**GIG UPDATE**

Friday 29th October 2004 @ Bonds from 9pm

Sunday 31st October 2004 @ Watersplash from 7pm (JT & Fergus)

Friday 5th November 2004 @ Blue Note Bar from 9pm (Bob Vincent & Justin Thorne)

**JUSTIN THORNE LIVE AT BONDS THIS FRIDAY (29th OCTOBER)**

From 9pm

Originals and covers including Ben Harper, Damien Rice, David Gray, Jack Johnson, Tom Baxter and Goo Goo Dolls.

Come and check it out and as Jersey Bob says "Keep the vibrations going!!!"

**JUSTIN THORNE LIVE AT THE SPLASH THIS SUNDAY (31st OCTOBER)**

The Acoustic Music Club was cancelled last night, so in a quest to find some live music, I popped in to the Blue Note Bar and was delighted to find that Bob Vincent and Kevin Pallot were playing.

They make a great team, very funny (especially Bob) and it was great to hear some original music and see a couple of very confident and capable performers live. Bob is very folky/tribal and Kev has a boy-band voice but with a rocker's heart, together I think they are very good.

They fancied a break (to drink more red wine) so asked me to get up and play a few, so I played Volcano, Diamonds on the Inside and Sold.

Written a new tune, which is funky but with a chilling chorus:

I'm so cold, son

I've been cold and I've been hard
I may have been a less than open soul, no apologies
I've been broke and I've been made
I've lied and stole to get you where you are, I'd do it all again

I'm not about to break down, without the rain we'd never see the sun
but I'm cold son
I'm so cold son
I'm cold son
I'm so cold son... cold son

All my life I've never shed a tear
I've never dropped down to my knees
through you I know that I'll live on

I pulled you down I picked you up
I made you strong and now you're on your own, you know where I am
I find it hard I find it strange, to tell you what I feel, too late for regrets

I'm not about to break down, without the rain we'd never see the sun
but I'm cold son
I'm so cold son
I'm cold sonI'm so cold son... cold son

All my life I've never shed a tear
I've never dropped down to my knees
through you I know that I'll live on

Watersplash open mic was very quiet last night, but I like that sometimes and it's nice to sit down and play mellow tunes to an audience who listen and appreciate the tunes.

I played with Alex Glendinning on percussion and Big Pete provided great backing vocals and bongos.

Set:

Volcano
Amen Omen
This year's love
Sold
Cannonball
Sail Away
Diamonds on the inside
The blower's daughter

I am working with some talented guys at the moment on a covers project, Simon, Keith and Craig...

They are basically ready to play 16 or so songs including stuff by The Doors, Ben Folds Five, Wallflowers, Blue Oyster Cult, The Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Elvis Costello... It's cool and I am getting to hear and perform songs I have never heard before... Plus, I just have to learn the words and turn up and sing, which makes a change.

Playing at the Original Wine Bar tonight, at the acoustic music club from 9pm. Great mix of players bangin' out folk, blues, jazz, funk, acoustic rock and whatever it is that I do... A blend of all of the above I guess.

Ah, the REVELS legacy continues... My mate read my account of my own Revels (see below)incident and made me spit out my coffee by saying:

"I had some the other day without reading the packet and was completely shocked when I got a raisin. I thought a stray "Poppet" must have made it in from another conveyer belt. I was well disappointed when I realised it was supposed to be there."

How funny is that!?!

I am ill at the moment, just a touch of flu like symptoms, you know the usual stuff, aching bones, runny nose, a cough and you look like death warmed up.

Apart from my nose being red raw and my head pounding, I usually enjoy being off work, I read and hire shit dvds like The Vampire Hunters and stuff like that. However, with no work to do and plenty of time on my hands... I think... And that can be dangerous. It can result in a new story or song or worse... An idea, or I get hung up on something stupid. Today, I got to thinking about the term 'Life is full of little disappointments', now I reckon that is a pretty negative outlook and I tried hard to think of one... And then it happened!!!

I love Revels, you know the chocolates that have orange, coffee, toffee, Maltesers and best of all... The little chocolate discs. Now, I love the little chocolate discs and I don't like the coffee or orange and can take or leave the toffee... But because of the discs, I will work through a bag of Revels... If they just sold the discs, I would probably still buy Revels at it's the contrast and the 'unknwn' that makes 'em great.

Anyway, I was in Blockbuster hiring The Vampire Hunters and few other shit films when I saw them on the rack by the till...

A giant bag of Revels...

A bag with the words 'New Sweet' plastered boldly across the top left corner... Now this is something unheard of, something Revels fans have been waiting for, almost as long as being able to buy the chocolate discs on their own... A new centre... Oh my God!!!

The bag also had a little picture of each of the old centres, the coffee, the orange, the toffee, the Malteser, the disc... And then, yes... A QUESTION MARK!!! A big '?' slap bang in the middlle, this was almost too much for me to handle, they weren't going to tell me on the bag what this new centre was!!!

How exciting is that!?! So I bought a bag and hurried home.

Jesus, I thought, I'm going to have to eat one at time just in case I get the mystery centre, I don't want to pollute the taste with a damn coffee or orange... So I grabbed the first chocolate...

Coffee...

Next one... Orange.

I had a couple of discs just to reset my palate... Now this is when my imagination kicked in, what had Mars come up with? Maybe fudge, or white chocolate or maybe just to throw everyone off they have done something wierd like curry flavour or hedgehog flavour like those crisps that were all the rage... Wow, I really need to get back to work and get a life.

And then I realised...

Hold on, that was a raisin... A fuckin RAISIN!!! Now maybe it is just me but two things went through my mind at this point.

1) I didn't realise straight away because for some reason I thought raisins were always in Revels but thinking back, nope, that's the new sweet.

2) Is that the best the Research & Development guys can come up with, a fuckin RAISIN!!! What a stretch!!! Way to earn your £50K a year salaries boys, A FUCKIN RAISIN!!!

And then I found something in the bottom of the bag much more interesting... It looked like three Maltesers melted together and then covered perfectly in chocolote... I knew it was a freak but far more interesting than a damn raisin!!!

And then I thought just how like life, this bag of Revels is... You get excited about the hype, the anticipation of something, then you find something by accident that is a whole lot more interesting...

fuckin raisins.

Oh and I wrote a new tune too and worked out a Ben Harper song...