Last Tuesday I went to The White Lion pub (a preferred local of mine, but blimey that's a low-fi website if ever I saw one) to see the Dead Victorians. These fine chaps are quite magnificent – music hall entertainment from a bygone era crammed with interesting instruments and innuendo.
This is the second time I've seen them, in the same venue as it happens, but both times they have been a threesome, without the elusive Pedro. I don't know why, but the good Dr. Blake doesn't seem to be in any of the publicity photos and gets nary a mention on the CD (on sale that evening for the first time) whilst appearing to be a thoroughly integral part of the band on drums, many vocals, spoons, washboard etc.
I'll quite happily admit that it was seeing the Dead Victorians for the first time that tipped me over the edge and caused me to buy an accordion. It was a pleasure to see them again, though the photos I took are shamefully poor, taken as they were from the back of a crowded but dark pub with a small compact camera. The blur sitting in front of Maestro Paul on the accordion is the good doctor playing the typewriter to accompany a vigourous trombone rendition of the William Tell Overture.
