New Year's Eve at the Plough & Harow Tilmanstone

Adrian O has organised a New Year's Eve event at the Plough & Harrow, Tilmanstone (between Dover & Eastry) http://www.ploughandharrowtilmanstone.co.uk/ starts at 8pm to well 12ish .... Driftwood will be making an appearance....

Deal Folk Club Xmas Bash 2009

Deal Folk Club had a packed session at last night's xmas bash. Driftwood were there (with Rose in full evil pixie attire); Dave had one of his christmas wishes (fanasty? Ed)  come true as he was in the front seat with seven women (and Adrian!) . Good friends Mike Broomfield and Steve O'Kane did some great numbers; Lynda excelled herself with her witty lyrics. All under Avril's gentle direction....

See all the photos at the Driftwood flickr site

its time to sport your festive bra....

New Years Day 2010 sees the 6th running of
Deal Tri Bra Run.

This is aid of Breast Cancer Care and is 5k along Deal seafront, which you can run, walk or crawl around if you over did the night before. The only stipulation is you wear a bra! There are lots of prizes for best decorated ones & children's fancy dress. Its great fun and a fanastic way to kick off the New Year.

The Race starts at 11am in front of Deal Castle. Entry is £9 before 31st Dec or £10 on the day (Juniors £5). Race HQ is in Walmer Sea Scout hut (near the paddling pool) and you will find a member of Driftwood helping on the desk. You can get an entry from the DealTri website http://www.dealtri.co.uk/  or by clicking here

It may just be coincidence, but the roadie always does his best time for a 5k when he sports one .... So stop that sniggering in the back row chaps;
Time to do one for our sisters.

I don't win things but ....

The usual response from colleagues and some family members to my running career is 'Did you win then ?'.
When this is asked after the London Marathon, where I come in at good 3500th it feels something has been lost in translation.

The odd thing today was I actually won something. It was at the Fowlmead 5miler Christmas Cracker. Ok it not exactly the New York Marathon but a race is a race. The announcer listed the winning men's team ... 'Deal Tri with Gordon, Steve... and Stephen Wakeford'.... and I got a bottle of red wine.

This was a trophy destined for the mantlepiece, well so I thought. When I got home holding the trophy bottle  my beloved Rose looked wide-eyed (I sub-contract all my drinking to her) - 'you can win wine at these things? - You are going to have to train a bit harder in the future ....'

I dare say the 'trophy' will not last long - its the Xmas bash next Friday at the Deal Folk Club and I can see the said bottle will be used in the Driftwood warm up... c'est la guerre.

Roadie

PS. My time was 0:33:32 a seasons best...

The good, the bad and the muddy

The roadie ran the Gower peninsula coastal trail marathon on saturday - a very scenic course (which is code for hills and more hills) around the south welsh coast in 5:07 - it had over 5000ft of accent including a lovely 600ft climb in the last two miles (and a suicidal descent to the finish - think vertical mud and rocks). The course was so magificient that the organisers decided to extend it to over 28miles!

PS: Just found out today 14th Dec - that I won the age group prize for V50. Gosh twice in one week!

Rumble in the Jumble

Driftwood the band that will play anywhere (especially for a good a cause) were in full motion at Deal Craft Fair on Saturday 5th December.



The fair was raising money for the repair fund at St Leonards in upper Deal and organised by our good friend & fan Lynda

Also on the bill was Deal Folk Club's favourite Mac McLean

strumming and singing

The fab four are back in town...

Driftwood is back to full strength this week after half of the band went on a raid to Norway.

They will be getting down to Deal Folk Club on friday to do a quick number while listening to Deal's power trio of Carey, Rathbone & Bell who are headlining. Starts at 8pm at the RMA club on the strand Walmer (next to the fish&chip shop)

Driftwood are back in action on Saturday 5th December when they are playing the Craft Fair at St Leonards in Upper Deal (about 10am, I think).

Alas the Roadie will not be there as he charging around the Gower Peninsula  in Wales doing a Trail Marathon (basically hills&mud and more hills)

Birthday party marathon

Well done to Sue & Rose! At Doug's birthday bash on Saturday evening they did an amazing 24 songs not including 'Happy Birthday'. By my reckoning if the whole band was there it would be pushing 48 songs. Now that is what I call value for money!

Mystery instrument revealed

The mystery instrument appearing on Friday' Deal Folk Club has been revealed as a Cajun Drum.

The Drum appeared with Sue & Rose from Driftwood on their rendition of  'Answer Me'.  The duo also played one of the Roadie's fav's ' Shady Grove'

Also at the session was Alchemy - a tuneful vocal trio from Sussex which brings together Mike Nicholson & Capella - with their beautiful version of  'the water is wide', a favourite of the band.

Join the Magnificent Revolution!

Just come accross an organisation - Magnificent Revolution - which brings together my love of music, bicycles and all things green.
They are a collective of artists, musicans, engineers, designers and eco-builders who come up with some simple but brilliant ideas - The one that got my attention was their bicycle generators for the PA for Deal's very own Cocos Lovers at a gig in the Secret Garden Festival.

Cocos Lovers - Howling Wind
(Generated by Bicycles + all Seven of them in a Van!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmrouE4y-PM 

Check out Magnificent Revolution's site at http://www.magnificentrevolution.org/ as they have got some fanastic ideas!

Midwinter Folk Festival - Ash 2nd Jan 2010

East Kent's master songmiester and teller of tall tales, Adrian O, is organising another of his successful mini-folk fests at the Chequer Inn at Ash (between Canterbury & Sandwich) on Saturday 2nd January 2010 - 11am to 11pm.

The guest list is starting to emerge - as well as Driftwood (who will be on about 3pm) - it looks like an impressive one: Bob Kenward, Redeye, Deal Hoodeners, Mac&Clive John Barden, Steve O'Kane, No Worries, Trevor Moss & Hannah Lou, True Colours, Loose Change, Not that John & Paul, Rambling Boys, Sue Watson, Knyghtriders Ceili Band and MC Adrian O.... more to follow

There will be food and I suspect some drink all day. More details will be posted here!

News: Mystery instrument to appear at Deal Folk Club!

A mystery instrument will have its world premire at Deal's Friday Folk Club on the 27th Nov.

The instrument who wishes to remain nameless at this point will be appearing wth the half of Driftwood (Rose and Sue) which is not touring the land of northern lights.

The Roadie will award one coconut to the first person to identify our mystery friend.... its that thing on the table (Hint).

Yet another thing for the poor Roadie to carry!

Show of Hands - AIG Video

As you know the band are a great fan of Show of Hands and especially their new album 'AIG'
Video of title track now on YouTube and in our favourites! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u2ill7yOZo

Driftwood 'Lite' playing at Blean Barn dance

Driftwood was playing support for the Deal Hoodeners at the Blean Barn dance on Sat 14th Nov in aid of the village's project to build a new Village Hall. The band were down a man (literally) as Dave had been kidnapped by those desperate men in Bottles... We want him back in the same condition, please !

Adrian O was also providing some light relief and joined the band for a rendition of  'This Land, is Your land'.

All this was happening between energy boosted sets of the Deal Hoodeners and caller Bill that had the dancers begging for a rest.

A great time was had by all.

Arrogance, Ignorance and Greed - Show of Hands

 We bought this today (in Deal's Indie record shop SoundHouse)  totally brilliant. A real anthem for a doomed banker...

You can listen online at http://www.myspace.com/showofhandsuk

Why are most folk songs so miserable?

The body count was running,particularly high at the Deal Friday Folk Club last night (6th Nov).

We had the slaughter of the Rochdale pals on the Somme, the massacre of an entire extended Yorkshire victorian family on the moors (except the dog), the sinking of the titanic, death of 14yr old troopers, the death of 20 cornish tin miners ... it was relentless ... did I mention the poor polar bears?


Not that it was bad music; just the opposite it was great evening jam packed with performers enjoying every minute and a vocal & engaged audience. This is not an argument for more songs about kittens - (although I note that Adrian O's songs on a truculent donkey and pathological goat both went down very well) - I liked Sue Watson's darkish 'Vampire Rag'. More of Les's demonic accordian on  Leaving Liverpool please....

By the way if you got an answer please tell me.
All IMHO - Roadie
http://www.dealfolkclub.co.uk/

Cocos Lovers - 'Father' great new video+song

Great new video + song from Deal's most soulful neo-Indie-folk group - Roadie five stars rating; most good (IMHO)

Cocos Lovers: http://cocoslovers.co.uk/ + http://www.myspace.com/cocoslovers





Link if you cannot see the embedded video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTo5XFdECBk

When, Oh When is this Ukulele madness going to stop!

No time soon, by looks ....

Driftwood is tooling up

If you missed them at the Deal Maritime Folk Festival check out the great Deal Band  Ukulele Gangstas : their neo-Formby-Punk ''Unicycle drive-byes' made me cough out loud (Sue's nephew is lead singer).

You do want see 851 ukuleles doing a mexician wave click here ....

Friday the 30th Oct - it should be more scary!

Busy Friday Night -  Driftwood were playing at Crabble Mill in Dover last night. Dave was reported as enjoying himself with his other job in Bottles (they were headlining at the event).

I decided to attend the Deal With IT meeting on 'Renewable Energy' at St Georges with Michael Meacher MP and Alistair Gould from the Pines Calyx in St Margaret's Bay (5miles along the coast).

Good to catchup with Patrick (we compared notes on last weekend's marathons) and discuss his ideas on getting a sustainable-cycling campaign going locally.

The meeting was well attended for a friday - about 70 people and there was was a good level of  discussion. I have not heard Michael Meacher since the Miners Strike and he was forthwright and critical of the Government and political class in general but enjoyable to listen too.

Personally I thought the discussion missed the point a bit:

 a) what should be no-brainers like delivering the 'decent homes' standard to the millions of council homes which is being put on hold by the Government to save money to pay the debts from bailing out the bankers.This will only get worse with all parties pushing the cuts agenda in 2010.

b) The not in my-back-yard localism - In my view this is because others are making profits from a perceived eye-sore (like a turbine), and there is no direct benefit to the communities effected. Easy remedy give them a percentage of the profits or free power...

 c) The sense of urgency - in 150 year if nothing changes, where the meeting was held (in a plush Georgian Church) will be under the sea (due to rising sea levels and the fact that Kent is sinking [thats the Ice-age for you]). Time to pick up the pace... we should be scared

All in MHO, Roadie

Celebrating Our Deal...

'CelebrateYour Deal'
This Sunday 25th Oct saw a very successful 'Think Global, Act Local' event - the day was jam packed with stalls from local producers, Canterbury Greenpeace, creative writing, seed exchanges, workshops, talks, some community singing, face painting, a scary lot of pumkins from Rippledown and a really dangerous amount of real chocolate...

There was a good presence of local performers at the event:

Bill and Mac kicking things off at 10:30 in fine style

and the Deal Hoodeners did a couple of sets outside - including the 'Great North Run' which went down well with Snowdon marathon recovering Roadie

Driftwood played from 2:30 to the close (well actually beyond the close - they did Nelson's Blood as things were being packed up and the lights were going off; but they do pride themselves on being a band that can out last their audience!). A great set which went down well, fuelled by some serial tastings of a local cider. Thanks to our loyal supporters Lynda, Martin and Karen + Oregano for the lovely cake!

A video of Bad Moon Rising can be found at the band's YouTube Site

Well done to Helen (Age??) and all at 'Deal With It' for organising a fantasic event - Here's to a Greener Deal

after the flood

Your intrepid roadie completed yesterday's Snowdonia Marathon in respectable 3:57:37 and was fully operational today in Deal for Roadie duties.

The weather totally fulfilled it forecast with horizonal rain and gusts of 60mph (there is about a inch of water in my rucksack still) and according to my garmin i did 4082ft of accent ... the last six miles were the killer with a three mile steep climb followed with  equally steep 1.5mile drop down a trackway (I wish I had my fell shoes for this bit!), then just to add to the fun the organisers had included a dog-leg in LLanberis with another hill in it to the finish....

Thoughly soaked, thoughly enjoyed it!

Roadie

http://www.snowdoniamarathon.co.uk/

Over the hills and far away....

Spare a thought for the poor roadie this Saturday 24th October - he is running the Snowdonia marathon and the forecast is for a mild monsoon.

To say this one is hilly is a bit of a understatement....

Back on Roadie duty on the Sunday as it the 'Celebrate Your Deal' Green event at the Landmark Centre ... with your favorite band playing at 2pm.

Bill & Mac are playing at 10:30 and the Deal Hoodeners are also lending their support....

Lots of interesting stalls ... see the report in this week's East Kent Mercury

Driftwood playing at Winter Folk Fest at Ash Sat 2nd Jan 2010

Adrian O is organising another of his very successful and Roadie rated mini-folk fests at the Chequer Inn in Ash on Saturday 2nd January 2010.

Driftwood will be there ... so watch this space for details...

Driftwood (short of a plank - Sue had absconded) playing at the much warmer August 2009 Mini-Fest organised by Adrian (the 'Kat in the Hat')

Driftwood playing at Blean Barn Dance 14th Nov 2009

Driftwood will be supporting the Deal Hoodeners at the Barn Dance in Blean School Hall (nr Canterbury) on Saturday 14th November.

The dance is raising funds for Blean Village Hall  Project - starts at 7:30pm £5, Bring your own food/drink - contact Carol Sturgeon sturgeon.carol@googlemail.com for further detals.

This will be a womens only Driftwood line up (Dave is on the Bottle{s} that night)

http://www.driftwood.uk.net/gigs.html

Raising the St Leonards's roof - Gig Report October 17th 2009

There was a real roll-call of local talent at the St Leonards repairs fund raiser on Saturday. The Evening was billed as one of 'music & song' and saw over 15 local groups and performers do their thing in fine style.

The Deal Hoodeners kicked off the event with a sea soaked medley, followed by rockers combo Mac & Clive, a lovely song from Janet, followed by Eddie, the marvellous Val & Bill, Sue Watson's Deal Fisherman's song with Stuart, Mike Woods' bluesy 'Mary Don't You Weep', New kids on the block 'Beux & Belles made their first outing and finally on the second half Bill and his magic accordion & dulcimer.

The second half kicked off with the excellent Loose Change, Mike Broomfield managed to sing his song without being struck by lightning, Jim rendered a great version of the dark isle, Adrian O give us his Ball of Blue, Steve O'Kane sang us his beautiful songs + Fiona lifted the roof (if not the spire) with amazing grace, then Driftwood got them singing in the aisles (literally).

The Management ended a great evening with abba's 'thank you for the music'.

Driftwood YouTube playlist : http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=8CEAB4C7BCD8620B 

(as the roadie cannot multi-task there is a bit of wobble on the videos,sorry)

Roadie's photos from the evening : http://www.photobox.co.uk/album/213823947
(There will be some copies for performers at the next Deal Folk Club on the 23rd  - but you can order your own copies/enlargements direct from photobox - if you need a electronic copy drop the roadie a line at roadie@driftwood.uk.net)

A big Driftwood thank you to Lynda for organising the evening

Like a virgin....

The Roadie has manged to get into the 2010 London Marathon - It will his nine outing at the event.

Sponsorship has moved over the years from Mars (health food?) to Flora (Fatty spreads) and next year will be the turn of Virgin (beardie failed-ballonist capitalist). ...

so as madge says 'like a virgin, for the very nineth time'

It keeps the roadie on the streets....

October 30th an evening with 'Dave Marshall'

Driftwood's lead flutist Dave Marshall will be playing with local bad boys 'Bottles' who are headlining at the Crabble Mill Folk Club in Dover on Friday 30th October.

Driftwood will also be there playing a few songs. Do you need a brodhran accompaniment ?

A few more sets on the 30th and we can declare it 'Dave Marshall Day'

http://www.myspace.com/thebottlesband
http://www.ccmt.org.uk/events.htm

Saturday 3rd Oct Busk - Deal High Street

Members of Deal's local folk club came out today for a busk to publise the gig at St Leonards on the 17th Oct.(See earlier postings for details)
Rose and Sue were joined by Mac, Lynda, Eddie, Bill & Val and Jim

They raised £44 for the church repair and a good time was had by all

See all photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/38482905@N08/sets/72157622381585133/

St Leonards fundraiser 17th Oct at 7:30pm

Driftwood are playing at the 'Music & Song' evening fundraiser for the repair of this historic church in in Upper Deal (part of it dates back to 1180, but it got a bit of everthing from the last 900years!)

As well as Driftwood there will be other local folk singers, hand bellers and the 'beaux and belles'

Saturday 17th October at 7:30 - tickets £5 from Sound House or contact Lynda on 01304 361 586

Organised by the 'Friends of St Leonards':
http://www.stleonardsdeal.co.uk/

We have a baby!

Yes, Mrs Gadget (aka Rosie) has a new micro roland bass amp  ....  purchased from our excellent music shop 'Mark-One' in Deal ... letter of apologies in the post to all neighbours

yet another thing for the poor roadie to carry ....

Celebrate Your Deal - Landmark Centre 25th Oct 10am-4pm - Think Global, Act Local!

Driftwood are supporting and doing a session at the 'Celebrate Your Deal' event organised by our local green group 'Deal with it!'

The day aims to raise local awareness of environmental and sustainability issues and encourage everyone to discover all that is being made or marketed in and around Deal in order to keep this a thriving town. There will be 30 plus stalls of independent businesses and local producers, creative workshops, community groups, presentations, music, seed swap, competitions, exhibitions, free tastings, gardener’ Question Time, and entertainment for the children as well as the rest of us

Driftwood will be on at 2:30...and we will be recycling our songs

Check the Event website at http://www.transitiondeal.blogspot.com/

Email  celebrateyourdeal@yahoo.co.uk

or email dealwithittoday@yahoo.co.uk for the campaign

Driftwood playing at St Leonards 17th October 7pm

Driftwood are on the bill on the fund raiser for St Leonards Church in Upper Deal. Starts at 7pm on Saturday 17th ... more details to follow

Driftwood & Friends - Busking Deal High St 3rd October

Driftwood and friends are busking on Deal High Street on Saturday 3rd Oct for the repair fund for St Leonards Church in upper Deal - Starts at 10am. Contact Sue or Rose or Lynda for details

New David Rovics Album - Ten thousand miles away - due October 2009

Two of Driftwood's most popular songs at the recent Deal Maritime Folk Festival were David Rovics's 'Black Flag Flying' and 'The Pirates Song'.

David is a singer/songwriter with unequivocal passion for social justice and change. His new album which you can hear online is really good - as a fully paid up member of the anti-best-western-league I love his song 'travel lodge' (Viva B&Bs!) and the Eureka Stockade is a corker!

David is never going to be a millionaire - his downloads are all free. So make a donation or order a few copies from 'Sound House' in Deal High Street. You can find his songs at http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=111310

He will be touring in the UK again in May 2010 .... so watch this space

David's Website: http://www.davidrovics.com/

of course all IMHO ... Roadie

Deal Maritime Folk Festival 2009 - Monster Busk

Despite the weather whch was cloudy and threaten rain - we had a very successful Monster Busk on open area in front of the kings head.

At its height there were some 25 local musicians, bands and singers jamming along on a variety of folk standards....

There will be some videos posted to ou site latter on...

Roadie

Driftwood Deal Maritime Folk Festival - Videos now on YouTube

Driftwood videos from the Ship Inn at now been posted on YouTube

www.driftwood.uk.net/video.html

Driftwood Deal Maritime Folk Festival - Shillelagh Ceilidh sesson Sat 9pm 19th Sept

Third sesson of the day - this time in support of Chris & Geoff (and Lynda) at the Ceilidh.

They did three songs in one of the breaks of the dancing - Gotta to Travel on, David Rovics's Pirate Song (Got the whole hall to join in) and Last thng on my mind - went down well and well played.

Now got two dutch fans who shared our table ...

Lizzie did some excellent numbers on her piano and jammed with the dance band

Roadie + a very tried Driftwood...

Driftwood Deal Maritime Folk Festival - Ship Inn sesson Sat 3pm 19th Sept

Driftwood kicked off the One & Half hours set at the Ship Inn, in Middle Street with a stonking version of  'Bad Moon Rising'. It certainly woke the place up and apparantly it could be heard in Dover! Who needs amplification!

Lots of friends turned up for this one, including John+June from West Kent and Louise, Gill and Arthur from SE London, plus friends from Deal Folk Club.

All the standards like the Black Velvet Band & Wild Rover (which the band had only recently learnt) went down well and  good sing-along (or bang-along) was generated. Some of the songs which are not well known like Karine Polwart's 'I'm gonna do it all' and Kipling's 'Smugglers Song' (featuring dave on flute) were really well recieved. In fact they had requests from people wanting to buy their CD (which does not exist... well not yet)

Another very good set but the band was tried by the end ...

Roadie

Driftwood Folk Festival Deal - Pier sesson Sat 12pm 19th Sept

The band made a good showing  at the open area at the front of Deal pier. Only enough amps for four mikes so the instruments were not balance - but good despite that. You could hear the 'Black Flag Flying' being belted out in the High Street!. The crew were were fully kitted in Pirate attaire, ther new band pirate flag and Sue had a scary tattoo which I hope washes off!

First public outing of David Rovics's 'Pirates Song' - one my favorites and they call it a childrens's song bah! - which went down well and they ended on another of his 'Black Flag Flying'.


Great weather and a great set... IMHO Roadie

Photos can be found off their website - www.driftwood.uk.net/snaps.html

New Driftwood Pirate Flag arrives

Hurrah just in time for the festival and it looks good...

Final Driftwood practice before Saturday Festival gigs

The band will be having an all day session at the village hall at Lyden on Friday... We have several friends coming to the Ship Inn session on saturday ....


The Ship is at
141 Middle Street
Deal
01304 372222

Driftwood.uk.net now indexed

Google are now indexing the site - that's a relief, 5 days to go the band's busy weekend

http://www.driftwood.uk.net/

Marathon

did not make it yesterday - bad night and woke up at 6am feeling exhausted! Decided to pass on this ... today I feel fine and ran over the cliffs to st margarets nr dover....

3toGo Marathon 12th Sept

running my 31st marathon tomorrow - well hopefully, felt bad today very tried ... we shall see what tomorrow morning brings.

This a small marathon down the lee river valley to the 2012 Olympic Park ... off roadish but flat

Driftwood Folk Band Deal Kent UK, acoustic folk by the sea ...

http://www.driftwood.uk.net/ is still not being indexed by google - god knows what i have done!

Possible gig date the 'Deal with it' event in October

More details to follow - check the http://www.driftwood.uk.net/

Only a week to go Deal Maritime Folk Festival

Everything kicks next friday 18th Sept - check the web site for gig details
http://www.driftwood.uk.net/

Driftwood Folk Band site news

completed the move of the http://www.driftwood.uk.net/ site to plus on Wednesday. Email working fine - still issues on searching

Portland Marathon 24th January 2009

This is suppose to be the 'easiest' of the Enduralife Coastal Trail Marathons, but still nearly took me 5 hrs to run.

The island itself was not as impossible of parts of the November Dorset stage but Portland is basically one large quarry so there is tons of loose stone around. The killer is Chisel Bank - the 7 mile pebble spit that contacts the island to the mainland. We had to run the ridge of this for about just under 2miles (x2) - hard on the legs and harder on the head. It was difficult first time around but at second time it hits at mile 23, hard.


Well organised run - run HQ is at the 2012 sailing centre which excellent facilities. Loved the 'dog-tag' medal plus ok teeshirt.

http://www.endurancelife.com/