Last weekend the band played at Waxy’s wedding up in Callander. We were well oiled (not literally) from sundry other gigs[*, **] and rehearsals, but had only a single practice to ensure that we didn’t get a frosty reception at the reception. Unfortunately, that crucial, last-chance-to-buy rehearsal limped home inconclusively under the weight of fatigue and exasperation, and so it was with a moderate amount of trepidation that I arrived with Ash at the Roman Camp Hotel on the big day.

Callander isn’t exactly at a rarefied Highland latitude, but the towns thin out and the midge clouds thicken up remarkably quickly as Glasgow recedes in the mirrors, and the hotel had the feeling of a country retreat rather than one on the main street of an otherwise busy little town. Waxy & Phil were talking with a knot of beaming guests, so we waved hello and wandered inside for a drink. The hotel manager gathered us up to watch the first dance as we chatted with the Captain in the library and we filed through to the function room.

The next couple of hours shot by until with alarming rapidity we found ourselves in front of the assembled guests. “Waxy, I hope we don’t ruin your wedding,” Charlie said, or words to that effect. “We’re Coba Fynn. Waxy asked us to play—” (Charlie had explained some time previously to Waxy & Phil that Coba Fynn would of course be playing at their wedding) “—so we hope you enjoy yourselves.” He turned to us. “Let’s go.”

And so we did.

It was tremendii. CF original Glasgow Girl got the guests onto the dance floor and some choice covers kept them there, Waxy’s dad joining us on harmonica and wailing vocals for Hoochie-Coochie Man. We played two wedding requests: The Lighthouse Song for Waxy, the song practically playing itself through our intruments; and Phil’s favourite Smoke on the Water. The demanded encore of Crossroads was played at a blistering pace with blistering hands, and when we finished the set after forty-five short minutes I felt a twinge of guilty triumph at having stolen the ceilidh band’s thunder.

We took paper plates of buffet pies and spring rolls outside to cool down for a bit. Doug and I analysed the night’s performance in a chin-stroking fashion.

“Nice work there on the drums, Doug. Although I couldn’t hear myself very well—I thought maybe the bass was a bit low.”

“Really? I could hear you fine. I could feel you in my bones.”

“So long as it was your bones, and not your boner.”

“Obviously not, man. But I will say that if there was to be a sexual connection between any two members of the band…”

“…then it’s going to be the rhythm section, right? That’s what I like to hear.”

Ash laughed at us.

“Oh, it’s cool; we’re just being homoironic.”†

A fantastic night, and a fantastic wedding. Congratulations, Waxy & Phil!

* A month or so back we were pressed into service for Charlie’s boss’ retiral do at Oran Mor in the west end of Glasgow. We set up in the Auditorium under Alasdair Grey’s spectacular mural, soundchecked in the abbreviated time available and then got out of the way as the first guests filed in. Quite firmly uninvited to the meal itself, Doug, Davis and I ate mixed pakora at Charlie’s kitchen table while the dinner guests gorged themselves on wild salmon, truffled asparagus and caviar washed down by 18-year-old single malts and the finest cognac. (Probably, anyway. My speculation may be informed by a touch of jealousy.) We arrived bang on time for our set, waited through an hour of overrunning, back-slapping speeches and were hustled off the stage after only twenty minutes as the function staff started cleaning up at the stroke of 11.30pm.

** At Bannerman’s; intimate is the term, I think, meaning “comprised only of the band’s friends and immediate family.”

† Gauche, non-PC or just lame? I can’t decide.