So thank you for reading my inaugural newsletter giving you the view from Cheam & surrounding areas. This will hopefully be an entertaining read giving you news of what I have been up to, future events and the news on what will be the best rock band in the world, currently called Sulphur containing myself and Mr Matthew Oliver. I’m not sure how frequent this will be, possibly once every two months if I can be arsed and the Doctor updates his site to include me regularly.

My personal tally for the year is 354. This only includes United Kingdom pubs, another twenty or so were done on Mark Giles’ stag do in Bilbao , but I forgot to write all the bars name down. Also on the Saturday I was more concerned with my well being having broken my collar-bone whilst falling over on concrete during a football match. A rash but fair challenge by Andy Wright caused the game to be abandoned and myself, Mark & Ad getting a taxi to the hospital to sort me out! Had I had been counting though I would have made sure that I used the bar that was in the waiting room of Bilbao's hospital A&E department! It was a splendid weekend despite this and myself (and some of the others) missing out on the hard-core porn on channel seven because we stayed out too late. Surely the first time that the porn was on too early! Top marks too for the female guide who showed us around Athletico Bilbao’s ground. I certainly wouldn’t mind starring with her in a late night film shown on channel seven.

Crawls done in the last couple months include Newport IOW and Hammersmith. Newport was pretty good for pubs. I was at the Isle of Wight festival with Matt and during the Saturday we did ten pubs in the capital of the Island. Top marks for the barmaid in Bar Bluu, who had remarkable breasts, so much so that Matt & I struggled to keep a straight face whilst being served as we both wanted to shout out ‘look at the tits on that!’. Peroxide hair and Pamela Anderson-esque figure, alas she left when we were finishing our beer, vowing not to return to work until the following Wednesday! Bar Bluu also does San Miguel on draught so would have rated highly had I’d been scoring. The Medina Railway Tavern is also worth a mention, being nowhere near a railway, it also had a nice garden and some Pompey-loathing punters at the bar which is always a plus.

Hammersmith was done on 19.6.04 before my bro & I saw the lovely Belinda Carlisle at the Hoopy Empire. We started in O.S.P the trendy name for the Old Suffolk Punchbowl as it used to be. Budvar on draught which turned out very appropriate as the place was packed with many Czechs awaiting sight of their Euro 2004 game against the Dutch. Quite a few attractive girlies among them, imagine that they are Eastern European au pairs. So impressed I was I vowed to watch the final there if the Czechs managed to reach there. Unfortunately they cocked up in the semi! Some of you may be aware that the Oxford & Cambridge pub was one of the worst in the country. However I was suitably impressed on my visit this time round. There were no drunk locals propping up the bar and the pub seemed clean. Even the pool table had a new baize on it. How long this will last, I don’t know, and whether I’ll return this year to find out is very unlikely.

The Maple Leaf in Covent Garden has been visited in the last two months. They have replaced the draft Molson with another Canadian lager, Sleeman. An extortionate £3.40 a pint although like Molson was it is probably the only place outside the North American continent that you can get it on draft. The old SpringBok round the corner is now called the Bok Bar although the interior in this basement doesn’t look that different. Adding to the confusion just round the corner form there where Bad Bobs was, is now called the Springbok! Both full of annoying accents.

Finally, a cheeky little mention to the bar in Ikea where a bottle of Spendrups was drunk at a cost of £1.80. This was the Ikea in Croydon, and one now wonders whether other branches have their own bars and whether the bar is open to midnight like the furniture shop itself!

The last two month gig account started with the Isle of Wight festival. This was a fantastic weekend where on the first night I ended up doing an impromptu solo gig in the campsite. I can now say that I was supported by the Stereophonics! On the Saturday, The Who headlined with a fantastic set, and the Sunday Bowie made us forget about Beckhams penalty and Zidanes set pieces. On the ferry home with us was Tim Burgess of the Charlatans who we saw on the Sunday. I resisted the urge to say the new stuff where he sings in a falsetto is crap!

The day after Belinda Carlisle, I went to Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club to see Francis Ruffelle. On my way to the gents I was met by a man whose hair doubles his height and is very curly. Surprisingly wearing exactly what he wears on stage I said to him ‘Alright Brian!’ as it was Mr May himself. ‘I’m fine thank you’ he replied. ‘You on stage with Francis later?’ I questioned. ‘No old red is at home tonight’ and with that he went back to sit down with his wife (also Dirty Den’s first wife Anita Dobson).

Massive Attack were chilling at Brixton earlier in the month, with Dot Allison on vocals for a breath taking version of Teardrop.

Finally, saw the Alarm at the Camden Underworld on 19^th July. At the bar I ran into Sex Pistol Glenn Matlock. I gave him a flyer for the then forthcoming Sulphur gig ‘Porchaid’ explaining that Jimmy Page was invited to the last one. Needless to say he didn’t turn up! Also at the same gig, I had a piss next to Kirk Brandon of Spear of Destiny. Mr Brandon is the man who famously sued Boy George over an alleged affair with the Culture Club front person and lost! Needless to say I made a quick exit!

On Saturday 24^th July, merely four weeks after breaking my collar bone, we opened up Porchaid at St Oswalds Church Hall. Our first set was at six and the set list was Try To Write, Human Beings, Two Steps Behind (Def Leppard), Same Old Song, Runaway Runaway, Only Living Boy In New Cross (Carter USM). I was especially pleased with our version of Two Steps Behind as it was the first time I ditched the guitar to concentrate solely on the vocals (also due to the fact I can’t actually play the lead on it!) Around forty were there for the first set. After sets from Now Is The Winter, Caz, Nic Hoskins, Shake & The Shudders (one bloke doing Shadows cover versions with a backing tape!!!) & Mixed Generation we returned to the stage at nine for our second set. Set list this time was We Think We’re So Clever, London Calling (The Clash), Fade Out of Sight, Beautiful Thing, This Is How It Feels (Inspiral Carpets), Share This World and Sproston Green (Charlatans). Matts guitar lead fell out during Fade Out Of Sight, quickly rectified by myself but other than that we felt we were again pretty good. I especially enjoyed our song Share This World which turned into an audience sing-a-long and was commented on as being excellent by several people. Unfortunately the audience began to dwindle a bit after Mixed Generation and I reckon we performed to about thirty for the second set!. The whole gig was recorded and if we like what we hear we may put out an ep of three or four tracks to flog. As Matt is now heading to Australia for four weeks, all will be quiet on the Sulphur front. However, Cheamstock II is planned for the Autumn/Winter and as soon as the date is announced it will be on this website (if Dan can arrange).

And so I come to the end of the riveting read. As I said before I don’t know how regular this will be or become but will keep people informed of my otherwise trivial existence Next newsletter will hopefully include reports of crawl of Godalming and a City crawl which is planned with Dr Lovegrove himself. The beer festival at Olympia where music will be provided by Chas n Dave will also get a mention! Remember to put your beer in the sideboard here, let mother sort it out cause I don’t care!

Keep rockin’

Rich (The Face Of Cheam)