Gaughan's Irish tour Epistle, Part the Tenth
Belfast, 11.00pm, Tuesday 23rd Oct 2001

Haven't been able to get online for several days. It happens sometimes on the road.

Friday began with the RTE interview with Peter Browne. We did it at his house in Blackrock and then I set out towards Kilkenny. There was a deluge of the kind that has you looking for planks to build an ark and it took a full two hours to get round Dublin and onto the open road. I got to Kilkenny in time to grab a pizza before a very enjoyable gig. Tom Stapleton who promoted the night is an old friend and it was good to see him again. The gig was in John Cleere's pub where there is a fine back room which holds about 70 people and has no bar in the room so not once did I have to call for quiet.

I had the night off on Saturday and spent it eating, having a long hot bath, watching TV and sleeping. Then it was Mick Dolan's pub in Limerick.

I walked into the place and thought, "Oh Hell, this is going to be a disaster". It looked like a disco room - no chairs, a long bar down side of the room, a high stage and the feel of a heavy boozing, rowdy nightclub. It turned out to be one of the best nights I've had in a long time. They shut the bar during the performance and laid out tables and stools. Grainne, the house manager, couldn't do enough to make sure I was comfortable and ended up selling CDs for me. The engineer, Mike, was excellent; I'd worked with him years ago in Whelans in Dublin. As it was quite a late start, I decided to do just the one set and ended up doing almost 2 and a half hours onstage. Superb night.

Next day, Monday, I had an afternoon stint at Limerick University with a discussion with some of the students afterwards. I really enjoyed it. The long touring is kicking in and I'm getting a bit weary so I decide to drive to Belfast on Monday evening so that I could have Tuesday doing nothing. There is a hotel just outside the city to the south that I've stayed in many times and I like it. It's quiet, it has a restaurant and it's only a short drive into the city. I decided to hole up here for the remainder of the tour.

Constantly living out of a suitcase and dragging stuff in and out of hotels gets a bit wearing so the prospect of spending four nights in the one place is delightful. Got here late last night and slept until the afternoon today.

Got a phone call this evening from the tour promoter, Nigel, asking if I fancied doing a radio interview on Thursday morning. Morning? I don't do mornings if I can possibly avoid them. Especially not after the amount of touring I've been doing in the past two months.

"Err, what time on Thursday morning?"

"Around 10"

My involuntary burst of hysterical laughter said all that needed to be said.

So I have Armagh and Belfast left to do.

25th January 2005

Tour Dates - last update 30 August 2005

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