A wet Sunday evening, just the sort of night for wacking the fire up, drawing the curtains and watching mindless drivel on the telly… but no!… in our tireless search for the weird, wacky and wonderful we’re bloody well out again, this time to the Whitley Bay oasis that is the Trojan Rooms.

Greeted at the door by mein-host, Mick, looking suitably dapper in the weirdest hat-thing I’ve seen in many a long month, and into the warmth of the TR and the cold welcoming kiss of Guinness.

Now we’ve mentioned this one-off night, over the past few weeks, Craig Charles, Funk and Soul night, coming to the coast and a lot of people have worked very hard indeed, to make this happen. How? By making it a bit of an event with live music to accompany the Red Dwarf stars DJ set… and first out of the traps, local Hip-Hopsters, Baron Von Alias and Mistabreeze. Nee idea what the top hat and tash are about, but the boys certainly grabbed the rooms attention, opening with Organise Chaos,  a cracking little set ensued that even included their own distinctive take on Yolanda Be Cool’s – We No Speak Americano… tell you what, I reckon that’s not their usual crowd, but fair play, they were entertaining and went down an absolute storm.

Then in stark contrast, the huge P-Funk, logistical nightmare that is Coastadelic, slowly but surely filled up the stage, and I mean filled! Millions of them, 4 singers, keyboards, trumpet, 2 bass players, guitars, drums and bongo’s… that’s even more than The Union Choir… probably even more than the Union of Mineworkers actually! Anyway… it’s probably safe to say, that despite the headline DJ, the majority of people in the room had come to see this unique musical behemoth!  The place was rammed.

They opened with Sylvester’s, floor filling, gay anthem, Do Ya Wanna Funk With Me, (speaking of which… is that Elton John’s Silky bomber jacket I spy? I think so!) … and the room literally exploded… obviously exactly what the crowd were here for! Setting the scene for a good, 30 odd minutes of face-pounding, funky dance type thang! But that wasn’t all… up got the aforementioned Baron and Monsieur Breeze, squeezing centre stage to add to the mix… and then, up got Bertie “Bloody” Spoons, doing a funky spoon thing on the bass players helmet… did I forget to mention the helmet?… yes a genuine Top Gear fighter pilots helmet! No! I’ve no idea why! God knows what that sounded like from the inside… excruciating I should imagine! Fantastic though… a real spectacle… I really hope it’s not the first and last we see of Coastadelic!

Coastadelic went off, to well deserved, rapturous applause and a few minutes later Craig Charles took to the decks… and with a slightly glitchy start, he was off, doing his thing and dropping his danceable funkiness onto the eager late night Sunday crowd. Give him his dues, he never stops moving, dancing, waving, bobbing… smiling. Fair play to anyone who managed to get a blur free photo. The clock ticked on and the crowd began to thin a bit… work, probably school for some I suppose… but a good hundred or so stayed till the wee small hours, grooving away! Then it was all over. Mr Charles was off pretty sharpish, shook a few hands and slipped away.

Highlight… Coastadelic, The Baron, Mistabreeze and Bertie Spoons all on the same stage at the same time. Class!

Cheers fellas for a memorable night!

Huge Thanks to Dave Hudspeth from Reverse Image for the stunning photographs, for loads more from this set, check out his Facebook page here or for other examples of his work his website  http://www.reverseimage.co.uk

By Dave on November 23, 2010