REFLECTIONS OF AN AGEING D.J.

Top left B&W picture, taken on a typical Sunday night from mid to late '70s. A shot of the stage from a rather stained picture. The Amcron DC300A amplifier on view, Gauss 5840 speakers in the exponential bass units, Fane Crescendo speakers for lower middle, and Goodmans Hifax for upper middle and treble. The Goodmans were incredibly unreliable, frequently blowing and were soon replaced with Fane 920 horn units, later, Motorola piezo units were added to increase upper treble. These were rapidly added after trying Alvin Stardust's P.A. tweeter units at a gig I supported at Allied Breweries, Burton, when they first came onto the market.

Below that, a view from the stage shows from left, records in perfectly sized bread crates, typically Sunblest, but could be Mother's Pride or even Weetabix (they were blue), SIS jingle machine with N.A.B. cartridges, Shure Unidyne 545 microphone, (I've still got this one!) Custom turntable unit with Garrard AP76 Turntables and Citronic Mixer with the Amcron DC300A (500 watts per channel) amplifier on the right

Following the demise of my band, Soul Station, there's a website going free.Having collected a few of the lighting effects that I used to operate years ago, such as Tutor 2s, prism rotators, even a splodascope, surprised to find that there were any still in existence, I decided to share a few pictures on the web. But! Hold it! don't I have the rather nice sound system that was used by the band?( An Allen & Heath 500 watt amp, Electrovoice speakers) Haven't I replaced most of my vinyl collection with CDs, yes, I've managed to find many of those Northern classics, Motown obscurities, Reggae roots.......... All we need is a twin CD player.......

Well, now I've got that and a turntable unit and some amplifiers, the speakers from the band, some 45s from car boot fairs, my own collection of C.D.s, but then we need something to move it all!......
Always A Ford Transit lover, as Chase regulars will recall, but I did like the style of the current Renault equivalent....This will more than suffice!
Now, how much money has that little lot cost? I think I need a few bookings to get some back. But, let's have some fun on the way!!!

FunkyParrot.com, an international website. Well, it always was an outlandish name, so who else would want to register it? Somebody named Thomas Warren, it seems. So here's funkyparrot.co.uk. Since this was originally written, I have managed to acquire the URL funkyparrot.com.
Funky Parrot was the name of the roadshow that I ran in the 1970's, and as I am growing old disgracefully, collecting old lighting effects and amassing a high power sound system, I decided it's time to have a final fling.
So, now I can offer my services and present, on the web, a personal perspective of what was going on in Nuneaton in the mid to late 1970's.I was in my late 20s (Makes me rather old now!!!)
Kinetic lighting was in it's infancy, I saw it as a much more impressive form of presentation than the garish flashing boxes that most D.J.s were presenting with their Discosound or Fal sound systems, mostly with crystal pickup cartridges. YES! the frequency response was marginally better than that of the telephone, but probably sounding better than that of MP3 if used on the sound systems available today.None of us had the finance packages available today anywhere within our grasp. CASH was neccessary to buy gear. December 1974 was the big break, The first booking of what was to become a five year residence. At that time, two Sound City 120 P.A. amps were the powerhouse and five Tutor 2s were the lightshow. Fane Crescendos and Goodmans Hifax were the speakers used.Very soon, the amps were replaced by an Amcron DC300A, delivering 500watts per channel. In those days, MEGA power. A pair of Gauss bass units had to be added to add solidity to the incredible sound available from the amplifier. Performing at a prestige venue enabled me to accumulate some of the best equipment available.