26-May-2009 Acklam Open Mic

Our first visit to this recently established open mic night at Acklam Rugby and Cricket Club run by Ian and Catherine Swinburne. Ian is well known in the area not only as a performer but also as a very capable sound and video person too! He does a great job at the Station in Loftus, so we were confident that Acklam would be good too - we were not disappointed.

As usual we got there early to secure a good seat and plenty of space for the guitars - it also allowed us time to chat while final tweaks were made to the sound sytem setup.

Stormcrow got the night off to a spirited 2-song start, and we followed them with:

• Back Home To You (Allan Taylor)
• Passin Thru (Johnny Cash and Randy Scruggs)

Next up was Dean Coyle whose Taylor guitar looked like it had been through a battlefield and then re-assembled with Meccano-like bits to keep it together! Then we had John Wighell, Ian Smith, Phil Donegan, Tony Leonard and Ian Swinburne himself.

Then there was a short break while raffle tickets were sold (alas, we didn't win) - and then it was around again with 2 more songs from everyone. Our songs in this half were:

• Different Dreams (jiva)
• When (jiva)

We were pleasantly surprised when, at the end we were asked to do 2 more to close the night, and happily obliged with:

• Some Way Home (jiva)
• One More Song (jiva)

A fine night indeed, and a veritable Taylor-fest too... in addition to our three (910CE-L7, 910CE and 855) there were three other Taylor guitars! Wow!

Well done Ian and Catherine for organising these open mic nights, and thanks to Amanda for being MC for the night... we'll be back!

Links
jiva website
jiva MySpace
Ian Swinburne MySpace