London Animal Shelter Benefit Show

I got booked to do a benefit show on Friday night, February 26th for the Wood Green Animal Shelter.  The show was at the Plough Inn which is located in Walthamstow, London.  As I walked into the back room where the show was going to be, there was a fella on a banjo warming up with a lady vocalist that was singing a song about men.  She sang about so many men that she had to count them on her fingers.  I was glad I wasn’t singing that song.

Like so many benefit shows, they were run by people that typically don’t put shows together (I could be wrong on this but that was the feeling I got).  The person that put the show together, who was a very nice guy, thought it would be a good idea to put on a folk singer, then a poet, then three comedians and then some more music with a 3-12 minute break between each act!  This is crazy.  But the crowd, that looked like a group transplanted from an organic, free trade hazelnut outlet store, didn’t seem to mind.

Thank God the poet didn’t show up although the folk singer turned out to be something of an inadvertent performance wizard.  He was something to behold – a man in his 60’s but hair that refused to age like the rest of his body.  More importantly, his hair was of the same fashion as that of 1970’s female heartthrob.  What a combination it was to have such youthful hair around a face that belonged to an old, frightened, scattered villager. 

He was a tall, lean creature with a somewhat arched back that was covered in a blazer that looked like Christmas ribbon candy with vertical stripes of red, green, yellow and black.   His voice wavered dangerously back and forth between that of 1) an old man that had vocal chords that were young (but creepy) and 2) a husky broad that had a few more ounces of sexy to give to the world.

As he played guitar and sang, I could see that he was a good musician.  His songs were mellow and playful at times.  The things of his songs that got me were the lyrics and themes.  His first song was about politics on Mars.  If it wasn’t edgy enough to bring politics into your art, this gent trumps everyone by discussing the Martian political landscape.  I’m surprised a fight didn’t break out.  I wonder what made him write this song.  Maybe when he was watching Total Recall, he didn’t realize that it was a movie and thought that it was some live news footage and decided that a song needed to be written about it.

And while he sang, in the front row sat a man by himself that looked severely out of place.  Actually, just his hairdo looked severely out of place.  It was literally taken from any actor in any mafia movie.  It was very dark, save the grey patches located on each temple and it was combed back.  Another combination for me to savor: wise guy looks in a British man or Lord Bottinghams Soprano as I know referred to him as.  Lord Bottinghams Soprano (LBS from now on) must have been in some witness protection program because he clearly had no interest in being here.  His arms were folded and he struggled to stay awake during the riveting musical tale about the shady government that plagued Mars. 

And to make this even sweeter, at one point, the folk fella mentioned that he was selling fantasy novels that he had written and that all the proceeds would go to the animal shelter.  Whatever the smallest unit of time is, that’s how far I was from bursting out into laughter at what I thought was a wonderful joke.  Thankfully, I made a light speed decision to keep quiet and see how everyone else responded.  Silence.  I knew right there it would be hard for me to make these people laugh, especially Young Locks who was dead serious about his novels.

To finish off, Young Locks dug deep and gifted us with a song called, “I’m Bleeding For the Animals”.  While he sang, I looked for blood but found none.  He must have been bleeding internally (which is far more deadly).  It was quite neat to watch this guy croon away about saving animals and then look back to the huge platter of cold cut sandwiches that were donated by Subway.  I looked over to LBS to see how he was holding up and he must have taken three catnaps during this song alone.  If all of this wasn't great enough, when Young Locks was finishing the song, he stopped playing, he got quiet and said softly but intently, "But I'm not bleeding as much as the animals..." and walked off.  Perfect.  It was all too much for my sense of humor and wonder to bear. 

After a break and a comic, Barry Tattle went up on stage.  Barry’s boldness is very noteworthy for he had the brass to go up on stage in a suede blazer in a show that benefits animals.  It was all Barry could do to compete with Young Locks’ potent Martian themes.  Barry found it hard to locate the sensual appreciation from the crowd that he deserves so he decided to pick up the Wood Green Animal Shelter pamphlet that was lying on a table and drew powerful analogies between the shelter and his body:

“It says here in the pamphlet, ‘There’s so much to do while you’re at our shelter!’.  Likewise, there is so much to do while you’re at my body!”

“It also says that ‘Many of our animals receive veterinary treatment when they visit our shelter.’  That’s funny because so do many of the lovely creatures that visit my body!”

“It goes on to say that ‘This shelter takes in about 2000 cats per year’.  Well, that’s where the similarities end because my body takes in about 4000 kitties per year!  Shaboom!!”

After Barry left the room, I decided there was little reason to stay so I thanked the man running the show and left the pub too, in hopes of catching up with Barry…I never did.