old Irish pounds with the best of zildjian cymbals. We had weird and very contrasting gigging experiences. He had us playing one night upstairs in The Hunting Lodge in Ballyfermot and there was blood stains on the dancefloor and the customers ignored us for the whole gig and when we were about to finish, they came up and ‘asked’ us (told us) to play the National Anthem. We spoofed our way through it shakily, making endless mistakes and bum notes, and amazingly they gave us a standing ovation for our rendition. We were loading out the gear down the stairs afterwards and some bloke was being arrested and pushed into the back of a squad car where he kicked out the back window. A Baptist of fire you might say. A few weeks later we were playing support to Level 42 in the RDS ( to 6000 people!) and also in the Ulster Hall. I remember we had a ‘relaxation’ coach for before the gig and we turned out the lights in our dressing room and lay on the floor meditating (and farting). The Level 42 saxophone player walked into the darkened room and got the fright of his life and told us he thought we were all dead! The smell probably didn’t help.

Anyway, a few months on and this manager rang me up and told me I was fired along with the main singer, Frank. He was to be ‘taking back’ the beautiful drum kit also. I was in tears on the phone. Was it my mullet? He said that they were moving forward as a 3 piece and were going to be using a drum machine instead, for economic reasons. I went back to university and finished my degree and went on to have a decent career in music so I was fine. But it was devastating at the time. 

Fast forward a few decades and I was playing a gig with old friends in Whelans in Dublin last weekend and had a great night playing covers and original songs in a type of jam band. We are all professional musicians, and for once, had a night whereby we had no commercial pressures nor craved a record deal. Just playing music for the joy of it with friends. The interesting thing was that we were supported by another set of very good friends, people that I had recently played a lot with, and one of which was actually in that ‘Smithwicks‘ band that I was in in the 80’s. But guess what…..They had no drummer, just a drum machine!!! (insert scary old horror film music ).  OH NO! It’s back!

The famous Linn drum machine. All is forgiven Roger!