Meet the Band

I started browsing through the band members wanted vacancies for months when this offer of a spot with a Pink Floyd tribute band came up. I don’t sound like Dave Gilmour but you’ve got to start somewhere. I make it to the audition just outside London and my sore throat actually makes me sound like Gilmour. I try to explain that I normally sound like Sting but they are so busy thinking about up and coming studio and tour sessions that they hire me. “Did anyone else audition?” I ask. “Want a coffee from Starbucks?” replies the bass player, Todger Waiters. Is he bonding or avoiding the question. It was later I discover that he’s almost deaf. I thought that duff note at the start of Time was just ring rust. By the time he bought an empty cup of coffee back, I realised he also had Parkinson’s. What next? Oh Jesus. The drummer, Rick Monsoon, suffers from intermittent epilepsy (it helps on some solo parts apparently), the keyboard player, Dick Sleight, is an ex-porn star (always laughs at his own “I’m still playing the organ” joke), and the other guitarist, Dan Glamour, dresses up as a cowboy at weekends and goes looking for Pocahontus in and around The Oracle Shopping Centre in Reading - oh how the shop assistants in the Disney shop must love to see him coming. Not! What am I letting myself in for? In the next installment I’ll be covering rehearsals...