Vintage Pyjama Party

I’d been looking forward to the Vintage Pyjama Party gig for ages- how couldn’t you get excited about a gig boasting “bathing beauties in a cocoa bath”, “strip twister”, a peep show from the Alternative Miss World, “an operatic Bo Peep”, and a midnight séance? And the venue was something special too- Stoke Place Hotel (that’s Stoke Poges not Stoke-on-Trent in case you were wondering) is a beautiful old country mansion that apparently been used for the set of a couple of James Bond films and the odd episode of Dr. Who. I’ve become used to playing weird and wonderful gigs with Twin and Tonic, but this had the potential to blow the nipple tassels off the rest.

My email inbox in the run up to the gig was full of the usual logistical emails- sorting out the set list, working out how to get us and our gear to and from the venue, sorting out our costumes, sorting out the guest list etc. Now you would have thought all this would be doubly difficult with a venue 45 minutes out of London but no- The White Blackbird team (and especially Johnny Vercoutre and Polly Betton) sorted everything out for us- a van was to pick my keyboard up from my flat the morning of the gig and deliver it back to me the next day, we were booked on a choice of coaches coming out of London, we had a room at the hotel to store our stuff- amazing! It certainly beats waiting in Shoreditch for a taxi in the cold for an hour and a half at 4am with a bag as big (and almost as heavy) as a grown man.

There was an excited mixture of people on the central coach heading up to the venue on the sunny Friday evening. Some were already in costume (ranging from standard patterned pyjamas with Bart Simpson slippers to negligees and suspenders) and some attempted to get ready on the coach. Chatter was typically fuelled by innocent looking bottles of pop laced with a spirit of choice- ice tea and vodka seemed to be the favourite near where I was sitting.

There was no mucking about for me when the coach pulled up by the croquet lawn outside the grand entrance to the hotel- it was straight to the ball room for sound check. My keyboard was already there in one piece (amazing!), and the fantastic sound man Dan was busying away getting everything sorted, even taking the time to tune Yannick’s drums for him. The rest of the band arrived shortly after (Karen and Louise looking absolutely stunning as always) and it was straight down to business. Sound check over it was up to our room for final adjustments to our costumes and a band huddle, and then at last we were ready to get stuck in and enjoy the evening.

The whole hotel had been taken over by the party, full of wide eyed gorgeous looking people exploring the decadent delights on offer. There were queues on the stairs to see a puppet show and the girl bathing in the bath of cocoa (I missed both but heard that they were both pretty special), people of all ages shapes and sizes were getting stuck into the pillow fighting with a vengeance, Londoners were going gooey eyed as they cuddled brand new spring lambs in the garden, and the bars were full of mingling groups slowly loosing their inhibitions as they innocently quaffed their tipple of choice.

I don’t drink before a gig, so was in my own little world of sobriety as we kicked off our set to a packed ballroom with Jeepers Creepers. People were dancing from the start, flashbulbs from the camera’s were going off around us (especially when Karen and Louise dropped their peignoirs to reveal their corsets and stockings half way through Strip Poker), and everyone seemed to be lapping it all up. We finished with the usual crowd pleasers Back to Black and Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy and got a great reception at the end. Great crowd, great gig.

It was route one to the bar for me as soon as the last chord had been played, very appreciative of the people who took the time to congratulate us on the way. My mate Paul pushed me to the front shouting “Sober man coming through- get this man a drink!” which a very sweet girl in a red dress duly did, ordering me a double absinth which I necked in one. With that sudden injection of disco juice I had no choice but to head straight to the dance floor, finding my mate Renee and kicking into gear with some boogie woogie moves to music being supplied by the DJ (Hitman Hearne, the same guy who picked my keyboard up that morning). That was pleasantly interrupted shortly afterwards by the fantastic burlesque dancer Millicent Binks, who provided a bit of titillation before the Hitman Hearn kicked back in again to take the dancing to another level.

As the effects of the disco juice started to wear off Renee and I went to have another explore. Newly formed couples in various states of undress were entangled on every available piece of furniture in the Twister room, the bars were providing more lubricant for new relationships being formed, but the biggest change was the pillow fighting room where just about every feather filled pillow had been destroyed covering the entire room in plumage that was being thrown about as people danced creating a scene that could have come straight out of a fairy story.

I headed back to the Ballroom where I found Yannick unconscious on one of the tables as people danced around him. It was now 2:30, and I realised I had the job of getting our totally inebriated drummer to pack up his drum kit before the coach left for London at 3am. Shouting at him to wake up didn’t yield a reaction, slapping him across the face did little more, so I resorted to pouring a glass of wine over him and dragging him off the table onto the floor. Regaining some semblance of consciousness his drummer instincts kicked in and he started the job, although so slowly I knew he had no chance of getting it done by 3am. I asked our guitarist Sam to sort Yannick out while I went to the coach to prevent it from leaving until we were ready. It required all my charm reserves to persuade a coach load of exhausted revellers that waiting in the car park was preferable to making their way back to their comfy beds and duvets back in London town. The central coach eventually left about 20 minutes after all the others.

I woke up the next day with a very sore head but a big smile on my face. Johnny delivered my keyboard to the flat that afternoon, regaling me with stories of carnage from the night before, and potentially setting up a musical collaboration sometime in the future (watch this space!). He seemed to really enjoy our set and suggested that we might get a booking for the next party. Bring it on!!

Jonny Crabb, Twin and Tonic