Nottingham
I met the Sheriff of Nottingham. I didn’t know there was an actual sheriff, but there is. He’s a nice old man, I don’t see why anyone would want to give him any trouble. I was able to meet him because I played “Re: Your Brains” at the Guiness record-setting zombie gathering event outside in a square filled with zombies (he counted the zombies, I guess that’s one of his many duties). This is unquestionably the weirdest moment of the trip: me there in the green room tent next to the stage saying hi to the sheriff and seeing zombie faces everywhere. How did this happen?
And then of course we played the GameCity Halloween party that night – the standard semi-crappy sound of a large hotel conference room, made even more crappy by my then even larger throat frog. I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to get through the set. But an audience of zombies doesn’t care about this sort of thing, really all they want is brains. And of course Paul and Storm kicked ass as usual, so I figure even if I was terrible there was still some decent entertainment on stage.
I can only hope that they’re as forgiving here in Birmingham, because the frog is still with me (I have named him Bernie).
November 1st, 2008 at 12:54 pm
On the plus side it’s a very famous frog
I mean better than any frog in the throat we’ll ever have
November 1st, 2008 at 1:07 pm
The set was most awesome, fear not! I hope the zombie hoardes didn’t crush your laptop!
November 1st, 2008 at 1:08 pm
The unanswered question is… how many zombies were there?
November 1st, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Hmmmm…
Zombies break record in Grand Rapids
Updated: Nov 1, 2008 12:52 AM
“{GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — A world record number of zombies came to Rosa Parks Circle in Grand Rapids Thursday night. An estimated 2,000 people dressed up in their best ghoulish costume and broke the mark for largest Zombie Walk.
They also donated 8,000 cans of food for the Second Harvest Gleaners Food Bank of West Michigan – 5,000 by participants and 3,000 by Meijer stores. Organizer Rob Bliss spread the word with the help of Facebook.com. The old record – 1,028 zombies – was set last year at the Monroeville Mall in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.”
http://www.woodtv.com/global/story.asp?s=9270951
November 1st, 2008 at 2:52 pm
You were great!
(I was one of people who said hi just before you got on stage)
(You looked rather frightened, i promise we wern’t planning on eating you)
November 1st, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Hrm. I am pretty sure Toronto (http://www.torontozombiewalk.ca/) hit almost 3000 zombies this year on the 19th.
November 1st, 2008 at 5:18 pm
but did they get the sheriff of nottingham to count them? that seems to be the key…
November 2nd, 2008 at 6:05 am
I think the very least the Sheriff could have done was arrest the frog that was residing in your throat (Bernie, I believe?), and maybe incarcerated it in the camera of ‘Weird Camera Guy!’
November 2nd, 2008 at 10:53 am
Thanks for coming along to Notts Jonathan, As a games widow I was a slightly reluctant attendee at GameCity, but was totally won over by your set. It was certainly a very melodic frog and I loved your show. Over and above the excellent lyrics and great melodies, you guys just made a damn nice noise.
Tom Lehrer for the new generation
Come back soon, and drop by for a cuppa. I will buy biscuits especially.
November 2nd, 2008 at 5:42 pm
All I can say is wow. It was amazing. I bought tickets too see you do the show in the hotel after but someone told me it was 18+ and I’m only 16.
Front row when you sang “RE: Your Brains” though. And I must say thanks again for taking a picture with me!
http://photos-464.ll.facebook.com/photos-ll-snc1/v345/167/34/531154464/n531154464_1520679_236.jpg
Click that even if you don’t have facebook! Its a direct link, not a facebook page! Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
November 3rd, 2008 at 11:18 am
Thanks for a fantastic set! We all loved you, even though the crowd was surprisingly small. I was in second row both at the zombie count and at the set, and despite Bernie you sounded fantastic, thank you so much for coming! And for just wandering around strumming away, made it easier to find you for autograph’s
November 3rd, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Strangely enough, a couple weeks ago there were a ton of zombies (30 or 40 I think?) gathered outside of a McDonald’s near Bleeker st. in NYC a couple of weeks ago.
Not nearly as many as this, but still fun to come across.
November 5th, 2008 at 1:37 am
We had over a thousand at the zombie pub crawl (www.zombiepubcrawl.com) in Minneapolis last month.
November 9th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Hi, I just wanted to say thanks! It was a totally awesome night! I wish I could have gotten to meet you in person but my luck’s never been that great. Meh. The choir was awesome, but if it helps, I don’t think ANYBODY noticed Bernie. I know I didn’t.