Disco Thingie

[floppybootstomp]

In which I spin the sounds for a 40th Birthday party.

The birthday girl being Suzanne, mother of 2, partner to a musician and a damned fine human being

Party held in Charlton, in a recording/rehersal studio that hasn't been finished yet.

Went from 8pm to 5am aprox., two other guys had a go on the decks as well.

Pix:

This is my setup, 2 x 480W rms powered speakers, they do sound really good. I'm surprised that these tiny speakers do really fill a large hall with plenty of bass. They cost around £1200.00 including covers and stands.

And my coffin This one vintage 1984. The first one circa 1971 fell apart.

Those two big light columns, they gonna go. Too big for mobile use, 5' tall, 1' square. Gonna get something smaller and more transportable for mobile use.

If anybody wants to buy these, cheap, together with 8 channel light controller.4 channel mains output switched and 2 x multi-way cables, only one year old (the cables), PM/e-mail me (UK only).

Other than that, can anybody think of a good use for them?

Only thing I can think of is 2 speaker columns, I could take out light boxes and fit 4 or 5 8" or 10" speakers in there and maybe a tweeter. In each one.

But I don't think they'd be powerful enough for a disco and maybe too big for at home.

So, I don't know (serious) suggestions welcome

This is Peter, setting up the smoker's area, outside, with two braziers for cig stubs

This is the guy who done the visuals for the last Squeeze tour and also provided a projector light show for the party, together with my mate Johnny:

Kitchen staff

Suzanne gets her cake. That's her fella, Glenn, smiling

The first fella to do an hour's session, Gordon. He cuts my hair. He's a barber.

Dancing

That 'oops upside your head' thing. The blonde gal leaning over is Suzanne, birthday girl

More dancing:

Girls line up. Middle two are Lucy, bassist with The Fluffers, Glenn's touring band, and Suzanne, birthday girl:

I seem to get the thumbs up for the music:

Dancing:

Here's the other guy to do a session, Andy. He's early twenties, from Luxembourg and does lots of Raves in Europe.

Sandra looks at me as if I've just trodden in dog poo:

Andy again:

Old fart boogie

 

[Abarbarian]

Looks like you have a good life there mate .

 

[AbsoluteKevster]

Nice post mate

Looks like a decent do!

 

[Taffycat]

They look as if they all were having a fun time, lots of happy people.

Must take quite a bit of work to move that coffin-load of equipment around Flopps? Clever idea though

 

[floppybootstomp]

Minor references to debauchery - warning

Thanks for comments

I just thought, looking at pix, how I got the coffin handles. So, either ignore this or read on.

They actually are the real thing, even though they plastic, that's what really goes down into the earth. They're convincing when new, they look like brass, but they ain't.

Ya see, even death is a sham

Anyway, way back when, when me Roy & Bob built the coffin, we needed some handles to set the thing off.

So one morning I walked into the Lewisham branch of Francis Chappell, Funeral Directors, to the reception and asked if I could buy some coffin handles.

Now, I thought this was a perfectly reasonable request, I had money, I wanted goods.

What I didn't fully apreciate was that a 19 year old long haired denim clad hippie upstart asking for coffin handles might cause a few raised eyebrows.

I was very quickly and almost forcibly shown the door.

Unperturbed, I walked round the back, by the railway lines, to the workshop where they made the coffins and spoke to the guys there, surrounded by lots of nice looking plywood boxes.

One fella took me seriously, took me aside and we walked out the workshop.

He gave me a slip of paper and said 'Listen, we can't help, all goods here have to be accounted for, but here's the address of the fella who owns the firm who makes the handles'

I thanked him profusely, shook his hand, climbed in me motor and took off to Chiselhurst.

Chiselhurst is in North Kent, outskirts of London and was in last Flops' Travels. It's posh, no two ways about it.

For trivia fans Siouxsie of Siouxsie and the Banshees Comes from Chiselhurst and in the early seventies I done a Disco at a pub named The Bickley Arms in Chiselhurst and this piece of Council estate flotsam & Jetsam managed to 'make friends with' quite a few rich birds. Hee hee.

So I found this address, it's up an almost hidden lane off of a small country type lane. I drive quarter mile or so to the house and pull up on a large gravel courtyard and scrunch to a stop.

It looks like The Ponderosa. Even at my innocent age I'm aware there's money here.

I rang the doorbell.

This guy who I perceived as old at the time but who was probably about the same age as me now, opened the door and said 'Yes?'

Now I thought 'Rock Disco playing Black Sabbath, Stooges and Deep Purple' might not go down too well so I spun him a yarn about being a member of an amatueur theatrical company based in Bromley (Bromley is North Kent and semi-posh).

I said we had a coffin that was a stage prop and we needed handles for it.

He invited me in and we sat on his back garden veranda and somebody brought us iced lemon tea.

I was looking at a huge garden where I couldn't work out the back fence, full of expensive, yet subtle, tree and plant arrangements. Few flowers, no swimming pool. I thought the guy had class.

He explained his business had been built on plastic mouldings and coffin handles was one very small part. He exported worldwide.

After about 20 minutes wherein he told me all about his business and we consumed two cups of iced lemon tea, he asked me for more details of why I wanted coffin handles.

I said we held plays regularly at Oakley Farm on Bromley Common, which was partly true, except it was mostly bands playing in the barn, and that some of us hoped to go on to appear in West End plays (there's some pix of Oakley Farm on this forum).

He bought the story hook line & sinker and hoped we had some success.

He said it was good to see young people carrying on in the tradition of Laurence Olivier.

I did feel a little bit ashamed, thinking of all those parties in the barn with very loud music, alcohol, drugs, and if we were really lucky - nookie.

He gave me a box of six plastic brass-looking handles, wished me well, shook my hand and said goodbye.

I smiled, thanked him, climbed in my mini van and drove off across the gravel, down the long drive and back to the reality of SE London.

How the other half live eh?

The 3 handles you can see are the three remaining handles from six from 1971.

And one of those has been araldited together and repaired.

I think, soon, I may have to repeat the episode.

Yet I dare say now I'm older, look more serious and probably exude a little air of business acumen, I'll probably get taken seriously.

Which won't be half as much fun.

And that, boys and girls, is how the coffin handles came to be

 

[Ian]

Haha, I love reading your stories Flops Sounds like you've had some real fun in your time, even for things straight forward like picking up handles

 

[Taffycat]

It would be great to have a dedicated Floppybootstomp blog-thread here, because you have such entertaining stories to tell - I loved the coffin-handles story Wonderful stuff!