The Wizard Festival

I honestly didn’t think I was going to make the Wizard festival.  If you had asked me at the beginning of the week I might have cancelled due to ill health.  But, soldiering on with the Whynie Shuffle to my aid, we took the 3 hour drive up the east coast, past Aberdeen, to Newdeer; this years location for the Wizard Festival.  The weather was dreadful!  It was a cold harsh Scottish day with wind fighting the tents from every side and the rain lashing down on the site  only to add to the insult.  Add a bit of cold cold temperature to the mix and you knew you were at a festival on the north east coast of Scotland …. BRRRR!!!

It was great to see the AFC tent up and running.  Rick and Stoo were there and had been since the day before getting everything ready.  The weather had apparently caused a bit of tension in regards to the setting up of equipment.  It sure was muddy.  There was a dance group called ‘Hip Hop Scotland’ opening the tent.  They were a group of youngsters who did a variety of moves and tricks to various R&B and Hip Hop tracks.  It was great to see the kids having a great time regardless of the weather.  The tent was soon up and running after that with a good variety of music.  I did escape to see one of my all time favorite bands, ‘The Beat’ on the man stage.  I absolutely love this band and they really know how to play it to the crowd with tracks like ‘Mirror in the Bathroom and ‘Rankin’ Fool Stop‘. The place was bouncing! By the time I headed back to the AFC stage my very good mates Acoustic Butterfly were taking to the stage.  There were some serious sound issues with one side of the stage.  The Sound techs did a great job in fixing the bad leads with a bit of soldering.  We also ran into various pals of old and great acts like Devil Train, Oxbow Lake, Maria Hall and Jay, and one half of the Lyndsay Dolan Band.  It was a good gathering and a good crowd for the gig.  The tent wasn’t the biggest which suited me fine as it filled up nicely.  We had some close friends from nearby come along to see us so it was exciting.

So after the long drive we started and it went down great.  All the sound issues were fixed and we had a great crowd.  We even got an encore.  I was totally fecked by the end of the gig and had to take a backseat and crash all the way home.  Well done Dave and Si for slogging the driving while I kipped in the back.  You guys are a blessing.  The morning after, I’m feeling it man, but it was well worth it!