Excellent weekend was had playing and seeing music!

Walter Broes

Enlightened Member
Joined
Jun 13, 2005
Messages
5,892
Reaction score
1,957
Location
Antwerp, Belgium
We had the "Sjock" festival in Belgium this past weekend, a festival that started out very small and local 35 editions ago, but has been steadily growing into a bigger and bigger festival that balances between punk rock and rockabilly between two stages, and has been attracting people from all over Europe these last few years on the strength of the acts they book.

Some of the better known bands on the bill this year were The Fleshtones, The Reverend Horton Heat, Big Sandy and his Fly-Rite Boys, and the Paladins.
We had a bona-fide heatwave over here, and after a couple of hours I just started walking around with a towel permanently over my shoulder because it was SO hot and humid, but none of that mattered - the stars were in alignment, and it was one of those weekends that made me forget about all the travel, bad food, low pay, shady promotors, broken down vehicles and strings, etc... that I complain about a little too much after trying to make a living playing music for all those years.



My own band played on saturday backing up the lovely Sue Moreno from the Netherlands, and I'm borrowing some of fellow Belgian/LTG-er Caveman's pictures :
35102_1483326054008_1559552345_1184.jpg

35102_1483326174011_1559552345_1184.jpg



We were on the bill the next day too, with yours truly at the mic/Guild, and had one of those shows you remember even 200 shows later, a LOT of fun!
The Paladins closed the festival, and it was great hanging out with them again (my band shared the stage with them a lot in the 90's/early 2000's, and we got to be buddies), and both Dave G. and Brian (drummer) seemed very happy with our offer to use our backline instead of the generic usual rental stuff provided by the festival.

This is how the final encore of the night turned out :
PaladinsSjock.jpg

(that's Dave Gonzalez, yours truly, Big Sandy, and Thomas Yearsley in the pic)
 

valcotone

Member
Joined
Jun 25, 2008
Messages
227
Reaction score
4
Walter, thanks for posting... what a wonderful event to be a part of. I saw some recent Youtube videos of the Paladins reunion shows in Europe including a long interview... they really seem happy to be back playing together again. What was it like to seem them perform those great songs again in person? That must have been really great to share the stage. Did Dave have any comments on your amp setup?
 

Walter Broes

Enlightened Member
Joined
Jun 13, 2005
Messages
5,892
Reaction score
1,957
Location
Antwerp, Belgium
Valco, it was great seeing them together again, and they were obviously having fun too. They were extremely popular in Europe too, so they got pretty big crowds for their little reunion tour.

Dave was happy with my rig - he played a (vintage!) 3X10 bandmaster himself for the longest time way back when, with an outboard tank, and the festival only had Hotrod Devilles and silverface twins.
 

fungusyoung

Senior Member
Joined
May 20, 2006
Messages
1,274
Reaction score
1
Location
DE
Guild Total
2
I hadn't seen this thread until today, but what a cool sounding event!!!

Walter, is that Big Sandy of Los Straitjackets fame?
 
Top