Journal

Bedford Esquires – Sunday 26th February 2023

A return to one of our favourite venues. Crowd wise we were up against the EFL Cup Final and the big rugby international. So a decent crowd but not our normal packed house. Still the atmosphere was good and I think this was one of the first circuit gigs where the new Line up really bedded in. Frank was so comfortable on the drums he played with a lot of freedom and Kelly was probably the star of the night.

Her vocals sounded superb and she really nailed our new version of All Along The Watchtower as well as the Steamboat Song from the new album 2,000 Miles (Currently number 7 in the IBBA charts)

Chris has some new toys in the form of two killer pedals and his sound was even better than usual. We played the old song Rainmaker off of Dark Angel for the first time (For this line up) and it went really well. Death of the Blues and Better Days from the new CD were particularly good as was the version of Dark Angel

We are back at this real music lovers venue on the 1st of October

Gary

The Cavern – Saturday the 15th February 2020

Review to follow

The Skegness National Festival of Blues and Rock – Saturday the 18th January 2020 & Main Set Sunday 19th January
– A blockbusting jam session with highlights that included a great Scottish Band who’d come together just to do 2 numbers at the jam, WITH BAGPIPES!!!, brilliant!. Also the set from that great guitarist singer Roy Mette playing with that great guitar player Carlos
Over 60 diverse musicians boys and girls some disabled, with a massive range of styles came together to provide a wide ranging array of music that straddled meny syyles and levels of technical musicianship. At one point the new Blues Matters stage at Hotshots was a lockout and security were not letting any more people into the venue as the jam continued tomaintain its high popularity despite a relatively low level of advertising and the efforts of the excellent Blues Matters. A couple of numbers from s kicked off the afternoon at 12.45 and then the event rocked through until 16.30 with all but an unlucky couple of people managing to get on stage at some point
Gary
Now onto Sunday night and time for the Roadhouse main set featuring new material being heard for the first time. Even though this was the Bands 14th straight appearance at this legendary festival still the crowd was out in force for us and their support was tremendous. Highlights included a great version of ‘Slip Away’ (Dedicated as ever to Jules Fothergill), the excellent new ‘Rock and a Hard Place’ and a killer version of ‘Dark Angel’. 2 encores and all in all, a great night
Gary

The Tuesday Night Music Club – Coulsden – Tuesday 3rd September 2019

A great return to this incredible venue full of real music lovers. A massive crowd for a Tuesday cheered us all the way through a great gig. Highlights included a storming version of ‘Dark Angel’, a toast to all in ‘Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues’ and the ‘Preacher Man’ encore was very well played with brilliant vocals from Mandie (Thanks to Richard for having us and letting us encore even though it took us over time
Gary

The Cambridge Rock Festival, Sunday 28th July 2019

Our 7th time at the legendary CRF, one of the best organised and ‘nicest’ festivals in the UK. As ever it was an honour to be a part of it and Dave and his team worked wonders in adverse conditions. The Saturday amd Sunday saw the rain lashing down and some people giving up with their tents and leaving early.

There was still a very good crowd for our appearance on the Emerald Stage and we gave it our all with a set that was at least 40% different to last years set. Mandie was on top form dominating centre stage, while Danny was on a hot streak, his Bognor amp tone sounding like warm cream (In truth I don’t know what warm cream sounds like, but it came to mind). Roger and Bill just nailed it, driving the whole thing along. The set was:

1. Hell on Wheels
2. Swamp Girl
3. Slip Away (Dedicated to the marvellous Jules Fothergill)
4. Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues
5. Blues Motel
6. Knocking on Heavens Door
7. Tellin Lies
8. Voodoo Queen

Encore 1 was Preacher Man, Encore 2 Dark Angel (In response to all the shouting from the crowd)

One of our best big Stage performances of recent years. A special thanks to Stage Manager Adrian Phillips and his team and the excellent Sound Crew who did an amazing job.

Most of all thanks for the great support to all that came
Gary and all in Roadhouse

The Cavern, Raynes Park, Bank Holiday Monday, 6th May 2019

Another storming gig at our local, top quality music venue. Great to see so many friends and people who have come to support us over the years. Two more shows to come here in 2019, don’t miss them
Gary

The Hope Tavern, Holton Le Moor/Market Raisen, Sunday 29th April 2019

A record breaking attandance at our once a year appearance at this great Sunday afternoon venue. Playing with just Mandie on vocals now and the crowd feedback to the new style line up is tremendous. “Finest Roadhouse gig I’ve ever been to” was said by about 5 people
Mandie was freed up for a real front woman performance by her new radio mic and the Band put on a storming show. 4 encores in total
We’ll be back next year
Gary

Esquires – Bedford, Sunday 10th March 2019

Another return to an established venue for us. This venue is full of musicians and staunch supporters of live music. During the Skegness festival this entire venue transports itself to JAKS stage and gives us its support, priceless
Once more we played a different set, every show now has a different set list with plenty of old songs featured.
This time out after a few months break ‘Dark Angel’ was given a good airing (Request from Ian Stringer, to whom the song has special meaning)

A great atmosphere, great crowd and a great gig with Danny and I swapping hats while we played at the end. Mandie did an exceptional job on this one, revelling in our new mostly one girl line up.

We’ll be back on the 13th October, get it in your diary
Gary

The Colourhouse Theatre, Merton Abbey Mills, South Wimbledon, 3rd March 2019

Lots of great work has been done in extending this lovely Local Theatre since our last visit. Now extended with a spacious, comfortable new bar and seating area. It was great to be back. It was a good crowd despite the stormy/windy weather conditions
Unfortunately for us the whole band were weighed down with the crushing news of the death of our good friend and ex Band Colleague Jules Fothergill. We changed the set in memory of Jules to include the 2004 faves ‘No Place To Hide’ and ‘Slip Away’

Picture by Ken Jackson

Our re-working on ‘All Along The Watchtower’ was still in the set and the set climaxed with a great version of ‘Voodoo Queen’ after which the wonderful Mr Robin Bibi thanked the crowd and led them in shouts for an encore. A belting version of ‘Preacher Man’ and another great (but sad) evening at the Colourhouse was over

Picture by Ken Jackson

The Cambridge Rock Festival – Friday 27th July 2018

After having the honour of closing the entire festival last year, we were delighted to be invited back for the 5th time for our First Friday appearance.
Closing the action on the Emerald Stage, we were pleased that after some heavy rain, the freak temps had come down from the highs that had some musicians throwing up stageside earlier in the day.

We played an all action 90 minute set, featuring content from our new 25 Year Anniversary Double CD. From a rousing ‘Tellin Lies’ as the opener, through ‘Swamp Girl’ and ‘Blues Highway’ the set picked up more and more momentum

The final song was ‘Voodoo Queen’ in the middle of which I managed to forget Danny’s Personal introduction, durghhhh. Still I was reminded in time and he belted that out as well as a burning climax to the song which left us with a very big shout for an encore. We played Preacher Man of which a video can be found in the video section of this site. Very unusually for CRF we were asked to play a second encore. An emotional ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’ finished the night, with the girls singing sweetly on their solo section.

caption id=”attachment_2845″ align=”alignleft” width=”300″] Rear View, CRF 2018 – Photo by Steve Dulieu
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A massive thank you to Dave Roberts and his amazing team who put on a hell of a festival, with organisation that is exceptional
Will we be back a 6th time?
Gary

The Cavern Raynes Park, Bank Holiday Monday 28th May 2018
Another good one, and on a Bank Holiday Monday afternoon, that made a change to our usual Saturday night or Sunday afternoon slots. A good sized crowd saw us play some classic older songs for the first time in line with the limited release of our 25 Years of Roadhouse new double CD.
Slip Away went down particularly well with girls belting out the big chorus and Danny playing a great version of what on the original CD was a seminal Jules Fothergill solo.

The end of the show was well staged with ‘Voodoo Queen’ being given a thumping outing which the old classic deserved, followed by encores ‘Preacher Man’ and ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’

Onto the Cambridge Rock Festival we go
Gary

The Hope Tavern, Holton Le Moor, Market Rasen, Sunday 29th May, 2018

A great gig, write up to follow

Bedford, Esquires, Bedford, Sunday 22nd May 2018

A really good return to playing live for the Band, Full write up to follow

The National Festival of Blues & Rock – Butlins, Skegness – Friday 19th – Sunday 21st January 2018

To our 13th appearance at this great festival. On the Saturday we ran the Jam session as is the tradition and is for so many people the highlight of this great festival. The Jam allowed over 60 musicians, including people who had played on the main stages, plus punters attending coming together in a great cocktail of music. Everyone was flying by the seat of their pants and the music was spontaneous, edgy and often brilliant. We kicked it off with a 30 minute session, which warmed up the room nicely and then the main event started. Running from 12.45 to 16.00 the jam concluded with a great set from Robin Bibi on guitar and Nigel Feast on harp and they were joined from a great drummer, randomly generated from the waiting list of players, and Bill Hobley and Danny Gwilym on bass and 2nd guitar respectively, from Roadhouse filled the line up out nicely. Final song of the Jam 2018 was a version of Stormy Monday by said line up who were joined by Roadhouse chanteuse Mandie.G on the Vocals, magic. Unusual for any of us to be involved, but for that final set it was required.

On Sunday evening at 20.00 it was time for our own main set on the JAKS stage. We were without Sarah Harvey Smart due to a last minute problem and our good friend Sarah Duberi stepped in and supported Mandie.G on vocals for the final 3rd of the set, including a cracking version of ‘Dark Angel’. The crowd were with us every step of the way and it swelled from a half full room to well over the 400 mark by the half way point (Official door count), before a double encore ending of ‘Preacher Man’ and ‘Turn Your Face’ (Thanks to Host Clive Rawlings for the stage time) brought the show to an end . Well done Roger for the blinding drum solo in ‘Tellin Lies’ and everyone who came out and supported us in a packed room when they had other stages available to visit

THE ANNUAL ROADHOUSE XMAS SHOW – THE BULLS HEAD BARNES – MONDAY 11TH DECEMBER 2017

The annual Xmas show was a large well attended occasion as per normal. It is a great opportunity to feature some of our friends as we do every year.
The evening started off at 10.30 with Geronimo, a guitar player with a fine past heritage. Next up we welcomes the very talented Band Deep Blue Sea to the stage. Now on their 3rd Line up, they were excellent, with a great new female singer and guitarist Chris from their previous line up joining them for the final few songs.
After the Roadhouse set we had a bumper line up which included Roadhouse legend and slide guitar supremo Jules Fothergill (Go and see his current Band Northsyde), ex Savoy Brown harp playing vocalist John O’Leary and the local guitar hero who’s CD was one of the best releases of 2017, Robin Bibi. Mr Frank Dymore was the drummer for the first and final set and it was good to hear his signature cymbal splashes punctuate a superb set as the great line up sent the crowd happy into the December night.

As for the Roadhouse set, our ladies were well kitted out for a rocking Xmas Jumper night and we were allowed to play at a reasonable volume for the first time in 3 years at this great, historic venue and made the most of it belting out a set of Roadhouse classics

Ok, the songs (As ever ) were not very Xmasy, ‘Dark Angel, Hell on Wheels’ etc, but the crowd were with us and everyone had a great time. For the final 2 rockers we were joined by the aforementioned Jules Fothergill as we blasted out a Skynyrd style 3 guitar barrage on ‘Tellin Lies’ and ‘Preacher Man’. Jules and Danny were sparking off of each other at the Climax of Preacher Man and I wish that was captured on Youtube.

All in all a great night and we hope to be in a position to repeat it again next year
A Happy Festive Period and New Year to all our Friends and a massive thanks to all that turned up on that great night
Gary

BEDFORD ESQUIRES- Sunday 15th October 2017

We were without Sarah (Temp Personal Reasons) for this, one of our favourite gigs. Still, without her it shifts the dynamic, Mandie took centre stage and sporting her blond Annie Lennox hair style, put in a great performance. Danny had more room to operate and as a consequence the whole show was a bit more rocky and edgy.

We opened with the ZZ Top styled ‘Blues Motel’ from Gods & Highways and drove our way through a more energetic first set than usual. The 2 set we played our cover of ‘Roadhouse Blues’ and got our good friend Carlos up for some extra guitar pyrotecnics as Danny played my guitar and Carlos played his (As pictured below)

More to follow……..

THE TUESDAY NIGHT MUSIC CLUB – COMRADES – COULSDON – TUESDAY 26TH SEPTEMBER 2017

A welcome return to Richard Dunning’s excellent (Check out his great radio show) and booming Tuesday night venue. There is something very special about a place that is packed with real live music lovers on a Tuesday night. We felt very humbled by the big crowd and that people had come from as far a field as Ruislip and even Bedford and the South Coast to keep the spirit of Roadhouse going. It was also great to see top rock and blues photographer John Bull there and his pictures punctuate this review and are newly installed in the Gallery section of this website (All are available for purchase from the man himself).

The first set was on point with Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues keeping its place in the set and essentially freshening the whole thing up with the sound of a great “New” number. The girls sang ‘Queen of the Mountain’ (Sarah) and ‘Midnight Rain’ (Mandie) and as both of these songs had not been performed at the last gig it was great to see a bit of ‘rotation’ keeping the show fresh. Danny was pulling in the ovations with his soloing and our guitar trade off in ‘Rock Me Baby’ was our 3rd good one in a row.

The second set as usual saw the Band branch out and rock it up. The girls were putting on a great stage show and there was a lot of energy being expended under the hot stage lights. Mandie swapped by baseball cap with her leather cowboy hat and there I was doing a Robin Bibi for the rest of the set. Pictures show that it did not look too bad, but at that point I was just focused on the music. As usual Roger’s lightning infused sticks brought the house down during the drum solo in ‘Tellin Lies’. It was a strict 11pm curfew and the encore ‘Preacher Man’ just had time to reach its climax as the clock ran out on us.

Thanks to Richard for having us back and thanks for the great crowd who all came out on a Tuesday night, so many old friends there. A magical evening for all of us
Gary

Finally a great picture from band Photographer Steve Dulieu:

THE CAVERN, RAYNES PARK – SUNDAY 20TH AUGUST 2017
One of my favourite shows is the late Sunday afternoon slot at The Cavern. The overall quality of Bands that play here is amazing and Noel keeps them in an orderly queue that ensures constant quality for his audience. Sunday afternoon tends to bring in the real music lovers and they enjoyed the enhanced volume and tone of Noel’s new PA. This worked a treat on our 3 vocal set up, giving us a really great overall sound as the vocals flew above the noise that the rest of Band make.

We had 4 great lead vocals from the ladies who were on top form and a few great duets. Strangely my vocals were much better than usual. The win of the night was that without any rehearsal we played a note perfect version of ‘Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues’ which went down a storm. It reminded me what a great song that is and it is now officially back in the set. Bill and Roger were on top form and Danny overcame some initial technical issues to rush around the pub blasting out his usual killer sound and playing.

Overall we played for 2 hours and 20 minutes and for the last 15 minutes I was running on fumes. Apologies to the crowd that there was no 2nd encore, I kind of learned how long I could play for at this one. The rest of the Band were still up for it and plenty left.

Great show, thanks all for coming and Noel for having us. I’ll have to get fitter!
Gary

THE WOOLPACK, BANSTEAD – SUNDAY 13TH AUGUST 2017
Ace Roadhouse fan and all round good guy moved mountains to have us play a show at his local. A lovely big pub, special thanks also to Danny the publican for having us splash our dark, gothic, Southern Rock/Blues epics all over his nice drinking establishment. A very different show from Headlining the Cambridge Rock Festival. Thanks for the good turn out of Roadhouse friends and supporters!

Really nice to have so many great people virtually in touching distance while we played. Thanks to the venue for no restrictions placed on the Bands sound or volume. The second set was even more well played and in a nice relaxed way. Two encores including a strong version of ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’ to close the night. Remember never, ever give up, stand by your friends and family and fight for yourself just as hard (Well thats what the song is about really!)

See you soon
Gary

THE CAMBRIDGE ROCK FESTIVAL – SUNDAY 6TH AUGUST 2017 – Cambridge UK

Our 5th appearance at CRF, a massive thanks to Dave Roberts and Adrian Phillips for having us back and all the incredible sound people and staff that make it the friendliest and nicest festival around. The new great location allowed for the 2 Big stages and a sizeable 3rd. It was a great honour to have the Headline slot on the Blues/Rock Stage. There was no Stage 1 and Stage 2 this year. We were closing the festival on the Sunday night, up against Atomic Rooster on the Rock/Progressive Stage. I’m pleased to report that we pulled a really good crowd into our giant tent and they partied with us throughout.

Our set was scheduled for a mammoth 90 mins but The Ben Poole Band overan by 20 mins, and we were frantically having to re-adjust. I wore a baseball cap just to change my visual and Roger did not recognize me for a while (Seriously). The girls looked great as did the one and only MR Bill Hobley on the Bass.

The set was something like:
1. Hell on Wheels
2. Swamp Girl
3. Blues Highway
4. Too Tired To Pray
5. Queen of the Mountain (Great vocal by Sarah)
6. House of the Rising Sun (Superb vocal by Mandie)
7. Roadhouse Blues
8. Tellin Lies
Encore: Preacher Man

It was nice of the Stage Manager Adrian to insist we took a Band bow to the crowd at the end, but I suppose it really had gone that well. A special thanks to Roger who was as solid as a rock with his drumming and again excelled with his solo in Tellin Lies.
Another one to remember on a big stage to a big crowd at a special festival. We’ll come back anytime
Gary

The Wrotham Arms –

Friday 14th July -2017
A massive thanks to Geoff (Promoter) and Jackie (Hard Working Landlady) for having us back to this lovely music pub on the Kent Coast.
It was a sunny day the brighten things further. The pub doubles as a Hotel and many rooms were sold to people who had come to see and or photograph the Band.

Acoustics here can vary for us tremendously, but tonight we were blessed by the gods of sound and the whole show sounded great (All round feedback or no feedback if you see what I mean). For once Sarah had the loudest Mic (Hooorah, she’s had a lot of bad luck with mic allocation) and the vocals sounded great.

The crowd were with us and very encouraging from the off and largely entranced by Sarah and Mandie in her new 1950’s chic stage attire. Roger stole the day with his light drum sticks and drum solo in Tellin Lies (Move over Carl Palmer)

The night was so enjoyable the Band played for well over 2 hours and 15 minutes and the time seemed to race by. The final number was a very emotional ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’.
A very good one
Gary

The Dereham Blues Festival – Saturday 8th July 2017
Our return to the festivals largest venue, the open air Kings Head Hotel was built on the platform of last years large success at this brilliant little festival that is really gaining a reputation.

From the time we set up at around 20.15 the temperature dropped from 24 degrees to about 15. The really big crowd which had packed the field thinned a little, as parents took their kids home but then accumulated a lot of music lovers.
When we went on at 21.00 the whole dynamic changes from one of music being in the background as people chatted to the focal point. the girls grabbed the attention, looking great and putting on a great high energy stage performance as was blasted through an opening ‘Hell on Wheels’. Next was a great vocal performance from Sarah and Mandie as they did an amazing job with the vocals on ‘Blues Highway’, as the sound fought its way into the corners of the large field

For once I got the pacing of the sets right and we worked our way through Telling Lies, with Roger’s flashing sticks drum solo (Very powerful in the fading light) and Danny’s walk about and crazy rendition of Jacko’s ‘Billie Jean’ in the middle of his personal solo, Then the encores, Preacher Man followed by the sing along ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’ (Request by Lou). In the last one, the crowd had a nice ‘Sway along’ going and finished on a strong note. Danny played the powerful guitar melody straight, instead of recent jazz variations and it sent the crowd away happy. Getting them ready for the late night drinking and the next day of the festival in which we were represented by Mandie singing in the festival jam
Gary

The Colourhouse Theatre – Sunday 2017
We received a great complement when we saw that the live music posters for the year at this lovely theatre has our pictures all over them. Well I can understand the girls, but the shot of Danny and I in one of our gurning competitions was very kind. These are very large and up the whole year!

The theatre’s lights had blown out in the afternoons performance of a play and so it was with auditorium lights only that we had to play the show. As usual the intimate little theatre brought some great moment from both girls vocal performances and from both guitars. Roger and Bill were rock solid and ever since Roger has purchased his ‘Light up sticks’his playing has been even more in your face and on the money than usual. Stand out songs were a killer ‘Dark Angel’ and a very nice ‘Blues Highway’
Gary

The Cavern – Raynes Park – Sunday May 21st 2017
A welcome return to the Cavern on a Sunday. This sunny afternoon brought in its usual share of music lovers and their was buzz and interest following the cancellation of the last show due to my illness. This time it was Mandie who was of concern, having just been released from hospital less than 48 hours before the starting time. She performed the first set largely from a stool, but from the start of the second set the stool was long gone and she was rocking as usual.

Noel himself kept up constant adjustments to the PA so the sound was perfect. Danny was in essence playing at home as he spends a fair bit of time at this great local venue checking out the Bands and the crowd rose to his great playing. Two more shows to play this year on Sun 20th August and Saturday 4th November
Gary

The Hope Tavern – Holton Le Moor, New Lincoln, Sunday 7th May 2017
An all time great Roadhouse gig, with the Band warmed up from the Norwich show midweek. You can write a load of cliches about a band and audience being as one, but it honestly happened here

The pub actually shook with the demands for encores. Graham runs a great place and his hard work has kept high quality Bands passing through this iconic little venue. Thanks to all there who made it such a special afternoon/evening
Gary

The Murderers, Red Hot Blues – Norwich, 4th May 2017
To Dave Thomas’s Thursday night venue in the centre of Norwich. A real club feel here, with the thick red curtains and dim lighting, very cabaret. A good crowd too, very knowledgeable and appreciative. Following the success on our return to stage in Bedford, the Band were really up for this and a strong performance took place.

As usual the 2nd set really stormed home and unusually (Apparently), Dave himself joined in with a great lead vocal on an angst ridden 12 bar for the 3rd encore. The girls had downloaded the lyrics by the middle of the song and gave him a real run for his money.

A good night with a really great audience response at a fantastic venue. Keep up the good work Dave!
We’ll be back next year
Gary

Bedford Esquires – Bedford – Sunday 19th March 2017
After the fall out from Gary’s operation and the longest break in their 24 year history Roadhouse returned to the stage at this great venue. The word had gone around and with added bonus of Sarah selling new T Shirts the room was packed with friends, supporters and fellow musicians

The Band started with an enthusiastic and well played ‘Hell on Wheels’ and then demonstrated a bit of ring rust on the 2nd number ‘Swamp Girl’ with Gary and Danny playing ‘Jazz’ in the twin lead sections. Next up was a perfectly played ‘City of Decay’ and from that point the Band never looked back. Sarah sang a great version of ‘Queen of the Mountain’ and Mandie brought the house down singing ‘House’ if you get my meaning. Next up was a great version of ‘Too Tired To Pray’, which you can see by following this link:
https://youtu.be/ZFED7w5EL4
Mandie and Sarah sang us out of the 1st set on a belting ‘Rock Me Baby’

The 2nd set saw even more people come into the venue. This was the set list for the 2nd set:

– Voodoo Dance
– Rock Me Baby
– Dark Angel
– The Big Easy
– Blues Motel
– Tellin Lies
– Encore 1 – Preacher Man
– Encore 2 – Turn Your Face Into the Wind

The 2nd set was notable for the great connection with the audience. There was a moment of extreme sadness when Dark Angel was dedicated by that great Roadhouse friend and supporter, Ian to our other great friend Tony who had just died of a stroke. We knew where he would have been standing and Gary was weirdly having a bit of a weep while smashing out a notable solo in a version of the song that Band Photographer Steve Dulieu described as the best for many a year. Gary lead the crowd in a toast to Tony and the emotional songs sometimes laced with dark humour kept on coming. The stage quaked under the thunder of Rogers new illuminated sticks in his drum solo, as he looks ready for a stadium tour (I wish we had one)
A personal note from Gary – “Thanks to all there for the unbelievable support and comradeship I was given on my return to stage”
We are back in Bedford on the 15th October

The Tropic at Ruislip, Sunday 27th November 2016
It was great to see over 60 people in the room on a cold Sunday night in November. Especially as gigs on a Sunday are a rare occurrence. Philip has done a great job with this venue and
Bands are well looked after here.

It was great of Yoka and Ray from Yoka and The Sugerbeats to open for us. They played a gorgeous 25 minute acoustic set which had the crowd entranced

Two sets from us, top plays were ‘Swamp Girl’, ‘Hell on Wheels’, ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’ and ‘City of Decay’, the Title track of the new CD. Sales of he new CD were amazing on this night. Thanks for all the great people that came out and supported both us and live music
Gary

The Cavern, Raynes Park, Sunday 23rd October 2016
So there we were in a much coveted Cavern Sunday afternoon slot. The stage had been enlarged and with the enhanced PA, lighting and monitoring the Cavern is a great place to play and Noel, the owner/promoter is deluged with Bands all wanting to play.

The new set of new songs from the new CD City of Decay, coupled with lots of old Roadhouse classics including, ‘Swamp Girl’ which was played immaculately. For me personally it was great to get to the end of the set and play out pre encore with ‘Voodoo Queen’, for me a real classic Roadhouse song. It always gives Roger a Better platform for his drum solo and enables Danny to really build his guitar work up to the end of the solo sections where he plays out all guns blazing.
We will be back to the excellent Cavern 4 times next year.
Gary

Woodlands Art Centre, Gillingham, Thursday 20th October 2016 – Double Headline with Deep Blue Sea –

Great thanks to Louise Davies the great DJ and Deep Blue Sea Manager who arranged this magical gig and handled the promotion. A lovely big hall with great PA, switched on Engineer, music loving crowd, what more could we want. First up were Deep Blue Sea and they were much improved from the Band who did a nice slot at our Xmas show in Barnes last year. I loved the tone of the female lead singer Muz.

Our hour and a quarters playing time whizzed by with ‘Swamp Girl’ being the standout track, back to it’s dark and murderous glory. Audience reaction was fantastic and Muz joined us on stage to deliver a 3 part ladies harmony on the climatic ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’. The largest crowd to be recorded at that venue left in great spirits and we’d like to thank so many friends and lovers of live music for turning out

A great night for everyone,
Gary

The Red Lion. Stevenage, Sunday 2016
Back at Trevor The Hat Keeling’s atmospheric venue. A change in the pubs day to day Management has seen a welcome swing towards more support of the music events.
The revitalised set was given a good work out again and though ‘When Mountains Fall’ was not as good as last time the rest of the stuff blasted along a treat

No place for ‘Turn you Face’ in the set, as Trevor himself demanded ‘Preacher Man’, and we obligingly rocked out into the sunset, so to speak

Bedford Esquires, Sunday October 2nd 2016
Our first gig at the new look Bedford Esquires since its revamp and very cool it looks. We turned up with a new look set, which had a completely different dynamic. Back were old Roadhouse classics like ‘When Mountains Fall’, ‘Swamp Girl’ and ‘Voodoo Queen’. These songs sat very well alongside the new stuff from the CD ‘City of Decay’.

A great crowd of really good friends were in attendance, some travelling a long way to get to the show. We really appreciate your friendship and support. ‘Turn your Face Into the Wind’ again proved a great second encore.
Many folk were looking forward to seeing us at Skegness. The gig was also notable for being like a photographers convention. There were so many great and amateur photographers there. Please keep sending us your photographs, we will use them whenever we can (garyboner@btinternet.com)

We’ll be back at Esquires next year in March and October
Gary

The National Festival of R&B, Colne, Lancashire, Bank Holiday Monday 29th August 2016
A change of venue for the big British Stage from the Leisure Centre to the equally big and more atmospheric Pendleton theatre

It was great to see the fantastic sound crew and stage host, that we have worked with for so many years up at Colne. We played the same high energy set that we had played at Cambridge, only this time due to some cosmic time difference we were not able to fit ‘Turn Your Face’ in. Danny was on form, Roger and Bill were rock solid and the girls sang well and put on a great show.

This was the best we had ever played ‘City of Decay’ in a live show. The crowd was also much bigger than last year, due to the Monday segment finishing at 17.00 – 18.00 (With us!). With a bit of luck not too many people saw my comedy fall off of the drum riser at the end of Preacher Man (Priceless).

Fingers crossed to still be rocking at this great festival next year
Gary

Cambridge Rock Festival – Stage 2 – Saturday 6th August 2016
One of the great all time Roadhouse gigs was not off to the best start. As Mandie arrived 24 hours early to set up base camp, the terrible call came that her Mother Pauline who had been battling cancer was in the final stage. The amazing people at CRF drove Mandie from Cambridge to Leeds so she could say goodbye.
Showing tremendous bravery Mandie went ahead with the performance on Saturday. A performance that reduced many of the audience to tears with its power and emotion. When I say many, I mean a lot!. For example the Members of Mostly Autumn watching were wiping away the tears, including their lovely, talented Lead Singer

The arena filled up to a packed level, defeating the crowd that was next door on what was meant to be the main stage, where 80’s icon Hazel O’Connor was strutting her stuff.

The Band drove a set that kept the energy up and maintained our original core music principle. The set was:

– Hell on Wheels
– City of Decay (See the video on our video page)
– Too Tired To Pray (Again see the video)
– Midnight Rain (See the video)
– Queen of the Mountain
– Dark Angel
– Tellin Lies
– Turn Your Face Into the Wind

The girls came back onto stage with 2 inflatable guitars, so the 4 of us in the front line were all able to rock out together. God knows where they came from (The guitars not the girls). The one hour on this big stage shot by, I don’t know where the time went.
It made a change to finish off with ‘Turn Your Face’ instead of ‘Preacher ‘Man, but then with Mandie’s news that was what the show was largely about. There were not a lot of dry eyes in the house as we pounded this one out.
A special thanks to our girls selling the CD’s, Shaan , Alice and Sarah. Great job
Thanks to all at CRF16, you ran a great festival
Gary

The Tuesday Night Music Club – Coulsdon – Tuesday 2nd August 2016
A big win, with over 65 people on a Tuesday night. A ‘Stormer’, having the crowd with you from the word go is a big motivator and it led to a great performance. Richard Dunning has got a great formula going with his 2 Tuesday night music club venues. Who’d think people would be up for a pay at the door live music club on a Tuesday, but they are big time.

Everyone in the Band played really well and the focus was on all original music right the way through
A massive thank you to Steve Dulieu our official photographer, friend and promoter who linked with Richard to up start discussions to arrange this gig
We saw a lot of people who have followed the Band for years. A massive win for all involved
Gary

Harley Davidson Convention (HOGS) – The Racecourse, Fakenham, Norfolk – Saturday 30th July 2016
Lovely location, nice people, great event. thanks so much for getting us involved to legendary Groundhogs bass player Alan Fish.

The bikers sat in long ‘Viking’ style tables in the enormous tent. This led them to neglect the Bands as a kind of sonic wallpaper. Our first set went down well in a kind of ‘What is this’ kind of way. Before the 2nd set we were asked to play Bon Jovi, Thin Lizzy and would you believe Abba.
Not our kind of thing but a great learning experience. The Band looked great

The Wrotham Arms – Broadstairs, Kent – Friday 29th July 2016
A very good gig here. Thanks to Jackie and Geoff for having us for the 5th time. A little quiet at the beginning and then a good crowd had come in by the middle of the first set.

The 2nd set really picked it up and the whole place was like an atmospheric sweatbox (Well for the musicians anyway). A great ‘Voodoo Dance’ really set the tone and we finished with a great double encore, which included a dramatic version of ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’ from the new CD

Hopefully we’ll do it all again next year
Gary

The Hope Tavern – Market Rasen – Sunday Afternoon 24th July 2016
We were really looking forward to our gig back at the Hope after a 2 year sabbatical. We arrived, not to our usual Sunday Roast (A damn fine Sunday Roast) but to a power cut that had the whole area sans electricity. Was the gig on or off?, things were in the balance. A lot of the audience arrived to join the speculation with us.

Just as the tension ratcheted up to a painful level, the lights came on. the thing about the Hope is that the audiences knees are about 6 inches in front of you. The feeling of connection between Band and Audience is stronger here than almost anywhere else.

Another really good performance. Especially well played by Bill and Roger who were so tight in tight conditions and the girls were really ‘on’ the vocals as they could hear so well in close proximity to the speakers and monitors. Sarah proved she really is Queen of the Mountain and Mandie is a bit of a legend

Dereham Blues Festival, Norfolk (Outdoor) – Norfolk – Saturday 9th July 2016
A long story here. Roger managed to book us into one of the worst hotels in the UK (According to trip advisor) and then managed to only get the code for one room. Cue sleepless night in hotel horror (No hot water, electricity, carpet, etc, etc) and the death of Roger’s new career as Band travel agent

The heavy downpoor all morning threatened our open air show. Still the sun came out, the field filled with people and we went down a treat.

Danny did his party piece individual slot up the top of a fire escape at the side of the adjacent pub. “Jump you fucker jump” screamed other members of the Band, but he did not seem to hear (Joke, we love him). Thanks to the wonderful audience that were really listening and focussed on all the original material we played.
Gary

Radfest – Charity Festival in support of McMillan Nurses – The Oval Tavern – Croydon – Saturday 16th July
A well put together festival for a great cause. Two stages some great bands and musicians including our good friends Yoka and Ray from Yoka and The Sugarbeats. The neighbours complaints shut the outside stage early (Get a life people – its for charity!)
I apologise for the 20 or so minutes it took us to get ready for our set, but Rog could not play the drums the way they were configured. So having hep up proceeding we did manage to play a . Danny did well to cope with the onstage Fender Amp (Not his usual style).

Greatest moment was on the 2nd encore “Turn Your face Into The Wind” when Mandie talked openly to the crowd about her Mothers struggle with cancer which was going into the last phase. It lead to a powerful and committed version of the song.
Well done the organisers
Gary

The Dereham Blues Festival – Dereham, Norfolk, Saturday 19th July – Open Air Show – Kings Head, Dereham

After an epic Friday afternoon drive through multiple pile up zones and diversions we encountered the hotel from hell. Yes Roger was trying to help, but booking us into the one of if not the worst rated hotels in the UK was the stuff of legend. Unattended, with door codes, no carpets, no power no hot water, beds on platforms on the top of staircases. Could things get worse!!!!!, well in the short term yes.

Our outdoor gig was a saturated field of grass with drenched seating behind the Kings Head, and still it poured. We sound checked to a couple of faces sticking their faces out from a canopy. And still it rained.

Then the sun came out (Unexpectedly) and it dried up a treat. Two one our sets with a support band playing a relaxed set in the 1 hour mid show break, lovely stuff.
The crowd were into it from the off and an excellent 2 sets whizzed by. Fantastic response and the Band played a great show, the girls and Danny hamming it up and me threatening to sell the crowd dodgy watches in the half time break. 4 people actually came up wanting to buy one 🙂

A great moment was when Danny started playing from the top of a close by fire escape – ‘Nutter’

Preacher Man into the sunset and all that. The crowd really thinned as the next good quality acts went on, so it was a job very well done.
Gary

The Colourhouse Theatre – Sunday 3rd July 2016
A burst water mane cutting off access to the area did not help attendance. We were still grateful to all the great friends that came. A really good show. It was fantastic to see Noel from the Cavern on a night out and also Darren Wisdom after a bit of a while and he really travelled to get to the venue.

Each of our crowd has a story that in many ways is more important than ours. Copies of the new CD flew out of the door, a big thanks to all that bought the new CD. 15 in the BBI chart for June, Clapton is at 14, so not bad going
Gary

The Cavern, Raynes Park, Sunday 22nd May 2016
Sunday afternoons at the Cavern are possibly our favourite regular gig slot. This time we achieved the best ever vocal balance. Coupled with the fact that both of our ladies produced a fabulous vocal performance with more control than usual, made this an exceptional show

For example the standout tracks in the first set were Mandie’s awesome version of ‘Midnight Rain’ and Sarah’s powerful ‘Queen of the Mountain’. In addition to this we played ‘City of Decay’ so well, it was near CD quality, perfect

As usual the second set was very powerful. Danny sometimes calls the zone the Band get into ‘The Japanese War Machine’. Noel the owner thought Danny was totally in ‘The zone’ and that Mandie was demonstrating so much control over her vocals that it was the best he’d ever seen from her.

It was a bit frustrating that we did not have the new CD at this gig, but it should be with us from the 6th June. I was really pleased with the finish of the gig where we played a double encore. First up was the new CD closer, ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’ and this was probably the best we had ever played that song. Nicely helped by a lot of people in the audience singing along.
We will be back on the 13th August.
Gary

The Hereford Blues Club – Saturday 14th May 2016
A long drive up to Wales by Sam, the man with the plan, who was the driver of the hired splitter van. The solution for this day to our current transport crisis. If anyone would like to help to transport any of the band with their transport for the next few gigs please get in touch (07855-257728)
John has a lovely venue with a stage that had been graced by Robert Plant at the Deborah Bonham gig which had gone before ours. Its got a lovely gallery and is a cracking venue. We had a great time and the 2nd set was particularly powerful
Not long to the launch of the new CD now, orders from garyboner@btinternet.com

It did thin out a bit towards the midnight end as some worried about transport links/methods. the remaining audience had a great time and there was dancing and movement a plenty as wound up with ‘Preacher Man’.
Gary

Saturday 6th March 2016 – The Cavern Raynes Park – It was fitting that we had the gig the was close the my, Roger’s and Bill’s birthday at the venue which is turning out to be home from home. A passionate crowd of friends and believers created a special atmosphere and it was a great night for all.

The National Festival of Blues & Rock, Skegness, 22-24th January 2016
Our 14th consecutive appearance at this iconic festival. A massive blend of music was on over the 3 days with acts as diverse as Wishbone Ash, jazz legend Courtney Pine and Hawkwind.
On the Saturday afternoon we played a 45 minute pre jam set before running what I believe to be the festivals 8th successive jam session (All run by us, I’m proud to say).

We had a really good crowd for a 12.45 start and the set comprised of:
1. Too Tired To Pray
2. Spirits Across the Water
3. House of the Rising Sun
4. The Big Easy
5. Voodoo Dance
We had a really good reaction and the energy on stage and in the 750 capacity venue was excellent. The general feeling from both audience and Band was that we’d have to go some to beat that set when we played our main set on the Sunday night.

Watch House of The Rising Sun:

To the jam itself. I signed up players from 12.00 to ease the rush and this enabled me to build line ups even more quickly this year. The 2 hours 15 minutes blistered by with the jam finishing dead on the agreed time of 16.00. There were too many stand out moments to mention, but some that stuck in my mind are:
– Carlos from Bedford playing outstanding bass and then taking on lead and vocal duties later in the jam. What a great player
– A 3 peice band called the Shinkickers breaking up the run of pure jam line ups well with some short and punchy Rory Gallagher material.
– It was great to see Alan Pearce the Head of Blues Matters present and having a great time. All the fabulous entertainment over the 3 days on the JAKs stage was down to him

Main Set – National Festival of Rock & Blues – Skegness – Sunday 24th January 2016
To our main set. Up against strong competition from the Della Grants and The Animals, plus a earlier start than usual (20.00 instead of our traditional 20.30 slot) the crowd at the start was a touch lighter than usual. However, by the time we were at the half way through mark through to the end, it really filled up. I would say that other than last year, where the doors were shut for 2 lengthy periods as staff could not get any more people into the 750 capacity venue, this was the biggest JAKS crowd we had ever had.

We took a real risk by putting 5 new songs in the set (All to be featured on the forthcoming CD, City of Decay, release scheduled for May). All those song went down really well. I personally loved Danny’s haunting slide on the great Mandie.G lead vocal song, ‘Midnight Rain’. Sarah’s powerful vocal on the rocking ‘Queen of the Mountain’ was also stunning. We ended up with about 3 encores (Lost count!) and managed to play the new epic, ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’ which had quite a few people singing along even though they had never heard the song before.
The thanks to great DJ/MC Clive Rawlings and the sound crew who battled against limited time to make the set work.
Next Year?
Gary

The Roadhouse Xmas Show, Roadhouse and Friends, The Bulls Head Barnes – Monday 7th December 2015
Probably the 7th consecutive Roadhouse Xmas show, now a well established and always well attended tradition.
First up from our legion of special guests was the mighty Geronimo (Ex screaming Lord Such). We were then given a haunting acoustic set from the incredible Yoka and ray from the original line up of The Little Devils. We were then given a quality blues set from John O’Leary (Ex Savoy Brown) and session guitar player and luthier, Dave Mason. They were joined by Danny from Roadhouse for 3 great numbers including a killer version of “Down, Down, Down”.
Next up was the set from Roadhouse and though the sound was a long way from perfect and very cruel on Sarah’s sound level, the energy and crown response was remarkable. Blues Highway was played and sung really well and at this point the sound was on the money. Great vocal duet from Sarah and Mandie and each of the guitar solos was cheered and applauded

We played by special request the ZZ Top like Blues Motel and Queen Of The Mountain got another good airing as did the musically progressive title track of the forthcoming CD, City of Decay

Once the Roadhouse set was over, we had an excellent short set from the impressive new line up of The Little Devils. Well done to Graeme for keeping them on the Road and I really like the new, more rock and roll approach.
We’ll be back next year
Gary

Esquires – Sunday 4th October – Review lost by Website, Re- Load of main messages
This show was recorded live and capturing a performance in front of so many good friends in one of our fave venues, we have high hopes for the limited addition CD we will soon have on offer………

We will be back twice in 2016
Gary

Blues At the Farm – Saturday 3rd October – Review lost by website, Main messages Re-loaded:
Just one of those gigs where everything came together. Having warmed up in Cheltenham the night before the band were nicely limbered up and sounded really hungry.
what followed was one of our best performances of the year.

Its such great news that this wonderful venue with its great crowd at promoter is still to be kept going and we look forward to coming back in 2016
Gary

The Blues In the City Festival – Cheltenham – Friday 2nd October
Thanks to Nick Garner for having us for the 3rd time at his great charity festival. Playing on the opening night in a triple header with Will Johns and Split Whiskers, we were on last in the massive venue.

Though the sound out front was good the on stage sound was tough, with all kinds of bass bounce back and instruments blasting out of the foldback. The band coped really well and produced an excellent performance. The band put on a great show and the audience gave us a terrific response. A decent encore made a good start to our 3 gigs in 3 nights marathon. Blues at the farm tomorrow
Thanks Nick
Gary

The Red Lion, Stevenage, Sunday 20th September 2015
Our annual gig at the atmospheric Red lion, expertly promoted by Mr Trevor ‘The Hat’ Keeling. In fact this gig was (Not accidentally) on the night of Trevor’s birthday, and a great celebration it was.

The new songs went well, lots of people wanted to know (As usual) when the new CD would be out. I wish I knew!!!!
I misjudged the length of the set and we did not get a chance to play Turn Your Face. I was going to play it, but it would have meant sacrificing Preacher Man and that is Trevor’s Fave (He was paying us so it was a no brainer!).Another great night!!
Gary

The Colourhouse Theatre, Merton Abbey Mills, London – Sunday 5th September
Another great night at the Colourhouse. It was weird playing in front of an enormous fairy story background (Roger spent the whole night trying to get me to sit on the toadstool)

This was a great opportunity to play and cement the new numbers in the set. Mandie’s Midnight Rain, Sarah’s ‘Queen of the Mountain’, the killer finale of ‘Turn Your Face Into the Wind’ and the epic title track ‘City of Decay’. All of the new songs went down well with the excellent crowd

Danny played his solo section while sitting in the 7th row and the whole night was great fun and a good performance
Thanks for all the great support
Gary

The National Festival of Rhythm and Blues, Colne, Lancashire, Bank Holiday Monday 31st August

After a 4 year break it was great to return to the giant British stage at Colne. thanks to all at Blues Maters and Krossborder Rekords for making it happen.

It was never going to be like out glory days with the giant venue packed out to breaking point and the doors locked so no more people could get in. On the Monday all the pub venues have stopped having music and many folk have gone home after a long weekend at the festival. Most of the bands up to and after our slot had only 50-100 or so people rattling round the giant room. However, when it came to the time for our set the 7 years we’d played here gave us sufficient legacy to pull by far the biggest crowd of the day, with the room filling to nearly 60% capacity.

The 1 hour set blurred by in fast forward. standout moments for me included Danny and Mandie performing together while sitting on the centre monitor, playing new title track ‘City of Decay’ to a big crowd for the first time and Danny running round the room with his radio control unit in full action (I thought he was Angus Young for a minute). Too Tired Too Pray was like a runaway train and both Sarah and Mandie got big cheers for their solo slots as well as their duet on ‘Blues Highway’.
One guy talking me at the end thought the secret of our band was the great drumming and timekeeping of Roger Hunt…at first I thought he should be sectioned then on reflection he has a point.

A great show and tremendous crowd reaction, thanks to all and fingers crossed for next year
Gary

The Kings Head Acton – Saturday 8th August 2015

A special one off night. Mandie had been asking us to play locally for her for some time. The opportunity came up at this spacious venue and we could not let her down. People turned up in the droves for Mandie and the whole night had a kind of surreal feel. There were loads of Roadhouse first timers there mixing with long term fans and the audience gave the Band a great level of support.

Sarah’s lead vocal new song ‘Queen of the Mountain’ had a good airing and all the new songs went down well. However, for some reason “Turn your Face Into the Wind” was not as powerful as the first 2 times we had played it. Mandie had brought along a DJ and the dance tracks blasted out pre gig, in the break and after the show. It was really weird seeing gorgeous ladies in heels dancing around the Roadhouse stage to a totally different genre of music. All the people who had come to see the band on Mandie’s say so for the first time were really impressed.
Ray and Yoka from the Little Devils were there and played great guest slots on Rock Me Baby
Danny kept up the hide and seek routine by playing his solo section on a table at the back of the pub, about 30 yards away
Overall this was a different kind of gig
Gary

The Bird In Hand – Fareham – Sunday 2nd August 2015
A afternoon gig at this small, intimate venue. Booked by our friend and South Coast region promoter, Thelma. This was very much a return to the area of Danny’s youth. Many old friends and musical contacts made the journey to say hello to him, in what was a packed turn out.

The band was tightened up by its great performance on Friday but in some ways we never quite reached the heights of the Broadstairs performance. However, it was still a good performance with lots of punch and energy. The final stages of the gig were very powerful as the connection between band and crowd was very strong in this phase. Danny played his personal introduction section from the Pubs front garden, staring in at us while he played some blistering stuff as he kept the whole seek him here seek him there thing going 🙂

The final two songs saw the brilliant new ‘Turn Your Face Into The Wind’ performed next to ‘Preacher Man’ and the two together proved again to be a powerful combination.
Gary

The Wrotham Arms – Broadstairs, Kent, Friday 31st July 2015
A return to where we had played our 2 packed out appearances at the Blues Bash festival. This a lovely music venue well promoted by Geoff.

This was one of those nights where for some reason everything clicked and the band were on fire. Danny and I were both on top guitar form, Bill and Roger rock solid and the girls both singing well and putting on one hell of a show
A potentially moment of legend was Danny’s radio controlled guitar subterfuge reaching a whole new level. This time as I introduced him during the ‘Meet the band’ section of ‘Tellin Lies’ he’d handed his guitar to the talented Rosco Levee of the Rosco Levee and the southern Slide fame and let Rosco play his solo section. What will he do next????

The new song Turn Your Face Into the Wind blew (ha, ha) everyone away at the end. This was a really good gig.
Pics and media to be added
Gary

Roadhouse Live At the Cavern, Raynes Park, Sunday 19th July
Back to our new home from home. The hot sunny day limited our crowd a bit but it was still a good turn out. The first set saw the debut for Sarah’s new lead vocal song “Queen of the Mountain”, which had a very good first outing. Title track of the new CD, ‘City of Decay’ had it’s best ever play and this brought a fantastic reaction from the crowd and a lot of interest and discussion about the roots and origins of the song at the half way break.
We finished with our first ever play of the new anthem “Turn Your Face Into the Wind” and people were still really buzzing about that one as we were saying our good byes and rigging down

Overall the ladies were on great vocal form and Danny topped all his “Hide and seek” personal introduction antics, by playing his section from outside of the pub from the front garden. Betting is he will go across the road to the supermarket at the next gig here.

Thanks as ever to Noel for having us
Gary

Roadhouse live at the Hope festival – Saturday 30th May
A lovely, friendly little festival. Thanks very much for Ray Baldwin for having us along. The challenges were the temperature in this open air/tent arrangement (Cold hands for guitar players) and the quick set up and rig down for a short 45 minute set. To add to the difficulty Danny broke a string in Blues Highway, but worked around it well. the whole set got better and better and with the good crowd firmly on our side we Preacher Man’d it into the night. A good one

Saturday – The Cavern, Raynes Park – Saturday 23rd May
Thanks to everyone for coming out and turning this into a great crowd for this gig. The support was tremendous. Mandie had been unwell all week and she bravely went ahead with the show things got a little strange on stage a few times.

The second half of the set rocked and Sarah was a hero holding the thing together vocally. Danny appeared at the top of the stairs to start his personal introduction solo and at the end of the show the reaction was fantastic. We are back on Sunday 19th July where we hope to feature more new songs from the forthcoming CD, City of Decay
Gary

Sunday 19th April – The Colourhouse Theatre, Merton Abbey Mills
A return to the lovely Colourhouse. A on-going theatre production left the environment covered in Camouflage netting and gave it all a dark and post apocalyptic feel. A good crowd and a two good sets, with the whole thing catching fire and really rocking in the second set.

There were a group of Danish people there seeing the band for a 3rd time over a 18 year period and bulk buying CD’s, thanks so much for your support, other people had driven down from near Ipswich for this show.

#

Overall a great night, even though I played it with a bad dose of the flu and throat infection, it was magic!!, thanks so much to Robin for the opportunity and all the people who came for their great support

Back before the end of the year all being well
Regards
Gary

Sunday 22nd March – The Cavern – Raynes Park – London
The last of our 4 great gigs in the month of March. Our 3rd show at the Cavern was a really good one. Once more thanks to both Noel for having us back and to all of you, our friends for such a great turn out. The new songs went really well and are becoming nicely integrated into the set. A potential target for a new CD release could be early 2016!.

Highlights included Danny going totally over the top with his radio unit and playing a song from behind the bar (He could have got the beers in!!!), the girls once more dancing down in and with the crowd and a good rendition of ‘Heavens Door’ for the second encore

This was much better than our second gig at this great venue, maybe as good as the first. Keep on coming as we will change the show and the songs every time. As a birthday request for Paul we were asked to play ‘No Place To Hide’ and there was no place to hide as we’d only played that song twice on the last 18 months, but we ended up delivering a cracking version.

We will be back at on Saturday 23rd May, see you then 🙂
Gary

Sunday 15th March – Bedford Esquires, Bedford

A clash with the great and important institution of Mothers Day, however we still pulled a great crowd (My Mum’s still not happy though!).. A first time for some of our regular friends to hear the new songs ‘City of Decay’ and ‘Midnight Rain’ (Lead vocal from Mandie)
Thanks to our great friend at the venue for the loan of the excellent PA, the sound was great

What a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon!
We will be back on the 4th October
Gary

Saturday 7th March 2015 – Legends of Rock Festival – Great Yarnmouth

We were delighted to be asked to play our first festival for this great organisation. Appearing on stage at the Voodoo Lounge (How fitting for us?). We were one of a handful of original acts playing at what was largely a tribute band festival. The organisation runs an originals festival at the same great venue in August and also another festival in Spain.

Spread of 2 big rooms, the venue we were playing was much bigger than JAKS at Skegness but with a smaller stage, though the dinky raised platforms at each end of the stage helped us to put on our usual kind of show.

The stage and sound crew were top class at the though the Band on before us overran we only lost a couple of minutes in a less than 20 minute turn round. We kept the set fairly safe and though we played loads of our stuff (Hell On Wheels, Too Tired To Pray, Blues Highway, Spirits Across the Water, The Big Easy,) we gave the crowd epic versions of ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and ‘Roadhouse Blues’. Roadhouse Blues had loads of people up and dancing and by that time the room had really filled up and was on our side.

From that point we were able to keep everyone up and dancing and we finished with a belting ‘Preacher Man’. We were delighted to be given such a great reaction by the crowd. The promoter mailed us to say that they ha received a lot of really good feedback about us on the festival FB page 🙂

Here’s the Big Easy from the show with Sarah on top form

We are really hoping to do more work with this great organisation and play more at their brilliant festivals, fingers crossed
Gary

Friday 6th March 2015 – The Tropic, Ruislip

Our 4th gig here. and special thanks to Philip and his team for having us back when some of the Tribute acts on the bill here can pull more people. Original acts like us need their place and for the first time we broke the 100 people in the room barrier with an epic turn out, mainly due to a great job by Mandie who did some great promotion.
With the local support Band dropping out we were able to invite our friends Red Butler onto the bill. RB are the best young band in the UK and gave us a hard job in following as there great set blew the audience away and made them a hell of a lot of new friends.

The Roadhouse set was quite interesting as I think it’s the longest set we’ve played through without a break for many years (1 hour 45 minutes straight). The new epic ‘City of Decay’ had another very successful outing and from the 2nd number ‘Blues Highway’ the sound was nailed and audience response was very much in our corner.

After the obligatory Preacher Man encore we invited Alex and Jane from Red Butler to come on stage and join us for a improvised (Very) version of ‘Rock me Baby’. The taking it in turns bit between the 3 great female singers wobbled on occasion but the song produced some great moments.

Hoping for a return quicker than the last 18 monthish wait. Fingers crossed as everyone wants to play this great venue
Thanks to all for the great turn out and support
Gary

Saturday & Sunday 25-26th January, The National Festival of Rock & Blues Skegness:

Our 12th appearance in a row in this iconic UK festival. We never feel less than honoured for the pivotal role we are asked to play in this great festival.

Saturday afternoon: The Roadhouse Jam Session
We kicked of the festival jam session which we have run such it’s inception 8 years ago. First we played our opening set which was a 45 minute slot aimed to warm the audience up for our ‘jammers’
I am pleased to report that as usual there was a great crowd. notable events in this set was the first play for 3 years for ‘Swamp Girl’ from the Dark Angel CD, which went really well. The real attention grabber was the new song ‘Midnight Rain’ which is a lead vocal for Mandie. Our original version was in my view just not strong enough. So Mandie and I sat down together and she penned new vocal melodies for parts of the song that have made it a potential Roadhouse classic. People were coming up and talking about it for the rest of the weekend. The set was given a rousing response and set the scene nicely for our main 90 minute show scheduled for the Sunday night.

The jam itself broke its own remarkable the attendance record and was allocated more time this year due to how important so many people view it to be for the festival. A record number (over 80) jammers registered for a great session, which featured 5 bands and around 50 individual jammers. Regular folk mixed in with luminaries like Roy Mette and incredible seat of the pants performances followed. I could mention so many people but the role call would just go on and on. However Tommy Jones, Carlos, Gizmo, Chip the drummer have been stalwarts for so many years. A personal highlight for me this year was the appearance of Little Stevie Smith on the harp. I grew up watching him play and then admired his work with Ruthless Blues, so his barnstorming harp master class was a real pleasure to watch.
Thanks to all the jammers and the magnificent crowd
Gary

Saturday 26th January 2015 – Roadhouse Main Set – Jaks Stage – National Festival of Blues & Rock Festival Skegness
Now to talk about what many of called the finest ever Roadhouse show of the last 5 years……
It was the busiest we had ever seen JAKS. Standard crowd by the time we went on, but then by the mid point we could not see any spaces at all. Apparently for two periods the doors were shut to the venue due to the room reaching capacity. We are so grateful for the amazing support.

Up against Dr Feelgood for a period, and then for the last half hour the biggest draw of the weekend, Band of Brothers, we were delighted that our crowd did not seem to think out and stayed with us to a full on finale.
We started with ‘Hell on Wheels’ and the girls duet on Blues Highway drew an epic response. At the mid point we introduced our big new epic song all about the economic and social decline of Detroit, titled ‘City of Decay’. This is possibly the most mean, moody and difficult level of musicality that we have ever introduced in our set. We were very pleased with the great response, especially to the vocal harmony/choral section and twin lead passages. This is potentially the title track of the long awaited new CD.
the set was full of great individual performances. The ladies were superb on vocals and put on a hell of stage show and were down in the crowd dancing towards the end of the set. Danny was on fire and Bill and Roger ‘Right in the pocket’.
Finishing off with ‘Tellin Lies’ and Preacher Man’ as encore, there was not even time for ‘Voodoo Queen’.

I felt very honoured and humble to get the amazing reaction at the end. Fingers crossed for a repeat next year
Thanks to all
Gary

Saturday 27th December – The Cavern Raynes Park
A late booking after our initial show here had gone so well. It was very cold and the streets were very empty due to peak festive holiday season, so there was all the potential for a quiet night. Fortunately it was not to be, as a great crowd of Roadhouse friends turned up as well as lots of regulars at this great music venue.

Mandie had chucked the Bands black colour code out the window and was resplendent in ‘Xmasie bacofoil’ type garments. Performance wise there was lots of positive feedback, especially with regard to the sound and the overall level of punch. We had a request for ‘No Place to Hide’ and we managed to deliver that song really well, an amazing achievement when you bear in mind we hadn’t played it for ages. It had been nearly a month since our great set at Barnes and I noticed a bit of ring rust in the delivery of some of the numbers. Overall it was still a very good night.

A massive thanks to all that came out on a cold night in the festive season to see us, especially those of you and there were quite a few that drove large distances to the gig
Gary

Monday 8th December – The Roadhouse Xmas Party Gig – The Bulls Head Barnes

Now a big part of our tradition and DNA so to speak, this was out 8th consecutive Xmas show at Barnes. This is a night when we gather so many of friends around us and have them play on a night of many, many top quality guest artists. The Roadhouse set was situated at around the 40% of the way through the night mark and lasted for about 1 hour. Even then we were joined by 2 guests who have been key to both the fabric and history of the Band.

The running order for the evening was (As I remember):
1. Steve Eggs – A wonderful acoustic opening with Steve in solo acoustic mode, playing 3 of his great songs. Shame his full Band who have now opened for us twice were not available. But this was a great start to the evening.
2. Geronimo – Straight out of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, ex Screaming lord Such guitar player Geronimo, playing with the Little Devils Lovely Sarah on the drums and the amazing Tim Matthewman on the bass.
3. Our special guest Band, the Little Devils, Colleagues from the Krossborder Rekords Roadshows. These great friends played a wonderful 25 minute set featuring the fabulous Yoka on Vocals, sax and flute.
4. THE ROADHOUSE SET – We were joined by Kelly Marie, who sang the fantastic version of ‘The Big Easy’ from our current CD. After a strong version of ‘Dark angel’ Roadhouse legend Jules Fothergill joined us for a 3 guitar, killer version of ‘Preacher Man’. Boasting a tone like warm chocolate, Jules swapped solos with Danny and Kelly joined Sarah and Mandie, as we blasted off into the proverbial sunset (Well Barnes High Street to be honest)
5. Harp legend John O’Leary fronted the final set featuring guitar greats Robin Bibi and the aforesaid Jules Fothergill. With Tim Matthewman on the bass and both Sarah and Roger Hunt on the drums they brought the night to a quality conclusion

A massive thanks to all our guests and the amazing big crowd, thank you so much for coming out and supporting this night. thanks to Pete Feenstra ably assisted by Mr Bob Bonsey.
Gary

Friday 28th November, Chequer Meads Theatre, East Grinstead, KrossBorder Rekords Roadshow With the Little Devils and Red Butler

A giant theatre venue and a small crowd, which was a real shame as this Roadshow had the 3 great bands on display. What had pulled them in at the Fanrnham Maltings and Blakeney Harbour rooms found the good folk of East Grinstead reluctant to come down and rock out.

However, forthcoming shows at this lovely venue included Bucks Fizz, so perhaps the locals were not accustomed to the type of music on offer. All 3 Bands played great sets on the giant stage. All present said that ours was full of energy as we struck the A-Z of Roadhouse Rock poses in a blistering 45 minute set.

All present cheered their heads off as the 3 sets and a combined melange of musicians from all 3 Bands played out 2 killer numbers at the end, giving the crowd an unforgettable evening. a spectacular night

A special thanks to Red Butler and there Manager Richard, who graciously arranged the whole thing
Gary

Sunday 16th November – The Red Lion Stevenage
Our 4th gig at this very atmospheric venue. Run by the excellent long time friend of the band, Mr ‘Trevor The Hat’ Keeling, the venue consists of a long, thin room where the crowd are literally in your face, so not one for the faint hearted.
It was a great night for us as due to Sarah being out of the country the legendary Kelly Marie came in to support the Band

Kelly was on top form and it many ways it seemed like she had never been away. She did really well with the new numbers from Gods & Highways and provided a mean lead vocal on ‘The Big Easy’. The Band were on top form this night and the close proximity of a very good crowd fired them up into top performance mode.

There was a very good version of ‘Dark Angel’ and it was nice to be so close to the crowd during a double encore
We’ll be back next year. A great night!
Gary

Sunday 2nd November 2014 – The Colourhouse Theatre, Merton Abbey Mills – Sunday 2nd November

With a lot of our regular punters away or unavailable we thought this was going to be a quiet night, but all was great in the end. In fact it was 5th successive big crowd (Size relative to venue). The band always seem to raise their game at this intimate, atmospheric, waterside venue.

Two good sets (especially the first, this gig was notable for Danny being on top form and ‘flying’

This venue has had a few quiet nights and deserves much better support. We hope they continue in 2015 and if they do we’ll be back
Regards
Gary

Friday 24th October 2014 – The Krossborder Rekords Roadshow at the Blakeney Harbour rooms, Roadhouse plus The Little Devils & Red Butler

Gary Mears and his lovely wife run this great venue, filly equipped with a nice PA and one of the best engineers/sound men we’ve ever met. Because of these lovely people and the great crowd we took on the challenge of driving to Blakeney. Driving rain, Road-works, the half term rush and several accidents saw many Band members from the 3 Bands suffer a 4 hour drive extended into a 7 hour one.

As a consequence as the only band all present we (Roadhouse) went on first instead of the scheduled last. all the mounting pressure flew away as we ploughed into the opening ‘Too Tired To Pray and ‘Hell On Wheels’

Audience re-action was brilliant and they were up and dancing by the end of the set. Once the set was over all the other band members had arrived and it allowed me to work out an new schedule. Both Bands adapted really well and played great sets, keeping the audience on their feet and turning a tough start into a major win and a great night for all.

The final set as is a tradition on these great nights, is that a mix of the different Bands members join each other on stage forming ‘The Red Road Devils’. With a stage full of talented ladies the hot vocals and guitar licks on ‘Help Me’ and ‘Blues Is My Business’ brought the night to a grand close

Thanks to all, one for the memory books in more ways than one
Gary

Sunday 19th October 2014, The Cavern, Raynes Park
After a lot of pressure and requests we finally agreed to play at the local hot free door venue, The Cavern. A great packed gig, with fantastic reaction and high CD sales was the result played out on a memorable afternoon for all. Run by Noel Nevin who used to book Roadhouse for The Cartoon in Croydon 20 years ago, this is a great venue for live music. However, we will not be going back to playing free door venues and pubs again, the Cavern is an exception to this rule

Danny had been checking out the Sunday afternoon shows here for quite a while and Mandie had put in a number of guest appearances on the Sunday afternoon stage.
The busy venue inspired us to 2 really long, full on, rocking sets.

The 2nd encore was Mandie. G belting out ‘Heavens Door’ and the first set was one of the best that the Band had played in recent history. Thanks to Noel and to all for the great turn out
Regards,
Gary

Sunday 5th October – Bedford, Esquires – Our 3rd gig at this great afternoon Sunday club venue. Thanks to Pete for having us back and to Dennis for the use of his wonderful PA

Our 3rd gig here and the crowds keep getting bigger, this was a great turn out and very appreciative crowd full of friends and people that have helped and supported us through the years. Thanks so much for everyone for coming out and contributing to a great gig

The new song ‘This House Is On Fire’ had a strong outing and generated a great response. Along with the girls great duet on ‘Blues Highway’ we have two strong tracks ready to go onto a new CD

Thanks for everyone who came and we have already dates in the diary for this great venue next year
Gary

SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY GIG AT THE BOOM BOOM CLUB – SUTTON FC – FRIDAY 12TH SEPTEMBER

Roadhouse Live at the Boom Boom Club – Sutton Football Ground – Sutton – Special 24th Anniversary gig – 12th September 2014

Thanks to the constant belief and support of famous London Promoter, journalist and DJ (Listen to his show on Get Ready to Rock Radio), Pete Feenstra we returned to this great venue, which is the home of so many top concerts. Our 23rd Anniversary celebrating a period which has seen well over 2,000 shows, 11 critically acclaimed CD’s and now the best line up of Roadhouse ever. In celebration 100 special double DVD/CD packages were put together by hand, by our Drummer Roger Hunt giving ever friend that attended the chance to by a special limited edition item for a very cheap price.

A thanks to all our fiends who came on the night and contributed to an amazing atmosphere. Proceedings were kicked off by the wonderful Steve Eggs Band (Supporting us for the 3rd time). Steve and boys have a new excellent CD out called Hometown Skyline and its great!!!. They played 50 minutes of great new country rock pop Americana. A great set…..

We started with a double tap of Too ‘Tired Too Pray’ and ‘Hell On Wheels’. The Girls soloed on The Big Easy (Sarah) and Blues Motel (Mandie) and we threw in a rare version of ‘Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues’ demanded by Clive and his table full of Roadhouse fanatics in the corner. My fave song of the opening section was ‘Spirits Across the Water’. Danny went jazz in Dark Angel (Lol) but overall he was on fire, great playing. Bill and Roger were rock solid all night. No time for ‘Voodoo Queen’ as the 90 minutes ran away, so introductions were made on ‘Tellin Lies’ and the encore was a blasting ‘Preacher Man’

Check out some of the show on Youtube thanks to Steve Dulieu:

Blues Motel

Blues Highway

Preacher Man

Thanks to all that came, for Pete for having us and for Eric Harvey who was a great host
Gary

The 2nd Krossborder Rekords Roadshow – All day Blues Bash at West Exit Live – Roadhouse Live – Hastings – 25/8/2014

Onto the second Roadshow on a typical British Bank holiday, with the whole Country lashed by torrential rain and high winds. Instead of Red Butler the bill was opened by the well established and very successful in Europe, The Sharpees.
As Mandie had to be out of the UK at this time this was Sarah’s first ever gig with the band on her own. She is one of the most modest and self critical people I’ve ever met and she will refute that she was absolutely brilliant!!!!, but she was….Her voice soared throughout the night and the whole band played well

The night was concluded by the excellent little Devils, who played a strong set before we all drove out into the rain. The Roadshow has potential for bigger and better things next year
Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Cambridge Rock Festival – CRF 2014 Major Festival Appearance – 10/8/2014

Photo by John Bull at Facebook page Rockerpix

It was a real honour the play the Cambridge Rock festival again. A massive thanks to the organiser Dave Roberts and Stage Two Manager, Adrian Philips for their continued belief in us and the all action show that we bring to a festival.

The poor folk at CRF had to endure terrible weather of both Friday and in patches on the Sunday as hurricane Bertha’s passage brought freak winds including an actual tornado to the event. By the time we arrived on Sunday afternoon your could see the wreckage of tents and there were not as many people walking round the site as usual.

Photo by Steve Dulieu

Bearing in mind the adverse weather it showed that this was a festival for die hard music lovers as come 8pm we had our biggest ever crowd at CRF, with the tent and immediately outside it being packed by the 4th song. The crowd were brilliant, so behind us that the hour (and a bit) just flew by…… for those interested the set was:

1. Too Tired To Pray
2. Hell On Wheels
3. Blues Highway
4. Spirits Across The Water
5. The Big Easy
6. Blues Motel
7. Dark Angel
8 Telling Lies
Encore: 9. Preacher Man

Enjoy these film clips on Youtube, the first one by band official photographer Steve Dulieu is the best (Wicked Uncle Steve) – Hell On Wheels

Hell On Wheels from Cambridge. Filmed by Steve Dulieu

Blues Highway:

Spirits Across The Water:

The Big Easy:

We started off with what in effect were two opening numbers “Too Tired to Pray” and “Hell on Wheels” and that gave us a lot of momentum to drive through the set. The reaction too and emotion generated by a strong performance of “Dark Angel” was second to none and though we had run over our allotted time, Stage Manager Adrian Philips kindly gave us time for an encore. the crowd were going crazy and this was probably as good a performance as our legendary 90 minutes in Skegness in January.

We really hope to be back next year as this an amazing event populated by top music lovers. One to remember (More pictures to be added to this entry soon)
Gary

Roadhouse Live At the Cinque Ports Club Uckfield – Saturday 26th July 2014

Thanks to promoter Brian Stobbart of BS Promotions for booking us into this members only club. In truth this is not the type of environment that Roadhouse has played in before. Still many great circuit acts and a lot of top tribute acts play here and we met some great people on the night who really appreciated the music.

Unfortunately for the first time in along time it was a very quiet night at a venue we were playing at. The days earlier Uckfield festival attended by the Belgian Royal Family and featured on BBC TV, had inevitably kept many people away. Still we had a job to do and having to play for a record breaking 2 hours and 45 minutes, this gig proved a great warm up for the forthcoming Cambridge Rock Festival scheduled for Sunday 10th August.

About 10 hard core Roadhouse fans made the trip and it was great to see them. this night was notable for a really good first performance of a great new song, “This House Is On Fire”

Roadhouse photographer Steve Dulieu was busy again taking some great shots and some video clips.

Check out this Youtube clip as Mandie closes the night with her version of “Knocking On Heavens Door”
Knocking On Heavens Door

Hopefully we’ll be back next year
Gary

Roadhouse Live At The Beaverwood (First of Two Special 23rd Anniversary Shows) – Thursday July 24th 2014

A return to Pete Feenstra’s excellent Beaverwood club venue, fully manned by the superb Mr Eric Harvey (Great to see Geoff from Broadstairs too!). This one was the unveiling of our new double CD/DVD collectors edition, with 1 hour and 40 minutes live footage from over the last 12 months, plus funny outakes from the bands Electronic Press Kit and live tracks from last years Boom Boom Club, Gods & Highways launch. Thanks to all that bought one.

A massive thank you to everyone who turned out in the heat wave conditions and it was pleasing to have a bigger crowd than one or two major acts who had played the Beaverwood recently. We played different sets to last year brining in ‘ Sprits Across the Water’ and the new version of ‘Blues Highway’ which is sung by Mandie and Sarah as a duet and a return to form for the classic slide driven ‘Too Tired To Pray from the Dark Angel album. Roadhouse photographer Steve Dulieu was hard at work both stills and video and you can catch the first sets closer, ‘Rock Me Baby’ on this Youtube link:

YouTube stuff here…
Rock Me Baby

A spirited second set saw a strong finally and inevitable ‘Preacher Man’ encore. The girls really put on a show this night and the sitting down on the edge of the stage stuff was brilliant!!!

A massive thanks to Pete and Eric for having us
Gary

The First Krossborder Rekords Road Show – The Farnham Maltings – Thursday 29th May 2014

This is the text of a journalists review scheduled to appear in the July edition of Blues Matters magazine:

The Maltings, Farnham was the first venue to host the KrossBorder Rekords Roadshow – an event which plans to rumble around the UK for the next 2 years featuring some of the key bands from the KrossBorder CD “Best of British Blues”.

Tonight, as ebullient MC, Earl Jackson, was keen to point out, featured 3 headline bands – Red Butler, Little Devils and Roadhouse.

Red Butler kicked things off in a very lively fashion. Peppering their originals with sympathetic covers they kept up a bouncy “glad to be here” feeling throughout – partially because they had just taken delivery of their new CD! Originals that stood out were “Young & Free”, “Jay Walker” and their penultimate belter, “Danger Zone” – all featuring fine guitar playing from Alex Butler and youthfully exuberant vocals from Jane Chloe Pearce.

Second headliners were Little Devils, featuring Yoka on powerhouse vocals, flute and sax and the fiery taut guitar of Big Ray – playing songs that capture the human condition – happy, sad, lost and found. Songs included the heart rending “Deep Inside” from the KBR compilation, featuring swirling sax and guitar interplay and introducing several new songs such as “Wounded” dedicated to Maya Angelou who inspired the song and the emotionally torn “My Perfect You”, a song I already consider to be a defining statement.

Third headliners, Roadhouse, completed the evening. They are a big band with twin female vocals and they like to take you on journeys with their Americana influenced songs that evoke big landscapes. Songs like “Blues Highway”, “Hell on Wheels” (from the KBR compilation), the brooding magnificent Dark Angel (featuring a big solo from band leader Gary Boner) and the epic closing number “Preacher Man” (featuring an equally epic solo from Danny Gwilym) all drew the crowd into the magic of the moment.

Over 2 & ½ hours of music – damned good value – but it wasn’t over! Roadhouse were joined by Alex and Jane from Red Butler and Yoka, Big Ray and Sara from Little Devils – hence forth known as The Red Road Devils! Jamming on “Help Me” and “Blues is my Business” leaving the audiences cheering for more.

Sadly, time was called but I am pleased to report that the Kross Border Roadshow is heading to Blakeney Harbour Rooms (Friday 24 Oct) and Chequer Mead Arts Centre (Fri 28 Nov) with more planned for 2015. Keep checking the websites – this is a gig and a half in every gig!! Not to be missed.

Terry Parker

Roadhouse Live at Blues On The Farm – Essex – Saturday 3rd May 2014
A great return to Roy Anson’s fabulous venue. How such a top quality big stage, nice PA, Saturday afternoon venue can be lacking the desired level of support is beyond me. At least the crowd numbers were well up on recent showings for our gig and a massive thanks to all our friends and supporters who came down and created such a fantastic atmosphere.
When we arrived I thought Mandie had a new friend, some stunning girl with long black hair, only to discover it was Sarah in a wig. The crowd were also confused, thinking we had yet another great new singer and when the girls swapped the wig over in the break even more controversy prevailed.

The first set was very well executed with ‘The Big Easy’, ‘Hell On Wheels’ and ‘Blues Motel’ leading the way. I lost form with a few lead playing errors at the start of the second, but the band managed to pick me up with a resounding ‘Voodoo Queen’ and ‘Preacher Man’
Get yourselves down to Blues At The Farm, what a great venue, give it the support it deserves
Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Hope Tavern – Holton Le Moor – Sunday 6th April 2014

Nea

One of the best gigs in recent years, equalling in it’s own way our main performance at the this years National Rock and Blues Festival. We started positively and the audience reacted really strongly. The solos were cheered in Blues Highway, as the girls vocals just keep getting better on that one. Bill and Roger were totally on the money during this gig providing a solid foundation for Danny to work his magic over. The guitar trade off section in Rock Me Baby went into completely different territory, with a crazy high speed section that surprised us as much as the audience (I couldn’t do it again!).

The second set lifted things even further and this lead to 3 encores, finally resolving nicely on our version of ‘Heavens Door’ with Mandie and Sarah being well controlled bearing in mind how big their voices are and that it was at the end of the gig. The vocal harmonies on ‘Voodoo Queen’ were really sweet.

A massive thanks for Graham for having us back for what was about the 8th or 9th time, its nice to reward him by pulling such a great crowd. a special thanks to Mick who has helped graham with this great club over the years. This was his last show as he is off to Australia. Best of luck from all of us. What a great gig.

We’ll be back
Gary

Roadhouse Live At The Admiral Rodney, Southwell – Saturday 5th April 2014
Thanks to Bernard for booking us to play this great gig which is only run on a near 6 monthly basis, and it was for the 2nd year running. A very good sized crowd saw us play 2 sets with a double encore at this excellent venue.

Notable events included Danny leaning over my shoulder and playing my guitar with one hand. I wouldn’t mind but he sounded better then I do with two!

Bill and Roger were rock solid and the girls on top form. In addition we had an excellent PA crew, plus a spot on Master of Ceremonies. It was great to meet 2 new groups of people who had come long distances to see the Band as a result of hearing all our CD’s on Spottify. It was good to see new faces singing along.
Keep coming to see us please!

Thanks again to Bernard
Gary

Roadhouse Live at Bedford Esquires – Sunday 22nd March 2014
A massive thanks to Pete for having us back at his great 3 stage venue, where we know so many people. A good sized crowd full of so many old friends and believers. A massive thanks to all the people who travelled great distances to go to this gig (Some from Wales!)

Lots of photographers were present and Pete himself played some great sounds assisted by the lovely Cherry Lee Mewis who it was also good to see. The new version of Blues Highway with the girls on the vocals is going great and is going to be on the next CD for sure. You can see the actual performance on:

This was a great gig at a great venue, we are back on the 5th October, see you then
Gary

Roadhouse Live At the Sydenham Blues Club, The Grape & Grain, Crystal Palace, Friday 21st March 2014
Our first time at this nice big stage pub based club. Many thanks to Becky for having us here and to Robin Bibi for the recommendation. The stage was nice and deep which gave the band plenty of room to move around and put on a real performance. It was great to see so may old friends who turned up here even though it was out first time at the venue.

The sound was really good in the first part of the room but then fades as it hits the middle section of the really deep room. Video highlights of this show are available on the following Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/WickedUncleSteve

Top songs in the first set were ‘Blues Motel’ and a classic version of ‘Dark Angel’, both of which are available on the above Youtube channel. In the second set things picked up pace and energy as usually and the biggest round of applause was saved for a killer version of ‘The Roadhouse Blues’.

‘Too Tired Too Pray’ was given a rare airing an Danny played some Demon slide on this one. Overall the sound balance was great and we had some terrific feedback from the crowd, “Best Band here ever” etc…..we were made to feel very welcome. We hope to return

Thanks to all for your great support
Gary

Roadhouse Live At the Colourhouse Theatre London, SW19, Sunday 2nd March 2014

A special birthday celebration for Roger and the night of my birthday put the Band in a celebratory mood. A massive thanks to all the people who turned out on another great night for us and packed out the Colourhouse.
Set wise we stuck with the new version of ‘Blues Highway’ which now features a duet between Mandie and Sarah. Additionally, ‘Spirits Across the Water’ has become a regular in the set and brings a different kind of energy. The first set was really good, but then the 2nd set cranked up the performance levels. After not playing our new CD’s title track in our 2 sets at Skegness we made sure to play ‘Gods & Highways’ here, and the girls sounded great. The triple finish of ‘Tellin Lies’, ‘Voodoo Queen’ and ‘Preacher Man’ built to a substantial climax and it was great to see that great guitar player Mr Robin Bibi come up and announce the encore. A well done to him and the whole Colourhouse team for building the impetus at this great venue.
Back again on the 2nd of November, see you then
Gary

Roadhouse Live At The National Festival of Rock & Blues – Skegness – 25th & 26th January 2014

Main Set – Sunday 26th January 2014 – 20.30 – JAKS Stage
This was one of the best Roadhouse gigs of all time. Slot wise we were up against the amazing Chantel McGregor and in the 2nd half of the set, Jefferson Starship. We started with a really good crowd and from the time that Chantel’s set was over JAKS was totally packed. The atmosphere was electric and the band really rose to the occasion playing as well as I can remember in recent memory. The 90 minutes flew past and the reaction at the end of ‘Voodoo Queen’ and then the encore ‘Preacher Man’, was fantastic

Starting with a lively ‘Tellin Lies’, the Band blasted through ‘Spirits Across The Water’. The girls were featured on ‘The Big Easy’ (Sarah) and ‘Blues Motel’ (Mandie) and both did a great job.
The Band then turned back the clock and played the epic ‘I Couldn’t Get To sleep At Night’ from 2004’s No Place To Hide, for the first time for many years.

Another epic was played in the form of set Favourite ‘Dark Angel’, then the great Nick Garner joined the Band on the harmonica for a free form rendition of the ‘Roadhouse Blues’

Towards the end Danny and I slugged it out on our version of ‘Watchtower’, while Bill and Roger sounded like Thunder in the background. Party pieces were brought out to play in the individual introductions during the centre section of ‘Voodoo Queen’, including a great drum solo from Roger. At the end of the encore the band came forward and took a well deserved bow. Our 11th successive Skegness festival was over. Thanks to all at Blues Matters, Krossborder Rekords and to all our friends who gave us such tremendous support
Gary

National Festival of Rock & Blues Skegness – Jam Set and the Jam – 25th January 2014
A really good crowd turned up for the 7th Skegness Jam. It remains an honour to run this great event.

We kicked off the pre jam set with a cracking version of ‘Hell On Wheels’ and then quickly followed that with both ‘Too Tired To Pray & ‘Rainmaker’ from the Dark Angel CD. The girls sang ‘The Lying Game’ (Sarah) and ‘House Of the Rising Sun’ (Mandie), before the set came to a great crescendo with a killer extended version of ‘Voodoo Dance’, which managed to be both sexy and a bit psychedelic in nature. The crowd reaction was amazing, Like a full on late night gig in its intensity.

The jam was as busy as ever with some stunning highlights in total 67 people played and variety of styles and standard of playing was breath taking. There were a few grumbles that there were a few complete Bands taking up slots, but we had 4 the same as all the other years. Two of them had never played to an audience of any size before which made it totally legitimate as far as I was concerned. It was also great to have a set from the great Clare Free.
There was a great power set from young Band Red Butler and a superb closing set by legendary guitar player Roy Mette, who was playing with the excellent Dave Thomas. A special mention in despatches to Carlos and Gizmo both on the guitar, Chip and Dave on the drums and Mick on the harp. Shame that quite a few people put there name down and then when they were called had disappeared. This created about 10-15 lost minutes and my apologies to the handful of people I had to turn away as the playlist was so full within the opening hour. Also apologies to the great Trevor the vocalist from Bedford who I did not manage to fit in.
Rocking,
Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Famous Monday Blues at the Jericho Oxford – Monday 17th December 2013
It was an honour to be asked to host the Xmas party of this famous and long lived venue under the legendary and iconic stewardship of Philip Guy Davies. The problem was a back injury to Roadhouse drummer Roger Hunt. after a last minute dash for a replacement, Bob Ayre stepped in. Bob was recommended and we met him at the venue for the first time!!!!.
He was a total hero getting us through the first hours Roadhouse set. We didn’t help him by starting off the Big Easy at double speed, how Sarah coped I’ll never know. Yes this was PRESSURE 🙂

In the second half we hosted and supported some of Philip’s excellent range of guests. The whole second half was well drummed by Bob the hero!!!!
A good crowd and a surprise win under the circumstances
Happy Xmas All
Gary

ROADHOUSE LIVE AT THE TROPIC RUISLIP – SATURDAY 16TH NOVEMBER 2013
It was great to be back at the superb Tropic after a wait of over 18 months. This venue rocks and does great business with bands stacking up to get in like Jumbos on the flight path to Heathrow. A massive thanks to Philip for having us. Whenever this fine promoter puts on a Tribute act he gets a massive crowd. However, he sticks with original talent too and we were pleased to pull our biggest ever Tropic Crowd and one of our biggest of the year for a non Festival event.

With fantastic support and audience reaction we blasted through 2 sets of over 1 hours duration. Both Mandie and Sarah were on great form (it really was a home crowd for Mandie) and ‘The Big Easy’ and ‘Blues Motel’ from the new CD, Gods & Highways & Old Guitars went down a storm. In the 2nd set ‘Watchtower’ was given another spirited outing and I found I could repeat my new speed guitar technique (lol). Danny was on great form!!!

Spirits across the Water had an excellent play, and it produced a strong reaction from the crowd. there were 3 encores on a brilliant night for the band where CD sales were totally astronomical. thanks you Philip, Darren Wisdom and all who came and encouraged others to come, for a superb night. We hope to be back again next year.

Gary

ROADHOUSE LIVE AT BEDFORD ESQUIRES – SUNDAY 3RD NOVEMBER 2013

Roadhouse Live at Esquires Bedford – Sunday 3rd November 2013

It was great to finally get to play at Esquires after scheduling issues with the previous Management. This time we met the efficient and nice chap Pete and were well looked after. A bastion of support for true music lovers who attend the Skegness Festival of Blues & Rock, this was like a massive re-union party, with folk travelling from all over the UK to be there. It was great to see so many friends and true Roadhouse supporters and an honour to have the great Del Bromham of Stray in the crowd. Great player and great guy.

2013

The Band played as well as I’ve known us play in the last two years. This was a full on good performance to a crowd who were totally behind us all the way. Set wise we juggled things around a bit, starting with a double tap of ‘Hell On Wheels’ and ‘Too Tired Too Pray’. There was 3 encores, the 3rd being the first airing of ‘No Place To Hide for nearly 6 months. Danny blasted out the slide part in excellenct fashion. Personaaly I had a weird outbreak of decent playng in ‘Watchtower’ where I started playing so quickly that Danny had to come over and check that I wasn’t miming. Roll over Joe Satriani!

We are in the process of scheduling a return in the first half of 2014 and are dying to get back to this place. A top gig!!!
Thanks to all who made the effort to come
Gary
Roadhouse

Roadhouse Live At The Colourhouse Theatre – Merton Abby Mills – Sunday 13th October 2013
A nice return to this lovely candlelit local venue situated on a riverside. Once more we proved to be one of the top crowd pullers if not the top crowd pullers here. A few PA problems in the first set did not spoil a night of hard blues rocking, which delivered a top notch 2nd set.

Top rockers of the night was an epic ‘Roadhouse Blues’ and the current CD’s title track ‘Gods & Highways and Old Guitars’

We will be back on the 2nd of March (The night of my Birthday) as the night will be a celebration of a special landmark for Roger
See you then
Gary

Roadhouse Live at The Blues In The City Festival, Headlining the Sunday of the Festival at the Black Bull, Chelmsford on Sunday 29th September

Nice to be back at the tireless Nick Garner charity champion and damn good harp player’s festival for the benefit of The Helen Rollason Cancer Charity. We were in the headline spot on the last day, effectively closing this festival which had sported some big names like The Nimmo Brothers and good friends of ours like that guitar great Robin Bibi

A delayed start caused by the overrunning of acts earlier in the day lead to us kicking with ‘Hell On Wheels’ to a strong reception. at the end of the first set Nick had a really good sax player, Greg Cambourne, who is the Chief Executive of the Charity up to jam with us on Rock Me Baby. This gave me some flashbacks to when awesome Australian Sax player Andy Thompson was in the band. Then Nick Himself joined us on harp on the 2nd song of the second set, our individual arrangement of ‘The Roadhouse Blues’

It was good to see our friends from Storm Warning who had played earlier in the day at the gig, especially Derek White. We finished with a strong double tap, of ‘Tellin Lies’ and encore ‘Preacher Man’. It was great to play for Nick and support such a great cause!
Gary

Roadhouse Live at The Blakeney Harbour Rooms, Blakeney, Norfolk, Friday 13th September 2013

A long drive up to the spit of land where the lovely small town of Blakeney sits out on a spit of land, you can taste the sea air.
Unfortunately after a nice set up and sound check in this big stage venue (good soundman), the heavens opened and torrential rain fell throughout the whole night leaving many roads flooded by the time we drove home. Unfortunately this had a real effect on the crowd numbers, which was shame as we love playing here and Gary and his team do such a great job of running the place and booking top talent.

Still the smallish crowd were right behind us and there were a number of Photographers on site including our own Steve Dulieu and the excellent Martyn Turner. After ‘Spirits Across The Water’ not going well at Stevenage we were determined to put that right and we managed to play a really good version which had a lot of positive feedback at the break.

The second set had a lot of the crowd up dancing and help them there until a cracking ‘Tellin lies’, ‘Preacher Man’ finale. Gary was delighted and said we were always welcome back. Great to see our old friend Gizmo there who I am sure will be blazing away on his guitar at the jam in Skeggy and also the people who came all the way from Leicester after buying the Cd on Amazon
Gary

Roadhouse Live At the Red Lion, Stevenage – 1st September 2013
Nice to be back at Trevor ‘The Hat’ Keelings atmospheric Sunday night blues venue. A long and thin playing area means the crowd is in your face (literally). a massive thanks to all the great Roadhouse fans who came down, people who have supported us for years, since our early gigs at Walkern music and the Stevenage Mayfest.
The band were stuck in first gear to start and the 2nd number was our first live attempt of ‘Spirits Across the Water’ and though spirited (boom boom), it showed up some flaws that need to be sorted out. Blues Motel really kicked the set into action and by the time we in the 2nd set we were in full ‘Big stage’ mode.

The only thing that stopped a second and third encore was the strict curfew. A good night for all, thanks to Trevor and all that came
Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Duck & Drake Leeds – 24/8/2013

So to night two of our little Northern jaunt. Apparently crowds have been a little up and down at this really nice pub venue full of rock memrobilia, but we had a great night with lots of enthusiastic music lovers and a good number of Roadhouse fans, some of which had driven across from Preston for the show.
Set wise it was similar to the Harrogate show, ‘Blues Motel’ really kicked, Sarah sung ‘The Big Easy’ and ‘The Lying Game’ one after the other and got a great reception. We revisited our version of ‘All Along The Watchtower’ again, which allowed Danny and I to branch out a bit while the ladies had a ‘rest’. Another great thing about playing this venue was that it allowed Mandie to perform to her family. It was lovely to see all of them looking so well, great folk!

There was a big shout for an encore and the positive vibe/energy took us as far as Watford Gap Services. I reached home at 5.45am and Roger eventually at 6.15am.
Well done Roger for driving the Band bus.
Thanks also to Simon & Sharon for having us for the two shows and to all of you for the great support
Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Blues Bar Harrogate – 23/8/2013
From the expanses of the big stage at the Cambridge Rock Festival to Simon & Sharon Colgan’s iconic little venue in the heart of Harrogate. Personal issues on band members made it appropriate the hire a tour bus for the weekend and setting off on bank Holiday Friday at 11am and we were lucky to make the gig. Traffic was at an all time bad and we pulled up at the Blues Bar at around 19.20 (We could have driven to Germany in that time!). We set up close and personal on the little stage and as usual for this cool place kicked off to a full house of music lovers.

Due to the fact that the Colne festival was on this weekend, there was not as much hard core Roadhouse support in the room as there usually is here. Its a real shame that after our 7 successive years on the big British stage at Colne, with 3 shut outs due to packed numbers, that we do not play there any more. Our record company (Blues Matters at the time) lost that stage and as a consequence we’ve not even been considered to return, still who said that life was fair! So we threw a few covers into the set. The crowd response to ‘Hell On Wheels’ was great and they loved Mandie belting out ‘Blues Motel’ and Sarah’s superb version of the ‘Big Easy’. It’s brilliant to see loads of new people loving the original songs. we played Not Fade Away for the first time in ages and we even gave the girls a rest for Danny, Bill , Roger and I to slog our way through an epic version of ‘All Along The Watchtower’

The first half was packed and then as it drew near the witching hour the crowd thinned out a bit. But there was still a fine shout for an encore and ‘Preacher Man’ sent everyone happily into the night. Our 4th good gig here.

Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Cambridge Rock Festival – 4/8/13

Many thanks to Dave and Adrian for having us back at this major festival. We went down a storm when we here in 2010 so it was great to be back. We were on stage 2 at 18.30 and our competition included Mostly Autumn who were playing on Stage 1.
It was good to catch with lots of old friends backstage including that great young guitar player Ben Poole and the chap that handles our UK PR, Jim Soars.

In front of a big and enthusiastic crowd the one hour set just seemed to blur by in minutes. Have a look at some of these video clips posted by members of the audience to get an idea of what it was like:

The Big Easy:

Dark Angel:

Gods & Highways & Old Guitars Version 1:

Gods & Highways & Old Guitars Version 2:

The set ran approx like this, Hell On Wheels, Rainmaker, Blues Motel, The Big Easy, Dark Angel, Gods & Highways, Tellin Lies, Encore = Preacher Man

What a great reaction, thanks to all that were there. After coming off stage I was interviewed by the good folk of Cambridge Radio and parts of our set have been broadcast over the last 10 days with the new CD, Gods & highways being featured on their breakfast show. I then did an interview for Radio Caroline and had a good chat with that excellent DJ Trevor Howard from Severn FM who is also currently playing the CD.

As a personal postscript Danny, Mandie and I hung around to Network and from the side of stage 2 I saw a stunning set from Dave Edwards. Bill and I grew up watching this guy in a Band called RDB, where he played with Dennis Stratton who went off to be in Iron Maiden. Totally magic, its weird how things come round full circle

Commiserations to Bill on the death of his brother Terry who was also a part of my life growing up…….. live everyday while you still can
Gary

ROADHOUSE SECOND CD LAUNCH NIGHT – THE BOOM BOOM CLUB, SUTTON FC, 19/7/2013
So to the second of our launch nights at Pete Feenstra’s great venues. The heatwave rolled on the and the air in the Boom Boom was almost tangibly heavy.
However, there was a much bigger crowd than at the Beaverwood and the Steve Eggs Band provided rousing modern Country music based support. With our host Eric Harvey looking after the door and excellent CD sales, the clock edged around to showtime

The Band were well warmed up by last nights show and a spirited opening with ‘Hell On Wheels’ lead to us attacking ‘Blues Motel with real venom and confidence. Everyone is loving Danny’s solo on that song. Sarah sang a great version of ‘The Big Easy’ and ‘Dark Angel’ brought one of the biggest cheers of the night and the longest guitar solo (Well in my defence, it was quite a good one)
Great all round musician and journalist Pete Sargeant then joined us onstage to duke it out with Danny and I on Rock Me Baby.
The title track of Gods & Highways & old Guitars was next with Mandie and Sarah really doing it great justice.

at the end of ‘Tellin Lies’ everyone was going crazy for an encore but we had run out of time. Complaints from the club’s neighbours meant we could not risk getting a top venue like this into any trouble. A massive thanks to the support that promoter Pete Feenstra has given this Band over 16 years of its existence.
thanks so much to all of you who came out on this hot summer night and gave us your support
Gary

ROADHOUSE FIRST CD LAUNCH GIG – THE BEAVERWOOD CLUB, CHISLEHURST, 18/7/2013
Well into the heat wave, advance bookings were down for this key show for the Band. We were well looked after by the excellent Eric Harvey who ran the night expertly in the absence of the legendary Pete Feenstra.

With only 15 minutes to go there were only a handful of people in the room, but by the start nearly 40 folk saw the show and they were so brilliantly supportive that it seemed closer to 100. The first play live of ‘Blues Motel’ was excellent as was the first outing for ‘Sinner’ which came up as a 2nd encore following Preacher Man. It was good to see Geoff and his friends up from Broadstairs and nice to have a great writer Dave Ling from Classic Rock at the show.

The response to the new material was excellent and for the relatively small number of people CD sales were a record high, a totally amazing amount of CDs were sold.
Thanks to everyone who came out on a hot summer night for a memorable gig
Gary

ROADHOUSE LIVE AT THE HOPE TAVERN – HOLTON LE MOOR, NEAR MELTON MOWBRAY, SUNDAY APRIL 14TH 2013

A return to one of our fave venues, it was great to catch up with Landlord, music lover and great all round guy, Graham. after the ritual Sunday roast lunch we watched this quaint country pub transform itself into a atmospheric Blues/Rock venue. On the downside the crowd was a touch on the low side compared to our past annual appearances here. However, it was a good gig and we managed to push material from the forthcoming new CD, Gods & Highways & Old Guitars to a very receptive audience

This was one of those gigs when the Band really loosened up in the second half. thanks to all the music lovers who were there to warm up this cold Sunday afternoon (When will the weather ever change).
The new CD approaches
Gary

ROADHOUSE LIVE AT THE ADMIRAL RODNEY – SAT APRIL 13TH 2013

Roadhouse Live at the National Festival of Rock & Blues, Skegness – Sunday 17th Jan 2013

Our main festival appearance was from 20.30 – 22.00 on the JAKS stage on the Sunday evening. the previous year was the first year JAKS had been open on a Sunday night and the good sized crowds delighted all. However, this time we were up against both main stages as only one had been operating in 2012. With 10 minutes to showtime I thought ‘Well at least its a reasonable sized crowd’. However, from 15 minutes into our set the room was packed. I cannot tell you how much the Band and I appreciated the amazing support.

This set was all about featuring new numbers from the forthcoming CD, ‘Gods & Highways & Old Guitars’. Mandie has the lead vocal on the title track and its first play went really well. We’ve been playing the new song ‘Hell on Wheels’ for quite a while now and the heavy rock/country riff catapulted us through another winner.Sarah performed another new song, ‘Slow Down’, in which the chorus has a duet style trade off with Mandie. this was also well received and you can see a video of this performance on Youtube, as filmed randomly from the crowd by the following the link below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DAXtb8xpDc

We had opened up with ‘Tellin Lies’  =  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lHc9rJEByE    –  and then we played the new nummber ‘I Can’t Say No’ followed by a cracking version of ‘Dark Angel’. Suzie.D took centre stage for a brilliant version of ‘The Big Easy’ from the Broken Land CD. How she can remember all these songs and immediately create 3 part harmonies is beyond me, ‘brilliant’!

I toasted the crowd, very sincerely at the start of our drinking song ‘The Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues’. That little rocker turned into a nice little 4 minute kick arse party. The encore was, as ever ‘Preacher Man’. The reaction was superb and as many have told me, it was the best Roadhouse gig for years. As we accepted loads more advance orders for the new CD it was great to see our good friend Robin Bibi take the stage with his usual blend of excellent musician and showmanship. A great weekend!

Here’s to next year

Gary

  

Roadhouse Live at the National Festival of Rock & Blues Skegness – Saturday 26th Jan 2013

So to our first appearance of the weekend. An opening 40 plus minute set followed by running the Festivals legendary Jam Session (My 6th year of doing this in a row).  We opened to a really good sized crowd and with Suzie.D coming in augment the great vocals of Mandie.G and Sarah Harvey-Smart, the Band sounding on form with a massive, ‘widescreen’ vocal sound.  We only played one of the new songs in this set and the Epic, ‘Katrina’ did great on its first outing, receiving an excellent reaction

Mandie was on top form with her now famous rendition of ‘House of the Rising Sun’ as featured on the Sea of Souls CD. You can see this great performance on Youtube by following the link listed below:

By the middle of our set and throughout the jam the JAKS  venue was packed, as busy as I’ve ever seen it. The audience gave great support to the jammers and to me this event is what the festival is all about ‘Performances by the people for the people’. All improvised and full of moments of absolute magic. It was great to get the excellent Roy Mette up onstage and his drummer went into history by battering the life out of Roger’s kit and breaking one of the double bass drum pedals (great drummer though). There were too many amazing musicians to mention, though it was great to see the great ‘Mr Charity’ Nick Garner on the harp

The great Claire Free (top publicist and musician) also did an excellent set, very Texas Blues oriented, wonderfully augmented by our own Danny Gwilym on the guitar – great stuff!

Once more the Jam was brought to a climax by a set from the excellent Tom Jones, with our great mate Carlos on the guitar, Mick on the harp and the aforementioned Dave doubling up on the vocals for the last of 3 numbers. You can watch this performance and get a sense of the jam by following this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcLS6eIzrnk Here’s to 2014………???????????, well done to all and thanks for the amazing supportGary

Roadhouse Xmas Party Gig – Live at the Bulls Head Barnes – 10/12/2012

One of the best ever Roadhouse Xmas party gigs. a great crowd, a great bunch of guests and a night to remember.

This was our 5th succesive Xmas gig at the Bulls Head, so it is becoming a firm tradition. those of you that have been to one of these fun nights will know that we love to share them with past memebers of the Band and great musical talents that have supported us over the years.

First up was the excellent Geronimo of Screaming Lord Sutch fame, with John Scott (USA) on bass and our our own Roger Hunt on drums. this was followed by a marvellous set from legendary UK Blues Man, John O’Leary and ex Roadhouse guitar god, Jules Fothergill. Tim Mathewman joined on bass and solo’d really well (he must have played at least 4 solos on the night). Along with our own Rog and Danny on drums and guitar respectively, these guys produced some awesome stuff. Next up was Jimmy Dublin who played a couple of well received songs with ex Roadhouser Funky George on the drums. At 9.35 it was time for the Roadhouse set. With Sarah dressed as a sexy Santa and Mandie as a Xmas fairy (fully equipped with in dress light show) the stage image was a little different. We opened with a belting ‘No Place to Hide’, much to poor Sarah’s chagrin as she has only ever sung it twice before, followed by ‘Rainmaker’ in which both girls vocal performances went down a storm with the crowd. This was followed by a belting version of the new song ‘Hell On Wheels’ which went down really well. Sarah then sung a great version of ‘The Lying Game’. This was the first time that her family had come to see the show and they really  enjoyed this performance and the overall gig. Mandie sang a killer ‘House of the Rising Sun’ before our special guest Kelly joined us and delivered a storming version of ‘The Big Easy’ and then sang brilliantly with Mandie on ‘Rock Me Baby’. Danny and I had a decent guitar battle in the middle of that one. Talking of guitar, we were then joined by ex Roadhouse guitar god, Jules Fothergill for the last two numbers. ‘Tellin Lies’ was delivered as a kind of Wishbone Ash twin riff thingy and then the encore, Preacher Man decended into some epic Skynyrd style mahem. What a great crowd reaction, I really don’t know where the hour went?

To finish we had an epic instrumental from Pete Sargeant and Jules followed then by a show stopping couple of numbers from the amazing Robin Bibi. A massive thanks to Pete Feenstra for having us and the wonderful Bob Bonsey for running the night.

A happy Xmas to all our friends and here’s to rocking in 2013

Gary

Roadhouse Live at Clowne Rock & Blues Club Derbyshire – 28/11/12

Well this was our 7th gig since our return from the enforced sabbatical. All had been brilliant, but the run came to an end here.

The last time we played this club probably about 25 Roadhouse supporters came (plus a good few locals) from pretty long distances to see us play a rare gig in this part of the world. Well not having gone North at all since our return, I thought it would be a good idea to stay in touch with people even if with the petrol involved, this gig would cost us money.

Bad decision, as it turned out. I remember the room (a modern concrete sports hall with a high stage) being a bit poor for sound.  As we arrived the memories came rushing back and no matter what volume we set things at things were out of proportion in different parts of the room. Apparently the promoter, Alan Robson, usually puts up a curtain to stop a bit of the sound bounce, but he was full of flu and obviously didn’t have the help or the energy.

Well the good news, about 15 Roadhouse supporters came (plus some locals) and we saw quite a few special freinds and talked about future shows with some promoters. At the end of the first set we came off knowing that we’d played a really good first set and totally happy.

It went wrong at that point as some people thought the sound was fine others said it was too loud, others said they couldnt hear the girls , others could abut could not hear the guitars in balance. It all depended where they were sitting in the room. We tried our best to address all this and by the end we’d turned in a really good performance with improved sound.

However, the promoter said that some people had complained about the vocal harmonies being out of tune. Now Sarah’s monitor 95% failed from early on in the gig, but I could hear the vocals throughout and there were only a couple of times that they went fractionally off, so I’ve no idea what he was talking about?. He also started the you need to bring more people rant. Well my answer to that is as ever we’ll bring the quality and as many people as we can, you promote!!!!!!!,

Its only a band thats was rated by music writers as being the top 15 best live bands in the UK in 2011, Dark Angel as being the 4th best UK release in 2011, that has played Glastonbury and has two great looking and fabulous sounding female vocalists. Can someone sell that???

We need more people like Alan. Here he is running a club with little support and often making a loss. How brave and dedicated is that. We (Bands) need more people to be like him and do this to keep live music alive. The pressure on these people is vast as they gamble with their own money. Its tough in a recession with a shrinking market for live music, so I have a lot of empathy here.

What I do know is that this is a very hard room (the hardest we’ve played for years) for sound.

Well it was great to see our friends

Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Beaverwood, Chislehurst, 25/10/12

A great night at Pete Feenstra’s excellent venue. A lot of big names have been playing this club in recent months, it was an honour to play here again, thanks to Pete and Eric for having us.

I was hoping for a crowd of over 80, but with more than 50 paying punters it was still a solid night. Amazing to see so many old friends.  A major thanks to all who turned up, with a special thank you to Alan Harvey for the pictures.

The new songs ‘Hell on Wheels’ and ‘ I Cant Say No’ were well received. This was the first time that many Roadhouse stalwarts had seen Sarah sing and she made a very positve impression. Dark Angel was one of the highlights of the night, for some reason we seem to be really hitting top form on this song at the moment. We played ‘ No Place to Hide’ for the first time in ages and it sounded really fresh.  Well played Bill on bass who has been playing really well over the last few gigs.

There was a big shout for a second encore but I had promised Mr Harvey that I would not play over the set time limit. Apologies to all who were shouting for more, we would have loved to have played on.

Thanks for the great support

Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Famous Monday Blues Club – Oxford – 22/10/2012

Now the legendary Philip Guy Davies club has moved to the Jericho Tavern, (other than the parking situation), everyone is loving it……

A great night for us saw the return to vocal duties of Kelly Marie Hobbs. Mandie and Sarah are currently the bands main singers but Kelly is top of the Dep list when we are playing in the South (Suzie.D when in the Midlands) and we really excited about her doing more work with us. What made this night even extra special was that Sarah came too and we had all 3 top female vocalists rocking out……

With ten minutes to go crowd numbers were really thin, but by the time we were into our third number  things were much better. A large group of young foreign students came to the gig and loved it, we were posing for pictures with them afterwards.

Kelly was amazing, it was like she had never been away (other than the new hair colour!). It was great to be able to play the ‘Big Easy’ again and Kelly really blasted that one out!…..We are looking forward to her doing more shows when either Mandie or Sarah are not available

The crowd reaction was great all night and Sarah joined us on stage as we tried a 3 girl vocal with Mandie on lead, on ‘Knocking on Heavens Door’….Kelly was so full of sass she was even dishing out the verbals on stage, and ‘ Tellin Lies’ brought the set to a powerful close. Sarah joined us once more for the encore ‘Preacher Man’,… A great night at this nice new venue and we look forward to coming back next year

Great to see Darren Wisdom back in the crowd!

Gary

Roadhouse Live at Blues at the Farm – Essex – Saturday 6th October 2012

Our first gig at this great venue. It took a few years to arrange but after the audience reaction and the great comments on their website we know that we will be back next year.

With a 14.15 start and bright sunshine outside, I wondered about the crowd, but this place has a lot of very knowledgeable music lovers and they stayed with us through two full on sets. Danny was on top form and by the end of the afternoon at least 5 people came up to me and said that he was the best guitar player that they had seen for years. He was using a different amp set up and his sound was sensational.

The vocals were not quite as good as usual as we struggled with the venues single monitor. However the girls nailed their solo numbers. The music however was really spot on. With the crowd totally behind us we really piled the rockier stuff on. The first set was as ‘kicking’ as the second. The girls were well looked after by the friendly crowds hospitality and reaction. Mandie was out and about and dancing in and with the crowd towards the end. There was a good version of ‘Voodoo Dance’, plus ‘Rainmaker’ went down a storm. The new song “I Can’t Say No” was given a decent outing and I reckon that will be up to full standard again by the next gig . The twin guitar section worked a treat!

The best gig yet since the return from our enforced break………We’ll be back to this great place

Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Crawdaddy Club – Essex, Special Charity Gig for J’s Hospice – Thursday 27th October

Thanks to the incredible work of Nick Garner who pulled together a stunning line up of events in aid of the wonderful J’s Hospice, we happily played this gig without even expenses.

A double header with Tim Aves excellent Blues Band, Wolfpac; it was great to be back at playing a big gig for a great cause. With Tim being very much the local DJ and  well known musician I was happy for us to go on 1st.

As a band I think we have done well in the first two gigs since our forced break, but tonight was the night that Roadhouse returned to form. In a nice big venue with a good crowd and full PA, the band really played well. The hour and 15 minutes flew by. Due the the excellent monitoring, the vocals were the best they have been in a long time. Mandie and Sarah’s voice gell together nicely and both girls were on great form despite Mandie’s sore throat.

Bill was also back on top form and along with Roger’s drums the rythmn section powered us through the first few numbers. Third up was the new number ‘Hell on Wheels’ which again was given a good outing and was very well received. ‘Dark Angel’ featured some really smooth as silk harmonies and a fabulous solo from Danny.

Nick Garner himself got up and joined us on harp for a nice, jam style version of  ‘The Roadhouse Blues’.  Sarah did well with a nice version of ‘The Lying Game’ and then Mandie brought the house down with her version of ‘House of the Rising Sun’. ‘ Tellin Lies’ culminated in a big shout for an encore and a decent version of Preacher Man ended the night on a high. There was a great crowd reaction, but the people at the Crawdaddy know their music and these were those generous souls who were also supporting Charity. A big thanks to Paul for having us back at his venue for the 6th time and the rest of the guys in that great band ‘the Heaters’, who also run the PA (really well).

This was a vintage Roadhouse performance. A massive thanks to Steve for the superb photos of which many more will be featured over the coming weeks

Roadhouse Live at the Wrotham Arms, Broadstairs – 21/9/2012

Thanks to Geoff for promoting and looking after the Band. This was our fourth show at this friendly pub music venue which features as a key location in February’s Broadstairs Blues Bash.

The second gig after my operation, the Band showed its lack of matchfitness with a few mistakes in the first half. A good start with cracking versions of ‘Too Tired To Pray’ and ‘Rainmaker. then wobbled with mistakes in the new song, the epic ‘Skinwalker’. Though the other new number, ‘Hell on Wheels’, went very well.

The second set was a different story with the Band delivering a typically powerful set. By the end of the show the crowd was totally engaged with the performance and ‘Tellin Lies’ lead into the usual encore of ‘Preacher Man’. The gig was notable for it being Sarah Harvey Smart’s second appearance in Roadhouse. Her voice has a fantastic bllend with Mandie’s and she continues to make a great impact. We will be back at this lovely venue for the Broadstairs Blues Bash on Friday the 22nd February.

Gary

Roadhouse Live at the Halling Festival – 18th August 2012

So after the longest break in Roadhouse’s 21 year, 11 album history we returned to live performance. I’d like to thank everyone for their support over the long period of my recovery from major surgery (especially for the week that I was effectively blind).

Thanks to the people of Halling for choosing us to be the main act for their annual festival. A special thanks to Trevor and his team for looking after us so well. The community centre hall was enormous and though the gig was on the hottest day of the year we kicked off the first set to nearly 100 people which I think in the current climate of recession is pretty good going.

After a layoff of over 3 months we were surprisingly good and star of the show was debute Sarah Harvey-Smart, who has the voice, image and talent to go on to become one of the best ever Roadhouse female vocalists (and the whole performance just based on about 3-4 hours coaching with Mandie). The harmonies in Dark Angel were amazing, the entire vocal textures sounding rich and creamy on what was a great version of the song…She did well on her solo vocal too

We threw in a few judicous covers to help the non initiated relate a little more easily to the experience, but overall it was a night to celebrate original music. The new song ‘Hell on Wheels’ with its storming electric ‘Yeehah’ fiddle sounding riff, had quite a few people asking to but the CD that it is on. All we have to do now is record the new album!

      There was time for a second encore, after a big Tellin Lies, Preacher Man finish. We had to sing the intro of Working Class Gospel Drinking Blues to Danny who was having a small mental abberation…classic, but he rose to the challenge…For me personally, the night was a big success. The hurdle of that first gig has been jumped and with plenty in the tank to spare (so to speak)….so well done Sarah

So come and catch the new look Band and the new material.

Its your support that keeps us going

See you soon

Gary

Review of Dark Angel in Rock Society Magazine

Roadhouse Live At The Tropic Ruislip – March 2011

Roadhouse At The New Inn – Witney – 26/3/2011

Roadhouse At The Famous Monday Blues Club – The Bullingdon – Oxford

The Hope Tavern Blues & Rock Club – Holton Le Moor – March 2011

The Broadstairs Blues Bash (Festival) –The Wrotham Arms – 18/2/2011