Tour Diary: 2020 Soundsystem by Moodymanc/Dubble D

Tour Diary: 2020 Soundsystem by Moodymanc/Dubble D

30 November, 2010 | 8.16AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: 2020 soundsystem, dubble d, moodymanc, tour diary

The life of a touring musician isn’t all wine and roses: in between the highlight moments under the spotlights, there are plenty of long commutes, dodgy meals, and naps grabbed whenever and wherever one can.

Surviving the touring life requires an iron stomach, a resilient immune system, and above all, a positive spirit. Fortunately, Moodymanc (Manchester’s Danny Ward, aka Dubble D) has the latter in spades. He recently hit the road with 2020Soundsystem, both as the drummer for Ralph Lawson’s 2020 Soundsystem and also playing a few DJ sets along the way; indulging our curiosity, he cheerfully agreed to chronicle the sojourn for Beatportal.

Read on for his misadventures with salad niçoise, shattered windshields and suspicious drum kits, and don’t miss his contributions to the recently released records Tsuba Deep, 35 Graus, Jazzy Best Part 1, and 2020 Vision’s own We Love Space Sundays.

Thursday November 11th - Leeds UK

2020Soundsystem supporting Booka Shade at the O2 Academy, Leeds, followed by a Moodymanc DJ set at Teknicolour at Mint club...

I drive up to my rehearsal room in Manchester’s Ancoats… I’ve had a “practice” room here, in a complex of rehearsal rooms in a dark satanic mill in this slightly less than salubrious (ahem) quarter of the city for about 15 years. (If you take a look at the cover of my Moodymanc “Mode” EP, shot just around the corner, you’ll get the idea....) I pack up the drums I’ll be using for tonight and tomorrow’s gigs and wrestle them into the ancient goods lift, getting them into the car in as few relays as possible, to avoid the crews of opportunist scallies who are ever present to nick anything. I then nip back home; we’re still waiting for details of what time our sound check might be tonight, so I get on with checking through some promos and tunes that I might want to play at my DJ gig, after our gig at the O2 tonight.

I decide to try to get a little rest (20 minutes’ snooze—it’s going to be a long night!!!) before Ralph wakes me at 5pm to let me know that I’ll need to bring a DJ mixer to the gig too.... Twenty minutes later I hit the road, in full-on rush hour traffic, to panic drive over the country to try to make our load-in deadline (I have a healthy OCD inspired aversion to lateness!!)… We eventually get a short, sharp sound check and I go to the dressing room to grab another 40 winks before our press agent Neil joyfully wakes me from the sofa with pizza and chat through what’s lined up for next few weeks and some exciting plans for 2011.

We hit stage on time; the venue is full already and the audience, despite it being a Thursday, are very much “up for it,” and very much in a “Leeds” way. We get a brilliant reception and soon get into our stride despite the little break we’ve had from playing since the summer. We finish the set buzzing and I run over to the Mint club, sweating, to do my DJ gig for the lovely guys at Teknicolour, a hugely successful Thursday nighter that has seen some of the biggest names of the moment playing to a packed house! Tonight, even though it was a much smaller crowd than the O2, we have fun and go for a drink at around 4:30/5 (you can do that in Leeds on a Thursday night!) before I head back home in incredible gale force winds-debris blowing everywhere—including straight into my windscreen, cracking it!

Saturday 13th November – Birmingham UK

After a day tweaking a couple of mixes in the studio and warming my wrists up a little for the gig (I’ve been playing drums on a jazz gig in Manchester the previous night) I get in the car and set off for Birmingham for the sound check. The venue is nice: a massive old boozer with multiple rooms upstairs which act as separate venues, really nicely done out.

The guys are already here, and I’ve timed things well; they’re ordering dinner from an extensive menu of great sounding food.... I place my order and then go to set up my drums. We eat together in the dressing room, admiring the ridiculous number of legendary names that appear on the venue’s posters that adorn the walls. The food is great, (a Halloumi salad starter, followed by a Cajun spiced fish dish, lovely) and the dressing room is just around the corner from the kitchen. We stick our heads in to pay our respects and chat with the guys who run the catering there. The guys are lovely and offer us dessert and coffee (homemade waffles with ice cream and dark treacle-wooooha!), which they bring to us as we soundcheck—result! No wonder this venue gets so many big names coming back! We sit in the dressing room and catch up with Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon’s The Trip courtesy of BBC iplayer—GENIUS!

The gig goes, well, not the busiest, but a superb party crowd who are going for it from the get-go and a good onstage sound courtesy of the venue’s resident sound engineer… We have fun and hang out a little, chatting to our gracious hosts, before I jump in the car (around 2.45 am) and head for home, finally making the motorway after sitting in a near stationary traffic jam for at least 45 minutes(!!!? It seems they’ve closed one of the main routes in Birmingham city centre for roadworks, but forgot to tell anyone in a car...lots of horn honking and brummy tinged obscenities flying...quite funny if it wasn’t for the hour and the fact I’m stuck in the middle of it!!!)… I get home around 5 and get a text from Ralph who has unfortunately had a blowout on his way back and is waiting for the recovery vehicle—he has to do the rest of his (considerably longer) journey home on his spare tyre, which restricts him to 50 mph! Ah the high life…

Friday. 19th November...Bristol UK

2020Soundsytem & Booka Shade at Motion, Bristol

I’m up really early this morning, finishing tweaks to a remix I’ve been doing. It’s been accepted by the label but I’ve had a couple of days off from it now, and I retackle with fresh ears to get it sounding as I’d like.... I jump on the train to Bristol from Manchester Piccadilly at 13.07(!)… (Hire kits for the next two nights! “Drums du jour” as we say in the trade!) I cunningly got to the station early to pick up tickets and grab some food for the journey—I’ve done this route before and the on-train food on offer is bad even by train standards! This done, I smugly get in my seat, try to look as offputting as possible to anyone who looks like they might take the empty one next to me, and get my laptop out to mess around with some beats and check through some promos I’ve downloaded earlier. All good until I start to get hungry and realize that I’ve forgotten to pick up the plastic cutlery for my salad niçoise at the checkout!

I’m picked up at Bristol by Ken, who is driving us for the evening. He takes me to the hotel. The other guys are already out, eating at a nearby cafe. I order a knife and fork from room service and take my revenge on the niçoise before grabbing a couple of hours’ sleep!

Arrive at sound check to see the hired drum kit has definitely seen better days, and a few worse, too, judging by the suspicious police evidence tag, which is still tied to the floor tom!

After another food jaunt, I get back to the venue to find some more bits of a mate-of-a-mate’s drum kit have turned up. I cobble together something playable and set up behind a speaker stack, with the guys perched on a shelf (actually the top of a speaker ramp!) behind the stage. We sound check. The in-house engineer,
Cotton does a great job and everything is sounding great by the time we finish. The venue looks great. I have a nosey at the other rooms and a catch-up with a couple of mates who are playing and running the night… Our room fills up pretty quickly with Amos dropping some great tunes and we go on to a brilliant crowd—really good gig… I hang out to hear a little of Jozif’s brilliant set after us, and pour myself a stiff, well earned whiskey!

I then head back to the hotel with the brilliant Simon Richmond (aka Palmskin Productions) who is taking leave from the Bays to play with us at the moment… I half watch a trashy French detective movie whilst fantasy-buying bits of studio gear on eBay before crashing out. I’m aware of Ralph, who stayed at the gig, coming in later but it doesn’t break my sleep…

Saturday 20th November.....Fabric, London.

We all get up and brunch together, and then grab a cab with our gear to the station in leisurely fashion. We grab seats in the waiting room, swapping tunes and mixes between each other to pass the time before our train to Paddington gets in. Once on the thankfully quiet train we all doze, read and play around with beats on our laptops…

We arrive in London and grab a cab to the much-needed refuge of the Malmaison, right next to Fabric. I sleep for an hour (getting the pattern here?) before a couple of mates turn up. We grab a quick brew then I head over to the club to sound check.

Ah, Fabric.... I love Fabric!!!! I’ve played here with various bands and DJed under different names over the last ten years and I’ve always had a great time. Fabric’s commitment to making your music sound as good as possible and your experience the most conducive to a great performance is second to none. It’s great to see familiar faces and once we’ve ironed out a couple of “issues” with the “drums du jour.” We get done quickly and everything’s feeling great.

Off to dinner around the corner. We’re joined by the guys from Dumb Unit who are hosting room 2, Saul and Judy from Fabric, Matthias Tanzmann who is closing room 1 after us, and Craig Richards. I sit next to Matthias, who I’ve never met before—a brilliant and funny guy. With the others, we talk records, gigs, food (specifically the nuances of the fruit crumble) and dogs(!)… A lovely meal… I then head back to the hotel, feeling super-charged by double espresso, and grab a shower before hooking up with mates and heading down to the club with the rest of our crew.

The gig doesn’t disappoint… I love every minute of it… we have a great one… then I catch up with various friends and hang out for a few drinks, checking out the different rooms in the process… Terry Francis rocking it (as ever) in room 3 was great and the guys in Room 2 had it going off in great musical techno style… Matthias comes on in Room 1 at 5 am, and despite the hour lifts it to another level. He does it playing great sounding, jazzy tinged, brilliant grooves to my delight and all with a great panache and style… I hang out on the dance floor and in the booth and am blown away! Great!!!

It gets close to 7am and I decide to say fond farewells and head back to the hotel to get my stuff together and hit the train of shame (or in this case the train of smug—I’ve managed to resist the temptation to make a proper acid house night of it!), only to be corrupted slightly by meeting my old mate John Thorne (Lamb, Lou Rhodes etc. etc.) on the Euston concourse...He’s merrily on his way to a gig in Brighton after an already heavy weekend of gigs and insists that I join him for a swig or two from the half-full(!) bottle of dark rum that he’s carrying inside his coat.

I ease back into my seat in first class (it was actually cheaper that the sual standard...) and fire up the laptop to keep myself amused on the journey home.... ROCK N ROLL!!!!!!

Moodymanc’s November Tried & Tested Chart

2020 Soundsystem on Beatport

Moodymanc on Beatport

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