No Rock And Roll Fun

MORE AWARDS FUN: robertshaw, bsn's man in the know, travels to an awards ceremony we bet you hadn't heard of...
went to my first ever awards ceremony last night and it was an industry one of all things. the musos, apparently. I'd never heard of it but dotmusic has: it's by the musicians, for the musicians (man) and they covered the inside of the hackney ocean in grass for that authentic festival experience. or something.
I was there as a guest of the darkness who were, as every the living embodiment of ROCK, though only for two songs. they were on v. early (half-past eight) so I don't know what a roomful of half-pissed could-bes and have-beens (with a smattering of ares) would've made of them. the actual awards ceremony was presented by your favourite rent-a-presenter and mine, lauren laverne, unably assisted by a pissed johnny vegas (who capped off a marvellous display of incoherent
ranting by vomiting behind the podium).
tony rogers from the charlies won best keyboardist, and was there to collect it, and the charlies won best live band, too, which he also collected, this time with a rant about west bromwich. at least I think it was west bromwich. tim sent a message from la. johnny greenwood won best guitarist (message from la), alan white from oasis best drummer (brother steve from the paul weller band), peter hook best bassist (steaming mad rant about bassists being better than lead guitarists; the award was presented by noel redding from the jimi hendrix experience, too) polly jean best vocal (someone from island)ian brown best single (surprisingly dry and succinct), and damon gough best songwriter (grateful if sceptical; joined on stage by peter hook and mani from the primal scream). I think that was all.
in between and after we had performances from big sur and kid galahad who were both nowt special. oh, and the modfather won some kind of lifetime achievement affair. his drummer picked it up, because paul doesn't do award ceremonies. end of the night saw reef play with noel redding on bass, they did 'hey joe' and 'voodoo chile', both of which were surprisingly good, even though I thought him the lead singer (I knew his name, once) Robert has since contacted us to point out he does know its Gary Stringer should have looked a bit more overawed.