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.