Strangers With Guns Getting Off The Ground 3

 Once we got off the ground we went pretty flat out with gigs. I was initially delighted to just be in a band, it had taken years and this one I could actually get together with. I could send Rennick recordings and he would have drums together in now time, someone actually listening to what I sent them was a complete foreign experience for me, he learned songs fast, showed up on time and dug the tunes, this was all amazing to me. Early on in practices Ricky blasted out "Sabotage" I realised that "A" it sounded killer, and "B" I had options vocally, so I think the next 4 songs I came up with all had him on the chorus or somewhere on em. I was still completely paying for practices at this stage which was 50quid a pop before I moved us to Pats place "Badlands" which is 40....I think, this trend only happened cause I wanted them to stay, Rennick broke this cycle a few months in by saying here we are a band we can pay like, this was great, so it was 12 quid from Rennick and 28 from me, it took another 2yrs for ricky to follow suit and was a large part of his exit.

We played multiple Fibbers Thursday gigs, felt like "paying our dues" sort of gigs and also free practices, we didn't really put to much thought into them, I could walk to fibbers after work with my guitar and we just play a set like, was great but probably not for Rennick who was driving from Newbridge and working the next day. Booked the Thomas house, was a weird gig, just cost me 150, didn't try to do any tickets, was just trying to find new people to hear us without much of a plan, think that is when I started with the hula skirt. Played in the milk market with Steiner and Dirty Casuals, that was fun, drank a bit to much pre gig though.

At one stage we played a gig, I cant remember the first nights gig, it might have been the Limerick gig, but I don't think so, and the next night we were playing a little music and video festival in Wexford, was the first time I ever really felt down about the band, I covered the accommodation for rickys for both and did all the driving,  I was treating the whole thing like a stags, bit of energy, lets drink and have fun, both lads just lay down, ricky had about 4 shits, they had no weed, they we're no craic. I thought fuck, is this what a tour would be like.