April download online now

April's download (the second in our ongoing series of permanent downloads) is Fighter Command from the Gathering Speed album. It's available at www.bigbigtrain.com now. It's gone online a little bit late in the month because, basically, I forgot.

May's download will be online soon and, in June, we'll have something from the re-worked, re-mixed and re-mastered English Boy Wonders. Also coming soon, a video diary of the (re) making of EBW.

Wondering about adding the definite article

As you know, we've been spending the last few weeks rummaging around in our old toy cupboard and having a play with the master tapes of the English Boy Wonders album.

It's been a happy time for us, dusting off the old material. I don't play many guitar solos these days but used to play quite a few back then. I've chosen to re-record some of them and add a couple more, inspired by a recent purchase of an Epiphone Les Paul (Epiphone make tremendous guitars these days, at a fraction of the price of the American versions.)

Anyway, it'll soon be time for us to set aside our childish things and release the revised English Boy Wonders. After that we'll need to get back to the new album which is looming up as a rather formidable challenge. We want to sustain the progress we've made since Gathering Speed by making further improvements and refinements to our sound.

We're also wondering about improving our band name.

When I were a young lad, my toy cupboard contained the splendid No 1 Big Big Train set. It had red track and a blue locomotive. Andy has pointed out that my set also possessed the definite article - it was 'The Big Big Train' rather than 'Big Big Train.'



I quite like this and we're wondering whether we should release our next album under the band name of The Big Big Train. This would be a sort of reverse Pink Floyd situation as they started off as The Pink Floyd. After Pink Floyd removed the definite article, they went on to become wildly successful and famous and had real groupies and everything. Maybe the same would happen to us, but in reverse? Which means we'd be even less successful and famous and have even fewer groupies than the ones we haven't got now.

Embarrassing onstage moments

There's a nice thread on the Musician's Corner page on the Genesis Forum about embarrassing onstage moments. This one made me laugh: (courtesy of iamreal):

'I was playing a gig in Holland many years ago. As a sort of show-thing at the end of the last number I would sometimes get up from the drumkit and throw the sticks at it for the last beat. (well it was the seventies.) Anyway, this time I lost my balance and fell against the back of the stage. There happened to be a fire door which opened as I fell against it and the next moment I was OUTSIDE! How I didn't break my neck I don't know. It was about a four foot drop so I couldnt get back in so I went around to the front entrance. There, they wouldn't let me in. Kept saying "band finished, closed". In the end the other band members came looking for me and I got back in!'