Rhyl Folk Club

We saw him, we heard him, we touched the hem of his garment and were healed. It was our chum Terry Hiscock back again.

It’s pretty obvious why we’ve booked him 3 years in a row since our first meeting on Zoom in lockdown. Singing his beautifully crafted songs with intricate but sympathetic guitar accompaniment (take note Alun, not too many notes!) and charming us with his stories . The gags need a bit more work Terry, I’ll e mail you a few.

What’s this John! I hear you cry – being nice, not your style. Don’t worry, he gets plenty of stick off me at other times.

Songs about pretty much everything you could think of, from being almost killed in the London tube bombing to songs about musicians, including Robert Johnson, the blues singer who allegedly sold his soul to the devil. Which brings me to……..

The blues part 6 (final chapter). Miscellany.

Blues beverages include whisk(e)y, bourbon, dirty water, warm flat beer and nasty coffee. Not Earl Grey or green tea, Perrier, Moet & Chandon or Pinot Grigio.

Good Blues deaths can include being shot or stabbed by the woman you cheated on, drug overdose ( especially in a grubby motel room) or the electric chair. Death while skiing or undergoing cosmetic surgery don’t feature here. If you any form of internet access, you cannot truly sing the blues.

Looking back over my past 30 years at the club, I would put Terry in my top 6 “turns”, alongside Dave Burland, the (original) John Wright Band, Jez Lowe, Kimber’s Men and, though I don’t like to admit it, Keith Price.

A memorable night, finishing off with “Where are you now, Sweet Marie”. A big thanks to Terry for travelling to Rhyl to play for us again. I can’t upload video on to this site but I’ll put a link to a YouTube clip on the end.

Andrew forgot to mention that next week is first Friday of the month so THERE IS NO CLUB ON THE 2ND AUG.

As many of you know, someone at the club has been going out of their way to piss me off, so I’m taking a couple of months away, hopefully see you mid September. Here’s Terry.

I must apologise for arriving a bit late with tonight’s guest, but the A55 was at a standstill for miles. That’s what Terry told me to say; in reality it takes him a long time to put on the slap over the wrinkles these days.

Yes it was Terry Hiscock back again by overwhelming demand.

Lots of chums turned up, not least Brian and Sue from Durham. We didn’t know they were coming down for the night so it was a delight to see their liitle smiley faces.

Terry? Does what it says on the tin. Loads of beautifully crafted songs, perfectly delivered by an old pro.

Not easy for one bloke with a guitar to keep everyone spellbound for the night, but he always manages it; bit of gob iron, bit on the electric Gibson with sliiiide and a few subtle effects from his electric box of tricks. Even got everyone singing along to Buddy Holly’s “Everyday” (don’t remember it personally – before my time).

Only one disappointment – where was “Where are you now, Sweet Marie”. Maybe next time. I’m sure there will be a next time.

That’s more like it! Lots of bums on seats, lots of noise but lots of barracking and abuse for the poor, mild mannered soul doing his best to MC. You lot don’t deserve me. The blog is a bit late today, as Brian and Sue have been down from Co. Durham this week and I’ve been trying to tidy up their room after they left this morning.

I opened with a couple of Scots songs then Lesley played “Mrs. Shepherd’s Fancy”, written by ARJ.

Everyone had chorus songs tonight from the start. Mike had a couple including “Leaving on a jet plane. Fred and Lesley P delved into fox hunting. Rhyl Folk Club has no official stance on blood sports, but we would certainly not be averse to seeing Jacob Rees Mogg torn apart by a pack of Rottweilers.

Alan was still shamelessly plugging his new CD and Adrian sang of a transvestite aboard ship, a song which contained the only death of the night. Dafydd basically got the audience to sing the song for him.

It’s always a treat to have Kevin in our midst, especially when he knocks out a Saw Doctors’ tune. Tonight he had chosen a shirt to match his guitar strap – attention to detail rarely seen these days.

In a world seemingly full of bigotry and hate, the Warbies are a liitle splash of love and affection to brighten our lives. John sang a song he had written for Carole as he said it was 56 years since they went on their first date. Sorry John, no cigar, when Carole revealed it was actually 54 years. Similarly Carole had a poem for John and another about the art work on John’s guitar case (done for him by Neil Martin).

Alun had some Dylan for us -“to make you feel my love”. A bit of gob iron would have been nice with it.

Despite this wealth of goodies, the highlight of the night was always going to be our chums from up North.

How fortuitous that the request pulled out of the box last week was for them to sing “The Bergen”, so we managed to squeeze 4 out of them altogether. A rotund Welsh gentleman sprinted on to the stage to join them in Dougie MacLean’s “Down too deep”.

We’ve had some great fun with them while they’ve been down this week, including a trip to Liverpool, where we taught them a bit of Scouse (we ate chechen in a perple shert).

The finale was “Peggy Gordon” In G. Only Alun could reach it. In D next time please!

Most of you know that Sue has had a rough time these past few months, and they really appreciated everyone’s concern and tried to talk to everyone during the course of the night, but Sue sends apologies for missing the Stokies. The club presented her with a bunch of flowers and hope things will get sorted out.

They’ll be back again, just as soon as I’ve repaired their trashed room.

We’re all back next week.

With a capacity crowd and a long list of singers, Andrew rolled up the sleeves of his K.F.C. shirt (other take-aways are available) and got off to an early start. If you want to see everyone who sang, look at the collage at the bottom, the list is too long to mention everyone in the blog.

It was a delight to see and hear some of the “old-timers” who had made the effort to be at the club on our 50th anniversary. Darryl got “premature clap” when, merely pausing in his song to take a swig from his pint of Chilean merlot, some of the audience thought (wished?) he’d finished and put their hands together. I owe a great personal debt to Darryl for his encouragement when I first started at the club over 25 years ago. If you think I’m crap now, you should have heard me then!

Hadyn Smith, looking very dapper, first sang at the club in 1966, and despite having to be somewhere else on the night managed to turn up to give a moving version of “The Fish Finger Blues”.

I’m not sure how Brian got through “All the little chickens”, with the wall of sound of farmyard animals coming back at him. Brian looks almost as young as ever (due to the picture in his attic), but alas, Jeff seems to have now stopped exfoliating and using his moisturiser and is showing 6 of the 7 signs of ageing; the only one he fails to demonstrate is rigor mortis. Jeff has been doing much of the graft for the club for years and doesn’t get the recognition he deserves. That unfortunately doesn’t stop me taking the piss.

Thanks to all the ladies who provided the food and to everyone who brought stuff for the raffle. Except Mike Hawkins. Those who read last weeks summary may remember he returned a perfectly good bottle of booze which he then won for a second time. Sure enough it returned again this week. Hopefully it has now gone to a good home where it will be treated with more care and respect.

It was fitting that young Mathew finished off the evening, after hearing the people who had carried the club through it’s first 50 years. Billy Connolly once likened life to a bus journey, where people keep getting off, sometimes before their stop. Over the years we’ve lost a few; Mike Hand, Kristen, Lindsay and of course, Ted. Due to the demographics of the club, it’s inevitable that more of us will be standing up and ringing the bell and we seem unable to attract a younger element to come and have a laugh on a Friday night, with the predictable end result of Mathew singing to an empty room (or a row of urns). We hope Mathew got his parents back to the home safely.

Guest night next week – Peter and Barbara Snape.