Who Nose the Rose?
“Let em say we’re crazy, I don’t care about that, put your hand in my hand baby, don’t ever look baaaacccck”
As we valiantly sang those words at 11:32 last night I imagine most people in The Rose, especially those on stage were questioning our sanity.
It had all started 3 and a half hours earlier, when at the beginning of our Red Nose Rockaoke night we rather foolishly guaranteed that everyone who wanted to sing would get at least one song. It’s for charity after all, what’s a band to do. And so we rocked and rocked and rocked until we had squeezed all the sweat and energy from our foreheads, strings, drums, lights, the rockstars, the pub and it’s staff. I’m pretty sure the door said “thank f@*k for that” when I closed it on the way out.
The night opened in style with a huge slice of big bad Jon Bon Jovi. Helena ( the organiser ) and her Red Nose crew set the standard for the rest of the nights rockers by laying down a storming version of Living on a Prayer. This got the crowd going and the first set flew by at ferocious pace with Sweet Child of Mine, Mr Brightside and You Really Got Me building to a Roger Innocenti shaped Simply the Best crescendo to close.
The second set bought around a semi naked rendition of Sex on Fire with Steve George struggling to raise the necessary £10 to whip his top off. Sophie from Surrey came up trumps though and coughed up the cash for him to reveal himself to the audience. She then kindly offered to do a number in the buff for £20. I wish I hadn’t bought all those red noses at the start of the night. We are now very seriously considering making “naked song” a regular part of the show. The performance of the night came from the middle of the second set when Jon caught hold of I Believe in a thing called Love by The Darkness. He grabbed it by the collar, spanked it and sent it home like a naughty little school boy.
By the time the third set came around, the last tube catchers had made theirs moves and we were left with a slightly smaller, unquestionably drunker but nonetheless resolutely rocking red nose massive. They were in for a treat however as we unleashed a volley of dirty rock anthems to tie the night up. Killing in the Name of, Nobody Knows and Whole Lotta Rosie got dusted off and thrashed about, but to be honest, by that point in the evening it wasn’t really a fair fight and we nearly didn’t make it out of the ring.
And so we made it to Helena’s swangsong at the end of a wonderful evening. The might of Starship’s Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now carried us all home on a Red Nose shaped cloud and even now my ears are still ringing. All in all we busted through the best part of 40 songs in 3 hours, raised around £900 for Red Nose Day and agreed that this felt like the start of a beautiful relationship.
This year The Rose, next year Wembley.
Job done.
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