Stroud - 2003

Well to start with, it seemed like your typical wedding gig on a summer’s evening – posh country mansion with a big garden and a function room. As always, the meal was running late so me and the rest of the band just chatted in the car park for over an hour until we were allowed to get the stuff in and set up.

The contract stated that we were booked from 8pm to 12pm in conjunction with the disco.

The bride asked us about 3 times if we knew how to play the first dance (I forget which song it was) – then her mother asked us a few more times. Apart from that everything seemed ok.

The bride asked us to have a chat with the DJ to sort out when we would be playing and when the disco would be playing (the DJ was a friend of the bride and groom). The bride seemed fairly relaxed about this. The DJ suggested that he would do the last hour (11-midnight) so that we could pack up and go (especially as we were right next to the exit and wouldn’t be in anyone’s way).

We played for about 2 ¼ hours finishing at 11pm. The only thing the disco had done at this point was to play for 15 minutes during our break. Incidentally, there was a sound limiter at this venue that meant that if we played too loud, the band’s electricity would be cut off (nice!). These useless devices are always set at a ridiculously low volume. Strangely, it only cut off the electricity during our quietest song! Despite this nuisance and the fact that we were playing at a VERY, VERY low volume, everyone was happy and dancing throughout. In fact, the bride was even taking photos of us while we were playing.

At 11.15pm, our guitarist, James Forster, was half way home and I was almost half way through packing the gear away (PA system, lights, drums etc). All the guests were happily dancing to the disco and having a good time. It was at this point that the groom came up to me. He was very similar to Phil Mitchell from Eastenders – but bigger.

"I thought the band was booked ‘til 12" he said.

I politely passed him in the direction of Ruth, my wife, because she runs the band and deals with all the contracts & arrangements etc.

The bride then joined in the conversation armed with her copy of the contract (which didn’t say anything different). Although I couldn’t hear the full conversation, I knew Ruth was explaining that we were booked ‘til 12 in conjunction with the disco – obviously we couldn’t both finish the evening off. Ruth also reminded the bride that she had asked us to sort out playing times with the DJ and that the timings were his suggestion.

Within 5 minutes the bride was becoming increasingly upset and angry with Ruth – as was Phil Mitchell. They were not interested in hearing our side of the story at all.

"I booked a f***ing band for my wedding – the disco was just to fill in the gaps when you had a break" said the bride.

Bear in mind the disco had a full sized rig with PA, lights etc – it wasn’t just a bloke with a CD player! Also, during all of this, the guests were dancing and enjoying themselves (perhaps unaware of the argument at this point).

Ruth had suggested that the band play some more (even though we’d packed away a lot of the gear and that we were a musician short – although they hadn’t noticed this). This idea was not welcomed…

"Like your gonna go back on now!" said Mr Mitchell.

"Take your band and F*** OFF!!!!" he said into Ruth’s face.

And a minute later….

"If you don’t get out of here now I’m gonna ram that keyboard right up your f****** ar*e!!!" he continued.

Then the bride joined in…

"You’ve f***ing RUINED my wedding!!!"

"I want a refund! I’m going to call the agent tomorrow!" (Fortunately, she had paid the full amount in advance to the agent).

You might be thinking that you’ve never heard anything like it. Well, this is just the beginning!

It was agreed amongst the three remaining band members (Ruth, Catherine Sykes [the singer] and me) that we needed to load up the van faster than ever before and get out. I started with the most expensive items without bothering to put their cases on. My well-rehearsed ‘loading the van’ system was also kicked into touch.

I was taking a speaker off of its stand when Mr Mitchell approached me and asked:

"What the f*** are you doing?"

After my non-committal, almost silent answer he asked again.

Mr Mitchell was now burning with rage. He was desperate for me to hit him but knew I hadn’t planned on such an exciting venture. That was when he hit me on the head with his empty pint glass – not hard at all though. He just wanted to try and provoke me.

At this point I raised my hands in a defensive pose and said, "Look..."

"Right!!" he shouted whilst removing his jacket very quickly. "Outside NOW!!!"

At about the same time his arms were lunging at me, three blokes (his mates) dived on him and dragged him out of the room. They pinned him up against the wall in the corridor to calm him down. My guess is that they knew what he was like and knew that it would have been the last time I ever played the drums if they had left him to it.

Clearly, it was time to speed up the packing away. On my next trip out to the van, I saw the bride pick up my floor tom and throw it into the road. Fortunately it was in its case and undamaged. On my second trip to the van, the bride was in the back of the van taking out microphone stands and speaker stands and throwing them as far as she possibly could. Throughout the whole affair, her best mate was trying to calm her down saying things like:

"Now what good’s that going to do?"

With the help of the other two, I’d managed to get most of the gear in the van. There were just a few stands and a big pile of leads remaining. As I turned away from the van to head back inside to get these things, the best man was running at me from inside the building as if he’d just come off the starting blocks of the Olympics 100 metres! We both had a scuffle and ended up in the bushes. Fortunately he had not succeeded in landing any punches on me.

It became very clear to me that I wasn’t welcome anymore so I did the polite thing and ran for my life. I ran through the car park, jumped over the wall down the road and ran down the road into a neighbour’s garden (I later found out that he was looking for me in the car park). I then phoned James, the guitarist, in a state of panic (who didn’t believe me to start with). He had just arrived home at this point and had no idea that anything had happened.

Although I was very worried about the other two and all the equipment, I decided I couldn’t go back so I called the police. After about 15 minutes I met up with two police cars down the road from the venue. After explaining the situation to the understanding officer, he called for a third car. Once this had arrived, all three cars made their way down the drive into the venue. I was sat in one of these cars and was feeling nervous despite the substantial police protection. At this point, Ruth and Catherine were driving out of the venue in our van having successfully loaded up the remaining gear without any more trouble. In fact, the bride was dancing to the disco again within 5 minutes of me leaving! It seemed that as soon as the only male (me) was out of the way, they were happy to let it go because they knew they couldn’t get away with hitting the ladies.

We asked the police not to go in as it had all calmed down and we didn’t want to make matters worse. The happy couple (?) will now know that the police were there as some of the guests that were leaving were unable to due to the convoy of police cars blocking the driveway.

Amazingly, the bride has still not phoned the agent to complain. Perhaps the worst part of this story is that we’ve got another gig at this place coming up!!! Aaagh!