Albany Down Play The Cavern!

It's true, we did. That little old club in the heart of Liverpool where the Fab Four were discovered - we played that.

It's not exactly the same club mind you. The area we played is actually an extension of the original club, in a far bigger area. The old stage is still there, but it is utterly minescule in comparison.

Unfortunately, that good old curse is still following me around. The one that inevitably ends up with whatever band I'm attached to getting screwed over as much as possible. Yup, Albany Down is no exception. I'll elaborate.

A while after our sound check we were watching the other bands set up and do their testing. Some of them were good, some of them were a bit crap.
As we were about to head out to grab some food between our soundcheck and our original 9pm slot, a member from one of the other bands came up and asked us if we'd be interested in swapping places with them. Well we weren't convinced. We had people coming to see us and we didn't want to screw over the sound technician out front. And then he dropped the hook.
He mentioned that he was in the last band.
He said we'd be headlining.

Well Billy was off on one before the words were even out of the guy's mouth. Me and Paul weren't convinced it was a good plan, since the last band wasn't due to start until after midnight and people catching public transport would need to leave before then.
Sadly, Billy wasn't listening any more. He got played like a two-bit fiddle. Kudos to the guy from the other band though - he knew exactly what he was doing.

Unknown to us at the time, Billy even went and confirmed the switch with the sound guy, so our arguing later on accomplished nothing. Being the calm and reasonable person that I am, I was all ready to drop out and not play at all.
Eventually my girlfriend, along with my mum and brother (who had driven down from Scotland for the gig - crazy fools) calmed me down and we went on at 12:15.

We were right though - the place was a hell of a lot quieter then than it was at 9 o'clock. The two bands who had each brought a coachload of people with them, had taken their fans when they left, so the place was a lot less crowded. That said, it was still far from deserted.
And it was fun, which is the most important thing. And everyone seemed to appreciate our Beatles homage at the end of The Morning After.

Onward to Surface Unsigned!