OFF: Deniz Tek au Havre

[Andy Gilham]

Me and Alun just got back from a totally excellent trip to Normandy to see
the Deniz Tek Group!

The nearest Deniz' European tour got to here was the little town of Notre
Dame de Gravenchon, 25 km from Le Havre, so off we went, 4am start to catch
the ferry from Portsmouth and all.  Found the venue without difficulty, the
Maison de Jeunesse et Culture (I'd been wodnering what MJC stood for).
Basically a youth club.  No advance tickets, just entry on the door, 30FF.
Getting in to the show was going to be the cheapest part of the whole deal!
Found a hotel, got a pizza, played some pinball, drank some beer.

Anyway, first up was a local band called Holy Curse.  Bloody excellent!
They included a kickin' versiof Birdman's "Cryin' Sun", and their own
material was good too.  They've got a CD out, _Livin' with a Head_, so I've
just ordered a copy from www.fnac.fr, obviously.

We hung around while Deniz set up - they didn't seem to have any road crew,
the man himself was busy with the gaffer tape (which immediately makes him
seem more human!)  It was a really friendly venue, about 150 people showed
up, so it had a bit of a party atmosphere.  Cool.

Deniz took the stage accompanied by bass and drums.  Bass was (99% certain)
the player from _Equinox_, Todd Eagle, and the drummer was this new
18-year-old guy called Tommy something, who seems to be some sort of
multi-instrumental prodigy.  Looked a bit like Cobi Jones, the USA
footballer who used to play for Coventry.  But a better drummer than Cobi
Jones is a striker!

Inspirationally good gig.  Deniz is a real perfectionist - he'd take a
minute or two to retune between songs, and nobody minded!  Great sound, real
charisma.  Great versions of the old stuff - "Hand of Law" was like to die
for (ObBOC - lyric "and the light that never warms") - and the new stuff,
some of which had seemed a bit baffling on disc, all fell into place when
witnessed live.  Set ended with a scorching version of "Outside" from the
album of the same name.

Encores: "Steel Beach", "Christmas Eve" from _Equinox_, with slide guitar!,
and "New Race" (yeah hup!) with Eric from Holy Curse on vocals.  Eric,
obviously a huge fan, was clearly totally made up.  As would I be in his
shoes!

So anyway we emerged and they'd set up a merchandising stand.  There was
supposed to be a limited-edition live CD on sale at the shows, but shock
horror it wasn't there!!!  So I asked the guy in my best French what had
happened.  By his stumbling pidgin reply I quickly deduced I was speaking to
the only Aussie in the place, who turned out to be John Needham of Citadel
Records who was mamaging the tour.  And he recognised my name from some
large mail orders.  Which was cool.  Turns out the CD wasn't ready in time
and they're still in Oz.  So I'll get a copy soon, John just has to fly back
home and post one!

We also got several free beers from the promoter - seems that after I'd
phoned the venue to confirm the show was on a couple of days beforehand,
they'd all been going "there's a couple of guys coming all the way from
London" "get outta here" "mais si!"...

And yes, finally we did get a chance to chat with the Man himself.  OK, I
was a bit the tonguetied fanboy, but he was such a nice guy!  Everybody was,
in fact.

Spent the next day offsetting the cost of the trip against cheap wine and
beer.  A good time had by all.  Seemed like a mad idea in advance, but I'd
do it again in a flash.

- Andy

mailto:Andy.Gilham at btinternet.com; http://www.btinternet.com/~andy.gilham