Fourteen To Go

On the stairs, queuing for tonight’s gig, I heard those fateful words, “are you Pete Ashton?” I’d been spotted in public by one of my readers and yet me tell you, it’s a rather odd experience. I’ve had the “are you…” question before but usually I knew the person asking and it was at some event or other where I was expecting that sort of thing to happen. This was the first time a perfect stranger had announced to my face that they were a reader of my blog and, dare I say it, a “fan.” Darren (at least I think that’s his name – cringing apologies if I’m wrong!) had stumbled across this site about six months ago while Googling for Misty’s Big Adventure and had stuck around following the blog and podcasts. He asked how the GDFAF week was going and we chatted for a bit about how odd the whole chatting for a bit was.

Suddenly I remembered I was standing with my mate Steve who had recently been asking me about this sort of thing – the fact that there are people out there who know about me but I have no idea who they are, famous for fifteen people and all that. You might remember Steve as the guy who recorded a couple of tracks in our living room which I played in Pete Radio 18 in September. So I said to Darren, you remember that guy who did those songs in the living room? Yes, said Darren, enthusing mildly about how he’d enjoyed that. Well, I said pointing at Steve. This is him.

I think Steve understands where I’m coming from now.

Oddly enough I had another “are you…” moment during the gig from Andy Pryke but this was expected as we’ve been failing miserably to meet for a while now. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens a lot more now I’m reviewing so many Birmingham gigs because Andy and I, we fucking own the Birmingham music scene when it comes to Google. Check it out: Distophia, Klopeks, Misty’s Big Adventure (I’ll give Andy that one…) and so on.

I’d love to say this was premeditated but like all the best global domination plans it’s was completely unintentional. Be interesting to see how it all develops.

(Oh, and Darren, sorry for turning you into content like that!)