Matthew
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Sunday 23 Nov 08, 20:33PM
After a triumphant win on Saturday at football, Shella and I polished off a great day by travelling down to Bristol to stay at Best man Jon and his wife Claire's to see The Rinky Dinks play in the Ring o' Bells pub in Nailsea for their cd launch night.
Matt with Best man Jon
The music was so loud my ear drum appears to explode on camera
Nailsea is a place which even the most hardened sat nav could struggle to find which led us to asking a rather rounded man directions whilst queuing for the cashpoint at the Esso garage just outside the village. Having ummed and arred over the question this man wasn't going to let us go until he'd told us how to get there. This certainly wasn't the person you'd want to see doing the Gold Run on Blockbusters. He was a local but was stumped on how to approach the answer. After about a minute of his directions I switched off and started to observe the cost of unleaded in the area. At one point he even moaned about how badly someone was parking. Maybe he was just allowing us a minute to take in his directions so far. His 'helpfulness' made him lose his place in the cashpoint queue and even then we didn't follow his instructions!
Eventually we found the pub and once inside found the venue through the door saying 'toilets' in a packed backroom of the pub which would be more fitting to stage underground boxing matches than a gig with over 200 people crammed into it. This just shows the following these guys have. Once we managed to squeeze our way to the bar we contemplated buying 4 pints at once but instead opted for just a pint a go of Weston's Cider ("When in Rome" as Jon said). And how well the cider went down. It seemed like we'd only been there 5 mins when we were on our 4th pint. This pub also had the greatest variety of crisps I've ever seen too. First shout was Ham & Mustard and some Beef Monster Munch then Jon appeared with Sweet Chilli, Barbeque and Cheddar flavour which can't of gone down too well when Ieuan from the band came up to me for a chat before they went on.
The Rinky Dinks played a blindin' set
The band opened with Baggy Trousers by Madness and this was the start of a fantastic set. Highlight was the medley they did half way through which included Seven nation army by The White Stripes. I wish I could remember the other songs but by this time the cider was taking effect. This might also explain the stench of someone's guff that suddenly whiffed through the air at one point. It led to a lot nose pinching and at least 3 people turning round claiming it wasn't them. I don't think you could say the old phrase 'whoever smelt it dealt it' this time or the whole pub would have been gassed. Hit after hit was played and I could see why they held the gig in a pub called the Ring O' Bells cos every song rang a bell to me.
Eventually we got the munchies so headed back to Bristol in a cab, Best man Jon and I stopped off at the pizza shop whilst the girls went back home to crack open the bottle of Cava we'd brought along. We sat and had a beer whilst waiting for the pizzas and observed the local gangster nippers that had just walked in. One 14 year old looked like he'd just walked straight out of The Bronx and even had the voice and limp to match but the strangest observation must have been the '£1.59' price sticker he had stuck on the side of his gleaming white trainers. I've never known such a fashion statement and when Jon pointed it out to the gangster's friends I half expected the nipper to produce a gun with a '35p' label hanging off.
Shella with Claire enjoying some Weston's Cider
I'd just like to say thanks to Jon and Claire for their hospitality and letting us stay. It really was a fantastic evening.
One other observation this morning on the way back was the signs on the M4 we kept seeing on the overhead board saying '50 pedestrians in road'. I think what they were suggesting was to slow down to 50 as there was people in the road but I swear I never saw a single jay walker over the few miles let alone 50 of them. That Weston's Cider really does make you loose the plot!
Shella also kept blaming me for guffing on the way back home until she opened her handbag to find half a packet of Beef Monster Munch. Oh well, that was breakfast sorted!
