Keep hauling

DId you miss the chance to see us at the Shanty Fest? Maybe next year! Meanwhile, here’s a video of us doing “Haul Away Joe”, one of our old favourites.

Off the back of a lorry

August also saw us gigging further afield, at the Canalside in Bridgwater. We’d love to say that the vehicle in the shot is The Buoys’ very own tourbus, but in fact it was a mobile stage provided by the organizers…

Home turf

We travel all over the southwest, but we’re a Weston band at heart… and the first weekend in August gave us a chance to strut our stuff on home turf. Long live the Weston-super-Mare Shanty Festival!

Hello, Catcott!

Here we are playing the sunlit garden at The Crown, Catcott, on June 11th, after a Phil Collins-style dash from the Front Garden Music Festival taking place just up the road. Phew, rock’n’roll, eh? (Trev’s really got that aviator-shades-and-ponytail thing happening, too.) Thanks to the sound crew at FGMF for their professionalism and the staff at The Crown for the warm welcome.

One to treasure

This shot’s from our 27 May gig at the St.Andrews Bowling Club in our hometown of Weston. Can’t tell you how brilliant it was to have people dancing in the aisles! We’d like more of this, please…

Shanty heaven

The Beach’d Buoys had a fantastic weekend at Cornwall’s Port Isaac Shanty Festival, organized by The Fisherman’s Friends. The weather was terrible and we were shorthanded, but the atmosphere was great!

We began on Friday night, watching the headliners give a magisterial performance in the red-and-white striped tent. Then on Saturday it was our turn. We played the minstrels’ gallery in the Chapel Cafe on Roscarrock Street (that’s the famous Organ Sign that loads of bands have photographed) at lunchtime, then did an early evening set at the rollicking Golden Lion on Fore Street — the photo below is the image from behind Bari’s makeshift drum stool.

More to come when we’ve downloaded all the images!

A room with a view

We gigged in Clevedon on Thursday, although you might not have heard about it — quite a few of our gigs take place in local nursing homes. No photos for obvious reasons, but everyone enjoyed the gig and they made us a splendid poster.

Don’t forget…

Stogursey’s Forget-Me-Not Café is a Wednesday pop-up where people experiencing memory loss can get together with friends and neighbours. We hope they enjoyed a morning’s shantying as much as we did!

Between sets at Keenthorne

Keenthorne’s Cottage Inn, where we played on March 12, is one of the band’s favourite venues — and, thanks to a friendly Sunday afternoon crowd, we raised more than £170 for the hospice. (That’s Andy and Trev making subtle adjustments to the backline.)