The Eighteenth Day Of May opened.

Scott McCaughey on lead vocals on 'Aw Shit Man' & 'Cigarettes Coffee And Booze'.

from universaltrendsetter.org

not a great start... i'd done a recce earlier to find the gig and failed, got the wrong entrance, so i bumble around until i have to ask..

once inside it all looks familiar, the front row at least. on a hunch i ask if they're from here and they are.. here and murmurs. i won't give names away, but hello guys!

the set was much the same as Birmingham, which is no complaint. The biggest difference was no Morris on vocals/percussion/drums for the end.

Tonight the troublesome 12 string wasn't even tried and Peter's amp worked first time, which is more than can be said for Robyn's.

Big shock of the night was Scott performing sans shades for a couple of songs. I've never witnessed this before in the flesh.

There was a new (to me) song at the end, Underground Sun and give it to the soft boys didn't get an airing, maybe Scot had wrecked his throat from screaming the night before!

Scottt did 'aw shit man' as the M5 song and Robyn persuaded him to do 'CC&B' as well. As usual, Scott plugged the fat Gun was on sale, but told everyone to buy The Eighteenth Day Of May cd & T-shirts instead.

'Driving aloud' wasn't as good as the night before, but it's still the 2nd best version of that i've heard and 'beautiful queen' was stunning, Peter adding some noddly jangles at the start that even had Robyn wondering what he'd done afterwards.

Interesting note... Robyn looked at Scott again during the "spicy goatee" line in 'ole tarantula'... when i pointed that out he said it was because i'd mentioned that the line reminded me of Scott, so he looks at him now when he sings it.

Great to see Peter and Scott heading to the merch stand afterwards to pose and sign... also good to see Scott hurry though the people to hug another M5 board member warmly.

Off to Cambridge soon... the weather's colder, so that should be fun!

also, there's no Wagamama in Cambridge, so i have a dinner problem!

there's loads of things i should have remembered from last night, but lack of sleep (do the people of Nottingham not go to bed on saturday night?) and absence of espresso has made me go blank.

see you in Cambridge.

-Laurence