We’re all capable of making a social faux pas. One of my favourite stories is the one about the Eastern European delegate at a UN dinner who finished an after dinner toast by saying “as the English like to say ‘early to bed and up with the cock’.�
Fortunately, I’ve never made one quite so severe. But a recent trip to Dublin was a close call.
I’m a bit of a gig goer and although my festival visits nowadays tend to involve a plush hotel over a muddy campsite filled with drunken teenagers, I still like to go out and experience a decent band.
Over the years my friend Nick and I have become quite adept at negotiating our way into after-show parties. A few years back a trip to see Ian Brown at the Eden Project found us in the company of Damon Gough from Badly Drawn Boy and a couple of back stage passes.
Hoping that lightning might strike twice, we tried our luck again at a Kaiser Chiefs gig in Dublin. At the after-show party I was introduced to a smart, 27-year-old Scotsman. A turgid conversation about legal contracts in the music industry ensued before talk turned to that evening’s gig.
Asked my opinion of support act the Frattellis I answered without giving it too much thought and said that their sound was a bit thin and they might do well to get themselves a second guitarist.
For my trouble I received a mumbled thanks and the man walked off, clearly a bit peeved. Had Nick not retreated to the hotel room some time earlier he might have been able to warn me that I was speaking to their manager.
Phil Rees-Roberts is principal of boutique property practice Rees-Roberts Solicitors