The 12 Bar - Swindon

Sat 26th Jan saw our first trip to Swindon's brilliant 12 Bar venue. Ray had played there before and had built up expectations, so we were all looking forward to the first gig of our 2008 dates and blowing away the post Xmas and New Year cobwebs (this was quite literally the case for one guitar stand in particular!).

The trip along some of the UK’s busiest motorways was really easy and we turned up with plenty of time to be greeted by Dave, the hugely friendly 12 Bar owner. The venue was great with top facilities in the dressing room as well a fantastic PA and lighting rig. 

We'd worked hard on promotion again and this had paid off with some local press and Tom being interviewed on BBC Wiltshire that lunchtime, so we were hoping for a good turn out.

Sound check was as smooth as a baby's, especially with 'Prog-rock' Paul behind the controls who'd done the sound for Michael Schenker the week before!!!!!

By the time we hit the stage the room was getting close to full and buzzing. This was going to be fun, from the opening riff to Burn, it was obvious that we had a crowd who knew their music! There were a good few Whitesnake T-shirts, and people we're singing along from the off. By the time the traditional Ain't no Love choir was due, they were in great voice and the 2 or so hours flew by. Notable highlight was Walking in the Shadow of the Blues, a new song to the set that went without a hitch and was lapped up by the crowd.

Thanks to everyone who turned us especially the delightful Karen and John who I’m sure we’ll see again! Also birthday girl Nikki and friends – it’s always great to see the girls having a good time! We’ll back, can’t wait to see you all again!

Pete

Hi Snakefans!

Well it was the last gig of the year on home turf so a bit dissapointed at the turn out. Although notwithstanding this the crowd that was there made up for numbers by being in fine voice.
Great to see so many friends of the band, plus Paul the sound man knows his room and is a Whitesnake fan so we always get a great sound.
Thanks to all the members of Love Honour & Disobey for turning out, I am sure we willbe watching you guys in the near future.
I had quite a long chat with Simon the landlord after the gig and he is starting to get the feeling that the Classic Rock bands are not the draw they used to be after several top line tributes not filling the room despite having rammed the place out previously. I think that in Simons case the local council have not helped matters with the parking restrictions put in place about a year ago. But also he has a point. 
If people continue to take it for granted that the music will be available live, they have got it wrong. If the people do not turn out the music will die in live format because none of the bands can afford to exist without paying punters coming through the doors. Furthermore all the clubs will disappear too.
Once these venues have gone the councils will oppose new live music licences without soundmeters and the like being fitted. At this point the music dies unless you start goingto places like Wembley, O2, Astoria and the like.
Some of you guys may remeber the same happening to the cinema industry ion the 80's. All the old town Cinemas died and it took a while before the Showcase and Multiscreen cinemas appeared.
We do this because we enjoy it, everybody who comes to our shows tell us they enjoy it. Do I get the feeling that Apathy is starting to take hold in the South as we do not get the same in the midlands and east Anglia although trends do spread from the South upwards and outwards
The other side of course is that we are musicians not promotors and we may not be marketing ourselves in an effective way to maximise the audience. Anybody who specialises in this area would be welcomed into the Snakebite fold.
Oh well rant over!!
For those of you who were there last night, we salute you

Love & Light 
Tom

The Vic Biker's Pub
10th Nov 2007

Oh my God! Yes, we're back at the Vic for the first time since The Moxter's of Rock 2007. I first played here in 1997 and have played it loads over the years. I love this venue and it used to be my 'local' when I lived in the Midlands. After the previous night's storming gig at Rock Cafe 2000, we were all fired up and ready for Coalville. Support band, Pirate Casino, we're loads of fun and very into their classic rock - cheers!

I can't think of any particular high point of the show, as it was all great, the usual awesome Vic crowd sang along and danced around, especially some of the legendary Vic ladies - thanks girls! Sound was great, atmosphere amazing, in fact it was so good we ended up sleeping on the stage, although the resident rottwieler insited on going round and licking us as we were trying to get to sleep! It was good to meet lots of you again, especially Wayne and Paula who'd made the trip from Barnsley - now that it dedication!

Thanks Nita and Jon for a fabulous welcome and amazing food. If Carslberg made rock/ biker pubs they wouldn't even come close to the Vic!

Stardate 9th November 2007. 
What a drive, if the M25 didn't get us the M40 did!!! Apologies to the motorists of the West Midlands who I was dodging at speeds well in excess of the national limit after being stuck in traffic since mid afternoon south of Oxford. 
Well on arrival we were very pleasantly surprised at the organisation and hospitality of the venue. 
After some problems with Nick's midi floor pedal (Hughes & Kettner wiring is not what it used to be!) we eventually got soundchecked. Apologies to our superb support band Heresy who had to set up and soundcheck in world record time!
To any of you muso's out there who have not played Rock Cafe 2000 get yourself in here. Great venue with helpful techs and enthusiastic audiences
Well lets get on to the gig, the Support band were superb, remember the name Heresy they are going to go places. Veryt reminisent of Alter Bridge/Creed Puddle of Mud but with heavier edges obviosly from their metal influences.
For a dirty wet night thew crowd was a good turn out, the place was nowhere near full but everybody seemed up for it and the choir was in goods voice and filled the right spots in the right places.
To top it all our lighting engineer for the night was Tim............ Yes I finally got to shout Light em up TIm!!!!
(You need to watch live in the still of the night to understand this one!!)
Thanks to everybody who came along to our West Midlands debut. You made us feel really welcome and we can't wait to see you in April.
Finally you guys have great take aways up there and the food was super cheap! Dudley travelodge was about the same as any other though...............****
Any offers of accomodation for our next trip to thje website!!!

Gawd Bless ya alll
Tom

Just wanted to make a quick entry on this one. Thanks to everybody who came along. We had a great time and the local hospitality was superb. Thanks to Simon for putting on the show and Torn Asunder for superb support. Thanks to Sally for joining me up on stage, apologies that I was soaking wet! 
That to Matt the twat in the hat who ran the door so well all evening
The choir was in superb voice, we love you all!!!
Hope to get back to The Twist in the near future. Have a look at the photos on our pics page

Next stop The midlands!!!!! Can't wait to see you Stourbridge!!

So a Friday night at the Beacon, a new experience as up to date it has always been a Saturday. 
Well first of all I have to say we were met by Paul the engineer who couldn't wait to tell us he had been listening to the complete Whitesnake back catalogue on his iPod all day and he now had the perfect David Coverdale vocal delay waiting for us!
It is always so nice when the engineers are not only enthusiastic but also knowledgeable and Paul certainly comes into that catagory.
Well after getting there late due to the bloody M25 and A2 roadworks (there till 2020!) we were cut down on soundcheck time, but as it happened, (again thank you Paul) we had both the front of house and monitoring just as we wanted after a couple of takes. That was lucky as people were already coming in!
We would like to thank a few people for coming down, Neil and Billy, Jason, Martyn, Vicky and Lisa, Paul & Selina who were at a Snakebite event for the first time. Good to hear you guys making some noise. The place was not as full as usual but that did not stop those there making a fantastic job in the choir. You guys make it special for us, hope the throats were not too sore on Saturday!
Pete made a few of his unplanned trips into the audience,  and from what I have heard one of the barmaids in still in trauma. 
As usual it was a great gig for us and good to share a couple of drinks with Simon the landlord and the crowd afterwards.
Can't wait to come back in December!!! 
Oh no! just remembered Pete and Nick are crashing on my floor tonight, better lock up the livestock!!!

Cheers
Tom

The Ruskin Arms - East London
1st June

I'd been excited about this one for a long time... The Ruskin Arms is a name that sends a shiver down the spine of every warm blooded heavy metal fan. When I was a kid, The Ruskin might as well have been in Australia, it was a world away from Lancashire...but the centre of the NWOBHM world none the less.

Anyway it's 2007 not 1977 and let's face it the Ruskin has aged as well as an Austin Allegro - what happened to a National treasure? It's not bloody fair! What's even less fair is how the Ruskin hardcore rock fans are being gradually robbed of their heritage by owners and management who neither know nor care the value of their asset.

It is to these hardcore fans that our gig was dedicated. They were great and sang along all the way through as Tom passed the mic round as usual, they didn't even seem to mind me running round playing guitar solos. Although I'm not so sure those playing pool out in the front bar were too keen LOL! It was great to tread the same boards as so many legendary names, and it was an honour to rock out in such an historic setting. Brian the sound guy was brilliant and knows that rock bands need to play loud! Thanks to everyone who turned out, we had fun and played hard as always. A special dedication goes out to Margareta and Karin - nice to meet you both and we'll see you at The Beacon Court. (Don't forget Chan n' Dave who were in fine voice at the bar.) Tom

Stay tuned to the blog for the story of how our solicitors extract our fee from The Ruskin's owners, who, when it was time to be paid, were nowhere to be seen - let that be a warning to other bands.

Pete

Well, we found ourselves deep in East Anglia for the first time with Snakebite and did not know what to expect.
We were welcomed warmly by landlords Andrea & Ray who made is feel very at home. Reaonable size stage, not enough for me (but then again I rarely find one that is!) 
We managed to get set up and soundchecked before 7:00pm and things seemed to be going alright. 
Came down from the dressing rooms for the gig and found an excellent audience already in place. These guys in East Anglia certainly seem to like their rock! Straight into Burn, and oh my god........... Feedback on a monumental scale. Apologies guys, there was no feedback during soundcheck and we did not have a sound engineer with us to take care of mix. Well we battled on and things got slightly better during the gig, even the landlord (house system) attempted to rectify the feedback issue, and to be honest it was there throughout the night in lesser amounts. But we worked round it. 
Apart from that all of the band had a really great time, the audience were superb and made for a great gig. Thansk again to Ray & Andrea who made welcoming hosts and were most accomodating.
On a personal note I do not think I have ever sweated more in an evening, those lights are mighty hot!
Unfortunately on the way out of Ipswich I missed the turnoffs for the A12 and continued on the A14 before seeing signs for Bury St Edmonds, AAAAAGGHHHHHHHH thats what happens when you are tired eh!
Finally returned to Kent by 2:30am and oh boy did I sleep!!!
Don't think the Folkestone boys got back much before 3:30am!  That will teach them to live beside the seaside! Onwards to the Ruskin we go!!! Hope to see as many of you as can get daaaaarn to Eeeeeast Laaaandon!
Cheers
Tom

HI ,THANKS FOR ALL THE NICE COMMENTS COMING IN FROM YOU GUYS AFTER OUR GIG AT THE GREENWOOD .WE HAD A GREAT TIME PLAYING, AND WE WOULD LOVE A RETURN VISIT .ANYWAY HERE ARE A FEW PICCYS ; 
CHEERS ROGERSNAKE

The 28th of April was always going to be a special one for Me and Nick. Not only did we have loads of fun at the Greenwood gig on the Friday night (thanks to everyone who came - really nice to meet you all. Steve the sound man was superb!) but we were going along to the London Guitar Show and the 'exclusive' Steve Vai masterclass...

However, as I sat eating my Cinnamon Grahams after only 3 hours sleep, it happened - THE GREAT FOLKESTONE EARTHQUAKE OF 2007!

I thought after standing in front of Roger's Bass rig the night before that I knew all about seismic activity, but this was nearly as cataclysmic as Ray's drum solo! 4.3 on the Richter scale was like Nick doing squat thrusts! Everyone in our street was outside doing the Blitz spirit sort of things, whilst I contemplated going round with a sledgehammer to maximise the insurance claim - I mean £5,000 worth of guitars and amps just fell into crack in the Earth that then closed up as if it had never have happened!

Needles to say this was all abit scary and made us late for Phil Hilborne and Nicko McBrain...oh well.

So here we were at Excel...surrounded by more gear than you could shake a stick at. We of course went round trying everything and met some very cool people indeed, including the lads from Lick Library, Stuart Bull, the charming Danny Gill (who did a lovely version of Satch's Summer Song) and the chatty and shredtastic Andy James who shared a nifty little sweep picking trick with me - top geezer. But more was to come!

Whilst everybody queued up for the Steve Vai masterclass like thick sheep, me and Nick sat on the floor and consumed pasties. We got up when everybody had filed in, and then pushed to the front with ease due to our competitive advantage of having more calories than everybody else.

Steve Vai was intergalactic as usual and talked even more than me. I shouted out the classic Frank Zappa quote of 'shut up an play yer guitar' but Steve was clearly intimidated by my presence and only played a few snippets. Unfortunately the 'Exclusive' masterclass was exclusive for what seemed like 4,000 guitar knob head of various persuasions. Nick even began a Darwinian categorisation scheme including such types as, 'Ageing 70s rocker', 'Fat death metaller in combat shorts', 'Crap shirt wearing telecaster player', 'Acoustic snob', 'Spotty Yoof', 'Shredder without a life' and the ubiquitous 'All the gear no idea' who were crowded round the PRS stand with their platinum cards clamouring to buy the latest bucket of snakeoil. The PRS stand wasn't all nonsense though, Oh No! 



Bernie Marsden! Yup we got to have a chat with the legend himself, a true childhood hero was chatting to us completely unaware of his superhero powers - he did a very good impression of a normal bloke, but he is a ROCK GOD! Bernie was very nice indeed and smiled and said 'Yeah, great, Snakebite.' Which was cool. I asked if he was OK with tribute bands to which he replied, 'Yeah, it's really flattering, you guys are keeping the flame alive. It's a real compliment.' Nuff said! 

So off we trotted still dizzy from our close encounter of the Marsden kind, when Nick said, 'Look, it's Uli Jon Roth!' Well, fly me to the rainbow, it was! Now the Scorpions, Michael Schenker and Uli are major inspirations to me, so to meet the Rothmeister was too much - I turned into a quivering idot and babbled, 'Uli it's a real honour to meet you, your highness.' 

'No, ze pleasure is all mine!' which of course, it was. We had a little chat and he truely is aware of his legend status but carries it off with aplomb - astounding! It was fun to see Stuart Bull and Danny Gill buzzing round him like school boys too! Ace.
Neither Nick, nor I had the slightest inclination to buy any new gear, not even a plectrum, although I quite liked the new Blackstar amps and valve stompbox, preamps. Nick's credit card was happy to get out alive, so it was back into the Snakebus and straight into the traffic jam from hell, just in time to hear that the mighty Bolton had thrown a spanner in the ointment of Chelski's season - how I laughed, Nick didn't. However, the following news of Big Sam's resignation soon pissed on my chips...what will the future hold now for the Trotters? Let's hope it's Little Sam.

Hi Guys n Gals,
Thanks to those of you who braved the A40/M40 to come and see us at the Greenwood last night. It was our first time there. Great venue, originaly a 1920's Art Deco Ballroom!
Firstly apologies that I could not go for the top notes last night. All through yesterday i had a slightly sore throat. In soundcheck things felt alright so had no clues until we went into Bad Boys and the howls at the beginning. The harmonic I produced was a clue that my vocal chords were not happy. At times I went for notes and not a single note came out!!! Well today I can hardly talk, so must have contracted some lurgi! Hope to back on form for our gig up in Ipswich @The Railway
Secondly respect goes to Pete and Roger who played all through tthe gig in a swimming pool after Pete went and tipped his water over! That look on Petes face was fear of electricution! As usual Roger is never fazed by anything!
Despite the above we all enjoyed the gig and hope to be back there later in the year.
Oh and another mention must go to Bronja's boots.....you had to be there and if you were....
Love & light to all
Tom