Sunday night in Hunstantons KIT KAT

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/OODJDdIbkF4

[8 boston square]

Hope you liked those blasts from the past, great days to look back on and didn't those American women dance a strange way, what did they put in their hips?
Tomorrow is the 17th and by the time most of you fall out bed, in the cold, we will hitting the coast in Pattaya, its still English summer temperatures here, so a good time beckons for 3 nights at the Areca Lodge Hotel, have a look on Trip advisor its a good place to stay. Only for 3 nights but a break to look forward to and a chance to get some English books and food. no Christmas Dinner we have come to early but maybe a roast so must not complain. Turkey is rare here, I have only ever seen one running about but they are available online..........Butterball 5kg......2950bts which is over 70 quid to you so we will sticking with a chicken and half a leg of pork and everything else apart from parsnips, oh how I miss parsnips.
Its going to be a right rum Christmas in the UK this year all you can do is make the best of it and hope for the best in 2021.
At this time with weekend coming up in Hunstanton I would be looking at the dates and hoping Sunday was not the 25th or 26th and then looking to see what extra dances were happening locally, Kit Kat, Sunset Rooms, Heacham Village Hall or around, that what I did in the early to mid 1960's and I dont suppose I was alone, wher is the Lynn News!!

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/gKwP_13qo-I

[8 boston square]

We have just returned from our break in Pattaya and a few more people about but more businesses closed up so its not getting better and I think the bars that are open and restaurants are only being kept alive by the local ex pats trade, the future does not look good and many like me unable to get back to the UK even if they wanted to, most are glad they stuck here rather than in the UK, at least its warm here.
Local elections here today and across the country so no alcohol allowed to be sold from 1800 Saturday until 1800 Sunday, they have some strange local laws here and it does nothing for people trying to survive if they cannot take any money.
So the week running up to Christmas and what I think is the best Christmas song, Chris Rea, the Middlesboro boy who likes his F1 and Deltic locomotives, enjoy and do have a good time on the 25th, Merry Christmas to everyone in the Kings Lynn area and especially forum members. take care.

[EWW]

Chris Rea was on a tv show the other night telling of his battles with ill heath. It is a wonder that he is alive at all.
He was very funny and drunk as a skunk and I thought with all you have been through..good on ya mate. Anyone
who would like to see it should look up Bob Mortimer and Paul Woodhouse's Gone Fishing Christmas show.

It will surely cheer you up. If it does not you are part of the Bah Humbug brigade

Merry christmas to you and yours also Boston.

[8 boston square]

Happy New Year to you all and lets hope its going to be better than 2020 but dont hold your breath! Imagine if what we are living through now had happened in the Kit Kat days, and trying to stop our nights out on a Sunday does not bear thinking about does it, t would have happened in those days I think, still we are where we are today and its not a good position and I dont see hoow they are going to get out of the situation unless there is a completely different approach, unfortunately the one in charge are following the science which I can understand but in 9 months nothing has changed, the advice has improved the situation we just seem to be going round in circles and its the same here and all round the world, it must be terrible for people who live alone especially if they are old. Grim stuff for the start of a new year so let me cheer you up a bit, I found a little gem last night so keep an eye out over the weekend for a show from 1964 in black and white that should jangle a few memories of times gone by.

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/mk51fdBcSuM

[8 boston square]

I was watching a programme on youtube the other night about the big freeze of 1963 and it brought back memories of the time when I was 17 and living in Hunstanton. The snow came in the north on the 24th and Norfolk got it on the 26th of December and one way or another it hung about till the first week in March, almost a white Christmas but not quiet!
The Kit Kat carried on regardless and never missed a Sunday Nights Dance, I half expected to turn the corner and see it was closed but it never did, Danny Ford and the Offbeats always turned up upstairs and there was always a guest group downstairs, amazing really looking back and although numbers were down to about 75% it was still a great night out all I had to do was walk carefully back uphill.
From Boston Square to Hunstanton Railway station was about 1/4 mile, my journey to Kings Lynn would start here on my way to Lynn Tec' and then a walk through "The Walks" to Tennyson Avenue and turn left to the Tec', then reversable journey in the late afternoon, Monday to Friday throughout, never missed a day, everyone turned up and the trains ran.
The Wash froze and there were 8' drifts at the end of the pier, never seen anything like it for so long and I dont suppose I will ever again.
Friday night at the Young Conservatives carried on as normal and the weekly "what is happening on Saturday night?"
I remember particularly one Saturday night when I was going to the pictures at the Capital, a group of us were going and my date for the night I think was Sandra Cracknell, from the shop next door to the Capital. Boston Square is uphill to Northgate and at the time an unmade-up road so I had to move sideways up the path slowly and hanging onto the walls as I made progress, I got about 3/4 of the way up when my feet went backwards and I ended up with a nose bleed and had to return home for a quick clean up and another attempt which tis time was successful and the date was made and the evening completed sorely! In those times I am sure Sandra had a phone but I did not so there was no way to say I wont be coming and I could not let the young lady down after all all you ladies will know how long it takes to get ready
Have a look at the programme it is a really good show, it is hosted to start with Chris Packham so if you want to miss him start at 3.59 and enjoy Cliff Michelmore, Kenneth Alsop and Derk Hart as they take you back to a time of black and white lives in an analogue world thats hard to imagine today, no internet or mobile phones then but thankfully we can now see it with the help of the internet..............The Big Freeze of 1963. Blimey 58 years ago!!

[8 boston square]

Hello everyone, keep tuned something coming up from 1965 which you might like, in colour this time as well!

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/YtwFESbL68w

[8 boston square]

The Beatles clip must have been from one of those Summer Shows we used to have at the time and this was 1965, note the Beatles have their new up rated Vox amplifiers and I do wonder what they thought about all that jumping around at the end of the show.
At that time living in Boston Square we had 4 bedrooms for me and the parents so mum did B & B to use the 2 spare rooms on rare occasions I would have to move out my room and sleep with mum and dad's room, dont know what people thought about my room with posters for dances at Lynford Hall and the Young Conservatives dances on the wall.
It would have been high summer when I was asked to move as a family from Peterborough turned up, parents and 2 teenagers, one was a girl about my age and I think there was a bit of match making going here looking back on it. Her father was a bank manager and I got invited over to Peterborough for a weekend, Eastern Counties bus number 2 from Millfleet and then I was picked up in Peterborough, all went according to plan even without telephones or any of todays other helpful devices, how did we ever manage it but somehow we did and it worked.
The weather was good for the weekend so I spent a sunny afternoon with the daughter out near the Nene Valley Railway, it was not the Nene Valley railway then of course but the highlight came a little later when we piled into her dad's Ford Zephyr 6 and we went down to the Embassy Cinema to see the Beatles new film "HELP" which had just been released, the one and only time I went to the Embassy and I dont think there were any return trips to see the young lady, I think we both realized there was no future in the relationship, Peterborough was 50 miles from Hunstanton, not far by today's standards but then with the railways in decline 2 buses and 3 hours travelling each way was not going to work and of course missing the Kit Kat on a Sunday night was also a big consideration.

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/5eRuvLCCkt0

[8 boston square]

A lovely little memory of a time gone by long long ago, anyone remember "Walk Dont Run." by the Ventures? This was like "Apache" was for the Shadows in England. Always like those huge American cars, they changed their design almost every year, had amazing colours and of course looked like they had come from the future with fins and wings at the end, nice girl as well eh boys!
The end bit at the cafe with the juke box was a quick flash of a different age and the end with everyone doing the twist with the band hiding at the back was a call back to the time when I went out dancing, when everyone had dress standards and you did not have to be young, really young to get up and get in there, today I might just about the energy for that one short track but a nice jog down memory lane.
Can you imagine staying away from the Kit Kat for the fly or a virus? Dose not bear thinking about does it!

[8 boston square]

https://youtu.be/Ffiwp9X96js

[8 boston square]

The Ventures medley I like because there is no hanging about and wondering what shall we play next? The Offbeats on a Sunday night always started with 3 instrumentals usually from the Ventures, "No Tresspassing" followed by "Perfidia" and then one more before Danny Ford came to the stage. I thought the instrumentals were always a good way to show how good the musicians of the band were without the singer and the Offbeats were good I thought that really early on, even when they played tracks I was hearing for the first time, its was when they changed their style and played "Midnight" that I was convinced that this was a really good band.
The first 3 tracks on the first medley are "Walk Dont Run", "Perfidia" and "Lullaby of the Leaves". Interesting choices as these were all written as "Jazz" tracks which the Ventures arranged in a different style and the tracks were not recently written either. being written in 1954, 1939 and 1932 respectively. Track arrangement is very important you can take as an example "The Breeze and I" written in 1923 would you believe, listen to the Shadows version a slow cha cha cha and then compare that to the Fentones much faster and punchy version, even locally where bands played the same track there was a difference say between the Sabres and the Offbeats, The Sabres were a good band but I lied the Offbeats versions generally.
The sound of the Ventures was different to the Shadows sound, we had them both Sundays and both were true to the original, the Ventures generally played the notes with the plectrum striking the strings over the first pick up at the base of the neck whilst the Shadows favoured playing over the 3rd or last pick up, the difference being for the Shadows a more treble sound with the Ventures a more mellow sound, they both had their own distinctive sounds and I like then both.
The Ventures only had 3 top 10 tracks surprisingly "Walk dont Run" in 1960, "Walk dont Run '64 which was a surfing sound version and "Hawaii 5-0" but LP wise they were really prolific, mainly they used Mosrite guitars and Peavey Amplifiers but also added the English Marshall amps later on. Today only Don Wilson is the only one left of the original line-up and he retired in 2015, Bob Bogle died in 2009 and Nokie Edwards in 2018, from 1990 to 96 the drummer was a chap called Taylor but he left and was replaced by his son who is till sitting behind the drums today as the "new" Ventures still play to packed houses especially and surprisingly in Japan.
In my youth I recall "Walk dont Run", a great track which nearly did not happen and only broke into the charts by a spot of luck, they has been playing a small intro to the hourly news on a local Tacoma TV station when the station were inundated with requests to hear the whole track, the rest is history as they say and for me I like their arrangements that they did and my favourite which I heard for the first time at the Kit Kat on a Sunday night in June of 1962 was "Perfidia" an oldy but a goody, go and have another listen.